Looking after kids. Working from home

[Dressassistance]

Hi 😊 I wfh as do the majority of my team. It seems that after school pick up and during school holidays, some of my colleagues with children are not really available. They take ages to respond, are inactive on teams and don’t answer calls. This of course impacts negatively on other team members. They are not catching up or anything after work, they work their standard hours.

I can’t get my head around this being acceptable when people who work from office / other people working from home (including myself) would have childcare in place and working as normal.
What are other people’s thoughts on this? Am I being harsh?

Surely this depends on company policy and what is agreed. Perhaps they have discussed it with a line manager who accepts their core hours in terms of availability are 9.30-2.30.
If you have children then maybe you should ask for the same considerations.

I don’t think it really is acceptable is it? I think most companies have policies against this. It wouldn’t be allowed where I work. Obviously I’m sure some people do it, just in the same way some people take long lunches or whatever other work-avoiding behaviour might not be acceptable.

YANBU, I have a friend who doesn't arrange childcare for her 7 year old during the school holidays, the child just gets left to it to play computer games and watch tv while their WFH parent works. Its such a shame for the kid, they must be so bored!!

It’s under the radar type thing. Just not mentioned. It has not been agreed as such.

Do you know this for sure though? I guess if colleagues are always unavailable and you need to have contact during that time you need to raise it as a concern.

This would not be acceptable in any place I’ve worked, at least on a regular basis. I think most people understand it as a one-off (eg after school childcare has fallen through) but it would certainly be a disciplinary offence to keep doing it on a regular basis, as per our contracts.

Yes i am certain. Yes it is something to consider. Thanks

It’s not allowed where I work. I do know though that some colleagues have their own arrangements with their managers that they basically do 9:30-3 and then do their extra hours either early morning or later in the evening.

I think the occasional once off is fine - childcare falls through, other parent isn’t around for pick up, sickness etc but I agree - not on a regular basis. I’ve booked half days off this week so the kids only had to do 9-3 in holiday club. I personally have a nightmare on Fridays wfh as my OH is off with our youngest but naturally my son will gravitate towards me and when my eldest is home from school he wants to see me - I do try to hide though and this is definitely where my partner needs to step up more!

I think this is very common.

The after school club at my DD school has only a fraction of the number of kids it had pre-covid. In families where there are two parents WFH it's easily possible to manage kids and work for an hour or so after school and it saves a fortune.

YANBU no one can do their job probably while juggling childcare at the same time. I would imagine company wfh policy would say that you cannot have any carers responsibilities during working hours.

Yes of course occasionally when child ill or something unexpected, that’s totally understandable, but this is everyday after school and all school holidays. It’s a lot really.

I’m not sure it’s financially viable for a lot of people having before / after school child care every day of the week… I also don’t get how parents can feel right letting young kids watch tv / play computer games all day every day during school holidays. We’re parents with a young child and both work, but I purposefully chose a job where I don’t work school holidays. I don’t think it’s fair on young kids if neither parent around.
Being a parent of a young child and knowing their needs and demands, I believe ‘wfh full time’ with young kids is one of the loosest definitions of ‘working full time’ out there!
IMO, working parents need to be more realistically accommodated for by employers. The system needs to change.

This doesn't really bother me at all, unless there is something demanding happening and they also don't help out then. Showing clearly that they dodging work.
I do not have kids, but I fully enjoy flexibility in my working hours and fully encourage everyone to do the same.
I know I'm most productive in 2-3hr stints, and much more productive after 11am than before. My colleagues know this and rarely will look for me, unless super urgent, before then. However they know if there is something going on that needs attention from 5pm onwards, I'll be around to take care of it.
Similarly I know I can count on my colleagues to take care of the morning stuff that crops up.
It's all about give-and-take.
I am so glad many more work places are recognising we are not all little worker drones who work 9-5 like clockwork. People being visible doesn't necessarily mean work, or productive work, is getting done.

Weird, I was just about to post about this when I saw this post. As a mum of a young baby who is about to go back to work (WFH), she is picking up so many sick bugs at nursery, and I'm getting sick with it too. Really worried about how to juggle looking after a constantly sick baby with work.

Just to give you an insight into my position, I really really want to pull my weight at work and to do a great job, but it's so scary to think of letting baby down too when she's sick. Sadly most companies don't seem to factor in real life situations of their staff - most mums need to work in order to pay for life, and I really think it should be down to companies or local laws to make some flexibility for this, since this is a societal reality

You'll need to report them to management if you want anything to change 🤷‍♂️

It should be against policy, but I agree it can be hard to manage (for example, it would take most managers a while to notice the 3.15 pattern)

although I have another adult in the home, my children are here when I wfh. They’re of an age (11/13) where I expect them to look after themselves and not interrupt me. That’s where I think a blanket “you can’t be-the main carer for children in the house” policy falls apart a bit.

that said if it has no impact it’s unlikely to ever be noticed.

if it were my team I would remind people in 121s that caring for children in work time isn’t allowed and they are expected to use childcare if their children are young.

that said, they obviously don’t have enough work or a big enough remit to be able to manage this?!

Having a primary aged child at home for 1.5 hours or less in the evening while working is fine for most people, children of that age are not toddlers and are perfectly able to get themselves a drink, a snack and entertain themselves for an hour.

I find it fascinating that people work in environments like this, where people just leave you be until it suits you. What sort of work do you do?

I do work a senior role in a fast paced environment but the idea of my stakeholders waiting around until I’m at my best is bonkers to me 😭

I worked from home for many years (2001 - 2010). There was a comprehensive WFH policy in place that included the requirement that childcare must be arranged to cover working hours.
It seems strange that companies are rolling out WFH & hybrid working, without such a comprehensive policy in place. I don’t think it’s appropriate to WFH & take care of children at the same time. One or other loses out.

I think covid really muddied the waters

Problem is the managers will all be at it too. I would say if you can't beat em, join em. Enjoy some slacking!

I find it hard to believe that it's as common and widespread as you say but hadn't been picked up at a higher level already. The only people who know what I have agreed within my work is my boss and her boss. It might looks like I work the standard 37 hours but I actually work less than that and work a proportion of the hours completely flexibly. You might think you're certain but there might be info you're not privy to.

I agree. When we continued hybrid working after covid we were asked if we had caring responsibilities, how we would deal with this while wfh. I had learned enough in covid that you can't do both full time, at the same time. Covid was a nightmare and it was really difficult to draw hard lines around your work time and home time.

You’re not being harsh on this. I’ve temped in central government and lots of staff do this and apparently make up the time outside work. I have no idea if they do do this but there are some definite skivers who’d log off at school pick up time then not log back on.

I hope this is monitored because those of us who don’t abuse wfh it gives us a bad name and means bosses trust wfh hybrid models less.