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?

And your evidence for this is what exactly?

Of course it isn't our job to fix it, the employers are fixing it by expecting employees to spend more time in the office. It appears though that some don't like the solution. There's always the option to change jobs if your current one doesn't fit with your domestic circumstances!

My point was to highlight the poster I quoted’s evidence-free assertion with one of my own.

Sorry I've only just seen this @MerryMaker .

Yes, obviously I do know.

But I work in a call centre. Everyone is very very busy and when they are on a call they can't help. When you have a customer on the phone and you need help, you need to be able to look around, spot someone who isn't on the phone, and hope that you can get them to have a quick look round the corner at your screen before they pick up their next call. There is no time ask someone to a zoom call, get connected and screen share!

We have a teams chat running all the time and we can ask questions in there but it takes much longer to get an answer than just speaking to the person next to you.

We are able to WFH two days a week if we want to. Most don't, for the reasons I went through in my original post. And we are only able to request WFH after 6 months, and if our team leader agrees we are sufficiently competent. Because we are a high end insurer we live and die on our customer service. We can't leave people on hold for 15 minutes while we pop into a zoom call!

Well good of you to acknowledge that but to be fair, Viviennemary was probably right about it being a skivers paradise. There was a post last week that provided all the evidence one might need with a high proportion of posters saying precisely what they did when WFH, including going swimming, the gym, going to the cinema to highlight just a few. Our well-quoted and readily available statistics on productivity in the UK show some pretty awful figures compared to many European neighbours, most of whom are back to pre-Covid levels of office working.

I swim or run or walk in my WFH breaks. Our managers encourage and support their staff keeping active (desk job). It is not regarded as skiving.

We've always been WFH so productivity can't be measured on office vs WFH.
If we didn't get papers published (I work for a journal) then the journal would fold. We are all professional, motivated and don't need our every move monitored. I'd never heard of a mouse jiggler before MN.

You don't need the evidence that is between the employer and employee
If their work is being done then that's all that matters

And to the person saying European neighbours, most of whom are back to pre-Covid levels of office working they are certainly not in my field of work

Panorama on Monday night focused on this. It was a bit simplistic in its coverage but will have stimulated further debate no doubt

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m00276pd

Yes, it left too much hanging in the air rather than coming to a conclusion imo. The one thing that wasn't covered, it seems to me, was the "trust" aspect between employer and employee. I say that only because of the responses the other day to a post on here asking people to be honest about what they did when WFH. Some responses were quite shocking - swimming, gym, cinema - to name but a few. The Panorama prog did highlight though the massive increase in golf played during the week since COVID! I wonder why?

@MyObservations yes I was staggered by the golf stats! I don’t think it’s unreasonable to suggest that’s predominantly men playing so much golf….while the women are being criticised for putting a load of washing on 🙄🙄🙄

It was annoying that there were no positive stories from employers about employees (particularly with young children) making working from home a success. I know such a thing exists!

Bringing it back to the main title of the thread, it was particularly frustrating that Stuart Rose (who was the executive chairman of M&S) was saying that people with young children should just "get on with it". My version of that, if I had to go back to the office full time, would be to quit my job and possibly my career. Because I could not make the nursery drop offs and pick ups work. Being a high earner, the government would not get as much money in tax, and I wouldn't be spending as much on nursery fees, which would be unfavourable to the economy. I doubt Stuart Rose ever had to make the school run whilst he was working at M&S. It's highly probable that his version of "getting on with it" was to hire a nanny or have a stay at home wife.

The WFH thing is tricky- if you do work that is measurable and all have agreed a timeframe for that work it is fine, because you do the work when you want, but most workplaces are not this regimented, so abuse is inevitable.

I think a more balanced approach is everyone is allotted weekly tasks and if they are not achieved the next week you have to go into the office until they are (as well as doing that weeks tasks) The problem is who organises and allots the work- managers may feel this is an imposition on their schedule, I would suggest less meetings more work organisation.

WFH is really the same as freelance work- the difference is freelance work is an allotted task (in my case making costumes) their is a brief of what has to be achieved and a deadline-this is what WFH needs- many people if it was like this would flow back into the office, because it is far easier to avoid work and hide there.

I totally agree that there is not a "one size fits all". And everyone is in agreement that nurses can't work from home if they work on a ward, for example.
I'm lucky in that my tasks are exactly as you describe. But for people who have jobs with "more difficult to measure" productivity, I agree that an office setting might be more appropriate.
However, I object to the blanket approach of saying everyone must return to the office because they're a shirker. It's simply not true, and I have no much to lose if my employer were to do that. Luckily the company I work for have no plans to do that, and are very progressive in that respect. But I feel sorry for people who work for companies who are not

Mmm, in the post I mentioned on MN it was definitely a woman who was telling the world she would go to the gym or cinema so not just a case of putting the washing on. But I take your point about golf but I'm pretty certain abusing the WFH model is not restricted to men or women.

childcare responsibilities are actually celebrated and honoured

This is such self-indulgent claptrap. You have kids, and you sort childcare when you are not around. Like parents all over the world do. It’s life. No celebrating or honouring needed.

And wfh is such a privilege. The middle classes ‘fighting’ to work from home yet expecting to be able to walk to shops, cafes and hospitals and have repairs and work done to their homes, whilst being served by real-life minions who leave their homes to do their job. Peak pandemic entitlement.

Your husband needs to do more at home. The pair of you need to stop enabling this sexist set-up.

My daughter did an internship this summer and found it so depressing and lonely. Most people worked from home, including her boss who worked from home three to four days a week. She really struggled to learn and her highlight of the week was the one team meeting when everybody attended. I do not think it is fair on the next generation to have so much working from home by their seniors. A balance is needed.

The problem wasn't wfh, it was bad management.
My company is nearly entirely remote; we hire students, new graduates and general new staff (PhD) and they all get full training via intense zoom calls and by the person doing the training being available during the working day.

I do actually agree that wfh suits more senior staff, but that doesn't mean it cannot work for junior staff.

‘Intensive zoom calls’ don’t sound like a particularly attractive option. It’s not the same as being in an office in person, and meeting people face to face through the day. However well managed.

I agree.

Not everything is down to 'bad management'. That's an easy cop out. The best manager in the world can't compensate for a lack of face to face interaction.

The thought of my only contact with colleagues being 'intense zoom calls' sends a shiver down my spine. If I were young and just starting out, I'd find it even sadder.

WFH does work for some people and some businesses. But claiming there's no down side to it, and that everything is the fault of 'bad management' is wrong.

No I am playing an extra round of golf per week
Start work at 6
Finish at 12
home from golf at 5ish
Work until 8