Work from home if you can should stay in place, surely?

[Ninefeettall]

Just thinking about June 21st and Boris said as recently as yesterday or the day before that 'Work from home if you can' will be scrapped from 21 June. Surely if the Indian variant is a problem (which we don't know for sure yet) then this is a really, really, really easy win? 'If you can' doesn't have to include people who need to be in the office for mental health reasons or who can't work properly from home, but there are vast numbers of young, unvaccinated or partially vaccinated office workers who have now been working from home for a year, doing their jobs perfectly well if not better who could just keep doing that and not add to the commuters or office workers spreading the variant about.

Firstly, the coffee chains are staffed mostly by young Europeans in London. Many of them returned to their home counties due to the pandemic and Brexit. But it's nice you care about their livelihoods.

The UK is not London. You don’t give a shit about the livelihoods of people outside London who worked in city centre or transport hub coffee chains then? Most of them were not from the EU. Not where I live.

But maybe one day you might have an electrician popping by to fix something, and want to WFH for one day. Or maybe one day you will be living somewhere you can WFH in a nice environment, and you might want to WFH for a few days a month?

We've always been able to work from home for a day if necessary and for me it's not a big deal as DH is semi retired (I obviously know that doesn't apply to everyone!). We can't afford to move unless it's right out of the area so that won't be happening. We live in a stupidly expensive area so can't move around here as the next step up would be double what our flat is worth!

Also working from home for the odd day because someone is coming round isn't comparable. I would work on my laptop and wouldn't need a full office set up like I do now.

I wonder if public transport companies will finally collapse

Almost certainly. Or tax payers will end up propping them up longer term, like they are now.

But that’s ok. Why give a shit about all those bus drivers who will lose their jobs when me wfh means I can pop a wash on in the middle of the day. And who cares about all those key workers who can’t get to work, as long as I can do the school run on the company’s time

The more of these threads I read the more convinced I am that those who enjoy full time wfh really are at the selfish and lazy end of society.

I’m not sure everybody who is working from home are doing a better job than being in the office.

When you contact companies it’s constant excuses that they are not enough staff and so on. People get distracted at home also.. however it it keeps COVID under better control I agree people should be allowed to WFH for longer.

[quote TheKeatingFive]But we really need to sit back and think, is a split WFH/Office the worst thing?

In theory, no.

In reality, it’s unlikely to hold together for any length of time.

This article was posted on here the other day and it’s so predictable how this is going to play out.

on.ft.com/3b5lplP[/quote]
Well indeed. I would be happy with a WFH/office split to some degree but I can’t fathom how it’s actually going to work without being an inevitable mess.

I suspect the only employers who make it work will be doing it with some kind of ‘core office days’ expectation, in the same way that flexible working tends to expect core hours. And then you’d have lots of the disadvantages with few of the benefits, so…

Tbh if I was a cafe owner in a City centre, I'd be looking at a different business model and adapt to the changing times. Lots of wfh workers are still ordering lunch (OH does deliveries).
Most companies where I live are planning a permanent hybrid return to work, so a mix of wfh and a 'covid secure' office.

@AIMummy

Tbh if I was a cafe owner in a City centre, I'd be looking at a different business model and adapt to the changing times. Lots of wfh workers are still ordering lunch (OH does deliveries). Most companies where I live are planning a permanent hybrid return to work, so a mix of wfh and a 'covid secure' office.

Excellent. An economy based around well off people working from home and people who can't stay at home bringing them things.

Can't see any issues with that.

@Lillipops

...all the bigwigs have decided that working from home is more productive.

No they haven't.

@SofiaMichelle they have in the company I work for.

Have none of you got teenagers, have you seen what this shit is doing to their mental and physical health?

My teenage brother, who has been mercilessly bullied at school, loved the school closures. We withdrew him and home educate him now and he's thriving.

@Watapalava why is WFH lazy? I do exactly the same job and exactly the same hours
The only difference is I don't drive 3 miles to work

It should be down to the bosses of the individual businesses. Only they know if things work with employees wfh. My employer has given us the option - I’ve chosen to carry on wfh permanently, but others have said they prefer to be in the office, so we have a good balance. But it won’t work for some businesses. It’s not fair to impose a blanket rule on all businesses.

In no sense at all has ‘WFH if you can’ been ‘totally free’ or an ‘easy win’ and you must be living in an absolute bubble if you think that.

City centres are still very empty, more shops and cafes shut every day, and that’s before you even get on to transport.

I run a large team working in a city centre office and I can assure you that 14 months of everyone WFH has not been ‘free’ in any sense. We have more people signed off sick with mental health issues than ever before, new starters are struggling to learn their jobs remotely, young people are miserable and working off their beds in crappy flatshares.

Mumsnet really is not reflective of the world - and I say that as someone working in a very middle class industry!

Wfh isn’t a lazy option. Most employees have targets on work they need to complete, and if they hit those targets, then obviously their productivity is the same as if they work in the office. I don’t think employers would just leave workers at home to formulate their own targets/schedules.

Enough with the hysteria. Should the government also bail out Debenhams forever so that no one loses their job ever? Sure, I'm callous, selfish, DERANGED because I don't want to needlessly commute for over 40h every month to keep the status quo and satisfy Saints like you.

[quote Lillipops]@SofiaMichelle they have in the company I work for.[/quote]
I didn't read your post as referring only to your employer, but fair enough.

Out of my clients (FTSE 100 and 250 companies) at least 50% are looking to get people back in, as soon as possible, because of collaboration hurdles and the lost 'casual but key' conversations which are so important for innovation and discovery.

I think most people who want to continue to wfh do so because it benefits their lifestyles and theres nothing wrong with that but let's not make out they want to continue to do it out of some sacrifice to save the community from covid.

You want to wfh because it benefits you mostly and those who don't want to wfh also because of the benefits to them mostly to work out the home

I run a large team working in a city centre office and I can assure you that 14 months of everyone WFH has not been ‘free’ in any sense. We have more people signed off sick with mental health issues than ever before, new starters are struggling to learn their jobs remotely, young people are miserable and working off their beds in crappy flatshares.

Yes, this is my experience too. Some of my colleagues love it, some are absolutely sick to death of it and really struggling in all sorts of ways.

Not everyone has a lovely big house and a garden office and a nearby village high street full of small local businesses they can potter along to on their lunch break, and an established career where they don’t need to learn on the job and get by fine with no in-person contact. And not everyone suits working from home, even if they do have all these things.

It'll be so nice to see everyone back in the House of Commons. I'm surprised they're not already in place given the low, low risks reported by the Government

Completely agree. My boss keeps on at us to go in. I’m not. I’ve worked really hard at home which he seems to have unnoticed.

@DumplingsAndStew

It'll be so nice to see everyone back in the House of Commons. I'm surprised they're not already in place given the low, low risks reported by the Government

There’s MPs there every day. And a ton of parliamentary staff who work behind the scenes.

"young people are miserable and working off their beds in crappy flatshares." so the solution to young people in crappy accommodation is forcing everyone to work from city centres full time? Brilliant young people should get used to it, much as old people got used to their god given right to rising property prices, holiday homes and rental incomes from exploiting young people.

I’m speaking on behalf of all nannies out there with bosses working from home... we bloody wish they would go back to the office!!!!

I posted this on another thread, but the currently-affected Indian variant areas are not full of people able to wfh in isolation. They are doing the sort of jobs which enable others to stay at home.

Agree wholeheartedly that wfh suits some people down to the ground. Own it and don’t pretend you are making a sacrifice .