AIBU to think that if WFH employees aren’t getting their work done, the problem is with their management?

[Chessboardtable]

So many people seem bitter about WFH and claim employees just slack off.

I WFH and have done since 2020 and my output since 2020 has been higher than before 2020. I work in a job where output is pretty easy to measure.

I am also a billion times happier for numerous reasons I won’t list but the main ones are not having to leave DC in after school club until it closes, no stressful commute on frequently delayed trains and more time to exercise.

I do my work flexibility, e.g. yesterday I finished early to collect DC at 3.30pm but I had worked Wednesday and Thursday evenings to get the work done in advance.

AIBU to think if WFH staff aren’t doing their work, they are not being effectively managed?

I think this is still a ridiculous presenteeism attitude. I WFH, and if there's a day where I am not quite busy enough to fill my full hours, I finish early but make a note of the hour or so not yet worked. Invariably there will be a day later in the week when I have more work than can fit into a standard day and I will work later that day, so my hours for the week always add up to what I am contracted for, if not more.
It would be really silly to start finding random tasks just to fill up my day for the sake of it, when I know stuff on my other projects is likely to hit later in the week.

I've read it, thanks.

My question is why do you think that someone who can get their work done in five hours instead of seven is automatically "slacking off"?

Lots of contracts will say "an average of a 35 hour week" rather than expecting people to sit at desks for seven hours a day with nothing to do.

They may as well be saying "well, I can't do it so why should you be able to?!"

It's jealousy imo.

Flexibility is fine as long as you work your hours overall. I’ve not suggested otherwise.

Again, not what the OP is about which is about taking advantage of being able to work less than contracted hours by being at home.

My example was about supporting the team goals when you could and others do the same for you in return. Not “random tasks”. What could possibly be wrong with that?

Is this some new kind of contract work what you like. I hope you don’t mind being paid there or thereabouts

This is unintentionally funny. A lot of the roles where you're paid to be that responsive and for tasks rather than hours are pretty well renumerated, yes!

@SocoBateVira How does this relate to the OP, which is about tossing it off and not doing your job?

How does what relate? I've made a number of posts and you haven't quoted. If you mean the most recent one, ask the poster I was replying to.

Your last post. I understand that poster fine.

I set my own pay so no worries there 😂

But as you’re clearly not aware, it’s very common for salaried roles to be “work the hours required” with the understanding that some weeks that might be 20 and others sixty.

i wouldn’t volunteer to do anyone else’s job if I was finished with mine either - surely that just encourages other people to slack off? 😉

Oh yes, they go to all the pointless meetings and then arrange meetings to discuss the meetings. They come to my meetings when they don’t need to and contribute absolutely nothing
Pretty sure this wouldn’t be tolerated in the private sector

In that case, it's weird that you asked me how my post, which is about the same thing as theirs, relates to the OP but didn't do the same for them. Did you realise I'm not the one who started that subdiscussion?

This for DH.

He was actually looking for a new job, to better suit his disability, until new management took over and immediately agreed to full time wfh.

He can go out during day as needed, but he limits it and works over weekends to compensate as needed.

Boss said productivity has skyrocketed.

Yes But they still have a number of hours in the contract then an provision for such additional hours required or words to that effect

Working hours that can vary as much as you suggest tend to have annualised hours to accommodate peaks and troughs but will still have an annual number of hours required in the contract

for the avoidance of doubt I’ve not suggested that individuals cannot work flexibly. And yes this can vary significantly. But someone constantly underworking their hours is in breach of contract.

But someone constantly underworking their hours is in breach of contract.

But again, that's a management issue, not an employee issue.

Indeed it is.

Good luck with that - our Trust are selling off premises all over the shop or shutting buildings down over holiday periods and asking staff to WFH to save costs.

In my service we work wherever and no one is really bothered as long as data is secure and the job gets done. If I'm going on a patient visit I'll tend to work out of the office that morning, go to do the visit and then WFH to write up notes etc... but I'm not going to drag myself into the office to sit on the sinking office chair of doom to just type out reports all day and sit on Teams calls - so I tend to do those working from home. Most of my colleagues do similar and it means that there's usually a mix of people out on visits vs people working from home available on Teams if anyone has any queries or needs to discuss a case as well.

Likewise the flexibility thing - we don't take the piss with it, so we're trusted to do our jobs - if I have to duck out in the middle of the day for a school meeting or whatever - I'll make sure I work, and document in my diary where the time's been made up - and everyone, up to even the band 8s do the same. It works for us.

I also have bugger all willpower and get drawn into chit chat and stuff I shouldn't be doing but end up doing as a favour whenever I'm in the offices!

Mmm I was thinking the same re public sector. Enforced hybrid for a lot of desk based workers to save on cost of premises was part of the austerity cost cutting measures, way before covid. Lots of the premises have been sold or leases not renewed.

I wfh for the nhs and have no choice (i love it)

During covid, they sold our offices, so we now do not have any space in the hospital. We aren't patient facing and the monthly deadlines always get met. Where's the problem?

Patient visits and then writing notes at home seems eminently sensible. Seeing patients in their homes is clearly not WFH is it

If you’re in a totally non clinical role, do not have to liaise with any clinical staff, can work in isolation, don’t need a sense of what’s happening in the hospital or community team then fine, WFH fully seems okay

The folk I’m about do not fall into those categories.

The premises point remains, though.

Agree OP. We treat staff like adults and trust them to do their work. We set fair parameters in place and core hours. How you manage your workload outside of that is up to you.

in four years we’ve only ever had to have an informal chat with someone once and that’s it.

This.

I WFH 99% of the time at band 7. In a flexi team. Recently, all workers have been told to stop doing certain time-wasting tasks and there's been the inevitable backlash and the finger-pointing at those of us who are WFH more.

a) we literally have different jobs so the comparisons are pointless and b) those people spend so much time doing unecessary things or things that they shouldn't be doing; hence the recent directives to stop doing them.

usually, the people complaining they are overwhelmed are not only doing tasks they shouldn't be doing, they're incredibly inefficient even in the tasks they should be doing.

I'm not flat out busy or stressed WFH because i'm efficient, know what is needed and not, and do my upmost to have boundaries and not waste time holding pointless meetings which generally degenerate into group moaning sessions or just groundhog day conversations about the same people or issues, and have very few if any, real outcomes.

And on the days I do venture into the office, there's an awful lot of 'busy complaining about busy' going on.

Pre-covid when it was realised I could do 99% of my work from home, I produced less and was stressed to the point of serious MH problems because I was constantly exposed to moaning, toxic people who took up so much of my time 'wanting a chat about this work thing' and 90% of the time they wanted spoon-feeding or just to complain about their lives, work and otherwise.

I've recently become 'that person' and am calculating public sector time wasted in pointless meetings. 8 people in a 2 hour meeting that resulted in nothing? So that's more than two days professional time wasted.

The public sector wouldn't be on it's knees quite as much, if people were more efficient and stopped having pointless meetings to tick boxes or just relieve peoples anxieties.

This was the same for me for years - now I’ve just stopped doing the extra hours. I do what I’m contracted to and no more (with only a rare exception where it’s my responsibility, not a situation caused by other people not pulling their weight).

I figure that if there’s no reward for me doing twice the work of the people in my team who are WFH with young kids and never available, and nobody wants to address those people, then why would I put myself out?

I agree. I work for a big company, and wfh since Covid. Most people work hard, but there are piss takers who everyone knows who they are, and because management don’t want to target those people, they threaten the entire work force with being pulled back to the office. I think management have to be strong, pull up the ones who are slacking, bring them back into the office, and not blanket target everyone.