To struggle to see the appeal of full time remote working?

[YasminaJ]

I’ve been fully remote in a new role for the past month and had heard so many positive things about remote working, no commute etc.

I am finding the opposite though. Cabin fever despite having a healthy social life outside of work and teams calls really don’t replace that in person connection for me. I just feel like there’s more to life than staying in my house all week for work. I have a seperate office room etc.

I will give it a bit longer but am thinking maybe I’m just someone who needs to be around people? Has anyone been in a similar situation and found it improved?

The funniest thing about the office days I go to is that they're not even used to their fullest potential anyway, which makes it clear it's just for the chatty gossipers to catch up on things and maybe some work will happen in between. Recently at my work, there was a support ticket (I work in software) for a script to be written in a way that hasn't been done for years (so there's been no direct need to learn). My line manager, in person, pestered me to take the ticket because they hadn't got a clue where to begin with it and they worried that nobody else was showing an interest. Delegation = yep, that's what managers do.

Someone sat next to me leaned across and said "If they really want to make use of these in-person days, they could do a coding session that involves everyone here, you know that 'collaboration' they want. That support ticket would be complete in a couple of days and everyone will walk away with some more knowledge." We both agreed.

There was even a time when a couple of outside contractors showed up to be part of it. I'd just returned from having had an investigative hysteroscopy for recurrent miscarriage, and there were these people sat across from me talking about their kids. Loudly. Tuning it out wasn't an option, so many unsavoury thoughts ran through my head, but I never once vocalised any of them. So I did what I've done for a number of years and stewed in my own misery.

Is anyone familiar with a YouTuber called Tom Scryleus? He's Swedish, he's highly introverted and is a consultant at a large company in Sweden. He described what it's like for an introvert to be in an office.

Paraphrasing:

"Imagine climbing into bed and trying to fall asleep in a nightclub while it's in session. You will get to sleep eventually, maybe, but you will be totally exhausted. You will feel broken and damaged. Now imagine doing that for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, all year round with a few days off here and there. It's sensory hell."

I'm fully flexible, I manage my own diary. I WFH most days but also travel UK wide for business meetings and a day or so in the office here and there. I moan when I have to travel, and I moan when I have too many days at home 🤣🤣 hybrid is best, I love the interaction with my colleagues but don't get much actual work done when I'm in the office. I like my WFH days where I trundle to my home office in my trackies (best commute ever!) and can squeeze in a gym session, but I also like putting on my heels for a head office day 🤷🏻‍♀️

Not all work is communal. even when I was at the beginning of my career, learning involved having a meeting with a senior person and then being sent off to work solo for hours or even days without another interaction. The work was extremely detail oriented and required focus.

This is true for my trainees now. I give them instructions and they are always welcome to come ask questions, but there is rarely value in sitting together for more than a few minutes. The questions are likely to be highly technical and require sharing a screen, which is easier to do if we aren’t in the same office anyway.

mid level people tend to send questions that have to be investigated.

WFH full time and love it, no office politics or people with annoying habits

I really want a dog but can’t have one because nobody is at home in the day. I’d absolutely love a work from home job so I could have a dog. I’d also stress less having to rush from school pickup to the office and back to school again and have to battle for parking at both school and work.

I prefer hybrid but has done full WFH (including pre pandemic where it wasn’t a thing and everyone else was in an office, that was tough). The things I found that help:
If you have time give yourself a “commute” by having a walk in the morning.
Make sure you have a lunch break, go out for a bit, watch TV, whatever…just don’t be in the room you work in.
Have things that are only for work, eg the mug and water bottle you use.

Ive wfh for probably 12 years now, i could never give it up, I have autism and I love being able to have the heating and noise (either music or silence) exactly how I want, less office politics. No commute and I love having my spare time to do home stuff, be that putting a wash on at lunchtime or home cooked lunch or a quick lunchtime bath to ease my back pain.

For those of you who work fully remote, are you often in meetings when half or more of the attendees are all in the same office? How do you find that?

I hated WFH. I think it started from a traumatic time during Covid where we were all forced.
I hated rolling out of bed, starting work still in my dressing gown, being stuck in my spare bedroom, having a shower around 11am, not leaving the house all day, no interaction with anyone, feeling like work is always looming... I’m now 100% office based. Even though traffic is annoying,
especially now it’s getting into winter but I will never WFH again.
I enjoy getting up, getting ready and being out of the house. When I come home, I can purely relax without feeling like my house is work. My home is chaotic enough with kids, I enjoy getting out of it for work!!

You misunderstand me. It’s not about a manger micromanaging. It’s about a manager being able to pick up cues from a new starter that perhaps they haven’t understood something or are struggling, and that can happen simply by walking past their desk on the way to the loo.

I absolutely support younger workers, which is why I’m against fully WFH. But for office working to work, you need a decent number of people in- and you need experienced and senior workers in. if only the newer or younger staff go in because the rest have cosily got their feet under the dining room table, that’s going to cause division and siloing.

I love it.
I have dogs and horses so being fully remote with flexible hours means I have plenty of time for them, plus they keep me company and get me out of the house. Plenty of local friends for my social life.

We have a lively Teams chat which we natter a bit in, similar to office chat.
I’m a huge introvert and find it much less draining.

Yes - the idea that I’m against younger workers because I think days in the office are beneficial, as has been suggested, is hilarious!! It’s older workers who want to be more at home and of course that’s understandable too.

And the idea of working in the crappy rental I was in when I first started work after graduating would have been awful.

I used to be the only one, back in the days of one conference phone in the middle of a table where everyone spoke over each other, no cameras, lots of side conversations etc. It was awful and unproductive.

Then along came COVID, my employer sent everyone home, they introduced Teams. And I was ahead of the learning curve in remote working. Everyone else needed hand holding and emotional support. My career has accelerated massively since then. All of my team are at least partially remote. When there are people in an office room, they still have cameras on and it is a far more level playing field than pre-2020.

This - it’s definitely a personality issue.

Extroverts get their energy from being with people and introverts get it from within. So roughly 50% of WFH employees are probably quite content, the other 50% not so much.

I still think that’s an antiquated way of working. It’s also not very structured. Managers can be extremely busy with meetings and other direct reports / other responsibilities. Relying on just seeing that they’re struggling because they are in the same vicinity isn’t exactly the best way I wouldn’t say. I just think new ways of working can be adopted. Perhaps it’s nice to do some in person social time for a new starter to put faces to names and feel comfortable, but not as an actual learning tool in my view.

I WFH around 3 days a week. I generally go in to the office 2 days. I’d hate to WFH full time, but there’s no way I could go back to 5 days in the office. I think a bit of both is perfect and I really enjoy my office days, but do virtually no work because of all the chatting and long lunches with colleagues.

Weird the way you didn't actually address the point about young workers who benefit from remote options, though. Almost like you can't...

Ultimtely, if you're against fully remote work per se, you're not pro young worker, you're just pro the young workers who fit your belief. You've shown no concern at all for any young worker who benefits from the greater availability of remote work. What about the ones who don't have the option to get even a crappy rental near the workplace? No fucks given.

“The problem with people already established in their careers discussing this issue is that they too often conflate their own experiences when they were a young worker with young people per se. They're not the same thing at all. And you're doing it in your first paragraph too. As if anyone could possibly understand how training works in every role and sector.“

Totally agree with this. I WFH as a “youngster” and absolutely loved it. It will suit some people and not others but please don’t generalise or try to take something good away from others based on your own feelings.

As a 20 something all my colleagues were at a different stage of life. I really wasn’t interested in Sally’s husband woes or whatever and they weren’t interested in staying up til 5 am clubbing. I had friends my own age that lived with me or nearby. I loved working from my bed or sofa in peace and quiet, saving money on lunches and spending more time with my housemates after work instead of on a packed train commuting. It was bliss. I attended week long training courses in person from time to time and collaborated by phone and email. No issues at all.

The positive thing for young people entering the workforce now is that we know which jobs have gone WFH. There are loads of jobs which can never be WFH because of the nature of the role so young office/commute-lovers can go into those fields instead!

I think you need to step back a bit and park your misplaced rage against me.
I don’t owe you a reply but even if I was going to give you a considered response (and your post needed that and indeed I was still thinking about it) I’m certainly not going to bother now - why would I bother with someone as rude and angry as you?

I understand some people would love full time wfh but I hate it - I’m hybrid which is an excellent mix but overall I genuinely enjoy being in the office.
Its real life interactions that I enjoy and nearly went round the bend during a 6 month stretch of wfh on the second wave of covid.

This is your own feeling and your own perspective though. Many young people will absolutely love WFH, and find it life enhancing, like I did. Some will hate it, I’m sure.

WFH is not universally “bad” or “good” based on your age. Totally depends on personality and individual situations.

I love it but my husband also works from home so I am not lonely.

I haven't been in to the office for many years.

That was a lot of words to tell us you don't have an explanation for why you only care about the young workers who fit your preconceived notions, and don't even acknowledge the rest. I hope you don't really believe anyone is fooled by this conveniently timed moral objection, though, as that would be tragic.

But for those reading, this is the hole in the argument about remote work being bad for the young. This sort of blindness comes from people who benefitted from the old system and didn't notice all the people who weren't there in the office with them because the barriers to in person work kept them out.

Well, of course not. Though from this thread alone it’s interesting to see who loves and who hates it.

That’s why hybrid can be the answer. Because of course no one size fits all. But it’s got to be done well - you need a critical mass of people for it to have any point or benefit. It works well at my employer but I know others where it works terribly because it’s badly managed.

I’m glad WFH working out well for you. My opinions are merely based on my observations and conversations with both older and younger colleagues.

I was fully remote for 3 years - the last year I felt very isolated but appreciated the easier schools runs etc. I am now hybrid and much prefer this - I like the social side and my office has lots of perks . I do find the commute a time waste though I get more done at home