Remote work risks wiping $800 billion from the value of office buildings in major cities, highlighting the potential losses that landlords are facing from post-pandemic changes in employment trends.
If you design for work in office, WFH probably isn’t going to be more productive and the other way around. A lot of companies made the mistake thinking that WFH is the same as regular office but with everyone being home. This is not the case.
I have experience with company without WFH employees, where any team that wasn’t literary all in the same building had some serious communication and cooperation isuues. I have experience with company where there was no office whatsoever, people were across globe and time zones and we managed to cooperate effectively.
I’m not saying that WFH can be always more effective. But in many cases it’s just terribly implemented change and companies are just moving back to investing into office space instead of investing into proper WFH culture.
Folks at Zapier wrote an excellent guide if anyone is interested. It’s serious effort, sure. People often feel like this is extra work to keep WFH viable, but they tend to forget that keeping the office running is also a serious effort. Many companies probably have office manager, how many of these have some alternative of that for WFH?
I would agree that implementation of WFH could be better. I also appreciate the link you shared. WFH can also be a viable option provided you set up for it.
However, I tend to find that a lot of the people who work best in WFH situations are generally friendly and productive people who will reach out on issues and cultivate relationships.
In contrast, those who seem to advocate the most for WFH online seem to want their direct manager to plug them into a system that will turn them into a cog that doesn’t need to be proactive in solving problems. That isn’t everyone who wants WFH, but they seem to be a loud minority.
Yeah, you absolutely have to set up for WFH. Which is no different than working from office. We just take that effort for granted.
Another issue is, that lot of the office work cost is not paid by companies. (At least not directly) For example the commute to work can easily be 10% of overall time spent from leaving your house until returning back home from work. But both the commute cost and time spent is paid by employee. So obviously companies are reluctant invest into WFH, because that does generate some expenses.
If you design for work in office, WFH probably isn’t going to be more productive and the other way around. A lot of companies made the mistake thinking that WFH is the same as regular office but with everyone being home. This is not the case.
I have experience with company without WFH employees, where any team that wasn’t literary all in the same building had some serious communication and cooperation isuues. I have experience with company where there was no office whatsoever, people were across globe and time zones and we managed to cooperate effectively.
I’m not saying that WFH can be always more effective. But in many cases it’s just terribly implemented change and companies are just moving back to investing into office space instead of investing into proper WFH culture.
Folks at Zapier wrote an excellent guide if anyone is interested. It’s serious effort, sure. People often feel like this is extra work to keep WFH viable, but they tend to forget that keeping the office running is also a serious effort. Many companies probably have office manager, how many of these have some alternative of that for WFH?
I would agree that implementation of WFH could be better. I also appreciate the link you shared. WFH can also be a viable option provided you set up for it.
However, I tend to find that a lot of the people who work best in WFH situations are generally friendly and productive people who will reach out on issues and cultivate relationships.
In contrast, those who seem to advocate the most for WFH online seem to want their direct manager to plug them into a system that will turn them into a cog that doesn’t need to be proactive in solving problems. That isn’t everyone who wants WFH, but they seem to be a loud minority.
Yeah, you absolutely have to set up for WFH. Which is no different than working from office. We just take that effort for granted.
Another issue is, that lot of the office work cost is not paid by companies. (At least not directly) For example the commute to work can easily be 10% of overall time spent from leaving your house until returning back home from work. But both the commute cost and time spent is paid by employee. So obviously companies are reluctant invest into WFH, because that does generate some expenses.