To finally be over the office?

[Rainbowstarssunlight]

Since Covid, I have never really properly been back to the office. I worked from home for a long time and then after getting made redundant I started consulting so was completely remote. I did sometimes I attend the offices of the companies I was consulting for, usually if I was giving a presentation or attending a specific meeting.

6 months ago I got a full time job at a new company. They mandate office attendance on Tuesday and Wednesday every week. The idea is that if everybody is in on the same days you can collaborate in person.

Going to the office only two days a week is also ideal for me as it saves me commuting time on the other days and makes it easier with managing childcare.

The thing I’ve noticed though is that the office days are treated exactly the same as the non-office days. All meetings are still on Teams regardless of whether the people on the meeting are in the same building or not. This problem is exacerbated by the lack of meeting rooms but also I think people have become so used to teams they find it easier then wasting time moving between floors and trying to find colleagues. I regularly sit on Teams calls where people adjacent to me are also on the call and we have to keep muting ourselves the whole time to avoid feedback.

I sit in a room with my immediate team, so about 10 desks and often they are the only people I speak to on office days. There are no cross functional meetings held on these days.

I don’t really mind going to the office, particularly there is good shopping nearby 😆 but it seems pointless when the company just seems to behave as if it is entirely remote.

I was always keen on in person collaboration. I missed it when Covid came. But now, six years on, I feel like working practices have changed so much that we might as well just accept that.

When my fixed term contract ends I’m thinking I’ll look for something entirely remote which I never thought I’d say!

Has anyone else had this experience in their workplace? I wonder if this is something cultural with this specific employer or whether it’s something more general that’s happening across a lot of companies?

my work place is global (like truly global) so you'd always need a zoom bridge for any meeting because invariably there is at least one meeting attendee based in a different country. Nonr of my team are based in thr UK.

So while that does change it a bit from your workplace I do agree. I go all the way into london to speak to people on zoom in different countries.

When it is time to go home, North America is just hotting up and I suddnely get really busy.... except I now have to sit on a long train journey saying "sorry no signal can it wait until tomorrow" 🤡

That sounds even more pointless than my situation!

All our team meetings are on Teams too -- although our working-in-the-office days are not set like yours so some people may be in the office, others not.

Using Teams makes certain things easier (sharing information and images without the need to print stuff out).

I’m fine with it now (we started having online meetings during Covid).

I WFH for 2yrs during & after COVID but then my company started insisting on a phased return (1-day a week to start with, then 2 etc).
It was completely pointless with some people being exempt due to "issues" plus some people preferring to be in mid-week while others the start/end of the week. Most of the time I would go in and find I was the only person in the whole office.
Completely pointless.

Yanbu. I work 5 days a week in the office because my job really cannot be done from home. But dh does three days in the office and finds the same thing - it's all on teams anyway!

I think he quite enjoys the staff canteen and air conditioning though

That sounds like very poor management. I think hybrid working is great, best of both worlds. But the way your employer is managing it makes it a pointless tick box.

I’m similar to @Nourishinghandcream with people in on random days but we also work in project teams with colleagues from different offices across the UK.

I find it irritating when there are several people nearby on different teams meetings who don’t use headphones so you get to hear everyone’s contributions, plus they always seem to be the ones who have no volume control when they are speaking and they are the ones who spend all bloody day having meetings.

I’ve also realised that I find it quite stressful being around people all day. I suppose I just got on with it before COVID but now I have experienced wfh, I’d much rather do that most of the time.

The only advantage I can see, is that I do a much shorter day on an office day. Like PP I find it quite stressful being around people all day, particularly with endless teams calls going on the whole time. My job is quite cerebral so I have to put headphones on with loud music to drown it out.

By the end of an office day, I’m much more drained. By the time I’ve done the commute home, I really don’t feel like opening the laptop again so often I don’t.

Same here. My job needs a very high level of concentration and the distractions in the office are significant so I have a pair of noise cancelling headphones.

My office days are much longer than WFH days and it’s difficult not to spend time chatting when in the office. My productivity/concentration at home is higher.

Yes i find it much the same. I do actually enjoy going into the office twice a week but it's really just for a change of scenery, air con when it's hot, legs feel the benefit of walking to and from the station and like another poster I often end up with a shorter working day because I get in, get down to it and go again. (If I'm at home I'll have breaks to put washing on, do a workout, have lunch in garden etc. I'm not a skiver, so I often then work past 8pm but I can't seem to motivate myself to replicate the "office day".) I wouldn't want to be fully remote for those reasons. I get cabin fever! And I really love London!

BUT despite those benefits, it seems pretty pointless otherwise. People do different office days plus I have my own office and am busy so I often find I'm shut in my box, head down and don't really see or speak to anyone all day, except on teams for pre arranged meetings).

The board has just introduced a 3 day a week policy, citing productivity, collaboration and support for junior colleagues. None of that relates to me but it is imposed across the board so people who really do need to be in can't say "it's not fair" which i get. But it does seem pointless for me and expensive. A peak day travel ticket for me is nearly £80! Luckily I've managed to negotiate a flexible working adjustment as i have a lot of medical appointments, to 50% (3 days and 2 days on alternate weeks) which I can spread across one weekly travel card. Hey ho.

I think the thing is that working from the same place as your colleagues (at least some of the time) is so much more than having meetings off Teams. It depends a lot on the company and it's culture, but where I work it's things like:

Having lunch with colleagues to build more human relationships.

The occasional last minute after work social!

Noticing that a person seems fine on calls but a bit flat otherwise, and being able to check in with whether they are ok or need support (I've been on both sides of this one).

New starters being able to get a feel for the culture of the company they've joined and make some connections.

People feeling part of something bigger and not so isolated.

And on and on! Like I say, it doesn't depend on the company and its culture, but i do think it's wider than just time on Teams etc.

My office days are purely to satisfy the die hard bums on seats brigade in the team. I go in and chat on teams while sitting next to others doing the same. Occasionally I see someone interesting but as we multiple offices it’s unpredictable who will be where when.

I find going in and sitting at a hot desk (so not “my” desk) feels more isolating than when we’re all on teams. But then I’m not after friendships at work - been stung too many times with that one.

I may be in the minority but I think the idle chit chat that comes from being in the office is so important! Let’s say I have a difficult meeting/call with a client, when I finish the call I probably immediately say to my colleague at the next desk phew glad that’s over, what a pain the client was … sometimes it develops into more of a chat about the client and why it was difficult and they have helpful observations, sometimes it’s just blowing off steam and having a friendly face to sympathise. If that call happens when I’m wfh, I wouldn’t call a colleague just to have a moan … so I miss out on that. Similarly my junior team members don’t get to see that it’s ok, everyone has difficult calls, here’s how to deal with them.

My company’s policy is 3 days in the office and 2 from home and for me that’s the perfect balance.

I hear you, we had to do two days, Tuesday and Thursday, so annoying, then one day just Wednesday, it was nice seeing everyone, but our productivity dropped because we were distracted, we now go in once a month, but the office is open and we can go in all week if we wanted too.

Can you try to book a meeting room and encourage your peers to be there in person if they are in the same building.
Also use the town centre when your there ( if possible).
And concentrate on work that takes less time, ie emails etc. I GET IT.

Presumably the meetings they had before COVID were in person? So why don't they go back to that if you're all in the same building? Why hasn't someone said 'this is stupid' lets talk to each other directly like normal people?

I think some employers gave up some of their office space and moved to hot desking to reduce overheads - Covid massively accelerated this. As a consequence there are hardly any meeting rooms.

That's understandable - people get different things (positive and negative!) out of their environment.

I would say on your second point though, there is a wide gulf between "people i only talk to when there is a specific thing we are obliged to have a Teams meeting about" and "friends", and for me a lot of my colleagues fall into that gap. For a lot of companies and industries, having a bit of a network can make life a lot easier, and those human connections in real life go a long way in that regard (where I am at least).

Exactly! I think it’s because they just isn’t enough meeting room space and it all gets booked up weeks in advance by senior leadership.

The rest of the company hot desks and we are the only ones with fixed desks. This is nice as I can leave my charger there, but it means you’d never find a colleague to have a quick chat in the office even if you wanted to!

Also, some people I don’t recognise in real life. I’ve had a couple of really awkward encounters where I’ve walked past somebody, thought I might know them but not been able to place them.

I absolutely get that but with no consistency re who is in the office it’s much harder to make those connections.

Exactly like this in my job. I’m supposed to go in once a week but avoid it like the plague because i spend most of the time on Teams calls. Then, when I’m not on a Teams call, other people are so there’s no-one to network with. Plenty of times, I’ve been in and the only face to face contact with my team has been the usual morning pleasantries, then it’s back to Teams, even if they’re sat next to me.

Someone on a town hall meeting tried to use the argument that not enough meeting rooms was a reason not to come to the office when twice a week came along.

Director pointed out they are plenty available on Fridays!

But if I came to the office on a Friday I’d be the only person there!