It is unlevelling for me. I have one room where basically everything that my family does happens and it is the only place to put a desk. It is noisy. It is very distracting. I am physically "at home" so my family expect me to be able to help out and do things, but I am mentally trying to be "at work" so I end up doing a half-assed job of both.
I can't move out of London so that I can afford a place with a dedicated study/office room because "hybrid working" means I still need to be within commuting distance (any property within commuting distance is £,£££,£££, even before covid). Hybrid working rules at my place mean I can only physically go to the office a couple of days a week (e.g. cannot do Mon to Fri, but have to go in on assigned days)
It is professionally crippling, at least for me.
Edit: comments about "just do a longer commute the days you do go in" are valid, but not applicable here: I have care commitments that can't be ignored while I am on a train.
Yes, for many, working remotely is not sustainable. You definitely need a quiet and private space to work. If you have that at home, great. But many don’t have that luxury.
Personally, my home setup is much better than working in an office, so I plan to work remotely indefinitely if possible. But it is not for everyone and office cultures would do well to ensure in office and home office workers are able to have similar experiences.
If you’re commuting once or twice a week, you don’t have to be very close to the office. You could make the distance little longer making travel a little hectic only for 2 days but for 5 days you get a bigger house.
> I can't move out of London so that I can afford a place with a dedicated study/office room because "hybrid working"
Factoring in what you've said, you don't have access to a dedicated environment and don't see how to make moving out further to afford the dedicated space a possibility. That makes it clear to take advantage of the space your employer is offering you then. Go into the office.
If you don't want to commute into the office every day, the other replies below are the path. Instead of commuting 30 mins each way into the office M-F move further out, commute 1 hour each way but on Monday & Friday. You're still spending less time in a week commuting but now live further out.
This is a completely valid point and I think it’s really important in this conversation about work environment to bear it in mind. Too many people seem to assume that their environment is universal, but home or hybrid working is not a panacea and different people in different situations can face a wide variety of challenges.
However it’s pout out at least that keeping meetings online even when present in the office can be a really useful tool for helping everyone to have equitable access. The assumption that all of our meetings are done online from individual devices wherever possible has made it much easier for remote and in-office workers to collaborate on the same level.
If you're only going in once or twice a week you can afford to live much further out. You can live 20 miles from zone 1 and still get a train in in 25 minutes.
Equity never means strictly bringing the lower end up to the top. It also means chopping the top down. You were the top. You could afford to live in a very expensive city and have proximity to good jobs and other nice things.
You are not understanding correctly, no - you have presented a rather colourful and uncharitable interpretation of the totally reasonable point being made.
I’m not a woman so the point isn’t quite the same, but I can absolutely observe the effect of online meetings generally reducing the temptation of certain people to dominate the conversation.
> If I’m understanding correctly, the playing field is “levelled” in favor of people who tend to be late for meetings because of poor time management.
Could one assume that people who prefer meetings (online or in person) over an online text conversation or email thread have poor written communication and reading comprehension skills?
Yeah, online meetings require different skills to be effective communicators than in real life, so different people in groups may be more effective or visible in their communication.
I have ADD. The last 18 months have been incredibly difficult for me. During in-person meetings, I'm able to mostly focus on what's being said and participate as needed. In online meetings, I invariably zone out and miss everything.
I don't doubt that online work has helped a lot of people participate, but as with all things it's an environment that will work better for some and worse for others. What we should have is both—companies and teams where the expectation is that you'll come to the office every day and meet in a conference room, and companies and teams where most meetings are done online.
I have ADHD as well as a few of my colleagues(we talk about it pretty openly, which is also great, but likely belongs on another thread). A lot of folks on the ADHD spectrum have chosen to RTO early in my group, due to the things you've mentioned. It's not just meetings. The ADHD people usually will report things like, it's easier to stay focused on code in the office, with few distractions. Though, tbh, the office right now for me is a dream - we're at voluntary RTO. There's 20% occupancy, it's very quiet, no home distractions, and sets the scene change my ADHD needs to remind my brain it's at work.
I agree that there's so many different ways to work, that one modality is never going to make everyone happy.
> I have ADD. The last 18 months have been incredibly difficult for me. During in-person meetings, I'm able to mostly focus on what's being said and participate as needed. In online meetings, I invariably zone out and miss everything.
Are you my boss?
Seriously though, I’d be working 100% from my home if my boss could parse anything from video meetings. But he can’t, so I’m in once a week for all our project meetings. I don’t actually mind it most of the time, I like the break from home and being able to whiteboard.
I agree that fully remote work isn’t the universally level playing field so many are making it out to be.
There are many with serious medical issues that have blossomed with digital meetings. They can attend meetings without leaving their (home) office which is setup with the accommodations they need.
Some aspect of this may come off as offensive, but frankly there was a certain amount of sexualizing gaze I had to deal with from both sides of the aisle that made things like meetings rather unfocused, and I don't think that'd change if I moved jobs (btw I'm not interested in "playing the field" or some such). Being able to elect to only pass on my voice in meetings is so much more beneficial for clear, conducive discussion for everyone instead of having to negotiate the unspoken politics of desiring gazes when we're in a place of business. There are enough people think they absolutely have a right to let you know how interested they are, and frankly, one simply shouldn't have to negotiate that at work (and enough people demonstrate they don't realize how bad they are with implicit/explicit rejection; not to mention the side effects of other people picking up on this phenonmenon that creates visible, needless resentful behavior). The minute you speak up about this, everyone wants to act like its not happening or that its your problem somehow ("don't you like it? isn't it flattering?"). But this is exactly how harassment and escalations of such happen for anyone.
There just isn't a good solution for "opting out" from this behavior in-office, so remote work has been a great boon in this direction in particular.
It is too bad for your coworkers, though. A pretty person on the team makes my work satisfaction and motivation just skyrocket. This effect lasts for years and to me almost justifies the wage premium. They must have not been too offended at the sexualizing gaze since we ended up going on work walks or becoming Facebook friends. I think it was pretty much just upside.
Frankly, it's because you're (we/most people with bosses) -- more or less -- are glorified modern serfs, whom the lords (bosses) hold power over.
A solution to this is "being more entrepreneurial," wherein you can decide who you work with -- albeit, with sane expectations (e.g. you're not going to scale to $100m value without having to eat a lot of shit, but that's true with climbing the corporate ladder too).
The pandemic has made it blindingly obvious that this has been true for at least ten years. The same corporate innovation that led to offshoring set the stage for making remote work feasible.
And it's not just zoom. In fact the biggest driver is Slack/Teams and the like. Everyone has an equal voice on slack. Interruption is impossible. Thoughts can be curated, recorded and edited in real time. And it can all be asynchronous.
Not just women. They've been a big boon for anyone with certain types of physical disabilities. I have several levels of my spine surgically fused and can't really sit or stand or be still for too long, because my hips lock up and my back seizes on the side where they took the bone graft and pulls me to the left and starts throbbing. That had the effect of making 30 min+ meetings somewhat awkward because I was constantly standing up and walking around. There was also the fact that I need frequent breaks to lay down and decompress a bit through the day.
No longer an issue at all now that I don't have to be in a job where someone expects me to be in one position in one place in one room for hours at a time to get work done. Going for a walk or laying in bed for a meeting is no problem.
It is long past time we actually used the remote communication ability our handheld networking and computing devices have enabled and quit pretending it's still 1960. If ISIS can manage war campaigns over WhatsApp, I think your business can figure out a way to make it work.
What do you think the point of the article is? The title say that the playing field is levelling, not that it has levelled. It's not binary or a target - it is a situation which is happening. The article offers both for and against the situation being played out. There's no definite conclusion in the text of the article and no disproving of a certain point.
I realise this is about meetings but working from home is terrible for me. Working from home is like how I imagine most people would feel sleeping in the office. I just cant really do it at all.
I've already got a final warning work, and it still feels impossible to do anything from at home. It's effected my self esteem and really damaged my career. I think I'll try to get an ADHD diagnosis and then I'll be considered disabled and will maybe get some help and legal protection.
[+] [-] mattlondon|4 years ago|reply
I can't move out of London so that I can afford a place with a dedicated study/office room because "hybrid working" means I still need to be within commuting distance (any property within commuting distance is £,£££,£££, even before covid). Hybrid working rules at my place mean I can only physically go to the office a couple of days a week (e.g. cannot do Mon to Fri, but have to go in on assigned days)
It is professionally crippling, at least for me.
Edit: comments about "just do a longer commute the days you do go in" are valid, but not applicable here: I have care commitments that can't be ignored while I am on a train.
[+] [-] jms703|4 years ago|reply
Personally, my home setup is much better than working in an office, so I plan to work remotely indefinitely if possible. But it is not for everyone and office cultures would do well to ensure in office and home office workers are able to have similar experiences.
[+] [-] garyfirestorm|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] furyofantares|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ckdarby|4 years ago|reply
Factoring in what you've said, you don't have access to a dedicated environment and don't see how to make moving out further to afford the dedicated space a possibility. That makes it clear to take advantage of the space your employer is offering you then. Go into the office.
If you don't want to commute into the office every day, the other replies below are the path. Instead of commuting 30 mins each way into the office M-F move further out, commute 1 hour each way but on Monday & Friday. You're still spending less time in a week commuting but now live further out.
[+] [-] matthewmacleod|4 years ago|reply
However it’s pout out at least that keeping meetings online even when present in the office can be a really useful tool for helping everyone to have equitable access. The assumption that all of our meetings are done online from individual devices wherever possible has made it much easier for remote and in-office workers to collaborate on the same level.
[+] [-] dabeeeenster|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mensetmanusman|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] giansegato|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chana_masala|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Consultant32452|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mypastself|4 years ago|reply
Additionally, “masculine hegemons” can no longer use their arm-waving skills to win arguments.
Hard-hitting journalism from The Guardian, as usual.
[+] [-] somebehemoth|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] matthewmacleod|4 years ago|reply
I’m not a woman so the point isn’t quite the same, but I can absolutely observe the effect of online meetings generally reducing the temptation of certain people to dominate the conversation.
[+] [-] u801e|4 years ago|reply
Could one assume that people who prefer meetings (online or in person) over an online text conversation or email thread have poor written communication and reading comprehension skills?
[+] [-] trident5000|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] newsclues|4 years ago|reply
I don’t do well IRL, but online I can shine.
[+] [-] geofft|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwaway-38nmm|4 years ago|reply
I don't doubt that online work has helped a lot of people participate, but as with all things it's an environment that will work better for some and worse for others. What we should have is both—companies and teams where the expectation is that you'll come to the office every day and meet in a conference room, and companies and teams where most meetings are done online.
[+] [-] nomansland|4 years ago|reply
I agree that there's so many different ways to work, that one modality is never going to make everyone happy.
[+] [-] cauthon|4 years ago|reply
Are you my boss?
Seriously though, I’d be working 100% from my home if my boss could parse anything from video meetings. But he can’t, so I’m in once a week for all our project meetings. I don’t actually mind it most of the time, I like the break from home and being able to whiteboard.
I agree that fully remote work isn’t the universally level playing field so many are making it out to be.
[+] [-] clarkevans|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] imbnwa|4 years ago|reply
There just isn't a good solution for "opting out" from this behavior in-office, so remote work has been a great boon in this direction in particular.
[+] [-] Grakel|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Noumenon72|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwaway2331|4 years ago|reply
A solution to this is "being more entrepreneurial," wherein you can decide who you work with -- albeit, with sane expectations (e.g. you're not going to scale to $100m value without having to eat a lot of shit, but that's true with climbing the corporate ladder too).
[+] [-] tootie|4 years ago|reply
And it's not just zoom. In fact the biggest driver is Slack/Teams and the like. Everyone has an equal voice on slack. Interruption is impossible. Thoughts can be curated, recorded and edited in real time. And it can all be asynchronous.
[+] [-] nonameiguess|4 years ago|reply
No longer an issue at all now that I don't have to be in a job where someone expects me to be in one position in one place in one room for hours at a time to get work done. Going for a walk or laying in bed for a meeting is no problem.
It is long past time we actually used the remote communication ability our handheld networking and computing devices have enabled and quit pretending it's still 1960. If ISIS can manage war campaigns over WhatsApp, I think your business can figure out a way to make it work.
[+] [-] flavius29663|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wdb|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] cruano|4 years ago|reply
So they disprove their own point by the end of the article...
[+] [-] tchalla|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nikkinana|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] paperoli|4 years ago|reply
I've already got a final warning work, and it still feels impossible to do anything from at home. It's effected my self esteem and really damaged my career. I think I'll try to get an ADHD diagnosis and then I'll be considered disabled and will maybe get some help and legal protection.