To be angry that we paid our PM to drink coffee and eat cheese?

[Shamplade]

Article in news today. BJ wants us all back in the office because when he worked from home he spent too much time eating cheese, drinking coffee and walking slowly back to his desk! Then he forgets what he was doing!! He thinks we are all like that too and that’s why we should get back to the office.

AIBU to be angry about this on two counts;

1. tarring us all with his own lazy brush. I barely stop when I WFH. Back to back meetings. Log on early. Lucky if I get lunch. How dare he suggest we are all lazy like he is.
2. we were in a pandemic and paying this lazy, good for nothing lump to lead us. He cared so little, he was meandering back and forth to the fridge and forgetting what he was doing. He is the PM. How does he have time to meander back and forth to the fridge when he is being paid to lead the whole countr?

Made me so cross.

I've worked from home occasionally for years and have always found that people who want to skive will find a way whether they work from home or the office, that's where adequate day to day and performance management comes in.

Let's not dismiss something that enables plenty of people to have a far better work life balance because of some idiot and his cheese. Personally I love being able to do things like go out for a quick walk at lunch, eat stinky leftovers, listen to trashy music, etc., and still do more hours because I've saved the commute time.

Lockdown has proved that people can work from home just as effectively as in an office. I suspect that the number of companies who have cancelled their rental agreements and given up their office spaces, particularly in London has begun to affect the bank balances of rich Tory landlords.

Genuinely interested - the people on here who say that those working from home are skiving etc - who do you work from?

Personally, agree with some of the other posts - I think the skivers are skivers no matter where they work

Who do you work for

What about those of us who would prefer to be paying public servants to do a full days work without looking after their children, their puppies, etc?

I know, it's such bullshit, it's been shown time and again (as people have mentioned) that most people are at least as productive, if not more, at home!

On top of that, a huge set of data from an organisation (Leesman Index) that measures workplace satisfaction/productivity and switched to surveying 10,000+ home workers got results which said clearly that an average-rated workplace was always beaten by home and only the very best equipped and organised workplaces beat homes for productivity.

But who is telling you that those public servants are busy looking after their children and dogs etc? The daily mail?

He's trying to convince all the non home workers to turn on home workers. I am sure there are some which skive just as presenteeism is an office problem. But a vast majority work really hard and even harder because they don't log off on time.

You tend to judge others by your own standards so now we know he drinks coffee and eats cheese all day instead of working.

My dn works from home and works really hard, my inlaw who worked from home during the pandemic was glad to go back for a separation of home and work.

You are spot on @Theforest - is just the same as trying to convince people that teachers all leave at 3pm, that gp's aren't seeing any patients etc

This. He’s a cock. This is the least of it.

No, @BotanistBay, lots of comments on here about how wonderful it is not paying for/worrying about childcare and friends/ex colleagues. Of course some are still working as hard as ever, but it's bloody clear those with a tendency to skive are finding wfh fabulous!

More than anything though, how do people actually learn? How can less experienced staff not be disadvantaged by not actually seeing their seniors at work? Be able to observe, casually ask questions? Where is the experiential learning.

I now only go into the office twice a month or so and eating cheese or ‘walking slowly back to my desk’ aren’t things that happen. I can’t even poo in peace - I’m answering emails on my phone as I shit at sonic speed. The days I spend in the office, I get virtually nothing done as people are distracting (hello, ADHD!).

I can’t say that I’m surprised at his reaction to wfh, though.

Dolphins - at my organisation we have a hybrid situation so still plenty of time for people to do that. Although is interesting as we are now a hot desk organisation so most people go into rooms / booths for calls etc which means a lot of that has gone anyway. But do agree that if you're not in the office is very important to make sure you are thinking about how to incorporate juniors into calls and meetings. My job is v clear we need to do that!

I was one of those ‘fuckload of people’. The reason me & 600 of my colleagues were payed 80% of our salaries to ‘do bog-all for months on end’ was that demand for our company’s services literally collapsed by >98% overnight, by government diktat and through no fault of our own.

I assume you work in the public sector. If so, you may not understand that businesses require positive cashflow to survive. Pre-pandemic, we were a growing, profitable business. Without furlough we and almost the entirety of the hospitality, travel, entertainment & events industries would have ceased to exist within weeks, doing massive, permanent structural damage to the economy which creates the wealth which pays for essential public services. That’s why I was paid to ‘do bog-all’.

First lockdown: working 10 to 14 hour days managing staff redeployments.

Second lockdown: more redeployments plus setting up 36 post COVID rehab beds to take people out of the acute sector who were still testing positive.

Fuck off, Boris. Just because you're a skiving lazy twat that doesn't mean we all are.

That said I would much prefer hybrid working, exclusive WFH is lonely and you tend to go over your hours and forget to take breaks.

This

Just keep on emailing your MP. I have emailed mine - she tried to brush it off as old news and wouldn’t comment until after the police investigation (obviously hoping people will forget). It makes me livid though and the whole “No comments at this time” thing makes my blood boil.
Email your MP otherwise they don’t know people are still bothered and think they have successfully swept it under the carpet.

It's all clever PR....if you Google bozo and cheese these stupid comments are your first hits rather than his cheese and wine parties!

Excuse me?! I’d like you to know that this public servant has put in no less than ten hours minimum a day for work since the beginning of the pandemic, thanks to no longer having a commute.

For the first nine months or so, I clocked an average of 17-18 hours a day, including weekends, as did my OH and many of our colleagues. I was broken by the end of it.

Now, I don’t mind working ten hour days, especially as I get to order my day around what needs to be done, So, I’ll often work 7-11, then again 1-6, then do another hour or so before bed to set up for the next day. Most of my colleagues are the same.

None of us are working 9-5 anymore - we work more than our old 9-5 hours over 6am-11pm - but we’re getting more work done, when it needs to be done and to a higher quality with a much better work life balance. When we need to collaborate, we go into the office.

Why on earth would you assume people are skimping on their work commitments to look after their personal life admin rather than fitting more work in around their life? 🙄

Oh my god that's it! You are so right

What a a prize twat. Don't give those who WFH a bad name just because you admit to being a lazy overweight arse Johnson,

@LaughingCat because I'm still in touch with colleagues I've now left. I know for some youre working harder. However most of my senior colleagues will acknowledge that many juniors are being disadvantaged (even if they don't realise it yet) and many are just taking the piss.

Also, at my level we were encouraged to wfh for many years before the pandemic and I resisted. To keep a work life balance with the amount of stress I had I needed them to be very separate. Or does work life balance mean something different?