[libranof1987]

Originally Posted by Samurai

In fact, it is more than an U-turn, it has gone into a spiral.

I am very confident more than 75% of the work force from the WFO-enabled industries will be 75-100% back to office before the end of the year. All those carrots and sticks of flexible working, WFO etc. won't stand a chance against our mentality, both: of bosses wanting to micro-manage and employees' arrive-before-boss-leave-after-boss, and the lure of misusing WFO.

[Dieseltuned]

Sharing from my personal experience.

I head a small software testing unit based out of Mumbai and Pune (HQ in UK). We as an organization had as everybody else in 2020/2021 asked our staff to WFH. However, there have been a few instances in my personal way of working as well as noticed a few traits in employees which has forced me and our senior managment to re-jig the permanent work from home to a hybrid policy wherein the staff is asked to come to office atleast once a week.

Initially, I will talk of the experience with staff and then will come to my personal experience :

1. A few our staff opted to migrate to their hometowns in the hinterlands of our country. We immediately noticed that they were facing a lot of network connectivity issues and therefore their deliverables were getting impacted. Mind you, these folks are exceptional workforce and at the top of their game always. Due to poor connectivity they themselves started feeling low and their self motivation levels started dropping.

2. As part of senior management a big logistical problem evolved in terms of getting the IT equipment delivered to their hometowns. Even well reputed courier companies were hesitant in delivering to these locales. One of my staff had to travel 50 Kms to the nearest district head to collect the equipment.

3. Fake interview candidates, We were in the midst of setting up a new team and were interviewing a lot of candidates , however we did come across a couple of cases wherein the candidates were found to be fake. Initially we did not realize this, but then on a whim we asked candidates to share their recent photographs so that we could match whether the same person is giving the interview.

4. Lip syncing. This is one more thing that we observed in a few interview candidates. The person sitting in front of the camera just moved his lips but the voice was coming from somewhere behind the person. This was also identified by the voice of the person when he said his/her name was different to when they were answering the questions.

Now, coming to my personal experience :

In the initial days of the pandemic when this WFH was novel way of working, I was enjoying it. I did not have to travel 2-3 hours in a day, not get stuck in traffic jams and also saw an increase in my productivity. However, as months went by, I started seeing a lot of changes in my personal lifestyle which I had picked up inadvertently. I had lost my ability to wake up in early mornings. (since WFH so no need to wake u early and travel to office). I had started becoming lethargic and started ignoring my daily chores. Any mention of stepping out of the house would get me irritated and I would totally avoid stepping out in the sun. I could hardly walk 10 minutes in the afternoon sun. In short I was becoming the man as depicted in the movie WALL-E wherein he sits on the chair all day and has lost touch with the world outside. Not to mention I was getting obese.

This was getting out of hand and things had to be put back on track.

The first change that I did was "get out of the house". I started going to office at least twice a week. (even though it means getting stuck in traffic). I had to get my mind back to "working" mode. It had become a game of controlling my mind.

Apologies, for a long post but this is something which I have experienced and wanted to put it out. It is a mind game and I have now realized the importance of mind and body wellbeing.

Regards
Diesel

[Samurai]

Originally Posted by Dieseltuned

This was getting out of hand and things had to be put back on track.

The first change that I did was "get out of the house". I started going to office at least twice a week. (even though it means getting stuck in traffic). I had to get my mind back to "working" mode. It had become a game of controlling my mind.

This is a question of discipline. This happened to lots of people during pandemic. You need to implement a structured way of working even from home. I have been partially WFH since 2010 and fully since 2020.

Create a home office environment where you don't distracted by the general home environment. I used to have a bedroom reserved as my office in an earlier house. Now I have a glass partitioned cubicle with white board, etc.

Ensure you go out at least once day for some errand. Dress properly when you go out, and don't rush in your shorts. Add a daily walk in the sun to your activities. Talk to your colleagues everyday.

[am1m]

Originally Posted by Dieseltuned

Any mention of stepping out of the house would get me irritated and I would totally avoid stepping out in the sun.

I noticed I was getting a bit sloppy working from home, since I didn't have to go in to an office and meet other people. So started dressing for work, even though I don't leave the house. I don't mean I wear formal work clothes and shoes but made sure I change in to full pants or jeans and a fresh t-shirt before starting work, instead of track pants, shorts, etc. Helps maintain the mindset. And if I am on video calls, I wear a collared shirt or t-shirt.

Didn't have issues getting up or getting out for exercise because I used to go for a run before going to office on some days of the week, and on most weekends even before WFH started.

[rajushank84]

My thoughts on this have changed too.

In an office there is a different level of connective tissue and teamwork built unplanned, in an organic way. Energy and enthusiasm spread.

The work itself - especially for a fairly established process - can very well be done from home. But the team building and morale, its not the same. And for new products or startups, it is a night and day difference.

I think I'm moving from even hybrid to mostly-office mindset where it is still technically hybrid to allow for people's varying schedules and adhoc chores, especially for people with kids. But that aside, most of the time, being in the office sitting next to each other works like nothing else does.

Unpopular opinion, I know.

Btw I experienced some other angles like people double-timing (working at 2 places from home) and other such challenges. Those can be overcome I guess. But my main reason is the team feel doesn't get built as easily when remote.

The commute may be inconvenient but I think it is better for me as an employee too. I have relationships from colleagues 20 years back. I don't think that would have happened if everyone were remote then. Today they will try to refer me somewhere if I need their help. A remote coworker may not take the same efforts. Forget about referrals, some of these people are closer to family friends than ex-coworkers now. Just not the same with remote.

Also, +1 on the discipline and focus. When going into a physical office that's much easier too. Fewer distractions, everyone is working, the natural thing is for me to start working too. At home... well, let's say some of us struggle more with distractions than others. Maybe it is ADHD or something, I don't know. It is not just "laziness", it really is much more difficult for some people than others.

[avira_tk]

Originally Posted by libranof1987

I am very confident more than 75% of the work force from the WFO-enabled industries will be 75-100% back to office before the end of the year. All those carrots and sticks of flexible working, WFO etc. won't stand a chance against our mentality, both: of bosses wanting to micro-manage and employees' arrive-before-boss-leave-after-boss, and the lure of misusing WFO.

Yes, the reason why people are delaying isn't because they don't want to come to office. Shifting takes a lot of time and coordination, most senior manager told don't know anything about how long that takes or moving, getting admission to a school, finding money for down payment on rental advances. They've been comfy for too long.

The managers who don't know if their team is working or lazing off should get the boot first. Keeping track of deliverables is what they're paid for, it's not like you never have people overseas sending status reports, they work from home all the time. Flexible working isn't allowed in dead end jobs, talented folks have always had flexible hours in IT, that'll not change.

[SoumenD]

Am still a staunch supporter of WFH. Even pre-pandemic we were in hybrid mode(1-2 days WFH) and now since last 4 months I am again going to office twice a week. Productivity has taken a hit I can feel. Office days = 2-3 hours in traffic, 1 hour for getting ready & clean up post return. That's 3-4 hours of pointless non-productive time. I could very well use it for other tasks back home. I know pre-pandemic also this was the case but now that we know it can be utilized better why not do it?

About getting obese or lazy I haven't gained a single Kg extra inspite of no gymming or running. Only physical exercise is using stairs and walking. I go out for a walk(15-20 mins) break every 3-4 hours and this keeps me charged up. On WFH days I am able to get so much done but on office days I feel dead tired thanks to traffic fatigue. About connectivity we have 24/7 DG backup and I bought a 1000kva UPS for powering the modem,TV,PS etc just incase the DG takes longer to kick in. This has ensured flawless connectivity. Ofcourse if there's a natural calamity you can't help and that holds true even for office. For example my office in bangalore is now closed due to water logging but am able to work without any issues because I work from home.

I don't see any more interaction with colleagues happening compared to pandemic days over teams. My team(14 members) is as tight/loosely coupled as it was during pandemic. We have delivered 5 major releases in last 2 years completely working from home, infact team was spread all across India(Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Trivandrum, Kolkata, Hyderabad and Bangalore). Its all about your attitude IMO. If you want to laze around you do that even in office, we are not kindergarten kids who need a stick on their behind to do their homework. Office presence is appreciated only by upper management folks I see, nobody else finds it of much use. Just my 2 cents.

Having said that I do understand this is a luxury only IT folks have or maybe HR departments. But the other service sectors dependent on these firms like canteen services, house-keeping staff, cab service etc would be affected severely if 100% WFH is made a norm. And hence the hybrid model makes sense for overall economy. But team-building and similar shenanigans are just not convincing enough.

[ninjatalli]

Originally Posted by rajushank84

Unpopular opinion, I know.

Not at all - agree with most of the points. I see this with myself and several of my colleagues.

Originally Posted by Dieseltuned

It is a mind game and I have now realized the importance of mind and body wellbeing.

Very true. I shared a thread on this topic that saw similar views from many bhpians. Many of the problems you guys have highlighted is not something that can be "solved" with a cubicle space or separate room arrangement in our houses; definitely not for all (for a few it might).

Hopefully we'll get to a working hybrid construct that works for all in their own customised model.

[CeeBeeR]

Originally Posted by Dieseltuned

......
However, there have been a few instances in my personal way of working as well as noticed a few traits in employees which has forced me and our senior managment to re-jig the permanent work from home to a hybrid policy wherein the staff is asked to come to office atleast once a week.

In the initial days of the pandemic when this WFH was novel way of working, I was enjoying it. I did not have to travel 2-3 hours in a day, not get stuck in traffic jams and also saw an increase in my productivity. However, as months went by, I started seeing a lot of changes in my personal lifestyle which I had picked up inadvertently. I had lost my ability to wake up in early mornings. (since WFH so no need to wake u early and travel to office). I had started becoming lethargic and started ignoring my daily chores. Any mention of stepping out of the house would get me irritated and I would totally avoid stepping out in the sun. I could hardly walk 10 minutes in the afternoon sun.

Hi Diesel,
Imagine I'm in your company.
1) I live in a tier- II city. It doesn't have the fancy malls, but it has stable call and data connectivity and a good postal network. We have Jio fibre that works fabulously. So no question of slow bandwidth and also no issues in receiving office parcels over courier.
2) I'm a bachelor, living with my parents since the pandemic started and I have my own room upstairs where I have the aforementioned Jio fibre router connected to an inverter that provides a 6 hours backup. This again prevents any sudden disconnetions due to a power cut. 6 hours should be more than sufficient. In case that doesn't work, I have power banks that can provide my mobile enough juice to act as a hotspot for at least 2 days. The laptop also has an extra battery.
3) I made it a rule to never, ever connect to web meetings through my phone. WFH is a luxury and I won't abuse it. So, I always connect through my office provided laptop.
4)I lost 15 kgs by moving back to my hometown from B'lore. How? Well, I can wake up early, spend an hour jogging/walking, spend another hour in the gym, eat good food at home while being calorie conscious and in general avoid the stress of traffic. It's not that these can't be followed in a city, but it's just that doing this in my hometown is easier.

With the above points, would you still call me back to office just because WFH didn't work well for you and some colleagues? Would you risk losing an employee in the name of "collaboration, coordination etc"?

I'm aware that WFH is easier for me because I'm slightly more privileged than others. I have a supportive management, no children running around and the financial means to setup my infrastructure. However, this also illustrates why we shouldn't generalise the WFH vs WFO argument. What works for me may not work for another person, but that doesn't mean I should be made to follow something just to ensure a "one rule for all" mentality.
Management should take the time to understand different types of employee WFH situations, not just stick to the popular consensus or their own personal experience.

Now, I won't stay in my hometown forever. In fact, I'm planning (and dreading) to go back to B'lore. However, I'll visit the office rarely and if that isn't allowed, will search for options that provide more flexibility in work locations.

[OpenRoads]

Originally Posted by CeeBeeR

Management should take the time to understand different types of employee WFH situations, not just stick to the popular consensus or their own personal experience.

Well said, and I agree with you 100%. My case is a little different.

1. Before pandemic and WFH thing started, my little daughter spent her whole afternoon in a day care center till I picked her up while coming back from office in the evening. But now she gets to stays with us and is very happy about it.

2. Daily I spent 2.5 - 3 hours during office commute burning fuel which I get to spend now reading newspaper, talking a nice walk, chatting with my family/friends. And during weekend go on short trips but still saving money from fuel which is not wasted for daily commute.

3. There is no shortfall in my or teams productivity due to more relaxed environment and flexible timings (depends on how well you know your team and manage them by giving responsibility, ownership and milestone based work). On the other hand people are happy since they are able to help more at home and finish work as well.

I have witnessed many instances where the head of the family/bread winner or what ever name you want to call is anxious to get back to office citing there love for work productivity, collaboration etc. In reality these folks get extremely irritated with house work related to kids or things which the better half handles.

This pandemic showed various ways to adopt and progress with better solutions which we should analyze and learn from instead of bluntly going back to old ways of working.

MORAL: Its high time we should switch from 'Diesel' to 'Hybrid'

[kaushikduttajsr]

Originally Posted by Dieseltuned

Sharing from my personal experience.

I head a small software testing unit based out of Mumbai and Pune (HQ in UK). We as an organization had as everybody else in 2020/2021 asked our staff to WFH. However, there have been a few instances in my personal way of working as well as noticed a few traits in employees which has forced me and our senior managment to re-jig the permanent work from home to a hybrid policy wherein the staff is asked to come to office atleast once a week.

Initially, I will talk of the experience with staff and then will come to my personal experience :

1. A few our staff opted to migrate to their hometowns in the hinterlands of our country. We immediately noticed that they were facing a lot of network connectivity issues and therefore their deliverables were getting impacted. Mind you, these folks are exceptional workforce and at the top of their game always. Due to poor connectivity they themselves started feeling low and their self motivation levels started dropping.

2. As part of senior management a big logistical problem evolved in terms of getting the IT equipment delivered to their hometowns. Even well reputed courier companies were hesitant in delivering to these locales. One of my staff had to travel 50 Kms to the nearest district head to collect the equipment.

3. Fake interview candidates, We were in the midst of setting up a new team and were interviewing a lot of candidates , however we did come across a couple of cases wherein the candidates were found to be fake. Initially we did not realize this, but then on a whim we asked candidates to share their recent photographs so that we could match whether the same person is giving the interview.

4. Lip syncing. This is one more thing that we observed in a few interview candidates. The person sitting in front of the camera just moved his lips but the voice was coming from somewhere behind the person. This was also identified by the voice of the person when he said his/her name was different to when they were answering the questions.

Now, coming to my personal experience :

In the initial days of the pandemic when this WFH was novel way of working, I was enjoying it. I did not have to travel 2-3 hours in a day, not get stuck in traffic jams and also saw an increase in my productivity. However, as months went by, I started seeing a lot of changes in my personal lifestyle which I had picked up inadvertently. I had lost my ability to wake up in early mornings. (since WFH so no need to wake u early and travel to office). I had started becoming lethargic and started ignoring my daily chores. Any mention of stepping out of the house would get me irritated and I would totally avoid stepping out in the sun. I could hardly walk 10 minutes in the afternoon sun. In short I was becoming the man as depicted in the movie WALL-E wherein he sits on the chair all day and has lost touch with the world outside. Not to mention I was getting obese.

This was getting out of hand and things had to be put back on track.

The first change that I did was "get out of the house". I started going to office at least twice a week. (even though it means getting stuck in traffic). I had to get my mind back to "working" mode. It had become a game of controlling my mind.

Apologies, for a long post but this is something which I have experienced and wanted to put it out. It is a mind game and I have now realized the importance of mind and body wellbeing.

Regards
Diesel

I echo each of the points you've made. I'm a social animals and a sedentary indoor life doesn't suit my mental health. Forcing myself go to office, a min of 2 days a week, has really helped. So yes, I couldn't agree more. For some people though, I think the WFH life is exactly the life they envisioned. My sister, for example, despises stepping out and gets energized to do her best when left alone.

[Vishal.R]

Many points against WFH, are also apply to geographically distributed teams.

So for the industry which itself first flourished on teams, distributed across geographies, it would be difficult to digest when someone says full time working from office is the "only" way.

E.g. today's home broadband speed in many smaller cities might be batter than speed available to individual desktop in a big office connected by leased line few years back.

Exception can be organisations with constraints related to data security or Intellectual property.

[Arun Varma]

Originally Posted by Dieseltuned

Sharing from my personal experience.


Regards
Diesel

I understand where you are coming from. From my personal/professional standpoint, I would add the following:

• If a job involves a lot of handovers, then you will likely get better efficiencies WFO
• For some specific work types that require additional stringency (HIPAA is but one example), companies can feel WFO is a better option for standardized and optimal enforcement of such compliance requirements
• For teams that work together in established hierarchies, team bonding, culture building, etc. are better accomplished while WFO

Is it impossible to do all of that WFH? Of course not. Have companies done it? Of course yes. But to each their own!

And to echo your sentiment, gluttony in the form of snacking is my primary sin and I have poor self-control therefore for me personally I am better off WFO where I can avoid temptation!

[anti21]

I think Work from Home has been amazing for me (and my company).

Before COVID, we were a company where WFH was exception. During COVID, our CEO realised that we now had access to much better talent than being limited to the 2 cities we had our office in. He then decided to go to a permanent WFH after taking employee feedback (where over 70% wanted WFH). Our existing offices are still open if someone wants to work from there. It is entirely up to the employees. The number of applications for our openings have more than tripled since, we had to implement an auto-screening test. We also have tripled and outgrown our offices.

Now we are hiring much better quality wise and are easily able to entice talented people from the companies which are asking employees to come back to office. Most of the time we don't have to offer the huge package bump that has been synonymous with tech market nowadays due to permanent work from home advantage.

People love it because they can live with their generally ageing parents in their hometown, don't have rent and other general living expenses (this easily increases their disposable income by 5-7 lakhs), our productivity has gone up overall, people don't have to spend time in traffic, they are eating healthier at their home, they live close to their school/college friends, can see their children growing up, not have to deal with landlords (6/11 month rent for security deposit is outrageous) etc. The benefits are endless. In recent survey, more than 82% people preferred working from home.

But one of the concerns that was raised recently in town hall was that people are missing the face-to-face interactions. We do schedule things like Fun Friday or just shoot the breeze sometimes after our daily calls. But, yes, it is not exact replacement of face-to-face interaction. Our teams are anyway spread across multiple countries so Zoom calls are important anyway so there is a limit to having face to face interaction among the whole team. The company is looking at solutions for this. We might implement a quarterly one-week team meets at various locations. Also, looking at the possibility of satellite offices in various cities via tie ups with local co-working places (provided the employees in that city are interested in that). Despite this shortcoming, most people don't want to come back to office so that is out of question.

Also, some have raised concerns of moonlighting. I personally don't have a problem with it. If employee is delivering what is expected of them, I don't care what they do with their spare time. If it helps them earn an extra income while also learning additional things on their spare time, I don't see a downside. And since we offer flexi hours, they can schedule it as they please (except for some daily standup call times). If the CEO of companies can sit in board of other companies, why can't an employee take on a part time job in spare time that doesn't affect their work? They should just exercise the common sense of not using their office laptops for their part time as anything that is created on office laptop is property of the company.

I personally think if you hire people whom you cannot trust to deliver their job, you need to rethink your hiring process.

[am1m]

Originally Posted by anti21

But one of the concerns that was raised recently in town hall was that people are missing the face-to-face interactions...We might implement a quarterly one-week team meets at various locations.

We tried this and it worked well. We found that meeting people face-to-face once just improved the quality of the video/audio call interactions afterwards. Perhaps one half-yearly company-wide face-to-face and then leave it up to individual teams to figure out how to meet perhaps once a year or once a quarter or however frequently the team decides among themselves. Seems to work best.

Originally Posted by anti21

Also, some have raised concerns of moonlighting. I personally don't have a problem with it.

Wow, that's pretty broad-minded. I'm totally pro-remote work but personally don't think moonlighting is a good thing or should be encouraged. And I've known people that moonlighted even when they were working out of an office, so it's not an inherent negative of remote work model either. Quite frankly, where do people get the time anyway?! Once I'm done with my work at my one job, I just want to shut down and do something else!

Originally Posted by anti21

I personally think if you hire people whom you cannot trust to deliver their job, you need to rethink your hiring process.

Absolutely! Well said!

If you factually find that you can't trust a lot of people in your team, then you need to look at your hiring processes. If you basically come in with the mindset that most employees can't be trusted by default, the issue is with your management style! (And you probably shouldn't be a people manager in the first place!)