The true villans of the pandemic ?

[^woody^]

I'd have told him/her to just put a tablet in their mouth for the sore throat.

A Samsung Galaxy Tab 10", sideways.

It may not have cured the sore throat, but it would certainly stop the spread of any more crap of of their mouth and others being affected.

 

[BlueLoo]

I suspect it will be a generational thing. Yes I remember the novelty of video calls via phone 15 years or doo ago, but the technology and systems were crap and could not cope. So it never really caught on.

Now it's better and you can just click and connect, good image and sound and is now natural for the youngsters, but not so for the oldies.

Fundamentally, face to screen should be no different than face to face.

Video conferencing?

How quaint.

Teams is the balls. Works great.
Allows me to go in and out of meetings as when required. Utter game changer.
Teams allows me to network with colleagues far far far easier than in an office environment.

Nobody, and i mean nobody in a productive role thinks working in an office is better than working in a (decent) wfh situation. A few odd ball middle managers clinging onto past glories perhaps.

The office is dead.

 

[Lower]

I suspect it will be a generational thing. Yes I remember the novelty of video calls via phone 15 years or doo ago, but the technology and systems were crap and could not cope. So it never really caught on.

Now it's better and you can just click and connect, good image and sound and is now natural for the youngsters, but not so for the oldies.

Fundamentally, face to screen should be no different than face to face.

It’s not just about the tech, we’ve got used to that. It’s all the other stuff that goes on in an office with other people when you’re not on a call that the tech doesn’t replicate.

 

[Lower]

Video conferencing?

How quaint.

Teams is the balls. Works great.
Allows me to go in and out of meetings as when required. Utter game changer.
Teams allows me to network with colleagues far far far easier than in an office environment.

Nobody, and i mean nobody in a productive role thinks working in an office is better than working in a (decent) wfh situation. A few odd ball middle managers clinging onto past glories perhaps.

The office is dead.

Might be for you. How does working from home work when you work in a factory?

how goes working from home work when you’re managing that factory? How does. Working from home work when you’re developing and testing a new product?

 

[fillyboy]

Might be for you. How does working from home work when you work in a factory?

how goes working from home work when you’re managing that factory? How does. Working from home work when you’re developing and testing a new product?

Training is another thing that must have been very badly hit in office environments whether it be banking or local services, that's going to come back and haunt us in a few years.

 

[Notch7]

So you've accused the previous poster of bad absolutism, and then you do the same in saying that WFH is more productive....

My experience of WFH in my company is that individual tasks get done effectively, but the easy communication that people sitting in the same office use to grease the wheels of tasks that aren't simple tick box exercises disappears, so overall productivity reduces. The extra effort of having to call someone to ask a question means that people often park their questions for a later call, which holds up the task, or they struggle on on their own, which also holds up the task.

I have been on the direct receiving end of inefficiency on the part of HMRC and a number of financial institutions, where the work from home directive has caused all sorts of problems that they appear to unable to resolve. Anecdotally, i have heard of lot of companies having major medium and long term issues caused by working from home.

My personal view is that work from home is effective for certain industries and tasks, but it won't take long for companies to ask people to return to the office once they are allowed to do so for productivity, social and welfare reasons. I think there is a big work from home car crash about to happen for lots of companies.

Some people love being able to work from home and tell the world how great it is for productivity, even when it isn't. However, there is also a significant percentage of those currently being asked to work from home who hate it and can't wait for the current WFH guidance to end.

I think the pandemic has changed the way we work for good.

Some businesses have closed their London offices permanently.

Younger people have embraced to this new way of working and businesses are now advertising jobs that are WFH

Mostly it’s hybrid working: 3 home 2 office

But it’s highly industry dependent - sectors like manufacturing will probably see all staff returning.

 

[Notch7]

Me too. My usual work with local and other government agencies, statutory providers etc has involved the ubiquitous and almost standard "there will be delays in dealing with your request because we are working from home". But why? Home workers access the same information and systems in exactly the same way as they did from their work desk, so there is no logical reason for any delays or disruption of their service.

My experience of trying to contact planning officers is they hardly seem to work anyway. They seem to be constantly in staff meeting, training, sabbaticals, annual leave, blah blah blah.

 

[JP_]

Video conferencing?

How quaint.

Teams is the balls. Works great.
Allows me to go in and out of meetings as when required. Utter game changer.
Teams allows me to network with colleagues far far far easier than in an office environment.

Nobody, and i mean nobody in a productive role thinks working in an office is better than working in a (decent) wfh situation. A few odd ball middle managers clinging onto past glories perhaps.

The office is dead.

Yeah, totally. A mate has been working for Google for about 10 years now, and from day one meetings were held online, they very rarely have office meetings because people are spread all over the world.

Roll on a decade, and a friend in banking mentioned that the pandemic was so good for business - people were getting so much more done. Rather than having 5 meetings a week, people were doing 5 on Monday and working the rest of the week, and more deals than ever were agreed because people were not wasting time driving and flying, staying in hotels, eating expensive meals and generally wasting time.

Although, saying all that, my plan is to try to mostly use the office for meetings in the future, when I stop working from home. Make the office place the place to network with co-workers and talk, then get your head down and work without distraction at home.

Offices are soooo distracting. So much time is wasted every day.

 

[BlueLoo]

Yeah, totally. A mate has been working for Google for about 10 years now, and from day one meetings were held online, they very rarely have office meetings because people are spread all over the world.

Roll on a decade, and a friend in banking mentioned that the pandemic was so good for business - people were getting so much more done. Rather than having 5 meetings a week, people were doing 5 on Monday and working the rest of the week, and more deals than ever were agreed because people were not wasting time driving and flying, staying in hotels, eating expensive meals and generally wasting time.

Although, saying all that, my plan is to try to mostly use the office for meetings in the future, when I stop working from home. Make the office place the place to network with co-workers and talk, then get your head down and work without distraction at home.

Offices are soooo distracting. So much time is wasted every day.

You get it.

My experiences exactly.