Do you think working full-time in an office environment is dead?
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What about NEW workers? WFH is all well and good for people who have houses they bought 10 years ago and are so well established at their jobs they need no supervision nor mentoring, and collaboration is more annoyance than benefit. Also they have pre-existing families so no need for socialization with peers.
But imagine you are a 26 year old new graduate just starting out. He doesn't have a home office. He's sharing a house with 4 other people who can sometimes be loud. His workspace is a laptop on a TV tray next to his bed. He's not established in his job, can't really do it in an independent contractor type model like WFH is.
I'm in education, and going full remote was a huge disaster for us. It did not work well at any grade level except maybe for graduate school and not nearly 100% even for that. Outcomes WAY down across the board, for every single grade level including college. If it didn't work for younger humans and they suffered dearly for lack of socialization, I'm not sure how you think this is sustainable going forward in the world of work?
Mark my words - in 5 years, the labor shortage your workplace is experiencing now will be WORSE. I'm here to tell you - the cohorts coming up through the system are not only smaller demographically, but the 2 years of the education they lost and the effects of isolation on their mental wherewithal will mean that among those smaller cohorts, fewer still will be capable of working complex jobs independently from home. Fewer proportionally than in the previous decade. Among a SMALLER cohort.
We've just been pushing them through ignoring standards. I'm sorry, that's how it is. I was never one to say "kids these days." But no joke - the decline in grade level skills across the entire system, including college, from 2019 to today is SEVERE.
And by the way they can't even come close to affording homes in the current housing cost paradigm. So where are they going to work from?
It's not that big of a deal... There's been more disruptive times in human history than covid.
Basically, like higher education, your first job is likely better off to be one that's in person. For many people, their entry level job is more of an apprenticeship, and there's lots of in person places still around, especially in bigger cities where young people tend to congregate after college. After 2 years, they're no longer entry level and then they can launch off onto the environment that suites them best. What's better now than in the past is there's more options. It's not like in person offices have been banished. Newbies have the option to be in person or remote, we didn't have that option coming out of college, they have it better.
Gen Z and alpha are fine, they've got quite a few things going for them. There's no way this crumbles out that they end up having a employers labor market, expensive housing, and limited options. There's more options now and if housing is expensive, then they'll have more demand and if the labor markets squishy, then housing will be cheap.
Teams with members across the country don't have a single location to meet so the idea of forced collaboration being so vital is out the window anyway.
The entire point of collaboration is working together re: a common goal; think in terms of ‘cooperation’ i.e. there isn’t anything ‘forced’ about it. That said, many times it involves teams from different organizations as well; hence the point of business travel. Granted, such travel has been dramatically reduced in the past few years; however, it’s one of the many reasons some employees have found themselves feeling a bit ‘stir crazy’ and/or wanting a return to the office - at least some of the time.
Also, when creativity and collaboration is a necessary part of the job - team members (at least those worth retaining) typically work out of the same location, if possible. (Key point being, for some, they want/need to be.) It is the Directors/VPs and c-level executives who aren’t necessarily so (as mentioned in my previous post in response to Three Wolves).
The point is that collaboration has been assumed to be essential in every (most every?) field and where that assumption has been made it can then be used as a reason (excuse? rationale) to push/require collaboration through in-person worktime.
There have been few efforts to actually assess the need for and the value of collaboration. We all know examples of the super-creative teams brainstorming and frenetically bouncing ideas off each other or at least have seen such sessions on TV. How much time does the TYPICAL team spend doing such activities? Once a year in annual planning? Quarterly for an hour?
If the team truly spends a lot of time in such activities then sure, make 'em come in...for THOSE specific activities not necessarily 40 hours a week or even 8 hours a week. And don't mindlessly apply that standard to other groups without making an honest assessment. People can come in voluntarily but if they are completing their work satisfactorily without coming in to the office then that weakens the argument to require in-person collaborative time.
And there's no reason to assume collaboration must be done in-person. Haven't we all been in hundreds of online meetings? None of that counts as collaboration, especially if they are working sessions? Those aren't productive at all? Then why are we all in so many meetings? ha
A few individuals being "stir-crazy" (cabin fever?) is not reason to require everyone to come back to the office or for businesses to return to big travel budgets. How many of those trips were just junkets/rewards for people, anyway? We know that happened and still happens a fair bit.
Now, please don't ding me for the lack of references to studies (though I could likely find a few good ones) ...these are my bonafide personal observations throughout a career of working in various positions in various capacities...that's all!
The point is that collaboration has been assumed to be essential in every (most every?) field and where that assumption has been made it can then be used as a reason (excuse? rationale) to push/require collaboration through in-person worktime.
I don’t think this assumption has been made/expressed by anyone - except for you (in terms of ‘pushing’ or an ‘excuse’). Point being, collaboration is not ‘forced’; rather, it is often necessary (and highly relevant to the debate, per the thread).
That being said, you are nonsensically assuming employees don’t have free will to do their jobs (or an ability to collaborate) sans being ‘forced’ to do so - or that employers need ‘excuses’ to motivate them (such as Phil’s comment, below).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Phil P
What will happen is companies who really push for in person working are going to have to spruce up the office and team offerings. Using all sticks and no carrots simply won't work anymore
Keep in mind we’re presumably discussing adults who competently do/enjoy their work i.e. no force or blackmail involved. :-) Else, they wouldn’t likely be candidates to WFH anyway.
There's been continual debate and discussion over working from home versus at the office since the pandemic began. What is your preference if your job would allow an option? Would you rather have a hybrid situation where you do a little of both? Do you think the world will ever go back to working in offices full time the way it used to be?
I hope not. My previous jobs required me to be onsite because that's where the patients were, or the school kids were, or the military families and chain of command were.
The entire point of collaboration is working together re: a common goal; think in terms of ‘cooperation’ i.e. there isn’t anything ‘forced’ about it. That said, many times it involves teams from different organizations as well; hence the point of business travel. Granted, such travel has been dramatically reduced in the past few years; however, it’s one of the many reasons some employees have found themselves feeling a bit ‘stir crazy’ and/or wanting a return to the office - at least some of the time.
Also, when creativity and collaboration is a necessary part of the job - team members (at least those worth retaining) typically work out of the same location, if possible. (Key point being, for some, they want/need to be.) It is the Directors/VPs and c-level executives who aren’t necessarily so (as mentioned in my previous post in response to Three Wolves).
I think you misunderstood what forced collaboration is. That term isn't talking about routine team work where the members are assigned (formally, informally, whatever) by their supervisor and/or job role to work with each other on a specific task.
Forced collaboration on the other hand is a designer/consultant term meaning the building is designed, not for efficient work, but to force people to cross paths by multiple means -- everything from taking down cubicle walls to having wider and narrower paths strategically located so that people are forced to cross through their personal space and then have the wider spaces to congregate.
The idea is kind of like forcing Jane from accounting to walk by Bob from Engineering to get to the bathroom. They talk and wander to the gathering space where they meet Jenny from Manufacturing and create the next iPhone while swapping stores if their last ski trip sharing bagels and Star*&^% coffee.
Or at least that's the BS the consultant sells upper management who all think they're a combination of Jack Welch, Steve Jobs, and Liz Holmes.
The point is that collaboration has been assumed to be essential in every (most every?) field and where that assumption has been made it can then be used as a reason (excuse? rationale) to push/require collaboration through in-person worktime.
There have been few efforts to actually assess the need for and the value of collaboration. We all know examples of the super-creative teams brainstorming and frenetically bouncing ideas off each other or at least have seen such sessions on TV. How much time does the TYPICAL team spend doing such activities? Once a year in annual planning? Quarterly for an hour?
If the team truly spends a lot of time in such activities then sure, make 'em come in...for THOSE specific activities not necessarily 40 hours a week or even 8 hours a week. And don't mindlessly apply that standard to other groups without making an honest assessment. People can come in voluntarily but if they are completing their work satisfactorily without coming in to the office then that weakens the argument to require in-person collaborative time.
And there's no reason to assume collaboration must be done in-person. Haven't we all been in hundreds of online meetings? None of that counts as collaboration, especially if they are working sessions? Those aren't productive at all? Then why are we all in so many meetings? ha
A few individuals being "stir-crazy" (cabin fever?) is not reason to require everyone to come back to the office or for businesses to return to big travel budgets. How many of those trips were just junkets/rewards for people, anyway? We know that happened and still happens a fair bit.
Now, please don't ding me for the lack of references to studies (though I could likely find a few good ones) ...these are my bonafide personal observations throughout a career of working in various positions in various capacities...that's all!
I think the question is larger than "can we do meetings over Zoom vs. in a conference room?" I see this as more of a question of, can people do their entire careers this way? The big Covid experiment was "can we do this temporarily?" That answer was yes.
My contention is - not the education piece, and not the first few years at least. This is both a productivity question and a societal and psychological question.
As an educator, what I observed during Covid is that people learn from each other FAR more than I ever realized. Taking way the "each other" part made trying to learn an inexorable slog that many people just gave up on. Many. I didn't appreciate that the value of school is mostly social. I think we learned pretty clearly from Covid - education can only be done, at most, about 25-35% totally online, until graduate school. At the graduate school level, the work was always individualized and solitary for the most part.
So regarding workplaces - what is the value of socialization of labor in any given industry? I would argue that it's probably worth more than you guys think.
Speaking for myself, after a year of all online work, I was about 5 minutes away from quitting. I previously LOVED my career. But 100% online I was miserable. I went into a deep depression, was over-eating and drinking too much alcohol. For WFH to work... you need to have a nice home life and decent house! For me, being trapped in my home was hell. If they hadn't started bringing in-person back, I would have quit. I was doing google searches for "jobs that have to be done in-person." E.g.: I thought about starting my own business and even considered becoming a cop, of all things. Have to be outside for that. It still looks like it's going to be about 50% online from here on out. I am pretty bummed about that and still thinking of changing careers as a result. The last thing I want from a new career is not to be able to meet any new people and be stuck in an apartment all day only engaging over e-mail and occasionally Zoom. No no no no no no no. There is no amount of money you can pay me to make that worth it anymore.
Now, do I think we have hit a paradigm shift of re-thinking the 40 hour workweek? Yes. The 40 hour workweek was devised for the industrial era. I think we all experienced a lot of "wasted time" in any office environment where we were done with our work and just waiting out the clock. There's no need for that. But I do think there is need for humans to socialize and they work better that way, especially when they are working for an organization that has a shared goal.
Last edited by redguard57; 12-28-2022 at 12:14 PM..
Teams with members across the country don't have a single location to meet so the idea of forced collaboration being so vital is out the window anyway.
Quote:
Originally Posted by reneeh63
The point is that collaboration has been assumed to be essential in every (most every?) field and where that assumption has been made it can then be used as a reason (excuse? rationale) to push/require collaboration through in-person worktime.
Quote:
Originally Posted by tnff
I think you misunderstood what forced collaboration is. That term isn't talking about routine team work where the members are assigned (formally, informally, whatever) by their supervisor and/or job role to work with each other on a specific task.
Point being, collaboration isn’t ‘assigned’; Renee was (clearly) speaking to it being ‘forced’, as if employees are assigned or coerced into doing such as a way to manipulate folks to the office. It is not the point of collaboration i.e. ‘cooperation’ and working together; the employees decide/schedule such, as a whole. The outcome of it is the point - creatively, administratively, planning, structurally, whatever (and how it’s relative to the debate/thread). Obviously, it’s not the collaboration (or how it comes to be) in and of itself.
You speak as though the employees have the maturity of a kindergartner and must be assigned a task or a work partner for the day; you also are not taking into account socializing. The pandemic has left many employees feeling isolated - particularly in the Bay Area; a reason many have looked forward to a return to ‘normal’.
Quote:
Originally Posted by tnff
The idea is kind of like forcing Jane from accounting to walk by Bob from Engineering to get to the bathroom.
Huh, lol. I think you’re missing the point relative to the thread. ;-)
This debate has run its course, and the O.P. has never posted any opinion or discussion since starting this in July.
Safe to say that there will be plenty of both WFH and working in offices going forward.
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