is there such a thing as a work bubble?

[Tomatoesneedtoripen]

some of my colleagues talk about it
my initial thought was that is not a bubble i want

i understand schools have bubbles,
people have support bubbles
but a work bubble is a nonsense.
six in an office, all go off sick together? how is that sensible?
how can i tell them they are wrong/if they are wrong?

I am not sure it's a thing...but a few people at my work have somehow used it to justify all going and getting drunk together at house parties! I'm not comfortable with it at all!

I presume they are thinking that if they are allowed to spend 8 hours a day breathing in each others germs in one room, then continuing to breathe each other’s germs for 2 hours in a pub is no biggie.

Not officially, but it does make sense to think about in terms of workforce planning. If some colleagues unavoidably have to come within 2 meters (for example to enable moving bulky objects or provide personal care to others) it makes sense for each person to always perform such tasks with the same other person so that only 2 people would be required to self isolate if someone tested positive. Similarly it makes sense for takeaways and similar businesses to split their staff into separate teams that never work on the same shift in order to protect from the whole workforce having to isolate.

so a bubble of 2 effectively, not a whole work force bubble?

I think I've read where basically the staff are on rota for coming into the office and no one overlaps days so if anyone goes down it's just that part of the team in that bubble and hopefully the remaining team members are healthy to keep the business going

There isn't a technical definition unless it's teachers in schools. It can be useful as a concept for planning though. Team bubbles where there is a rotation so only red / green / blue team can be in the office on any given day. I heard the head at a local school describing the admin staff as "in their own bubble, so nobody else may go into that room" (they hold staff meetings in the playground) which sounded like a useful way of describing the concept.