Remote working preferences (in the longer term)

[Mathew S]

I put about half the time. But, commuting by train is a problem, when it comes to part-time home working. If I travel three days a week, it's cheaper to buy a season ticket, and if I've got a season ticket then I may as well work in the office.

More flexibility in paying for my commuting (e.g. part-time season tickets, pay as you go, etc.) would make me much more likely to work from home more.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Or just reduce the price of Anytime (Day) Returns on commuter flows? They are not used by that many people at present so I reckon you wouldn't take too much of a bite out of revenue if you did.

There's also a fair case for Off Peak all day on Fridays on commuter flows, it's decidedly quiet.

 

[Puffing Devil]

I've been home-based for nearly 30 years, though it's balanced with a chunk of business travel for meetings and events. I'm now 100% home-based, though expect to be back travelling again as restrictions are lifted.

 

[Meerkat]

Prove they aren't sitting on the sofa, though...I am today for a change of scene!

Come on, you know H&S! As long as they have those boxes ticked showing that you COULD do it properly, and have watched the video telling you how,they sit back contented!

 

[Bletchleyite]

Come on, you know H&S! As long as they have those boxes ticked showing that you COULD do it properly, and have watched the video telling you how,they sit back contented!

Exactly. You take a picture of the desk your partner sits at, then you sit on the sofa

 

[bussnapperwm]

In normal times my department couldn't work from home - we have to take payments from the public for card/cash/cheque, deal with face to face enquireys and we discuss cases with each other whilst dealing with telephone contact from customers.

Plus we deal with controlled stationary.

 

[westv]

My spreadsheet now shows I will have saved £1,352 in travelling expenses as at 7/5/19 by working from home during the "lockdown".

 

[Cowley]

My spreadsheet now shows I will have saved £1,352 in travelling expenses as at 7/5/19 by working from home during the "lockdown".

What job do you do @westv?

 

[westv]

What job do you do @westv?

The wonderful world of reinsurance.

 

[Cowley]

The wonderful world of reinsurance.

Ah ok (Googles ‘Reinsurance’...).

 

[johnnychips]

I like to keep work and home separate. Home is my time and my space.

Exactly. I would rather get up early at about 0600 and arrive at my college at 0720, do lots of work before my colleagues arrive before they distract me; then after the kids have gone home, work till 1730. I detest bringing work home.

 

[leightonbd]

I like to keep work and home separate. Home is my time and my space.

I’m a big fan of that attitude. I can and do work at home but I much prefer being able to leave it behind and tune out while on the bus or walking home.

I voted ‘go in one day a week’ and also ‘roughly half’. Two days feels about right for me, in my line of work. I do think many office-based people, certainly those in teams and leading teams, need to have time together periodically. Junior staff benefit from clear guidance/ direction and a more open discussion with their director, and advisory clients deserve time with their adviser when the stakes are high, to be sure (for example) they fully understand their options. I’m not saying you can’t replicate most of that on the phone or by VC, most of the time, but you can’t, IMO, do it for ever without the service quality being threatened.

However ... even when we get into un-lockdown 1.0 I suspect the approach will remain ‘if you can work at home, stay at home’ so we are going to have to muddle on and make the best. The business I work in has gone very quiet, which, coupled with remote working, is clearly creating some unease.

 

[Smidster]

I went for the "roughly half" option - most likely a couple of days a week going forward and timed around other things

It is tricky - While I do kind of prefer being in the office as the facilities are better and there are some things that are undoubtedly better done face to face it is hard to get around the fact that by not spending hours a day on a commute you would have more time to spend on other stuff (and hopefully there will be more stuff to do in the future) as well as, speaking as someone who doesn't really enjoy travel, putting up with all the annoyances and frustrations of a daily commute.

There certainly is a point around the work / life balance that we will need to get used to - but of course those lines have been blurring for many years anyway though I will admit I am not good at switching it off (mainly as I have no life)

It is also right that you miss some of the work gossip / random interactions that happen in the office - although to some extent that is reliant on having a critical mass of people in the office to allow those interactions to take place. The more people who work remotely on a regular basis the less likely those meetings become and the value goes down.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I find the biggest benefit against a commute is getting enough sleep. Sure you can adjust yourself to getting up at 05bleugh easily enough, but I find that if I don't get home until 7:30pm I don't want to be in bed by 10, it just doesn't give me enough of an evening to do stuff and eat. So I end up in bed at midnight or later and the knock on of sleep deficit builds up. So it's not quite the same as being e.g. a bin man or postman who might also be up at 0500, because their shift is over by 1500-1600 and they've got the afternoon and evening to do stuff, so it doesn't matter that they're in bed by 2200.

If you only commute 2 or 3 days a week, ideally alternated, that doesn't happen and you're not dead by Friday morning.

 

[yorkie]

I am already finding that having gone from a situation where I worked in a lab, standing up for at least half the day, to sitting down for >90% of the day and doing what limited work I can on my laptop, I am experiencing significant discomfort in my back. Another reason for wanting to be able to go back to work...

It's not advisable to use a laptop by itself without additional equipment in place; I have made a separare thread to discuss this: https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/posture-tips-for-laptop-users.203502/

Considering the small size of our housing stock how are couples both going to work from home, particularly young couples sharing one bed flats or studios!
And the kids in shared houses in Clapham etc are going to be sleeping and working in the same room- that can’t be mentally healthy.

Don't forget this thread is about the longer term, i.e. when people don't have to work from home but after having being exposed to it for several weeks. I agree having too many people working from home simultaneously may have its own issues, but that's less likely to be a problem if each person avoids spending the majority of their working time at home.

 

[nlogax]

I find the biggest benefit against a commute is getting enough sleep.

Don't know about you but in a situation where technically I should be able take full advantage of not commuting by getting extra ZZZs in, my sleep quantity and quality has been appalling. Maybe it's the background anxiety to what's happening or what will happen once the lockdown eases. Am sure I'm not the only one.

This will inevitably change the way the country does things. This change was always coming albeit in a more glacial way. Covid-19 has forced the point and the knock-on effects to transport projects, the environment, internet infrastructure and how companies perceive and manage their employees..you name it. Some of the above will benefit, some will suffer.

 

[gordonthemoron]

I've worked from home more or less permanently for about 4 years, it's very lonely. Plus, in the winter I feel like I'm getting hypothermia and in the summer I'm suffocating due to the heat. So I mainly work from the pub

 

[yorkie]

... I should be able take full advantage of not commuting by getting extra ZZZs in, my sleep quantity and quality has been appalling. Maybe it's the background anxiety to what's happening or what will happen once the lockdown eases. Am sure I'm not the only one....

You aren't but feel free to create a new thread to discuss that! (if you do, I will be happy to reply to it with my experiences)

But this thread is about the longer term, and I know that for me, having one day working from home does help in this area as it gives me another day to catch up a bit on sleep.

 

[Bletchleyite]

You aren't but feel free to create a new thread to discuss that! (if you do, I will be happy to reply to it with my experiences)

In the longer term, having one day working from home is better for me as it's another day to catch up a bit on sleep.

I can very much see (even though that's not really that advantageous) Fridays effectively becoming a weekend day with pretty much everyone who can working from home (or their favourite other non-office location like the park, the pub or Costalottabucks).

 

[philjo]

I was generally travelling to my normal base office about 3-4 days per week then going into one of the London offices on the other 1-2 days.
I had an annual season/gold card to commute to the base office. Travel to London on the other days was booked through work (travelling in the opposite direction to the travel to the base office).
Our team is distributed across the country in different offices so I only meet certain team members when I visit the office in London
I often found that I was the only person working in my normal office in Fridays so I may work from home in future on Fridays.

The issue would be whether it is still worth having the annual season with gold card if I am only travelling to the base office 2-3 days a week, or just use carnets in future. I would probably still need to go 1 day a week into the London office - or 1 day every 2 weeks.

 

[GusB]

Until took time out to care for family two years ago, I had been working in a completely virtual call centre environment. All training, meetings etc. was done through conferencing software, and one-to-one meetings with coaches/managers were done by phone. I did have to move my desk to a small corner of the bedroom as I found that it was difficult to concentrate with other activities going on in the house, but that won't be an issue in the future now that I'm on my own.

At first I did find it difficult to separate work/home life, mainly because the money was good and it was too tempting on occasion to just log on for another hour. Eventually I set myself a range of hours and generally didn't book any time slots outwith this period. Occasionally I'd make an exception if I was at a loose end, or if they were really struggling to get bums on seats.

I did initially miss the office banter, but the arrangement suited me quite well. I was able to live up here and work for companies based much further away.

 

[david1212]

The various roles that my job encompasses do not follow a fixed pattern. For several weeks it can be 99% computer based then a period of hands-on which can not be remote. The support, repair and maintenance elements can not be remote either.

Home working has issues of discipline plus at times discussions are much easier with documents spread out on a table than looking at screens.

Overall while over a year a proportion could be home working with the occasional immediate move during the day I would prefer to always be based at the business premises.

So long as no major disruption my commute is about 20 minutes. If significantly longer then my preference would change.

 

[kje7812]

If I stay in my current career path (Chemistry research), working at home isn't practical most of the time. Maybe one day a week of admin.

 

[Yew]

I work for a company that previously viewed working from home as an exceptional activity. I think I'd like to work from home more, as I have an 40 mile round trip to work, and the fuel savings have been substantial. Prior to this situation, I was considering eitheir moving home, or moving to a new job; but I loathed to do it, as I do really like the company.

It might be worth noting as well, that I have a spare bedroom, and have converted it into a home office (thanks to a last moment trip to Ikea) as opposed to having to camp on the dining room table.

 

[Hadders]

Working in offices is not going to completely disappear. You can maintain relationships remotely but you cannot form them remotely.

I think the traditional 5 days a week commute will go down to an average or 2-3 days a week for many. What I do think will happen as well is an increase in long distance commuting. Instead of living relatively close to the office people might choose to live further away for a better quality of life, housing etc. They will put up with a longer commute a couple of days a week for a better life style overall. Travel costs probably neutral - annual season compared to long distance travel on Advance tickets a couple of times a week.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Working in offices is not going to completely disappear. You can maintain relationships remotely but you cannot form them remotely.

This is just not true, from someone who has worked remotely for many years. It's more difficult, but it is possible.

 

[takno]

I've worked from home more or less permanently for about 4 years, it's very lonely. Plus, in the winter I feel like I'm getting hypothermia and in the summer I'm suffocating due to the heat. So I mainly work from the pub

Sorry to resurrect an old quote, but it's definitely a common pattern I've seen in the more successful perma-home workers I know. In practice not being near a company office doesn't make setting up a desk in the bedroom any more pleasant, so all the work happens in coffee shops, or increasingly in hot-desking or co-working spaces. Needless to say, the complete loss of access to their regular workspace has impacted them just as much as the loss of a formal office has affected the office-based. Possibly more so since they weren't typically doing long commutes, and therefore don't see any of the benefits.

Personally I (previous to this) tried to go in at least 4 days a week, but often only for 4 or 5 hours at a time. My commute is a healthy walk which I'm currently suffering from the lack of, and 20-25 hours is a good enough number to have all the in-person contact I need (both socially and for over-hearing and staying in the loop). Added to that, it makes it a lot easier (for me) to slack off after 4 hours if I'm getting nothing done, and then power through for an 8 hour shift at home if the day is working out.

Of course, being the boss and not being part of a large corporate structure has helped me do that for the last 15 years. When I was attempting to get away with not being in before 10 and missing whole days at previous jobs I did tend to lean on being too damn useful to fire.

As long as it's seen as a way to get the most out of your workers and keep them happy I'm fine with 2 days homeworking. If it goes beyond that then you need the right temperament in the people doing it and you have to manage it well, which is frankly easier when it's the exception. Pushing office workers into full time home working as an alternative to paying for office space just sounds like a catastrophe.

 

[Farang]

All the time, because it's more efficient and it saves me £150 per month on the Oystercard.

 

[3rd rail land]

As long as it's seen as a way to get the most out of your workers and keep them happy I'm fine with 2 days homeworking. If it goes beyond that then you need the right temperament in the people doing it and you have to manage it well, which is frankly easier when it's the exception. Pushing office workers into full time home working as an alternative to paying for office space just sounds like a catastrophe.

I used to be a full time office worker, firstly at an office reasonably local and then at one quite a bit further away. When my assignment changed I was not required to go to an office so started working full time from home. I only travelled when I had a need to i.e for work that needed doing from an office or for occasional meet ups with my team.

I found it hard to begin with for many reasons. Firstly I knew very few of the people I was working with. Also it was too quiet without the background noise of an office. Add to that getting used to doing everything over Skype rather than a mix of Skype and in person. I've been what my employer termed a mobile worker, mostly working at home, since mid September 2019 and have gotten used to it now. Even if I do go to the office there may be none of the people I work with there or at best 2 or 3. I wouldn't go to an office without good reason and I don't consider a change of scenery a good enough reason!

Basically I didn't have a choice as nowadays my nearest office is around 65-70 minutes away. I consider that to be too far away to go to 5 days a week. As the travel times counts as part of my working hours it is just a waste of time unless I have a need to visit the office. I'd love to have a nearby office office that I could go to when I felt like working somewhere other than my home. This is not likely to every happen so I have to make the best of the current arrangement or look for a new employer. Someone I I used to work with said she would leave unless there was an office in London she could work from 5 days a week. As this was never going to happen after the London office we had was closed she left. My employer lost a very skilled worker.

 

[JonathanP]

This is just not true, from someone who has worked remotely for many years. It's more difficult, but it is possible.

Next week I will start a new job. I will join a team of people I have never met(apart from the boss) who until recently worked with each other in an office 5 days a week. Have you got any tips?