[Misc] Working from home

[ozzygull]

Tips.. always get dressed... dont have the tv on - tend to have rado 2 on when not speaking with clients...get up and move regualrly (house jobs are good to get done over the days and keeps the weekend free!!)...pack your day away if not working from a home office..
i love it... but do have internal skype / teams to access colleagues and do so few times a day... I can concentrate on clients.. after any 'heavy ones' mght mooch at social media to reset..
not everyone's cuppa tea, but mor productuve and the commute is great.

I listen to radio 2, but have to turn it off during Jeremy Vine‘s show as the thick people ringing in, who think they are experts in what ever subject make my blood pressure go up.

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

I started working from home around 20 years ago. It was the commuting I didn’t like…literally a waste of my time.

I agree with the comments about having a dedicated room; mine was in the basement of my house. When in the UK I kitted my room with a nice desk, chair, lamp and had a CD player. For fun I had two clocks side by side with my local time, and the local time of the office I was working with, and the locations underneath. Had some nice photography and stuff on the wall. Printer, shredder etc. It was a lovely space and really productive. Being on the lower ground floor meant it was out of the way of “living”. But, when I left I opted to use a co-working space which is a short bike ride from my apartment in a neighboring area of the city. I what it to be close but not too close. This is the best of both worlds for me, remote working but in an “office.”

I have not had an issue with being disciplined.

 

[deletebeepbeepbeep]

Working from home is great, I have started working 9-6 with a two hour lunch break so I get enough time both to have food and also go for a nice hour long walk to decompress.

As others have said going out for a walk before work in the morning and at lunch helps avoid the cabin fever. Also I get up every hour and do a small chore around the house to get me moving. Nothing major but bits like folding blankets and putting any errant cups in the kitchen, loading the dishwasher. Enough to get me out of my seat for 2 minutes, but also keeps the house ticking along nicely so I have less tidying up to do on the weekend.

 

[BN9 BHA]

I'd love to work from home

You do work from home, other people’s homes though, same as I do

 

[LamieRobertson]

You do work from home, other people’s homes though, same as I do

He sometimes goes back to school….bless him

 

[EliasTaproot]

I've never heard of a AAA mobile game before, now I'm really intrigued. I'm gonna guess at Ubisoft? Rainbow Six mobile? To have such a disgusting crunch culture I'd assume it would be someone like Ubisoft as opposed to Arrowhead or Remedy, and neither have an FPS mobile game coming out either.

Anyway, WFH is the best thing to ever come out of Covid, just learn to separate work from your home life which can be tough having them both together, and enjoy the lack of commute and office BS.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

I did far more work at home and for longer hours than I ever did in the office. Most office time seemed to be spent chatting, sitting in pointless meetings or going for coffee (and I worked for most of the 3 hours I would have been commuting too)

Ditto.

I was getting so stressed by the commute it was making me ill (prompting a colonoscopy). Will I get a seat? Will I have to sit next to someone who encroaches into my space, is eating stinky food, hasn't showered, is talking loudly on their phone, or all four? Will there be a delay making me late for a meeting?

Most of the time I can curl up with a book and my blessed iPod and Bowers and Wilkins headphones, but being autistic I only have to have one shit encounter and I then mither all the time about the next one.

I love working from home. On Thursday I was asked about a document I had promised (a guidance editorial about experimental design and analysis, for a science journal). I promised them 2 weeks. Then I though, let's make a start. I worked from 4 till 10 pm without a break and finished the whole thing. You can't do that when you have to fit in a 100 minute commute that sucks all the Qi out of you.

But to work effectively at home you need to be single minded, and a family that doesn't think that you are available at the drop of a hat to pick the nipper up from school and cook their dinner because the missus is at work in London. Oh....hang on To be fair, I'll take that over a commute any day.

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

I'd love to work from home

And we’d all love to have bored housewives in their dressing gowns swanning around our work environments…..

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

I wonder if staff who prefer to go in every day, who office politic and brown-nose, will gain a career advantage over time in manipulating bosses? We’ve all seen the type in our careers, they’re not good at their supposed core skill, but are held in high esteem because they stay late when the boss does …. presenteeism!

I have lots of colleagues who are obsessed with being on campus. It includes the psychopath contingent for sure. But it also includes others who probably dislike their own company and feel the need to be with people the whole time. The f***ing weirdos.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

I don’t have a TV in my office, but I do have a turntable, I sometimes use it when I am doing firmware updates, as there can be a lot of waiting for things to finish.

View attachment 179648

Genesis? Genesis without Gabriel? Really?

 

[Paulie Gualtieri]

Fortunate enough to have a dedicated room at home that’s used exclusively for my office so I can shut the door and walk away from work.

I’ve been working at home pretty much full time since Covid hit. At my current place we have staff in London, Newcastle, Sri Lanka and home based. We have Teams or Slack to stay in touch and I quite like being able to screen when I’m contacted when working on something detailed. (“The new wanky phrase is DND, “Deep Work” I’ve noticed!

Hours wise I would be working 08:30 to 18:30 with various breaks throughout, basically less than the 3 hour round trip to London each day.

Couple of tips that have helped me

- Mimic a walkable commute. I will walk 30 mins (roughly 2 miles) around 7am and another mile after lunch, it will do you good mentally and physically.
- put your personal phone out of reach for at least 5 hours of the day, it’s very easy to stop, check NSC or go down a YouTube wormhole.
- set yourself focus time say 45 mins of work and allow yourself 15 mins to get a drink, walk around the house, few pages of a book etc
- Try to personalise your work space as it will help with your mood.
- Stock some healthy snacks by your workspace to negate needing to go to the kitchen and destroy yourself!

I’d say I’m more productive at home and don’t miss the commute or social interaction at all, they are just colleagues these days.

 

[happypig]

I worked from home from 2000 to 2019 when I left. I was doing shifts so nights/weekends/lates etc.
I had to go in the office one day a week and I felt I was far less productive; at home there's no time wasted chattering inanely.
I had a dedicated office in my house and I only went in it to work. Colleagues used to have thier own routines to get into "work mode"; one bloke used to go for a walk round the block before and after no matter the weather because he needed to feel like he was going somewhere.
Another colleague worked mostly from his holiday flat in Malta (guvnors never knew/mentioned it), he reckoned he could save enough in petrol to pay for the Easyjet every couple of weeks.

 

[Weststander]

I do f*** all at home. I go on here mostly.

I need to be with people for my sanity and to prevent me from wanking myself into oblivion.

Work is also about the random unexpected interactions which only happen in the office, the cross pollination of ideas and about the ease of just turning to the person next to you to ask how something is done. None of this happens just hiding away in a back bedroom

As long as it’s just ideas.

 

[Bozza]

I need to be with people for my sanity and to prevent me from wanking myself into oblivion.

 

[kevo]

I think it very much depends on your personality. I love wfh and having a five-second commute and not having to deal with irritating people face-to-face all the time. But then I'm more of an introvert-type. I do miss seeing some of my colleagues though and enjoy going in to the office on the few occasions I do.

 

[Kinky Gerbil]

I’d say this thread’s sample size if too small to make general conclusions on productivity at home vs in an office.

There are deffo those who take advantage whilst wfh - I certainly do to some extent, but I am lucky enough to have the freedom and flexibility to make up time for the odd bit of slacking every now and then.

I do have a couple of ex-colleagues from my previous workplace who did suffer with a lack of self-discipline whilst wfh and preferred being in the office to keep up with work. But my general experience so far is that most of my close colleagues and friends here prefer wfh and do well.

Couple of departments at my previous job are being called back to the office full time as well as the call centre, as people were taking the piss.

Without going into full details, there was more staff/less calls and the lost call rate was higher and behaviours were not would they should be.

I've seen customer service in customer facing jobs decline with WFH.

 

[Kinky Gerbil]

I wonder if staff who prefer to go in every day, who office politic and brown-nose, will gain a career advantage over time in manipulating bosses? We’ve all seen the type in our careers, they’re not good at their supposed core skill, but are held in high esteem because they stay late when the boss does …. presenteeism!

I much prefer working in the office, it's about 10 minutes from my house, so it's not a massive chore, gyms by the office as well so I've got a nice routine, plus 12 hour shifts at home can be long.

I've got my furlough paid office in the garden, so I've got a decent work area, just prefer being around people.

But there is some truth in this from some

 

[Chicken Run]

I do f*** all at home. I go on here mostly.

I need to be with people for my sanity and to prevent me from wanking myself into oblivion.

Work is also about the random unexpected interactions which only happen in the office, the cross pollination of ideas and about the ease of just turning to the person next to you to ask how something is done. None of this happens just hiding away in a back bedroom

Yeah but working from home enables you to dart out on the school run, gym/yoga at 11am, run into AMEX and get your £12 lunch entitlement, school run again just after you’ve been to ASDA for the third time in the week and returned your 16th Amazon package to the drop off point, and all of this before 5. Before you left home to go to work at 8, stayed where you were and came home at six

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Yeah but working from home enables you to dart out on the school run, gym/yoga at 11am, run into AMEX and get your £12 lunch entitlement, school run again just after you’ve been to ASDA for the third time in the week and returned your 16th Amazon package to the drop off point, and all of this before 5. Before you left home to go to work at 8, stayed where you were and came home at six

All of that fun stuff, and (if you commuted from Brighton to London) the Brucie Bonus of not wasting 4 hours of your life a day on the commute while paying £5k per annum for the privilege. Bit of a no-brainer shirley

 

[chickens]

Starting to work from home soon first time in my career. Only 3 months but very big change for me as Im a game developer and we had a 6 week crunch in February and March when I only slept at home twice and spending the rest of the time travelling between offices hotels or often sleeping in the office. The last two weeks Ive been off work but already bored as nasty word. But not really looking forward to just sit at home coding and counting feels like it could be lonely and boring. Anyone with experience from suddenly going from office living workaholic to couch potato pretending to work ?

My experience was that I was my own timekeeper. You absolutely break to get the laundry out and cook something for lunch, but you end up counting that time as part of your break and ensuring you work to a certain level of productivity. In my case, definitely more than when working in the office.

In the office on a slow day I could spend 20% of my time discussing a topic of mutual interest with colleagues, whereas at home there are no social distractions for me.

Having said that, I’m not personally a massive fan of home-working. I think employers get more out of you, but I miss the social interaction and resent the merging of my personal space with my work space, so I’m currently looking at switching out to something with less remote work, rather than more. See how you find it, it works well for some, less well for others.

For me, in the old (pre-90s) way of working everything was hierarchical with managers taking duty of care seriously.

Employment these days is treated very much like a quote from that Derek and Clive sketch about Bruce Forsyth, “this **** won’t work, get another one in.”

In that environment, you could be sat on the moon. Either you’re turning in what they expect or you’re not. Workers are 100% expendable.