to think some people would be weirdly excited if WFH came to an end?

[LoveWFH]

Why do some posters sound almost delighted at the thought of Nigel Farage stopping WFH?

There’s this tone of “that’ll teach them” whenever it comes up. As if people working from home have been getting away with something.

Here’s the practical bit though. My company couldn’t bring everyone back full time even if it wanted to. They’ve sold off chunks of the office space. Whole buildings gone. Desks gone. Leases not renewed. There literally isn’t room for everyone anymore.

Hybrid working isn’t some trendy phase. It’s how a lot of businesses are set up now. They’ve planned for it. Budgeted for it. Recruited around it.

You can’t magically create space that no longer exists.

If you prefer being in the office, fair enough. Plenty of people do. But I don’t get the satisfaction at the idea of other people losing flexibility that works for them and their employer.

How can they talk about London being hollowed out and not talk about the price of accommodation?!

It's just distraction politics, like the "boat people". Farage couldn't run a bath, never mind a country, so he has to play distraction politics. It's just about getting into power so he can acquire more wealth for him and his cronies.

I don’t think it is an all or nothing, but I do think going in to work should be the default.

If some people need to come in a little late or leave a little early due to childcare, or need to stay home one day a week, I think that is reasonable.

But, if you are simultaneously doing childcare and working on a regular basis, you aren’t doing either well.

When I see the threads about Teams ‘etiquette’ on here, they are a total embarrassment from supposedly adult professionals.

But young people do feel isolated WFH, or coming into a nearly empty office. There are more mental health issues; being on screens all day both for work and leisure isn’t healthy.

It does strike me that a job that can be done 100% at home with limited human interaction, and multitasking with childcare, is a job that is ripe to be replaced by AI.

One of my DC works fully remotely. There is no office to go to as all the work is completed online. It has saved the small business many, many thousands of pounds by having no office. Businesses would simply move abroad if everyone was forced to pay for unnecessary office accommodation.

Genuinely, why do people link remote and AI? If a job can be done by AI then that's going to happen regardless of where it's performed now. If there is a difference, which I doubt, remote workers are less expensive because they don't require premises, so the saving from switching to AI will be greatest for in person workers.

Also, if you want to talk about the welfare of young people then that includes all of them. Not just the ones who want to and can do a job in a workplace. You're saying they feel isolated working from home. This is another unevidenced claim, but even if it were true, the ones who are only able to access work because they're allowed to do it remotely would be more isolated by a default of going into the workplace. Because they wouldn't have the jobs at all! Try and think about the existence of all the people who were screwed over by in person work being a norm.

And lastly, if you want working in person to be the assumed norm, good luck persuading either the public or employers themselves to pay for it.

It does strike me that a job that can be done 100% at home with limited human interaction, and multitasking with childcare, is a job that is ripe to be replaced by AI.

It's not really that black and white. I'm a fiction editor. While I acknowledge that at some point in the future that job might be replaceable with AI, it's very much not the case at the moment.

Agree that no one should ever be juggling childcare and work, though, or not if the children are small enough to need active care anyway. People wfh need to make childcare arrangements the same as if they were office-based, unless their kids are older and able to entertain themselves and it's just a case of not leaving them home alone.

I'd hold off on buying a new rail card if I were you.

It is worth separating out childcare objections based on age. People sound silly whining about older primary kids, whereas a toddler is much more likely to be a distraction.

As per usual Nazi Nigel is a total hypocrite:

As reported by The Independent, Reform UK is offering home-working options to staff, despite promising to eliminate remote work once it takes control of local councils.
Reform’s South Central Regional Director job ad guarantees “home working with occasional travel within the region.”
A £50,000 annual role is being advertised just days after Reform leader Nigel Farage promised that remote work would be banned in councils controlled by his party.

I agree with you about Nigel Farage's hypocrisy, but do not with the Nazi comparisons. Reform and Nigel Farage could not organise anything, whereas the Nazis could with all the evil consequences that resulted.

Who is multi-tasking with childcare? This is complete nonsense.

most people who wfh send their children to nursery or school. Those that don’t need to be called out by their companies and eventually fired if they persist.

there have always been exceptions for the odd sick day or inclement weather day. Back when I first started, sometimes people would have their children sitting in the corner of their office from time to time in an emergency.

professionals understand that they can’t get their work done with children around all the time. This isn’t really an issue.

I don't think anyone, or at least most people aren't saying WFH means no or limited human interaction.

What is happening is that human interaction is happening online.

Still human workers, still interacting..

I think a lot of people think WFH means just emails or something?

It doesn't.

I think reading this thread and many others on MN on this topic, a lot of people seem to genuinely think WFH means you log onto a computer, answer some emails and do what the hell you like all day and all week? or just bunk off whenever is convenient.

And no-one can tell? and no-one could be sacked because it's a human right to WFH or something?

No, that's not how it works..

The one thing that amazes me about any discourse around WFH is the number of people who seem to know the ins and outs other people’s jobs and companies. I don’t see how anyone else can make a call about whether WFH or office is better for my role or my company.

i work in an environment where we are trusted to just get on with our jobs. As long as we get done what we’ve been tasked to do then we are free to manage when and where we do that. Obviously you can’t completely disappear during normal UK working hours but generally if you need to pop out for a couple of hours in the afternoon, no one would care as long as all your deadlines are met.

We have only recently got an office after a number of years of using a small serviced office as a place to meet. I find 2 days in the office works for me. Like most of my colleagues we choose to WFH when we have lots to do and/or need to concentrate!

I personally don’t find the open plan office a productive place to work. We are all over Teams chat which I think works better for those quick questions your colleagues might ask you as you can reply when it’s a good time, rather than feel obliged to answer immediately when they’re stood next to you!!

The thing is the infrastructure just can't cope with everyone back in the office.

I only have to do a 35 mile journey when I go into one of my offices, went in on Tuesday and it took 90 minutes to get there and 140 minutes to get home, no obvious issues i.e. accidents, but just sheer weight of traffic.

Went into London on Wednesday and train problems mean't a 3.5 commute home for a journey that should take about 90 minutes.

Whatever crap is being spouted, the sharp rise of road useage in the last 2-3 years compared to covid is astonishing. Everywhere you go there are roadworks, potholes and problems. Trains are already packed, railways seem to need huge upgrades, stations can't cope with the number of people in them at core times.

Easy to make a stupid throwaway comment to get everyone frothing but the simple fact is, it's just not possible.

The one thing that amazes me about any discourse around WFH is the number of people who seem to know the ins and outs other people’s jobs and companies. I don’t see how anyone else can make a call about whether WFH or office is better for my role or my company.

It's incredible the way remote working threads bring out all the experts in jobs they've never done and sectors they've no experience of.

This.

The government won't mandate this, other than perhaps for civil servants, and even there I suspect it will depend on the job.

I suspect more and more companies will limit wfh in various ways, which obviously many people won't like, but others will.

@AmusedShark ,

‘I don't think anyone, or at least most people aren't saying WFH means no or limited human interaction.
What is happening is that human interaction is happening online.
Still human workers, still interacting..
I think a lot of people think WFH means just emails or something?
It doesn't.’

I am not sure most Teams meeting with false backgrounds, mics on mute and often cameras off constitute what I would think of as human interaction.

I taught remotely throughout COVID, and attended Teams staff meetings etc. They felt nothing like normal teaching or a normal staff meeting.

I am now of an age when many of my friends’ children are in the workplace, a fair number from home. I am not convinced they are nearly as involved or interested as I was in my work when I had my first office job.

I think the demographic here is mainly only and who live in nice houses with family. I think that demographic is most likely to like WFH.

It’s definitely jealousy from people that either were not able to work from home before they retired, or are in a job that can’t be done from home. They have in image of people having an easy life at home with a laptop putting their feet up, rather than considering the amount of time and money people are saving by not commuting and the realisation from companies that people can do just as good a job from their own home, and often productivity is higher!

In the company I work for, all the offices were sold, leases not renewed and all contracts were changed to home-based. There’s no way we are ever going back to an office environment. Many staff would like to go back - if you are working in a tiny space at the end of your bed in a studio flat or house share, it’s really not ideal.

One way to make your own life ‘seem’ better is to take something away from someone else. It’s not about bettering your own prospects; rather dragging someone else’s down.

I am now of an age when many of my friends’ children are in the workplace, a fair number from home. I am not convinced they are nearly as involved or interested as I was in my work when I had my first office job.
I think the demographic here is mainly only and who live in nice houses with family. I think that demographic is most likely to like WFH.

Have you thought about the possibility that you and your friends kids might not actually be representative here, speaking of demographics? If you're a teacher and previously did well in an office job, by definition you're someone who wasn't excluded or particularly disadvantaged by the old model of in person work. You did well in multiple in person fields. There were always people who couldn't do that for reasons of location, disability, caring responsibilities, neurodivergence etc.

We do actually need to think about them too, not just you and people like you. If your friends mostly have nice houses, it's not a great surprise that your anecdata mostly focuses on that group. Rather than, say, those young people living in low quality accommodation with family but who can't afford to move close to good job markets.

”I am not sure most Teams meeting with false backgrounds, mics on mute and often cameras off constitute what I would think of as human interaction.”.

A classic example of someone making assumptions about how other people work.

In my company we use Teams calls internally tas a means to communicate so of course we have mics on and it’s the norm to have cameras on too. If you need to discuss a document, then it’s actually preferable to do this over Teams as everyone can see what you are talking about clearly. The in-person version is crowding round someone’s desk or doing it a meeting room on a large screen which is an extra faff to set up.

And yes, we have a ‘false’ background but it’s because we use them for external calls as ours has our logo on it so it’s helpful when you are on a call with multiple parties. Not sure why anyone would have an issue with this.

Yes.
The thing is i dont mind paying tax. Since (hopefully at least) that money goes towards benefits or nurses or roads or what have you. I know "politics of envy" was a key phrase on the right for ages for high tax policies. But the real politics of envy is this. Its not improving one person's lot in life. It's making someone else's life worse. And the WFHs affected might be reasonably fortunate in that they have nice sit down jobs. But they aren't the billionaires. It's just another way to get the plebs squabbling and attacking each other while the super wealthy drain of all the money.

I hate that kind of customer service experience and I mentioned earlier, but I don’t think that means those roles shouldn’t be done from home, just that they need to be managed better. Plenty of customer service roles are outsourced but in offices and the quality is not necessarily better. The biggest issue I think is how little those roles are invested in - pay, training etc. That won’t magically improve if people are in a crappy office on an industrial estate they have to drive to and with nowhere good for lunch.

It's all a bit ridiculous, my entire dept WFH. So we'd lose our jobs. I doubt he'd be very popular if he made thousands of people unemployed.