Remote workers....what do you actually do?

[BC13]

I work as a labor relations neutral. This business transformed from 99.9% F2F to 99% virtual over the past 11 months. Instead of driving 30k work miles, I've driven 1500 work miles in the past 11 months.

75% of attys and labor arbitrators love remote hearings and negotiations. Mediations are a bit tougher due to the need for the mediators to "reach" the parties and move them to a deal. However, I estimate only about 25% of the remote mediations I've conducted really would have been significantly easier in the F2F setting.

I hold more sessions being remote, but the average length of the sessions is shorter. As neither party paid their atty 2-8 hrs of travel time it is easier to break at a logical point in the process and reconvene. It is much easier to schedule sessions as the players are not zigzagging across the state all week. My administrative and supervisory work is unchanged.

To the surprise of many in this field that doubted the efficacy of remote negotiations, arbitration and mediation, much of this work is going to remain remote post covid.

My staff has thrived in the WAH environment.

[schuss]

I will still go into the office when it reopens, but I do technology product strategy, research and company wide metrics and measurement. We're international, so everything is a teams call even in normal times.
That bullshit jobs book is just as bullshit as the theory he's peddling. Haven'ts seen much hard workforce research that backs up that specific approach. I think the most apt take would be to paraphrase Wanamaker on orgs:
“Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don't know which half”

[ötzi]

Currently President - Vandalay Industries

Hoping to get hired by Penske soon but if not there is always the Bro

I hear the Yankees are hiring.

[fomofo]

Keep your head up kid. You’ll make Assistant Regional Manager in no time.

Attachment 363179


Sent from my iPhone using TGR Forums

Apparently things worked out for him.

[easyrdr]

Been doing the wfh thing now for 8 years. Worked great for two years, then the baby arrived. Kicked my ass for a solid 4 years then made it to the other side. Then COVID hit and we decided to homeschool, productivity back in the shitter. I'm operating successfully in survival mode. I also have learned that I do not have the patience to teach my 5 year old anything school related.

[donutlynx]

Lead engineer for a fed agency. WFH about 50% of the time since the panda hit last year. The other 50% is spent in the field (can't work in the field from home). I am definitely more efficient with my time during WFH because there are less distractions from colleagues/coworkers. I will be making a case to do this indefinitely post-pandemic. A nice bonus is that I save 3 hours of commuting time per week with WFH. It has certainly made it easier to ski the concrete this season, but I'm working the hours that I get paid for...not skiing or something else.

[hatchgreenchile]

[VTskibum]

^^ That's pretty good

Suppose I count as mid-management for a big pharma company involved heavily in current event, basically do internal software development w/ small team of senior employees and contracted support/app dev teams. Have little to no desire to advance further currently and am already slave to my calendar of double/triple booked conference calls for multiple project status/issues/1 on 1 w staff/etc. I used to go to the office 1-2 days a week and WFH the rest b/c my direct reports and boss are spread all over the US, plus offshore support/dev. Going to the office to join the same webex/teams calls was pretty pointless, but had it's moments for bigger meetings and bumping into people you wouldn't see everyday. That may be the longer term impact for this, while I appreciate the minimal coffee talk, the relationships outside direct group may prove challenging.

Over the years as my team grew and projects got more visibility, my ability to take a long lunch has been shrinking. Raced mountain bikes pretty seriously for many years and lunchtime was go-to for training sessions as I have trails 1 min pedal from home for a power hour ride and back by my 1pm call. COVID hit and now lunchtime is just another hour to schedule calls for those who have nothing better to do. I want the world to go back to people in the office + me still WFH, not to mention virtual/hybrid school sucks for most kids/parents.

[ötzi]

I put the poles in the holes.

[warthog]

Yeah, lunchtime has become non existent. I work more now. No windshield time between calls.

[AdironRider]

I work in accounting, in a ski town, so there is nothing remotely challenging about the work, its steady, and I can do it from home.

But the reality is, I kinda suck at working from home. I get my shit done, but I find it unbearable to be working at my house so there is much procrastination and everything is much more annoying.

I like the division of work and home life, and mixing the two just grinds my gears. I also genuinely like my co workers, and miss the day to day banter.

[doebedoe]

I've been full remote since the outbreak in govt job. Previously middle management, now "senior strategist" (no direct reports) whatever the fuck that means. Shift happened when I took a couple weeks off to deal in October with my mental health (and not just off biking/skiing/whatever...more like trying to get out of bed) and came back to no team.

March-June I worked probably 70-80hr weeks every week. Putting in temporary IT solutions to help families find child care for their kids during the pandemic, and figuring out how to push out a ton of money in shitty state procurement systems.

Now I work a whole lot less. Maybe...20hrs a week or real work (i.e. drafting policy, research, analysis, coordination, etc)? I'm probably one of those WFHers mountain folks hate, dawn patrol until noon. Sneaking up for Tuesday pow days taking conference calls from the minivan. Sucking off the gov't teat for a while I figure out the next move.

And no...the agency has no ideas about the productivity losses of myself and (esp) my former team which are all now managed by non-technical folks. But those have little to do with WFH, and everything to do with managerial choices in general.

My ideal gig would be 50/50 office and home, working 4 10s. Offices are just better for some things (really collaborative activities like problem solving/designing, negotiations, etc). Home is better for others (reading papers, analysis, writing code.)

[Danno]

Seriously, what the hell do you people do?

[Self Jupiter]

Is everyone just working for a "startup" making new apps that no one actually needs but people get them anyway just because they exist? Getting paid off posting your sprinter in cool places on instagram? Seriously, what the hell do you people do?

[Sirshredalot]

I work in accounting, in a ski town, so there is nothing remotely challenging about the work, its steady, and I can do it from home.

But the reality is, I kinda suck at working from home. I get my shit done, but I find it unbearable to be working at my house so there is much procrastination and everything is much more annoying.

I like the division of work and home life, and mixing the two just grinds my gears. I also genuinely like my co workers, and miss the day to day banter.

X2 on a lot of this. I actually took a job at a fairly buttoned-down job with a commute into SLC because I was burned out at my old telework job. Now we are going frequent wfh at the new job. I'm holding my breath to see how it shakes out.

Sent from my Pixel 3a using Tapatalk

[TahoeJ]

I've been working remotely for about 16 years. First four I was self employed as a web publisher, the last 12 I've been in ad technology biz development. I was one of the first employees at the company and own a decent chunk of it, so now I basically just oversee my team, give advice, answer questions, and manage our biggest clients. All of which I can do from my phone.

Gradually my wife turned into my at-home micromanager because she was jealous of my flexibility and getting to ski / bike / golf all the time (even though I more than held up my end with the kids), so I decided to quit that "side gig." ;-) Which means I do all of the stuff I enjoy even more now. It's a pretty cushy job and I have no complaints, but I did have to work my ass off to get to this place.

[XXX-er]

I couldn't have wfh or worked at a data center or worked at a branch office i liked life on the road where i had my favorite coffee shops, bars, massage parlors. Of course some times the road grates on you but the best part was the leaving hopefuly with the job fixed

I was remote to branch office otherwise i duno if i could have lasted thru the whole gig

[hatchgreenchile]

But the reality is, I kinda suck at working from home. I get my shit done, but I find it unbearable to be working at my house so there is much procrastination and everything is much more annoying.
.

YMMV, but I was far more productive when I mixed in coffee shops and the library with the home office. These days, not so much. Coffee shops and the library are out of the equation, and Mrs HGC (far higher on the career totem pole) took over the home office in March and hasn't looked back. Add kids and minimal interactions with friends/family and it gets tougher!

I don't mind occasional travel, nor face to face time with key players within the company. Zoom fatigue is a very real thing.

[schuss]

Also, being involved with a lot of measurement - there's not THAT much worry about productivity losses as most of the drain is kids/remote schooling which isn't a solvable problem in the short term, better to get the important stuff done and let the pet projects fall by the wayside to build up employee goodwill. Ditching employees you've invested years in due to a pandemic is crazy short sighted.

[Kevo]

I've worked from home for the past year, but was on the road 75% for 5+ years before that and might as well have been remote since I was only in my office a handful of days every month.

I was previously in a technical sales and product strategy role for a tech company. My job was to figure out how to integrate my company's technology into a prospective client's technology and to architect whatever was needed from a product standpoint to keep that company competitive in the industry. I'd get things architected and handed off to an implementation engineering team and be on to the next project. I had a dedicated product manager and an engineering team who would build the things we needed if it wasn't available off the shelf (hence the product strategy portion of the role).

I've since moved to an enterprise sales role at a different tech company. I sell SaaS tech to large companies and manage existing relationships with enterprise clients.

No one cares where or when I do the things that I do so long as they get done and revenue is good.

I'm way more productive WFH. The open office environment of most tech companies these days is extremely distracting, and commuting is a gigantic waste of time.

[Skidog]

Yeah, lunchtime has become non existent. I work more now. No windshield time between calls.

3rded or whatever....but the flexibility for me makes up for it.

[seano732]

Zoom fatigue is a very real thing.

Just ask Jeffery Toobin......

https://www.vice.com/en/article/epdg...-dick-incident

He has since been fired.....

[shirk]

WTF I thought everyone on here was either a Pro Skier or Trustfunder?

Started the WFH last spring when the world went sideways, was back in the office by late summer. Have been WFH since the start of the year, we decided not to renew the lease on a secondary office space that I worked out of. A couple of us are now WFH full time and customer service was shuffled into our warehouse space (closer to home for him so less commute).

I manage our websites, ERP system and shuffle data around in excel.

[SoVT Joey]

WTF I thought everyone on here was either a Pro Skier or Trustfunder?

Started the WFH last spring when the world went sideways, was back in the office by late summer. Have been WFH since the start of the year, we decided not to renew the lease on a secondary office space that I worked out of. A couple of us are now WFH full time and customer service was shuffled into our warehouse space (closer to home for him so less commute).

I manage our websites, ERP system and shuffle data around in excel.

I had a trust fund, I blew it on heroin.

Now I grow weed and ski and thank someone up above for allowing me to wake up another day.

[diggins1712]

I WFH and am in healthcare IT, specifically as an Epic Analyst. I have my bachelor’s in nursing but made the change to the IT side of things a few years ago. Prior to COVID, I was able to WFH up to 2 days a week. Once COVID hit we went 100% WFH. We’ve since moved from WI to WA and I was able to find a job fairly easily. I’m in the process of changing jobs to work for a different healthcare system that offers better pay.

Now we just need to find a house! Trying to buy a house right now sucks.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk