OT: Will Telecommuting be the New Norm?

[XXtwindad]

Read an interesting article in the SF Chron today about some of the possible long-term changes the virus-that-shall-not-be-named is causing.

https://www.sfchronicle.com/news/article/Because-of-coronavirus-we-re-doing-things-15131973.php

Foremost among them: telecommuting. Could it be the new norm? I'm pretty excited about the possibility. A silver lining in all the dreary news. I think it could be greatly beneficial on two fronts.

The first, of course, is environmental. Traffic jams are toxic for the environment. I went to the gym the other day and flew by 580. It was remarkable how little traffic there was.

And the other hug benefit is stress mitigation. Sitting in a sardine can for two hours is soul-sucking. The flexibility in the working day would seem to be a move toward a more balanced lifestyle.

I know this might not benefit everyone. Restaurants that rely on Noon working crowds, for example, would be impacted. But on the whole, I think this would be a good thing. Thoughts to the contrary? Am I off base? Or could this herald a new and better era?

[AngryScientist]

Many companies that do the type of work that support virtual offices were going that direction anyway. Many have already gone to a "hoteling" type office where a fraction of the workforce is in the office at any given time with the rest of the staff at home.

this virus situation will definitely help build out and test the virtual infrastructure required for a more complete WFH capacity.

The first day my company told everyone in the NYC office to work from home (i do most of the time anyway, but this included everyone, support staff, etc) - our VPN network crashed and IT had to scramble to get it back up. Apparently they are working to fortify it and increase capacity now. I'm certain there are plenty of IT professionals working hard this weekend across the country on just such matters to prepare for what's coming.

i agree it's a good thing for the reasons you mentioned, but we definitely lose something from a culture standpoint if we never see our co-workers. Not a big deal for me since my industry thrives on boozy lunches and all-night dinners, so i'll see people often enough once this social distancing gig clears up.

of course this is a real first world discussion. so many people need to shop up to do the work they do.

[Miljack]

I think it will be interesting for the "last mile" providers in residential areas. We in CLT are just now getting fiber providers to compete against the cable providers.

[itsflantastic]

I feel pretty fortunate that I'm able to work remotely with my job. I have a friend who is a masseuse and her boyfriend is a tattoo artist. They are kind of screwed and are losing clients left and right.

So, maybe the new norm for some, but it's definitely a privilege that doesn't extend to all industries.

[buddybikes]

Where I work there was a push to work from home to reduce footprint. Then Yahoo president pushed her employees back to office (she had baby in tow and personal in office daycare) this started a swing back to "collaboration" with your peers and back to the office. See what this round does. Personally I work from home, medical dispensation. My wife is a CPA auditor, and basically has hunkered down. Fortunately our work environment is kind of nice, watching swans and ducks in our bay off of Narragansett.

[Miller76]

I’ve got to believe that Work From Home and telecommuting is going to be the new norm. My company ran a project two weeks ago where they asked every employee with remote access to log on between 6pm and 8pm and run as many applications and processes as usual. Yes, it was most likely to ensure capabilities if the virus restricts commuting etc but at the same time you have to imagine the cost savings involved in having people working from home. I’ve never had the ability to work from home in the past, and for the last ten days I’ve been working from our recovery site, but I would love the ability. My current commute is 90 minutes each way!!


Employees working from their home office can be happier and more loyal than their office-bound counterparts. ... They have a very flexible schedule and can work from almost any place in the world. Also, remote workers can reduce operating costs for their employers while improving productivity.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[XXtwindad]

I feel pretty fortunate that I'm able to work remotely with my job. I have a friend who is a masseuse and her boyfriend is a tattoo artist. They are kind of screwed and are losing clients left and right.

So, maybe the new norm for some, but it's definitely a privilege that doesn't extend to all industries.

Yes, I understand that. I'm a personal trainer, and my business has been severely impacted, as has the other PTs I know. But, I'm compensating by training people in a park (weather dependent) and at home if possible. And the silver lining (possibly...this stuff is all new) is that their hours of availability will be more open. No more bunching clients around 5:30-8:30AM and 5:00-8:00PM. Again, this is all speculative because things have yet to fully play out, But it MIGHT be a benefit.

[robt57]

A good idea anyway as far as hydro carbons expelled.

Maybe it will stick. Gas here already lowest I have paid in a long long time... Not that for me it is a big deal cost wise. I ride more miles than drive anymore...

[fa63]

The data show that there has been a huge increase in telework in the last decade (it has more than doubled), and there is no slowing down.

The environmental benefits will be big, but not as big as one might think. Less than 20% of miles driven are for commuting. Also, only about 50% of the workforce is eligible for telework. So if everyone who could telecommute did so, it would only reduce car emissions by about 10%.

There is a much bigger potential environmental impact from replacing short trips with walking or cycling. About 30% of all trips in the US are under 3 miles.

[veloduffer]

My former employer had a bit of a culture change after Hurricane Sandy, which shut down our offices (4 buildings in downtown NYC) for 6-7 weeks. Since we had to work from home (and remote suburban offices), management adopted an informal work from home policy, mostly on Fridays. What resulted was fewer meetings on Fridays (maybe one or at most two conference calls) and better morale.

I think there is a balance - the ability to have informal discussions can slow productivity. Plus, they say that body language is more than 50% of communication, so you can lose something in "translation".

[fa63]

The sweet spot seems to be 2 to 3 days a week.


I think there is a balance - the ability to have informal discussions can slow productivity. Plus, they say that body language is more than 50% of communication, so you can lose something in "translation".

[dbnm]

A couple of weeks ago, I renegotiated my contract so that I can work from home 3 days a week.

Pretty sure I will be working from home full time for the foreseeable future.

[colker]

I love my job and love meeting people whi le i am working. I love looking at people while going to work. The idea of social distance is just horrible. Unless you have zero empathy for other human beings i don´t see any positives in staying at home all day long. People are interesting beings .

[XXtwindad]

I love my job and love meeting people whi le i am working. I love looking at people while going to work. The idea of social distance is just horrible. Unless you have zero empathy for other human beings i don´t see any positives in staying at home all day long. People are interesting beings .

I'm with you. I agree. I take the bus in to work (usually) and I love my co-workers (clients and other trainers). I can count on one hand the bad days I've had at the "office." I also work "off-hours," usually 12-8PM.

But plenty of other people have miserable, stressful commutes. I think this new paradigm (if it becomes that) would be helpful in many ways. People might welcome the opportunity to interact more with people they really want to as opposed to people they're forced to interact with.

[bigbill]

Where I work, we make a product and do so with just in time materials and no inventory. Products go straight into a truck. Corporate headquarters are shifting to telecommuting.

[commonguy001]

Both my wife’s company and the one I work for are shutting down offices and having everyone work remotely if possible. They both have the bandwidth to go 100% remote which is pretty amazing since both companies are fairly large with thousands of employees.
Saying that, I’ve been 100% remote for a year and my wife has been doing it for just over 5 years so we get little face to face social interaction through working. We are very deliberate with that after work though... until now when we’re trying to distance.

[jlwdm]

I have a friend who has a small law firm - about 10 attorneys. Required to come to the office the first year and after that you only need to come in what you have to.

My friend also put a daily limit on the number of emails he will respond to from another attorney in the firm; probably some exceptions. It has made people think before they email.

Jeff

[cyat.es]

My company has been 100% distributed since the beginning. It requires a different culture of communication than you have in an office. I can’t imagine going back though. I get more done at home vs an open-plan office, and don’t waste 2-3 hours a day commuting into a city, to say nothing of the wasted money.

What I ghost-wrote for my boss: https://platform.sh/blog/2020/survival-guide-for-efficient-remote-work/

[Spdntrxi]

my job require physical presence... dealing with tools (some are old and changes have to be inputed in/on the tool directly) I could probably get away with it a couple days a week with roughly 25% chance of having to go in anyways.

[verbs4us]

There is a catastrophist theory in geology, that slow, gradual change in the landscape is punctuated by infrequent large-scale events that have major effects. Evidence of hurricanes decades ago is still recorded in the sediment record, for example. There is some analog of this in human history, in which relatively short but severe events leave a lasting effect. My parents were shaped by the Great Depression and World War II. I was shaped by the Civil Rights Movement and Woodstock. We can probably count on Gen-Z being shaped by this event in ways we can’t yet imagine.

[Kyle h]

On a similar note, will be interesting to see how this goes in the education realm as well. 3 big universities in the city have gone to web classes only for the remainder of the semester.