Remote working preferences (in the longer term)

[The Ham]

I would expect that most office-based Home Counties-London commuters will most likely do 2 days a week or thereabouts in the office and 3 from home.

Of course there are plenty of jobs that don't suit home-working, but pretty much all office jobs[1] do in some form.

At a rough guess, I'd say we will end up with Friday levels of commuting all week on average.

[1] I don't mean offices that have customers e.g. tax offices, I mean administrative type office work.

I'm not sure that all see much of a drop off in rail passenger numbers, as whilst there'll be a reduction in the number of days current rail users use the network a reduction in the number of days people work can shift the balance from car ownership (or at least a reduction in 2+ car households).

As the big costs of cars (purchase, instance, VED, servicing, etc.) don't alter overly much with large drops in milage.

Due to the way we travel a 2.5% shift from road to rail would offset a 20% drop in rail use.

 

[Jamesrob637]

The non-London (and even some involving London) TOCs should not interpret this as a way of allocating shorter trains in peak hours. Numbers will still be there and more people will get a seat/more value for money if train lengths continue to be as they were/had become pre-COVID-19.

 

[philosopher]

I suspect that the perception is that working from home is expected by some that it'll be no more going to the office almost ever.

In reality I suspect that there's going to be 20-40% of people working 10-50% of the time at home.

I suspect in the long term, home working will be more prevalent than it was before this, but probably not by much, perhaps it will end being 20% of workers working from home at any one time, so your prediction may be correct.

In the year after this is all over, remote working I think will be very common, perhaps up to half of workers working from home at any one time. However companies will start find the flaws of home working and start nudging their workers back into the office. The few companies that go the full hog to 100% remote working will end up reversing their decision and move back into an office.

Remote working I reckon is one of those things that on paper sound great but in reality never work out as well in practice.

 

[route101]

I was supposed to be starting a job in September , its been cancelled , may consider me for September 2021. I would of benfited of some on the job training and a mix on online at home training. Now im scrambling to get a job!

 

[DelayRepay]

I hate working from home. I miss the social interaction with colleagues, I miss sitting around with a huge piece of flip chart paper and working out how to solve the latest problem. I missed the sense of shared success when said problem is solved.

But what I miss most is switching off. Sometimes I would stay late in the office to finish things, but when I got home I didn't have to think about work for the rest of the night (unless someone called with an emergency!). In the new world there doesn't seem to be that clear break between work and home.

 

[yorksrob]

I hate working from home. I miss the social interaction with colleagues, I miss sitting around with a huge piece of flip chart paper and working out how to solve the latest problem. I missed the sense of shared success when said problem is solved.

But what I miss most is switching off. Sometimes I would stay late in the office to finish things, but when I got home I didn't have to think about work for the rest of the night (unless someone called with an emergency!). In the new world there doesn't seem to be that clear break between work and home.

I must admit, as soon as I hit the living room sofa, I'm switched off.

 

[takno]

I must admit, as soon as I hit the living room sofa, I'm switched off.

Same here, which is a pity since that's where I do most of my work calls from

 

[yorksrob]

Same here, which is a pity since that's where I do most of my work calls from

Come to think of it, it wouldn't make that much difference to my work calls either !

I don't let work sully the living room. Bad feng shui

 

[Bletchleyite]

The non-London (and even some involving London) TOCs should not interpret this as a way of allocating shorter trains in peak hours. Numbers will still be there and more people will get a seat/more value for money if train lengths continue to be as they were/had become pre-COVID-19.

I don't think there's a considerable saving to short-forming EMU services (unless you get into a silly stepped mileage based lease contract like LM did with the 350/2s). What would give a considerable saving is being able to move to an all day clockface timetable (so basically a Saturday timetable Mon-Fri as well, like is often the case away from London), using 8 car formations, then upping some to 12 in the peak direction (or equivalent).

That would save on staffing and on delays (because the WCML is literally crammed full in both peaks).

 

[Bantamzen]

I must admit, as soon as I hit the living room sofa, I'm switched off.

I wish I was, sadly one of the covid-measures my team took on was a WhatsApp group. Now the job is pretty much 24/7.....

 

[DelayRepay]

I wish I was, sadly one of the covid-measures my team took on was a WhatsApp group. Now the job is pretty much 24/7.....

Same here: Old world, someone might ring thee desk phone after 5 to see if you were still there. If you didn't answer, they'd leave it until tomorrow. Only if it was an emergency would they try your mobile.

Now people obviously default to the mobile and if you don't answer seem to keep trying. Partly this is because some people are working different hours due to childcare etc, so the evening is now their normal work time.

I am strictly on call to deal with emergencies out of hours, so leaving my phone off isn't an option but I am getting fed up of the trivial interruptions to my evening. I let it go to voicemail but of course I have to listen to the voicemail straight away in case it is an emergency.

Also people are starting earlier in the morning. It's quite common for my phone to be ringing at 7:30 now but 'before' it never rang before 9am.

 

[smsm1]

I'm in the camp of wanting to work remotely more. Potentially living further away and then doing a few days in the office every few weeks or less. I'm aware of companies who are fully remote and only do occasional meetups.

Groups should only be used where the messages are genuinely relevant to ALL users in the group. Just whacking everything out to a group is lazy and disruptive, and I don't hesitate to point this out to people if they do it.

We have a lot of team groups split down appropriately in Slack and in encouraging more use of them instead of people messaging me directly. I sit across lots of smaller teams and frequently I need to bring someone else into the discussion, or is useful for others in the team to know about the thing that is being discussed.

It's also acceptable to turn off notifications and if there is an issue to phone them if urgent. Also for many channels I'll set the notifications to no where unless someone mentions me, but I still get a message counter on the channel that I can review.

Being able to ignore the notifications and be able to review them later is a useful skill. It's also something to encourage to make acceptable in your workplace.

My office colleagues may not be the people I'd choose to spend my free time with but, when you live alone and in the current situation can't see your partner, friends or family, I really appreciate the human interaction. It may be no more than asking your colleague what he got up to last night or making the tea for everyone, but these little interactions make life that bit more pleasant. Even the commute to work is pretty pleasureable at the moment!

Where I work, management are encouraging people to have that kind of discussion remotely, even using a software tool to encourage it to happen by pairing people up with random others. The lunchtime board gamers are doing similar online occasionally.

 

[smsm1]

I am strictly on call to deal with emergencies out of hours, so leaving my phone off isn't an option but I am getting fed up of the trivial interruptions to my evening. I let it go to voicemail but of course I have to listen to the voicemail straight away in case it is an emergency.

Are you able too customise the voicemail greeting? Something like please only call and leave voicemail for non emergency items outside the hours of 9 and 5.

Sometimes it takes a bit of training, for example where we work we've changed the support questions to a rota in one team, so all questions have to go through the team slack channel for the person on the rota to pick up. Any direct questions can be batted away and refused to be answered directly.

If I was in your boots of be quite annoyed and say I'm not dealing with the request more until it is my normal work hours, in the future send a message (whichever medium email Slack etc that is best) and it will be dealt with in due course (likely with an extra delay).

 

[DelayRepay]

Are you able too customise the voicemail greeting? Something like please only call and leave voicemail for non emergency items outside the hours of 9 and 5.

I have tried that, and also included an instruction that if an immediate response is needed they should send a text message as well as leaving a voicemail. Some people have a strange view of what is an 'emergency'.

Someone left me a voicemail on Friday at 8pm saying there was an 'emergency' as they needed some data for a report. They were quite surprised when I phoned them back just after midnight to discuss their 'emergency'. Perhaps they won't do it again now. This 'emergency' was of their own making. The person is working afternoons/evenings due to child care, but seems to assume that because they are working through the evening, everyone else is as well.

 

[yorksrob]

I wish I was, sadly one of the covid-measures my team took on was a WhatsApp group. Now the job is pretty much 24/7.....

That's the curse of social media for you. 21st century flim-flam as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Someone left me a voicemail on Friday at 8pm saying there was an 'emergency' as they needed some data for a report. They were quite surprised when I phoned them back just after midnight to discuss their 'emergency'. Perhaps they won't do it again now. This 'emergency' was of their own making. The person is working afternoons/evenings due to child care, but seems to assume that because they are working through the evening, everyone else is as well.

That sounds like a call for the classic line "poor planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part"

 

[yorkie]

Has anyone changed their mind on working from home preferences since March?

I'm still of the view that I don't want to be working from home more than 1 or 2 days per week.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Has anyone changed their mind on working from home preferences since March?

I'm still of the view that I don't want to be working from home more than 1 or 2 days per week.

My ideal remains WFH 3 days, office 2 days, but it's very rare I get a contract that works that way (though I have had one in the past). I'm less bothered about which days other than that it'd ideally not be Friday as it's easier to go away for a weekend if you don't get home late.

 

[Ianno87]

Has anyone changed their mind on working from home preferences since March?

I'm still of the view that I don't want to be working from home more than 1 or 2 days per week.

With young kids at home, I was really anti-any home working, but definitely now feel I could do a couple of days a week at least.

I am however chomping at the bit to get some office time again to work with colleagues and clients face-to-face. But if on a given day all I'm heading to the office for is to type a report or do some e-mails.... I might as well do that from home and save myself the commute time.

 

[philosopher]

Has anyone changed their mind on working from home preferences since March?

I'm still of the view that I don't want to be working from home more than 1 or 2 days per week.

For me, I would be Ok if it was one day a week, though at a push I could live with two days a week. I live within a 20 minute walk of work and live alone, so there is very little upside for me working from home. The only advantage I can see is perhaps if I need to do work without much interruptions.

If my employer changed my contract so I was working home for more than 2 days a week, I would likely start looking for a new job.

 

[takno]

Has anyone changed their mind on working from home preferences since March?

I'm still of the view that I don't want to be working from home more than 1 or 2 days per week.

I've ended hiring a few people abroad, since it was easier and cheaper during lockdown. I'm definitely now considering whether I need to live in one of the more expensive cities in the UK, or should work remotely and do a bit of travelling. Longer term I think it's definitely better to be mostly in the office, but just because of timing the current company has grown pretty much completely remote and it's probably worth taking advantage of that

 

[VauxhallandI]

I will still be pushing for only two days in the office. The opportunity to be able to move to a less convenient transport set up is strong with
Payoff being better, cheaper homes in nicer places.

 

[yorkie]

I will still be pushing for only two days in the office. The opportunity to be able to move to a less convenient transport set up is strong with
Payoff being better, cheaper homes in nicer places.

Interesting point; I've created a thread (with poll) for this:

Will you consider moving home due to the effects of Covid 19 (e.g. due to a change in work travel)?

Following the poll for remote working preferences and with many media outlets stating people are likely to continue to work from home more than they did before, I am wondering if anyone is actually thinking of moving home as a result? For example if you previously had to work 5 days in the...

www.railforums.co.uk

 

[DB]

Same here: Old world, someone might ring thee desk phone after 5 to see if you were still there. If you didn't answer, they'd leave it until tomorrow. Only if it was an emergency would they try your mobile.

Now people obviously default to the mobile and if you don't answer seem to keep trying. Partly this is because some people are working different hours due to childcare etc, so the evening is now their normal work time.

I am strictly on call to deal with emergencies out of hours, so leaving my phone off isn't an option but I am getting fed up of the trivial interruptions to my evening. I let it go to voicemail but of course I have to listen to the voicemail straight away in case it is an emergency.

Also people are starting earlier in the morning. It's quite common for my phone to be ringing at 7:30 now but 'before' it never rang before 9am.

I turn the phone off, and they all know to send an email - and I do keep an eye on those, but as I'm not being paid to work out of hours I will decide whether it's important enough to deal with straight away.

Generally, any emails sent with the 'high priority' flag set can be ignored - they never are high priority, and some people regard absolutely everything they want as 'urgent'.

 

[WestCoast]

Has anyone changed their mind on working from home preferences since March?

I'm still of the view that I don't want to be working from home more than 1 or 2 days per week.

I think my view has changed from about half-half to mostly working from home.

I've never been a morning person so the ability to wake up at 8.15am, do some exercise, get ready and have breakfast and still be able to start work at 9am has been absolutely life changing.

I turn the phone off, and they all know to send an email - and I do keep an eye on those, but as I'm not being paid to work out of hours I will decide whether it's important enough to deal with straight away.

Generally, any emails sent with the 'high priority' flag set can be ignored - they never are high priority, and some people regard absolutely everything they want as 'urgent'.

For sure, I have some colleagues who send absolutely everything with a high priority flag and think that I'm ignoring them if I don't respond right away because I'm in the middle of something else. They're a good bunch of people but the problem is they are sales people who I am working with so they will never change no matter what I say about their ability to properly priortise. If I say something it'll be "oh yeah but on this one the customer really needs this right now".

The good thing about not being in the office means I don't have them walking up to my desk and talking at me...

 

[ScottGallagher]

As a Facilities Manager in a law firm whose team have been furloughed its not practical to work from home which is why i have been the only lonely one out of 95 in the office for 15 weeks! Plus i live in a Central London flat with no room for working without disturbing my Dad!

What non IT equipment have people been provided particularly if you were already remotely working regularly before Covid and where does a companys responsibility end? I suppose im coming from a DSE angle.

 

[VauxhallandI]

As a Facilities Manager in a law firm whose team have been furloughed its not practical to work from home which is why i have been the only lonely one out of 95 in the office for 15 weeks! Plus i live in a Central London flat with no room for working without disturbing my Dad!

What non IT equipment have people been provided particularly if you were already remotely working regularly before Covid and where does a companys responsibility end? I suppose im coming from a DSE angle.

We have been given a £350 limit for equipment - furniture, IT accessories

As we cannot use any non company IT due to security reasons all employees had a laptop already which helped immensely

 

[DB]

What non IT equipment have people been provided particularly if you were already remotely working regularly before Covid and where does a companys responsibility end? I suppose im coming from a DSE angle.

So far as I can tell, most companies haven't gone much beyond a computer (if that - many are getting staff to use their own computers). It seems to be the legal view that as it's an emergency, DSE assessments can be avoided on the basis that it's a temporary arrangement (https://www.pinsentmasons.com/out-law/analysis/display-screen-equipment-health-safety-lockdown). This could well prove an issue if employers are expecting most of their staff to work from home until later in the year though.

In our case, we haven't in most cases provided computers (it wasn't possible in the timescale), but have where we can provided various things for use with the member of staff's own computer - e.g. laptop risers, USB mice and keyboards, webcams, headsets, etc. We are currently in the early stages of a phased reopening of our offices.

 

[LAX54]

Come this time next year, or even sooner, the so called old way of working will have returned, working at home sounds al lovely and fluffy, but over time, you would never be able to switch off, your home becomes your workplace, you will be 'trapped' by your work surroundings, at least going to the office, gets you away from home, and / or keeps your home, just that a home, somewhere to wind down, relax.

 

[DB]

Come this time next year, or even sooner, the so called old way of working will have returned, working at home sounds al lovely and fluffy, but over time, you would never be able to switch off, your home becomes your workplace, you will be 'trapped' by your work surroundings, at least going to the office, gets you away from home, and / or keeps your home, just that a home, somewhere to wind down, relax.

My view (from involvement in facilitating home working over the past few months) is that it's likely to see an increase in people working from home for part of the week - but I certainly don't think it will be full time, and I think it will be less prevalent than is often assumed at the moment - for reasons including staff not entirely trusting their employees, employees actually preferring to go into the office, jobs which can't be done as effectively from home, etc.