to be tired of the jealousy towards people who WFH?

[WFHFan]

No one can post a thread about it without someone chiming in threatening if their job can done from home then it could be given to someone in another country or AI could take it.

Other people saying companies want everyone back in the office. Yes some do. Mine doesn't. They do not have the space anymore. Neither will my job go to someone in another country because of expertise and it does involve some critical face to face work. AI can't do it either.

Then some people getting offended saying if someone is WFH they shouldn't do anything else but work non stop. I can work and I do chores, shopping, school pick up, errands. It does not affect the standard or quantity of my work. I don't doubt it does affect some people's work.

I have won two awards for performance already.

But are they available if they're running errands and sleeping? It seems to be taking the piss.

I'm working for myself so it's whatever to me, but as an employer? I wouldn't love it.

I don’t think WFH is here to stay, except in a minority of cases.

So much of work can be done better in an office environment.

A lot of the best ideas and work starts with random conversations in the coffee room or as you pass someone’s desk.

And mentoring young staff is also awful on Teams or equivalent. You just can’t give the same kind of support as you can face-to-face. And spontaneous Friday night bonding sessions are out too, so useful for real team building.

Some will find studies that suggest productivity is as good WFH, but we need a good 10-15 years of it to see the long term effects on staff who are now young.

I think some flexibility and WFH is good, as it allows people into the workforce who would struggle otherwise, but the general rule should be most of the time in the office, except for a few roles.

Only snoozing, wake up when the phone rings 😜

Wasn't there a load of research a while ago that found people get just as much done in a shorter, compressed work day or on 4 days a week as they do on the standard full time hours? The shorter time frames made them more productive. I actually think people faff around more when they are working in office.

I imagine with wfh there’s a lot of silo thinking and very little contact with other parts of the organisation outside your own team.

Did I claim I work sooooo hard at home?

It is possible to work and do chores. I can easily do both as the nature of my work is not always consistent. There is regularly a lot of downtime while waiting for work to come in or for partner organisations to get back to me.

Yes I have won awards too for high performance. I am choosing what to spend my shopping vouchers on!

I have just been out to do my supermarket shop. It is quieter in the morning and less queues and now I am back to work.

I did my life admin when I was in the office full time. It is acceptable at work and at home. My manager never had a problem with it.

Some people are jealous love. They have admitted to it on this thread 😂

I work from home almost exclusively. Everyone in my business is remote-first. Very few choose to go into the office.

I know for a fact that our business model is more productive than equivalent office-based businesses, because one recently reached out to merge with us and on every metric - financials, customer satisfaction, number of projects, number of clients - they were weaker than ours. A similar picture has been presented by businesses wishing to acquire us and add us to their portfolio: our profits are stronger, our output more prolific.

This isn't to say that I believe working from home is better than office-based businesses. It's absolutely horses for courses and there'll be businesses out there more efficient than mine.

But if working from home isn't working for your business, it's because your managers and processes are rubbish, not because working from home is.

Our hours are fully flexible. We don't just accept that people will nip out and do things. We encourage it. No one should miss their kids' nativity, or the opportunity to form a local network at the school gate at pick up time. No one should spend their whole weekend doing life admin when some of it is much easier to pick up during the week.

We've only ever had one employee take the piss. It was immediately obvious and dealt with through performance management.

I have no idea why people are so down on the concept, other than jealousy. And yes, some jobs can never be performed from home. I have sympathy with people in those roles and I'd urge employers to support work/life balance in other ways.

But everyone else... We weren't put on this earth to be slaves or miserable. Work should be productive and good for us. Work is healthy. So let's really lean in to healthy ways of working.

There can be. You can't just take an existing culture and set of processes and send people home. You have to structure your business in a different way and create opportunities.

And yes, facilitating all that is a job. Managing a remote-first business is much much harder than managing an office. This is why employers are wanting people back in - nothing to do with keeping Pret in business. It's hard work managing a remote workforce - a job in and of itself.

But it pays for itself in my business through hard commercial metrics like productivity and soft but still commercial metrics like staff retention.

I feel a bit sorry for people who work from home. Both my sons have hybrid working, one in a civil service job. When they are in the office it is stressful hot desking and when they are at home they need to allocate a room as office, so in effect they are buying extra rooms in their flats for their employers. I have recently retired but I loved my office and most of the team I managed, chatty coffee breaks, secret Santa, all that stuff. It seems to me to be so isolating at home in front of a screen. There is nothing to beat personal contact, especially with customers and suppliers. So no jealousy here I wouldn’t have swapped my drive to work early in the morning giving me time to think ahead of the day for a tumble out of bed and into the spare room.

All the banks and fund industry, pensions industry want staff in offices, (bums on seats,) in order to protect the value of real estate and infrastructure, that they have invested in.

The awards are for high performance. I have won twice now.

My organisation has over 10,000 employees. They are doing well financially but they can't afford to pay for over 10,000 awards for encouragement to work 😂

If people in my place were out doing shopping or sleeping when meant to be working they’d be pulled in for a chat. Not sure why any company would be happy to pay people to do their shopping or sleep. Surely the staffing numbers need reviewing if there isn’t enough work to do. I am not jealous of home workers as I could work 4 days from home if I choose, but I don’t as I prefer to go to the office. Emptying a washer between meetings is one thing, but I wouldn’t be going shopping when paid to be in work. Mad companies happy to pay money for this.

Possibly depends on the sector.

I'm my Local Authority/council role my job is hybrid.

That can't change as under the Conservative government cuts to budgets were so harsh that the council have had to sell off buildings to meet the budget demands of essential services.

We no longer have a desk. We can book one but just about impossible as there are just not enough for the workforce.

Your post is just silly really, but I am not going to get drawn on to an argument about the time taken to boil a kettle for your one cup of tea v the time taken to take in a parcel. You are assuming that everyone who wfh does every thing on your long list every day, which they clearly don't. The same as some days uou might have a second cup of tea, adding an extra 5 minitues to your somewhat puritanical office day.
I have a fitbit watch that nags me to move every hour, so I do. I get up on the hour, get my 250 steps done by either loading the washer, hoovering etc and am always back at my desk before my screen times out at 6 minutes. So 8 hours x 5 minutes = 40 minutes, washing done, clean house etc.
It's not that hard to understand really.

Nice way to squeeze an ageism post in. Why would retired people give a monkey's?

I'm kind of on the fence as I've had a WFH job and I didn't find it very enjoyable, as in sociable. I don't think it's really jealousy that people have against WFH, it's more the fact that staff are often / sometimes unaccountable for periods of time. I've seen people freely admit they do their housework ect in work time.

But it comes down to trust. Do you have trustworthy employees or flakey whatnots ? People can take the Mickey in the workplace as well as at home. So I don't agree that jealousy is the issue here.

@WFHFan I’m not jealous of you WFH, but I’m very jealous that you are paid to simply live, and sleep. Can you tell me what your job is? I might retrain, because it sounds like the easiest job in the world. I’m pretty clever so I’m sure I can do it, and I’d really love someone to pay me to nap.

It is not a very easy job. The work flow is not always consistent so it is easy to dip in and out. A robot couldn't do it 😂

A job that does not have consistently busy times every second of the day is not a proper job? Ok then

I will stick with my improper job that has paid my mortgage and covers all my costs with extra.

Maybe your partner's job could be done by a robot? It doesn't sound like he has a proper job if he can watch all the matches in the Euros. Maybe it could be tacked onto another role?

It's not jealousy, it's the crap service that seems to have become exponentially worse since WFH became so common place.

On Easter Monday, I had reason to call the non emergency police phone line. Eventually answered by someone with a dog barking and screaming child(ren) in the background, meaning she couldn't hear what I was saying and I had to keep repeating myself. Then it was lots of sighs and groans as she said her laptop was running slow!

When the non emergency police call handlers are working from home, you know it's gone too far!

I spend most my days crying on my sofa in severe pain. I can't eat properly and have lived on liquid nutrition for a few years. I can hardly sit up. I can't care for my child any longer and they live with other parent now because I'm so sick. I've spent months in hospital. Nothing is controlling my multiple torturous diseases and I often wish it would just end.

I have friends who have witnessed all this happening to me for years. I feel strongly, resentment from one quarter because I don't work. I questioned this as how on earth could anyone feel that way about me having seen what my life is like ( it's like a horror). But I started to realise I wasn't imagining it and my senses were telling me for a reason. And I imagine if someone saw me just stand in my garden one day they'd think I was a grifter and would hate me for it.

So why am I telling you this - because it tells you that people can be total cunts. Usually because they need another focus for their own upset. And they'll always find one.

I wish it was the easiest job in the world! It has took years to get this level but it is worth it.

I am not jealous as I love going into work and would hate working from home. I think wfh works really well for some jobs but is awful for others. When I arrange meetings, I always offer people in-person, phone call or teams meetings. About 80% choose in-person. That kind of thing has to be taken into account when competing for clients.

I am very sorry you are having such a tough life ❤

I don't understand the logic of this at all. I should refuse to work at home so that other people still want to be nurses and teachers? Should I also turn down any pay rise I get in case it makes people not want to be nurses and teachers?

@WFHFan you've started a thread bleating that nasty people think those who WFH don’t work hard enough, then proceeded to boast about how little work you actually do for your salary (and all those shiny awards). What was the point? Perhaps it’s nap time for you 😂