Wfh - they can dictate when surely?

[ahemfem]

I have a manger who I think has been a bit too forgiving of things and now has put their foot down.

They've said right, you're meant to come in the office 50% of the time and you aren't. (To everyone) so now they've said I want you all in on Monday and Friday and pick one other day a fortnight that you want to come in. I think that's really fair but there's other people kicking RIGHT OFF and complaining. Am I right in thinking that even if the policy just says 50% of time in the office the manager is still able to dictate when that is? They've given a month's notice too which seems more than fair.

And why hasn’t her manager been managing that? Remote working is not exactly new - many of us have been doing that for years when we’ve been working with colleagues across the country or beyond. Our managers (and those of us who manage in turn) put structures and procedures in place that enables this - we can manage our teams without them sitting in front of us.

11? Nobody needs 2-2.5 hours for the morning school run but only 40 mins for the afternoon one.

Tbf that’s one person. Others it’s nearer 10

problem is that on office days they also do the school run so one does 11-2 in the office and others get in earlier but still an early leave

should add for a few their kids school is a 45 min bus ride and then they have to get home/to office so it does add up

Quite.
We have about 6 days a year when we all need to be in the office together (3 full day and 3 half days) which are in the calendar a year in advance.
We also have a weekly team meeting in the diary (it isn't always needed, and now and then gets cancelled if nothing is needed) but we can all be wherever we want to be for that as it is on Teams, where (again, like adults) we all have our cameras on and talk to one another as needed.
The rest of the time most of us don't need to speak en-masse to other colleagues, and, when we do need to get together with someone, we arrange to do so - which might be F2F (not necessarily in the office) - or might be on-line. But sorted out via diaries with the person or people you need to see.

also, it’s very hard to fit all our calls into 11-2.30
id much prefer they enforced core hours - say 10-4 - so there’s still some flexibility but we are all in at the same time for a good chunk of the day

Can you not understand that different people work in completely different jobs, and lots of people do not spend their working life on calls ?

Plenty of people have plenty of chances, you could try and manage people out for being lazy fuckers but as an employer it's tricky unless you've exhausted all options- going into office could well be one of the options to try before being confident in firing them for being useless.

Can you not understand that different people work in completely different jobs, and lots of people do not spend their working life on calls ?

Can you not understand that different people work in completely different jobs and even if they don’t spend their working life on calls they do need to spend good amounts of time collaborating with others, maybe who work in different time zones? Shock news, different jobs have different constraints on when people need to be available.

Most roles have pretty efficient ways to monitor output even if it’s via technology. For me and many others you’re either hitting your figures or your not. Even call centre type roles can generally see how long someone is spending on the phone and there’s lots of case management software that can time record in the background.

Well you are reiterating my point.

Some people need to collaborate, others don't, or do only as a small part of their role.

For those working with people in other time zones, it makes even less sense to try to impose a set time that they work. One of my friends has meetings with colleagues in America sometimes. Because she is trusted to do her job - and does it well - she is trusted to do the hours she needs to do, as and when she needs to do them. Which, for most of her work with American colleagues, means she will often do a meeting during the evening and will therefore not necessarily be at her desk 9 - 5 Mon - Fri. 'in lieu'. Because that wouldn't suit the role she has.

@SunQueen24 definitely
We have a board that shows how long you've been on a call/on lunch/in personal time (drink/toilet)
Screens are recorded, audio and visual
Log in and log out times are monitored, 9.01am is late...

Online presenteeism is just as hideous and toxic as in person presenteeism.

I simply would not be willing to work for an employer who behaved this way.

Awful.

Facilities Manager here - our policy is minimum 2 days in the office - we have a hybrid working policy - and staff across the globe know we get monthly reports of check-ins from sites that have key fob/swipe card access. Just do as you're told as the slackers will soon get filtered out.

@MinervaMcGonagallsCat it's not that bad
My job is to be present so it's not fair if people are late all the time. I'm not paid for what I do, I'm paid to be available
We have SLAs to meet and customers need the phones to be manned
If you were in the office and got stuck in traffic or had a nightmare morning it's fine but persistent lateness would be an issue

They are managing it…by having people come into the office so they can be monitored more easily.

Why do people need to be managed to not steal a living?

you can obviously pay all your bills so why do you work in the first instance?

To keep my independence should me and DH spilt up.
To keep my skillset relevant and up to date should I want/need to return to work.

Ive often toyed with being a SAHM, but ultimately I want to have the ability to support myself. But if it became unworkable for me to work, I’d have to stay at home.

They’re not though, are they. If they were then they wouldn’t need to be in the office on 2 set days each week. Read my post.

I have no option to WFH as I’m in education so the whole concept is baffling to me.

Really? I’ve never done shift work, but I understand how it works. It certainly doesn’t “baffle” me just because I don’t do it myself.

as for the saving money aspect, I firmly believe that if you choose to Wfh your salary should reflect this, especially for those jobs with London weighting or commuting costs considered. Why should you profit in this way?

This is a load of forelock-tugging shit. You actually want people to give back a chunk of their salary because they get the “privilege” of not spending a fortune on commuting?

I get paid the salary I do because I’m worth it. What I spend it on isn’t my employer’s concern. Why on earth should I accept a lower salary because my living expenses have changed?

This is how they've chosen to manage it

And if they had been a more effective manager they would have been able to manage their remote staff properly before it got to this stage.

Not really my place to say though is it. I just do what I'm told!

as for the saving money aspect, I firmly believe that if you choose to Wfh your salary should reflect this, especially for those jobs with London weighting or commuting costs considered. Why should you profit in this way?

But this is ridiculous. I used to live a 3 minute walk from where I used to work - should my salary have been lower because I didn't have commuting costs?

as for the saving money aspect, I firmly believe that if you choose to Wfh your salary should reflect this, especially for those jobs with London weighting or commuting costs considered. Why should you profit in this way?

Well, since covid forced most employees working for my employer to wfh, the employer has closed the two huge offices they used to have in the City Centre where thousands of people worked.
Saving rent (or mortgage?) rates, cleaners, supplies such as toilet paper and soap, paying cleaners, cleaning materials, security, heating costs, lighting, water rates, internet, printing costs, rubbish removal, as well as wear and tear on carpets and furnishings.
It would be great news if our salaries reflected the massive savings our employers are now making, whilst everyone is paying to heat their own homes during the day, which used to be empty. I don't think all the cost saving is by employees.

So if someone wasn't meeting them you think it's better management to sack them than to try different things to get them.up to speed? Crazy work. This also sounds absolutely hideous, beyond micro management. Some people really would rather this than to go into office a few days a week? Sad and a hit pathetic really.

I’m just making the point that if someone is slacking there’s various ways to measure performance that don’t involve watching them work.

If your job doesn’t measure performance in some tangible way then how on earth can an employer know someone’s value? If they can slack off and nobody notice they’re a waste of resource anyway.

I don’t think the better option is to ostracise your entire workforce to attempt to performance manage a minority. Deal with the slackers if that’s the issue, don’t punish everyone and tar them all with the same brush.

This lacks quite a bit of imagination, do you think all corporate jobs have hourly, daily tangible outputs that can be easily measured in this way? Many have sustained projects, portfolios etc where it does become evident someone's not working, but perhaps not until it reaches a milestone. Having someone having to check in regularly probably takes more time than is reasonable. Most adults play fair. Same with going into the office, if they've asked people in a few days a week of their choosing and people can't be bothered then mandating 2 days a week is fine.