To think the call back into the office is an example of the patriarchy very much alive and well?

[Yestttlo]

And anyone who thinks otherwise is either brainwashed by the patriarchy or isn’t a mother with a huge proportion of child related responsibility on her shoulders? (Or someone who is in a job where they can’t work from home so don’t want to support other women having the right to).

I have worked from home since covid. Been in the office eight times where it was necessary, for instance a company away day or face to face client meeting. I have a young dc and the call back to the office will damage my career progression due to time spent travelling which means I can’t be online longer and because I will be stretched to get household stuff done .. no I don’t mean I clean the toilets during work hours but that I can put a wash on first thing and know I can unload it at lunch, or get cooking done for the evening during my lunch break which means my evening is not chaotic and I can actually rest a little before starting in full force again the next day.

I will be fighting it to the very end. I will make my views clear. I strongly believe that forcing people into offices hugely disproportionately affects women. My work can be done anywhere. Forcing back into offices is a neon sign that the patriarchy is alive and well. Thoughts?

The office is a place of work. You are employed to work by the company and if the company decides they want to re-establish the office as the place of work then that is the company's choice. If it doesn't fit in with your new work lifestyle then I would suggest looking for another work opportunity.

@neverbeenskiing

And there are people who want to work in an office, they just prefer to be with other people, they work better in company and it is better for their mental health to do so. Personally I would hate a job with more than the odd day wfh. DS has a wfh job in AI, there are many teething problems but there is no one to go to to sort it out, which directly affects his earnings.

There is a lot of talk about a possible economic recession, job losses following the NI increase, possibly letting more EU citizens coming here to work again. I suspect that ultimately the jobs market will decide the overall balance rather than the patriarchy.

Perhaps this should be discussed with senior managers - building in time for a run, or mindless tasks? However, it's difficult to measure productivity this way, and is a complex issue. Would this benefit teachers, doctors, nurses, police, ambulance crew? All stressful and demanding jobs with no opportunities for doing things like this during the working day.

Ultimately it's about choice

People in my industry/my sort of roles say they can do everything from home. They’re wrong. Old established senior people can do the fun stuff from home - and neglect all their mentoring and team building responsibilities.

The data (and I’m in an industry that loves data and has heaps) shows that what happens is that when people stop turning up minorities are further disadvantaged (and in my industry women are a minority).

During COVID people said see this works fine (well people in my sort of roles, other roles were impossible to do properly). But they ignored the fact that a lot of things just got neglected cause there was no choice. They ignored the impacts on mothers (you’re at home - you should do the bulk of the house work and childcare), on women generally (so much easier to ignore when you don’t have to interact with them), on juniors (no shared learning, no informal mentoring, no learning through observation, easier to ignore for opportunities).

I’m not brainwashed. I’m incredibly aware of how my industry works, the data, and the research. WFH as the dominant model is detrimental long term in my industry. Flexibility in the workplace helps everyone - but not coming in, not having a collegial environment, means the long term key elements of our roles are stifled.

Remote work (rarely to never going in) does work in some roles in some industries. But the push to return to the office is because businesses aren’t seeing the productivity they want. They are noticing issues with training, development, retention, service etc.

If everyone was genuinely more productive WFH no company would be bringing you back. They’re wanting people back cause they aren’t getting the outputs they desire.

People didn't used to think it strange we didn't have weekends, and worked six days a week, with the occasional Saturday afternoon off to visit our mums.

Because everyone in an office works their fingers to the bone ...?

I'm senior enough to call the shots on WFH, not that it matters as it's understood I can manage my time as I see fit as long as the work gets done. And it's not difficult to measure my productivity, though quality of output is considered more important than quantity.

I am not a teacher, doctor, nurse or ambulance crew so the best way for them to work isn't really relevant to me. WFH is beneficial in many roles, including mine, but obviously it doesn't apply across the board.

Rather than likening it to detention, I see it as more like the many secondary schools who now no longer have Year 11's at home on study leave in the run up to GCSE's, instead they come into school so they can attend revision sessions and supervised independent study in school. They tried having them at home and felt it wasn't beneficial for the majority, so they've gone back to asking them all to come in. You could see it as a "punishment" for kids who are likely to be more conscientious or you could see it as supportive for all of them depending on how you look at things. But if a significant number of people aren't working effectively from home, unless you have the technology and resources to closely monitor every person's productivity individually on a daily basis then it makes sense to ask all staff to spend at least some time in the office.

Not at all , but a manager might notice if one person is missing from the office for vast periods of the day , or arrives at 9:30 and then leaves at 2:30 so is obviously doing their school run ( men or women) .

It becomes a punishment because an office environment is detrimental to many people's ability to work at their best.

I hate offices. I hate the chatter, the noise, the people constantly buzzing around you. I can't focus, I can't concentrate and I can't relax. Commuting adds a level of stress and tiredness on top of that. I last worked in an office in 2008 and the improvement to my mental health once I started WFH (and this was in my bedroom in a houseshare!) was so radical that I swore I would never go back.

I'm not in a position where I've had to give any company I've worked for an ultimatum about WFH but it's currently baked into my contract and my company knows I would leave rather than set foot in an office again - and I have backup options if it comes to that.

@Floralnomad - so you think that there is no monitoring of remote employees? Really?

Of course they don't. But I've never known anyone manage to spend hours watching box sets, gardening, have a nap, re-decorate or claim they're working whilst looking after small children when they're in the office. These things, all of which I've known people admit to routinely doing while WFH, are not comparable to spending a bit too much time chatting to the person next to you in the office or being late back from your lunch break. Of course there will be people in the office who aren't as productive as they could be, but it's ridiculous to claim it's just as easy for people to skive in the office as it is when no one sees them for days or even weeks at a time. That just doesn't make sense. There are people who have gone on holiday when they are supposed to be WFH and only been caught because they were stupid enough to post on social media.

Just a question, so you are given billing targets if you work in the legal industry?

Yes, I take your point and I suppose that's what I was trying to say, about the measurement of output, levels of stress and effectiveness of the working day.
Public sector jobs anyway will always be strapped for cash in the current economy, so no chance for down time in the working day. So very different.

Agreed!! Patriarchy and the dominance of extroverts in society.

Surely the level of monitoring varies massively depending on the nature of the organisation, their size and the technology they have access to? Some of the organisations we liaise with there certainly seems to be very little monitoring.

Yes, I have to log a certain number of billable hours a day. Every staff member has the targets, not just the fee earning ones (unless they're in admin support).

Nope.

Once the daytime breastfeeding / maternity leave was over we did proper 50% household and parenting. Shared school runs, sick days, school events, hospital trips, buying birthday presents and attending birthday parties…

Not prepared to compromise my career to his, and pleading ‘special case’ for women in the workplace eventually works against women. AND works against the idea that men also take emergency carer days etc.

You are arguably pandering to the patriarchy, not smashing it!

Nope.

Get back to the office, and be thankful for the time you had at home!

Enough already.

I chose a 100% remote role in a company with HQ in North America, because I am solely responsible for a disabled child and have very little by way of external support. I'm working on that, and hopefully by this time next year I'll be in a position to travel a bit to on site meetings, but we'll see.

The rise in remote working has super-charged my career. I would like an office presence in the future, when my child is older and more independent, but for the next decade I need flexibility. And I'll take my expertise to organisations who offer that to me.

These things need to be looked on a sector by sector basis. The sweeping generalisations about lazy WFH employees and in person productivity aren't particularly helpful.

I'm a university academic and I've always worked in a hybrid fashion. It's acknowledged that research /writing is best done at home rather than a shared office. Same goes for online teaching.

However, it is still important to be physically in the office sometimes as some work is best suited to that environment and it helps with relationship building.

There is evidence that fully WFH is detrimental to young employees and women as it removes opportunities for learning by observation and relationship building which can be really important for career progression.

Flexible working and hybrid approaches are probably the most ideal approach in most cases. At least that's what the research suggests 🤷🏼‍♀️

@neverbeenskiing - that's a management issue

Yes to the dominance of extroverts!

Oh crap....the office is in Hong Kong. That's one hell of a commute.
Oh wait........WFH was a thing well before covid.
Broaden your mind.