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.

Have you won any awards OP?

Yep - see my OP.

How about you?

I think you’re the ludicrous one.

Of course no one is trying to suggest that people could just as easily be putting a wash on or peeling potatoes if they were in the office. It isn’t physically possible. But the point about how people use the time is perfectly valid.

A poster on the first page described it perfectly when she said being in the office involves “busy work”. The jobs you do to look busy when it’s quiet - deleting old emails, clearing out your desk drawers, rereading company policies etc.. It wouldn’t matter if you didn’t do any of it - and at home, you don’t have to for appearances sake. If I’m not busy, why wouldn’t I just stick the washing machine on? It doesn’t stop me getting my work done, because if I’m busy, I simply don’t do it. There is zero incentive for me to “skive”, because the work has to go somewhere - it would soon be spotted if I wasn’t pulling my weight. I’d only be making life hard for myself.

I understand all that - but again, artificially making other jobs less appealing is not the way to handle it. Just like forcing people back to the office to keep cafes and bars in traditional business areas going is false economy.

And it still doesn’t address the fact that an awful lot of people can’t just say “Ooh, I know - I’ll take a WFH job instead”. They need the right skill set and experience.

True I personally couldn't think of anything bloody worse than WFH. My home is a place to relax not a workplace

I don’t think I understand this

But the posters I'm talking about aren't saying they're doing 2-3 hours work a day because work ebbs and flows eg this is a quiet period but they work 10 hours a day during a busy period. (Of course I understand this, my own industry has busy and less busy periods - none as quiet as 2 hours a day unfortunately)
They are saying they are regularly working 2-3 hours a day because they are super efficient when WFH
....in which case I'd think it wasn't actually a ft job....

@Fizbosshoes but it’s a full time job because you need to be available and ready during business hours.
So you might have a few quiet hours doing nothing all afternoon, but if someone urgently needs you at half past 4 then you need to be there! Whether that’s in person or phone/email.
You can’t just do your work in a couple of hours and finish for the day, and leave people hanging.

So you work from home but do school drop offs, chores and exercise... then you wonder why people don't think your working hard. You just answered your own bloody q!

I think that's the kind of person who gets easily distracted when around other people.

When I used to work in an operational role, we were measured on numbers. My numbers in the office were usually double the majority of the rest of the team, because I can work quickly to a high quality. They increased slightly when we started WFH in COVID but not to the same scale of increase of other diligent people now they weren't chatting half the day (I could work and talk, not everyone can and by this point I could also do the job in my sleep).

If you gave me the same workload (volume wise, if measured on numbers( as some of the "slower" people, it'd take me 2-3 hours compared to their 7, in the same conditions. But WFH, the diligent "slower" people would do more work in the day, whereas the less diligent "slower" people would do the same across the same time period despite less distractions. I always had a higher workload cos that's what I could get through.

I'm not measured on numbers now, it's output. So there are some days where I might be done in a couple of hours if it's the start of a project, and others aren't available or I'm waiting on work being done. But mostly I'm busy all day.

The people who say they're done in 2-3 hours when WFH are the less diligent, slower people. They have less distractions but aren't willing to take on more than they did with the distractions. And they give WFH a bad name.

Depends on the job though. I manage my own time, and I don't have customer/client calls. So if I "disappear" at 330 to do a pick up, that's fine, because I can make up 30 mins by working through lunch or logging on later. I am allowed to be flexible.

It's different if you're supposed to be customer/client facing and aren't available to do that work because you're doing drop off/pick up or popping to the gym.

My home now runs like clockwork because I have the time to shop, cook and clean. It used to cut into my evening when in the office full time. It has made for a much happier family and also workforce. Everyone in my department enjoys hybrid working and it has brought a lot of value to their lives.

It is something I appreciate. It only happened because of covid.

WFH suits people with young kids, particularly primary age. I am hugely fortunate that WFH works at the stage of building out my org. We have mainly mums at the moment who are mid-career and on decent money. The next stage will be building out our teams with early career (probably younger) people who enjoy the social interaction and learn from being together, so we will have to manage the transition to taking on an office. For me my youngest has three years left in primary and I think we will probably align quite closely. I expect legacy contracts will stay WFH, with new ones being hybrid. Today I have walked the dog and put out the washing, but I'll probably work once the kids are in bed too, so all works well. I look forward to the separation between work and home!

@ACynicalDadyou can see how this will play out as terrible for feminism though.
Men and women working mostly in office to build their careers. Women take time out to have babies and then WFH due to flexibility. Men stay visible in the office and get promoted.

I go to the office once a week. There's often no one "important" enough in the office to be visible to because they're also working from home most of the week.

Wouldn't matter if I was male or female. We're as visible as each other in that scenario.

You have made the point that you are WFH whilst doing school runs, chores etc..
Are you working your contracted hours irrespective of your performance awards?

https://www.hrmagazine.co.uk/content/news/hybrid-working-could-drive-gender-promotion-gap/

There is not a consistent workflow all the time. Sometimes I work more, sometimes I work less. It is the nature of the work. It ebbs and flows. I am often waiting for partner organisations to get back to me which leaves gaps so time to do school runs, chores, shopping, taking books back to the library etc

It's not jealousy it's just annoying how everyone assumes you can drop everything and be in for deliveries and appointments because you might be working from home.

Also my tax pounds pay for civil servants to be working in an office not sitting in thr comfort and convenience of their own home while ppl without that luxury slog into work everyday.

For the last five years, my wife has been in the office and I've been the one at home popping out at 3.15 to get the kids. Some of it is down to couples agreeing between themselves how to run their lives. I know the default, but I also understand that some people prioritise more than their careers. One of my team members who got promoted recently is now in a job with some prospects for the first time since her child was born with disabilities and her husband left. We do need a range of opportunities for different people's aspirations and priorities, she couldn't do this job from an office.

I think the general consensus is that anyone who works from home isn’t actually working & people don’t like that you are paid to be in your own home. I work in adult education & 3 days of 5 I’m in the college the other days I’m at home doing paperwork. It genuinely makes more sense than driving into work. But yes I do think it comes from jealousy but not because work requires a work place but that we have the freedom to dictate our own time

Honestly that is a crazy remark. What does it matter to you where they work once the work is being done? Ridiculous point of view! (I'm not a civil servant BTW!)

My taxes pay for civil servants to do their jobs. Doesn't matter to me if they're sat in an office or behind their desks at home.

I'd much rather that my taxes were put towards salaries for nurses, firefighters, extra police, facilities and services in the NHS etc than towards paying rents on office spaces.

Someone's been spending too long on X!

EHCP's require visits to see the child in a school/nursery/home school/hospital setting. Depending on the need it could require seeing various therapies in progress. It's not just form filling.