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My even more cynical take is that companies are finding employees are way more productive working from home. I think part of it could be that with COVID-19, a l

by allenu 6y ago

My even more cynical take is that companies are finding employees are way more productive working from home. I think part of it could be that with COVID-19, a lot of us are looking for an outlet for our energies, and so are working harder than normal.

kelnos 6y ago
With COVID-19 it depends on your family situation though. People without kids are probably working more, but people with kids (and who don't have a live-in nanny) are really struggling to juggle their work with child care. I imagine many people in that situation are less productive.
- allenu 6y ago
  Right, good point there. People without kids definitely have way more time and energy to devote to work than those with.
  - vageli 6y ago
    > Right, good point there. People without kids definitely have way more time and energy to devote to work than those with. Definitely? I have no kids and live with and fully support my father who had a brain tumor the size of a walnut in his head a couple years ago. Just because someone doesn't have kids doesn't mean they don't have responsibilities (goodness so many negatives in one sentence!).
    - mixmastamyk 6y ago
      Dependents is the more general word.
    - sizzle 6y ago
      I feel your pain, currently taking care of both parents I'm fortunate to still have around in mid 70's, one had a bad hemorrhagic stroke and is still recovering and can't walk, other has cancer and is completing chemo with a positive outlook after radiation. We have aides but with Covid-19, I am beyond paranoid they will infect my parents and send them to an early grave so I run this place like a high security compound and check temp and have a scrub in protocol I'm enforcing. I'm in my late 20's, no kids, no siblings. I feel blessed to have my parents around who had their mobility and independence snatched away from illness in the span of a year and I will never put them in a nursing home to die.
- caillancm 6y ago
  It doesn't depend only on your family situation. I am a PhD student working for the last 6 weeks from home without kids. And and also without a good income. I never expected my makeshift desk with the cheapest IKEA chair to become my work environment for 8+ hours per day, and I seriously worry about long-term injury resulting from this. This isn't meant to diminish the difficulties of people who need to look after their children. But I work in a laboratory where the senior people blithely complain about how hard it is to manage shared child-raring duties in a well-equipped home office, while junior employees are more or less expected to magically have a productive home office in a shared flats, often in less-than-ideal environment (e.g. with noisy room-mates or building sites next door), with RSI staring us down.
  - mixmastamyk 6y ago
    The second-hand market for office items might help.
0xffff2 6y ago
Maybe it's different for me because my organization is one of the last holdouts where everyone at least has there own assigned cubicle and many have full offices, but every single person in my team has complained about getting far less done than normal. Most of us had a tremendous amount of time and money invested in making our workspace productive, and it's very hard to replicate that at home.
- rightbyte 6y ago
  I think it is safe to say that a proper office is always best. It can be at home of course, but it need to be proper. (Desk, chair, shelf, door, flower). If my office was 10 min walk away I would not want to work at home, but it is 1h by car ...
Polylactic_acid 6y ago
Where I work we have been moving at 150% pace over the last month. I suspect its related to working from home not actually slowing anyone down and everyone not wanting to look like they are slacking while not in the office. Personally I have been starting work 40 minutes sooner than I normally do since it just takes me 40 less minutes to get to my desk.
intended 6y ago
The evidence is not in favor of long term WFH though. The evidence shows that WFH work creep is a thing - you get people who dont know how to turn off, and bosses who think they can get more out of you since you are a few feet away from your laptop. There is also a decrease in creativity and networking - evidence again shows that a good team has someone who is very tuned to the emotional and mental states of the people around them doing a lot of bridging. Finally - the people who work at office get more money over time, unless the firm takes active measures to combat these biases.

by allenu 6y ago

kelnos 6y ago

With COVID-19 it depends on your family situation though. People without kids are probably working more, but people with kids (and who don't have a live-in nanny) are really struggling to juggle their work with child care. I imagine many people in that situation are less productive.

allenu 6y ago
Right, good point there. People without kids definitely have way more time and energy to devote to work than those with.
- vageli 6y ago
  > Right, good point there. People without kids definitely have way more time and energy to devote to work than those with. Definitely? I have no kids and live with and fully support my father who had a brain tumor the size of a walnut in his head a couple years ago. Just because someone doesn't have kids doesn't mean they don't have responsibilities (goodness so many negatives in one sentence!).
  - mixmastamyk 6y ago
    Dependents is the more general word.
  - sizzle 6y ago
    I feel your pain, currently taking care of both parents I'm fortunate to still have around in mid 70's, one had a bad hemorrhagic stroke and is still recovering and can't walk, other has cancer and is completing chemo with a positive outlook after radiation. We have aides but with Covid-19, I am beyond paranoid they will infect my parents and send them to an early grave so I run this place like a high security compound and check temp and have a scrub in protocol I'm enforcing. I'm in my late 20's, no kids, no siblings. I feel blessed to have my parents around who had their mobility and independence snatched away from illness in the span of a year and I will never put them in a nursing home to die.
caillancm 6y ago
It doesn't depend only on your family situation. I am a PhD student working for the last 6 weeks from home without kids. And and also without a good income. I never expected my makeshift desk with the cheapest IKEA chair to become my work environment for 8+ hours per day, and I seriously worry about long-term injury resulting from this. This isn't meant to diminish the difficulties of people who need to look after their children. But I work in a laboratory where the senior people blithely complain about how hard it is to manage shared child-raring duties in a well-equipped home office, while junior employees are more or less expected to magically have a productive home office in a shared flats, often in less-than-ideal environment (e.g. with noisy room-mates or building sites next door), with RSI staring us down.
- mixmastamyk 6y ago
  The second-hand market for office items might help.

0xffff2 6y ago

Maybe it's different for me because my organization is one of the last holdouts where everyone at least has there own assigned cubicle and many have full offices, but every single person in my team has complained about getting far less done than normal. Most of us had a tremendous amount of time and money invested in making our workspace productive, and it's very hard to replicate that at home.

rightbyte 6y ago
I think it is safe to say that a proper office is always best. It can be at home of course, but it need to be proper. (Desk, chair, shelf, door, flower). If my office was 10 min walk away I would not want to work at home, but it is 1h by car ...

Polylactic_acid 6y ago

Where I work we have been moving at 150% pace over the last month. I suspect its related to working from home not actually slowing anyone down and everyone not wanting to look like they are slacking while not in the office. Personally I have been starting work 40 minutes sooner than I normally do since it just takes me 40 less minutes to get to my desk.

intended 6y ago

The evidence is not in favor of long term WFH though. The evidence shows that WFH work creep is a thing - you get people who dont know how to turn off, and bosses who think they can get more out of you since you are a few feet away from your laptop. There is also a decrease in creativity and networking - evidence again shows that a good team has someone who is very tuned to the emotional and mental states of the people around them doing a lot of bridging. Finally - the people who work at office get more money over time, unless the firm takes active measures to combat these biases.