Where can I find a very traditional office environment?

[FloorWipes]

I used to love my job but I’m about to lose it with our hybrid flexible system and everyone doing their own thing and some people taking the p. Fine for them, live your best life, whatever, but absolutely not working for me on any level and I am so so over it. I want a traditional 9 to 5 where we all come in and everyone has their own desk. What industry is my best bet for that in 2023?

Sorry, the only people I physically see in their office every day when I walk past are estate agents. You could also try a hospital admin/managerial role? My MIL works in a private hospital dealing with complaints and she goes there every day.

I work in utilities both both companies i’ve worked for all WFH most of the time. As well as flexibility, it’s half because they can sell off offices, and also because there has been a recruitment crisis, so they’ve found it useful to get candidates who live further away.

Honestly there is no remedy I don't think. We need fewer "systems" in place and people just actually speaking to one another. Verbally passing stuff on evidently works better in some ways otherwise it wouldn't happen and it makes sense that it does happen as these aren't the sorts of things to go in emails. I do not need another bloody calendar to check. Sorry. But it's just this is the logic that's killing it all! Bah!

It might not suit you but I am so glad I don't have to be in the office 5 days a week but yet still manage to communicate directly with people (phone calls, group calls, group calendars) and get the work done etc. Definitely don't want to go back to the 90s!

It does suit some of us though, WFH is my idea of hell, I love going to work.

I'd go to an agency or a headhunter and say you want 100% office based in a team the same. They'll probably bite your hand off.

My son is working FT in a brand and communications agency. All designers and account managers work 5 days a week in the office. All other similar employers where he worked for in the last 12 monts during his interships were hybrid. You just have to keep looking.

I know you disagree, but that really does sound like an issue of poor management and processes to me.

Email for paper trail stuff that's important, Teams messages for quick questions/info sharing, ruthlessly enforced file/calendar/CRM sharing for storing information and documents, and meetings that have a point and proper outcomes. It's made us far more efficient, and I've not seen my entire team in person altogether since May.

love love love wfh and or hybrid working sounds like you need better communications set up
Never ever do I want to go back to those out of the ark office environment days just plain awful micromanaging etc etc thank goodness it's all behind us now. This is the way forward wether we like it or not. In all honesty I could have worked from home years ago if we were not all stuck in the dinosaur age. It took the pandemic to change things for the better. I work for HMRC and we are either hybrid workers and go in 2 days a week or contractual home workers.
At 54 it is just an absolute blessing for me and many many others. It is beyond tiring to commute into work 5 days a week and I kniw for a fact if it had stayed like that many would have retired by now instead they are retaining their experienced staff and staff are very rarely I'll unlike before as not picking up.any germs
In fact everyone's sick records are exemplary
We communicate through teams phone clients through teams etc training through teams. It all works really well

why on earth would you want to go back to those awful dinosaur type days no thank you

NHS support services such as finance, HR, procurement, estates.
I work in estates, its hybrid but expectation of 3 days in.
I'm like you I hate wfh.

I'm at a large London University too. We've been hotdeskung with everyone encouraged to work a 9 day fortnight for 8 years. During covid we were entirely WFH for 18 months and now we come in just one day a week.

Fine for you. I don’t want to live like that though.

Legal. You could go in every day 9-5 and they’d love you! Well the Partners would. They themselves would still work hybrid. But they’d love it if their underlings came in.

The OP asked for ideas, not to have their mind changed. Totally get it OP. I much prefer going out to work after wfh for many years.

@FloorWipes the way you describe your current role, it doesn't seem as if you use any ICT (collaborative technology such as MS Teams) for information sharing, file storage and discussion, Co-creation of documents etc - that may be because your employer doesn't have them, or you don't like to use them.

You'll struggle in most industries if you don't get with the times and have some flexibility in your mindset. You've got two degrees, more than most, you're limiting your career prospects by not being willing to consider hybrid as a compromise solution with good use of technology to keep connected and getting others to play their part rather than you doing all the heavy lifting to disseminate key information.

Manufacturing seems one of the few industries not to have adopted hybrid so much, admin in thr offices of a manufacturer would be my recommendation.

This way of working is my worst nightmare but each to their own!

Its not really about the industry unless you want to work client facing in a shop or such.

You need to look for a small company with old fashioned views tbh, I work in the Construction industry sprucing up offices and moves to hot desking and reducing office size are happening in all sectors.

Ideas? In other words telling the OP to work in a NMW job because all the best paid jobs, with good working conditions get snapped up by people who are willing to be more flexible and get with the times. Right.

for that matter let's all go back to the days when women were tied to a desk, making tea for the menz and typing their correspondence for them as the only way of making a living. The modern workplace including the influence of technology is here, so it isn't a question of trying to change their mind rather it's pointing out the obvious, and that they'll struggle to find a job that'll give them the 5 days a week bum-on-seat experience they want with good career prospects, it's just not available. The culture has shifted massively.

I'm a civil servant in a client facing role. We are mostly office based with just a day or two a week at home for catching up on admin/training etc. Some staff choose to work ft from the office but it is definitely not traditional office environment as we have hot desking and the office can be very busy with different grades and roles all over the place.

I do understand where you're coming from OP.
I'm also a civil servant and expected in the office twice a week, but that feels like the worst of both worlds. I regularly wonder when the policy will be publicly called out for being so ineffective.

My office is absolutely massive, but no one else from my team are based there, so I don't know anyone. So I trudge in twice a week, usually sit alone on a bank of desks and don't speak to anyone all day. I simply sit on the same Teams meetings I would've at home. No attending with any purpose, no face to face meeting when I'm in.

If this is the 'new way of working', I'd so much rather they scrapped the lonely and pointless policy, and had less expensive office space , but spent the money on getting teams together for a few concentrated days every couple of months. Would keep things fresh and exciting, reconnect teams to eachother and their work.

But that would never happen, as people have become entitled and used to having their work expectations come second to their dog's defecation schedule or their kids' after school clubs.

But that would never happen, as people have become entitled and used to having their work expectations come second to their dog's defecation schedule or their kids' after school clubs.

Im also a Civil Servant and I value the degree of autonomy and trust I get in my job. I wfh and am in the office 2 or 3 days a week. My team also have the same autonomy and they do their job and log their hours on the flexi system so if they walk the dog or do the school run, they still get their hours done but are treated like adults with adult responsibilities, not micromanaged.

Flexibility doesn't affect commitment because they show up at meetings during core hours and don't take the P. I'd suggest if people are not meeting work expectations that's a line manager problem for not laying out the expectations and performance requirements.

Education (from 5-21 so look at colleges and unis as well as schools), healthcare (private and nhs), receptionists as they normally have to be on site.

I'm in HE in Scotland (finance)
Hybrid working here too. There are some people in the office 5 days a week, but it is 5 out 45. The rest is in the office 2 days a week and it causes a great grief is anyone is asked to come in for an extra day.
We have our own desks so that's a plus.
There is some flexibility for working hrs, you can start and finish early but we are expected to be at work during the core office hrs, so no really a change to working pattern there

Schools for sure. All the teachers and pupils have to be on site, so pretty much all the support team are too. Some flex in the holidays (for staff who work all year round) but it's definitely a traditional/less flexible sector to work in.

I think being frustrated by other people’s working patterns and flexibility is something you’d have to overcome in your own mind if you want an employer. It’s very unlikely you’re going to find a job that suits you (as opposed to the NMW on-site ones) where everybody else has your same mindset - flexibility for employees is built into the law to some extent now, into the cultural expectations and budgets of organisations and employees much more so, so you can’t really guarantee a David Brent-style office situation where everyone is in the same place for the same hours five days a week without changing. It sounds like you have quite specific skills - could you start your own business? That obviously brings its own uncertainty but it might save you from the frustrations of colleagues.