If you WFH, what's your Friday afternoon like?

[OldPine]

This week has been full on. 12 hour days Monday & Tuesday. Lots to sort Weds & Thursday so am not gonna lie, I'm now lying on my bed periodically tapping the track pad on my laptop while Mumsnetting and holiday shopping. DH is mowing the lawn! Anyone else taking Friday afternoon a bit easy?

Well, you probably wouldn't be inundated with responses from remote workers who were outraged you hadn't placed their circumstances at the centre of your post.

Quite often my Friday afternoons are busy as there is a rush to get things done before the weekend. I have had a really full on few months at work and this month things have started to calm down a bit. This afternoon I didn't really have anything urgent to do so I responded to messages when needed, did a bit of admin but also did a food shop and booked some dentist appointments for the DCs. I don't feel bad about it - on the days I go to the office I work on my commute (an hour each way on the train) and I also worked Tuesday evening in order to prep for an important meeting first thing on Wednesday.

I WFH but do travel into the office sometimes and also have some very long days including overnight trips (which are exhausting, not glamorous). For sure I'll take a chilled Friday afternoon WFH if the opportunity presents.

You're free to find a WFH job. HTH.

When do admin get to write an afternoon off then?

literally no one would care

I'm a personal assistant so this is what my Fridays look like too!

I think my customers might.

Only the bosses are allowed to skive.

I don't hate my job. I quite like it.

Exactly! I work condensed hours 5/4 and I'm meant to have Fridays off but did a few hours today to make up for taking a few hours for kids' Sports Day earlier in the week. When they did a WFH pilot at my work several years before Covid productivity actually went up, offices are full of distractions.....

Mumsnet full of "you are clearly the devil incarnate, if you have the audacity to put on a wash or do a quick hoover, WHEN YOU SHOULD BE WORKING!!!!!!!"
Oh piss off, and calm down!

When I worked in an office full time before the pandemic, there was no one to found on a Friday afternoon. I regularly had to stay on site for cover and the only other people there were also 24/7 on site, and/or people running the clock down to make up their hours. Just presenteeism basically.

I'm senior (Board level) and lead a team. I have to be available to deal with urgent problems at any time, including if I'm on leave. My view is that flexibility absolutely has to cut both ways: I expect a lot of my team, and would be deeply unimpressed if they didn't deal with something important because they'd done their hours for the week, but equally I don't expect them to hang around pretending to look busy when there isn't much on. In our organisation Fridays tend to be quiet but Tuesday to Thursday are hell on roller skates; I would be deeply unreasonable to complain because someone knocked off at 3 or 4 on Friday after working into the evening earlier in the week.

They aren't

Then why do you care what other people do?

Yeah but the ‘what about manual workers’ fanatics don’t want to hear about the late evenings or busy days, they just hear that people go to the gym at lunchtime or finishing early on a Friday (thanks to flexible working for most people). They are so convinced that they work harder than everyone else.

Would they really? Are you the only person in the shop?

I don't work in a shop. And I think I'd probably get the sack if I was found asleep in the storeroom because I'd had a hard week at work.

That's not my experience. I don't know anyone that works from their office more than once a week other than through choice, and my employer has just put another of our offices up for sale.
They offer me flexibility and I offer it back because we are grown ups that can manage our workloads without having our bosses helicoptering over us.

This. I work in comms in a large national organisation and if there was a crisis/urgent issue I would be expected to be online, doing whatever needed to be done, whether it was in working hours or not. No-one cares if I am pretending to look busy at 3pm on a Friday.

This.love Fridays, minimal meetings as so many are off. Great for getting your head down and concentrating uninterrupted

This. Lots of people don’t understand the concept of a salaried role and give and take.

I think this thread shows how flexible working works well. I wfh, sometimes logon early on a Monday morning, and as Mondays are busy, I stay logged on an hour later. It’s swings and roundabouts. When in an office environment there is no flexibility, but wfh, if you’ve worked extra hours on the Monday, you can take time back on another day just by popping to the supermarket or gym, or catch up on a tv program, do a bit of gardening. It’s a new way of working, and is a great work/life balance.

This week is awful. I've worked 60 hours. Things are dreadful, I'm exhausted. Today was no different. 5pm finish today though so I'll take that!

I work in a restaurant, very full on, some days barely get 10 minutes to ram dinner down my throat during a 10 hour shift.

Dh works from home. Today, he stopped working at 3, we took our son to the park after school, and went to buy dinner. However, he's worked (hours) late 3 times this week, as he often does, worked early if calls are needed to be done in different time zones and barely gets time to eat lunch most days. He might have knocked off early today, but can guarantee he's done way more than his contracted hours.

You should apply for flexible working
i did, and now do my hours mon - thurs. Enjoy Fridays off. I was working way over anyway so I decided it needed to stop! My weeks were like yours. But now I get paid for less days and have an extra day off :)