Or does anyone else get tired of the way men treat women's home-based jobs as if they aren't real?

[Thepeopleversuswork]

Does anyone else have this? I WFH two or three days a week, have done for years, have a home office. I feel like whenever I interact with men (and sorry but it is usually men) in the course of my working day they treat my job as if it's a joke and something I can just drop at any minute. Little things, but these three things happened to me yesterday and I'm 90% sure they wouldn't have happened to a bloke.

Having work done on my house: I had a plasterer round to do a job. When I spoke to him last week to arrange it I said Monday is good but please can you try not to arrive between 10 and 11.30am as I'm on a work call which I can't step away from. All good, he says, he'll be here by 9.30am latest. He tips up at 10.30am and knocks on the doorbell. I'm leading a call with about 15 people and have to get up to let him in which is embarrassing and awkward for my junior team.

I'm irritated but I get that you can't always control the arrival time in heavy traffic so I don't get pissed off with him, but he doesn't apologise for the timing and starts yammering on to me in excruciating detail about what he's going to do when we've already had this conversation. I then make my excuses and say if you're going out to your van can you leave the door on the latch because I can't get away again. 15 minutes later he does exactly the same thing, rings the doorbell, drags me off the same call and then drags me down into the kitchen to talk about what he's going to do.

A bit later my ex husband calls to speak to my DD (he's overseas at the moment) and insists on putting me on the phone to his mother (who I still get on well with) for a chinwag. I tell him I'll call back after I've finished work. "But you work from home," he says. "You can talk to my mum for a minute." I say no, call after work hours. He calls back half an hour later (11.30ish) and puts his mum straight on to me without checking if I'm free. It's embarrassing telling an elderly woman who I hardly see that I don't have time to talk to her so I have to spend 10 minute chewing the fat when I'm frantically busy.

Later still the dad of a friend of my DD calls me to say he's going to be late back from work and can the friend come back to mine for an hour after school. I say ordinarily it would be fine but today it's not ideal because by then DD will be out and I'm working. "It's fine, she can just watch TV," he says, before I put my foot down.

Despite the fact that hybrid working is the norm for many people, I feel like a lot of people (mainly blokes although some women do it too) feel it's a nice cushty one for women which they can do to earn pin money while they look after their kids and think they have an absolute entitlement to butt into it as they see fit.

No one would dream of doing that to someone working in a City office. It's a job. It doesn't matter whether you're in the suburbs or in a gleaming building in the centre of town, you still should have the right not to be endlessly disturbed by other people just to make their lives slightly easier. It's just another example of men thinking they have the right to interrupt woman and take as much of their time as they need, isn't it?

I still don't understand why you would schedule someone to come on a working day when you only work 2/3 days a week. Surely the whole point of part-time is that you have a day or two free for that sort of thing.

I don’t. When I’m WFH I basically only leave my office for a quick cuppa or for lunch. I treat like working from the office. I don’t even look at my mobile phone most of the time. Too busy. It’s different though as o work part time so I’d book work people to come on my days off. I guess if you worked in an office you’d have to either leave them a key or take the time off?

I think some people do treat women's jobs like they're pin money jobs and not real jobs, but most of what you've outlined OP is you not setting appropriate boundaries with your work time.

I’m pretty confused. If it is so essential to not be distributed when WFH, do not have a plasterer around on a day you’re working. If you were in an office, you would either book the day as annual leave, or WFH and accept to be disturbed. Why was your daughter at home whilst you are working? If she’s not old enough for her dad to contact her herself, it sounds like you would be on call to answer her needs too? Both my husband and me work from home and we will both disturb each other, obviously not if we’re on calls or busy, but other times we do, just as colleagues would do in an office, otherwise you’d book a meeting room and even then, can assume it would be fine ducking out if a reason came about. You do sound unreasonable, more for the sake that you’re making it about men doing this to women, when I’d say it’s 50/50. Don’t wfh if you have issues with people interrupting you when you’re allowing personal time into work time, and don’t expect a plasterer to pander to you…he’s also working and may need to discuss extra things.

It's not just men who still don't grasp that WFH is actually working. I WFH part of the week and have to fend off comments that I am "off", "leaving off for the day" , people assuming I'm off sick if I'm not in the office. This, despite the fact that the majority of the leadership team work from home most of the time, AND the very people who say I am off then spend the rest of the week in meetings, calls and email exchanges with me... Cognitive dissonance!

But the plasterer isn’t ‘treating your job like a joke and something you can drop’- he’s not cold calling- you have booked him to come round! A bit annoying he was late, but that’s life, and again he’s not doing that because he doesn’t value your job- he’s got his own work load to juggle, and everyone knows workmen aren’t always on time.

If anything it’s you that’s treating your job that way if you arrange something where there’s a good chance you will need to be interrupted during an important meeting. And surely you just don’t answer your personal phone if you’re busy, same as you wouldn’t in the office?

I just don’t think you can have it both ways- either don’t book people in/answer personal calls if you’ve got really important meetings that can’t be interrupted- or do book them but appreciate it means you need to be able to nip out to answer the door or chat about a problem. It’s up to you if your job is the type that lends itself to that- it’s not the plasterer or your partners decision to make- but if you book the former/take calls from the latter- that’s surely on you- not them?

Your boundaries are not strong enough. You say you can't answer the door at x time, but then you do answer it. You say you can't talk on the phone, but then you do just that. If you don't treat yourself seriously, you can't expect other people to do so.
And fyi, people who work out of the home have to arrange time off work to deal with appointments that they can't arrange for the evening or weekend.

What would you do re:plasterer and parcel if you had a job where wfh was impossible?

I wfh 3/4 days a week. I find it’s best to just ignore the phone. If it’s really important people will call again right away and/or leave a message. With the workman I agree booking a day off shouldn’t be necessary but I would block off time in the morning for something I was doing alone - documentation, testing, email etc so that if (when) I was interrupted it only impacted me. In that case it would be no issue losing 15-20 mins as I could just do the work later that day. If someone comes to the door and I’m leading a call I just ignore it. If I’m on a call but just listening I’ll answer it but if it’s anything requiring more interaction than just taking a parcel (neighbour popping by, person trying to sell stuff etc) I say I’m sorry I’m on a work call and can’t talk then close the door. The phone calls from your ex in the OP are a particularly ridiculous example. He called and you said you couldn’t talk but then he called back later and you answered. He likely assumed if you couldn’t talk you wouldn’t answer the phone

Short shrift is what I always heard it as

Yes it’s short shrift. I have no idea what a shrift is though!

Surely if OP is expected to be "professional" and not allow herself to be interrupted then there should be an equal expectation that the plumber can (after being let in the first time) get on with his job, finish up and close the door on his way out without disturbing OP, because he is also a professional person who should be able to follow the f-ing simple instruction not to interrupt the client who is working?

I think that depends on the job. Some bosses are capable of not micro-managing, and they trust their staff, and also trust their ability as a manager to judge staff based on their average productivity over a week / month / year, and don't rely on knowing the precise times in which they were working to know they are pulling their weight.

Exactly. It depends on the job - but it can have nothing to do with micromanaging bosses. My job has to be done at precise times, to the second. I can’t pop to the door and take in a parcel. My boss has nothing to do with it.

This happens to my husband too. It’s not because you are a woman WFH, it’s because you are WFH.

People who work from home treat their jobs like this too so will think nothing of putting the washing on or other household chores in a gap between meetings. It’s no wonder that WFH isn’t treated seriously by anyone.

When I WFH I regularly do things like get up to make a black coffee, and whilst the kettle's boiling I'll go and put a load of washing on. I am back at my desk quicker than when I was in an office and when I made myself a coffee I had to also make a white tea, two sugars for my boss.

I had a wall paperer comment on how he thought everyone who worked from home was a slacker but he said ‘you work very hard don’t you’ 😂 err yeah I do

OMG I feel your pain!!!

I used to work at the manufacture before I got pregnant. Long and weird working hours, a lot of overtime. So I resigned while I was on maternity leave. Luckily I managed to turn my hobby into a real good business while I was on maternity leave, I earn good money while only working part-time . I work from home 3,5 days a week (2 days my little one is at nursery and 1,5 days my MIL watching him).

Anyway my MIL can literally call me on the day to say that she can’t watch our little one because she arranged a hairdresser to her house. Or that she agreed to meet her friend. And if I comment that I have a lot of work to do she can say “Oh darling, you work too much”.

If I try to catch up in the evening when my husband is home, my LO will literally be hanging on my arm while I type email to one of my customers, and my husband will be doing something in the kitchen. Common, watch our son properly for a couple of hours at least so I can catch up!!!

My husband could come back home in the evening and say “Ooo, this house is a mess, you spent whole day at home, couldn’t you tidy toys quickly and load some laundry in the machine?” etc.

Hello!!! I am working from home! Not just walking around the house not knowing what to do! 😣

And I agree with you that only women’s WHF job is not taken as something serious. Pin money. We have a family member (a man!) working from home as well, he works in a big famous company as a manager. 5 days a week. No one would bother him during working hours, he locks the door and only gets out at the end of the shift.

I have to keep constantly reminding people (my own husband and our families) that this is a JOB. That nowhere I can earn this sort of money only working 23 hours a week! No, I can’t load laundry while I am working. No, I can’t cook dinner at same time even it’s just loading ingredients in the slow cooker (they still need chopping!). Yes, I need minimum 3 full working days a week to keep my business running, not 2, not 1.

It’s like a constant battle for a right to have uninterrupted working hours.

Anyway my MIL can literally call me on the day to say that she can’t watch our little one because she arranged a hairdresser to her house. Or that she agreed to meet her friend. And if I comment that I have a lot of work to do she can say “Oh darling, you work too much”.

Sack off the MILimo. If she comments, tell her you need reliable people so you can work so a other day at nursery it is.

I think the problem there is that any job that is primarily made up of “meetings” is possibly a bit of a non-job, nothing to do with working from home. I work from home and don’t have any “meetings” in the main- a catch-up with my manager once a month. That’s about it. I work nonstop during the working day.

This 👆 👆

Uninterrupted time is a feminist issue. Yes I will die on this hill!

It' just occurred to me that there really are two types of job out there -

(1) The ones where you are expected to work certain hours, and whilst you are there you work as hard as possible. Potentially "slacking off" is IMPOSSIBLE (teacher or nurse), and potentially slacking off is a disciplinary matter. Working in a factory or restaurant and many office jobs not least call centre probably fit into this category.

(2) The more flexible office jobs. Jobs where when it gets busy you are expected to do 14 hour days, and you might get sent to a client at the other end of the country for a few days. But the flipside is that if you're a bit quiet and working from home your boss simply won't notice or care that you did an hour of housework and 45 minutes for lunch when you are only entitled to one hour for lunch).

Some people don't seem to understand that these latter jobs exist.

And FWIW I once agreed to a deal with an employer where my base salary was zero, and my pay was 35% of whatever invoicing went out that month where I did the work. Whilst I was expected to work pretty much full time the deal was pretty much "do what you want, if you work you get paid, if you don't you don't"

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Uninterrupted time is a feminist issue.Yes I will die on this hill!

I agree with you on the whole.
But I'd also add the caveat that if a woman chooses to book contractors to the house during their work time and doesn't set appropriate boundaries for their working time then that's actually on them.

If I ring DH and he's in a work call or busy, he doesn't answer it because he's at work, but he might (depending on the call) pick up if he sees it's DC's school. Same for me. If I'm working and DH calls me at an inconvenient time, I don't pick up the phone. We can choose whether to pick up the phone or not when we're in the middle of a work task or call. Nobody has a gun to out head.