The social and economic costs borne by young people without offices
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Re: The social and economic costs borne by young people without offices
#2This article appears in the October 2020 print edition with the headline “A Cubicle Never Looked So Good.”
To be honest, I've never really had a cubicle. Usually just a desk in a bullpin type arrangement. No privacy. Distractions galore. The sound of co-workers flushing the toilets in the restrooms nearby. Nothing to reflect fondly upon in my opinion.
If I had wanted or needed a new job, completely changing careers would probably have been easier than getting another gig in my field with the experience I’d accrued at home.
No doubt my experience is different doing technical work, but I have never relied on my co-workers to line up my next position. I flip the switch on linkedin to let recruiters know I'm looking and call or email the recruiters I have worked with in the past. Sometimes an employer might ask for a reference. I suppose I do have a short list of those.
“Outside of immediate family, people’s co-workers become their most consistent opportunity for social interaction,” Peditto told me. “What happens when you lose that is one of my greater concerns.”
My social interactions really do revolve around my family and long time friends. It's not a large group, but I'm not a social butterfly either. I have a hard enough time keeping up with those social interactions. Who knows, maybe I was born for remote work.
Overall this feels like yet another hit piece against remote work with a lot of anecdotes and not much else. Here I am arguing against it with my own anecdotes. I really don't understand why these keep cropping up. Are commercial real-estate conglomerates paying for these?
Personally, I am happier than I have ever been working remotely. I don't struggle to keep a routine or maintain separation between my work life and my home life. I don't feel starved for social interaction either. I would hate to see the sentiments these articles convey ruin something that has been very positive for myself and my partner (and my dog).
Re: The social and economic costs borne by young people without offices
#3Best advice I can give is to have a dedicated space from which to work. This will probably mean you need more space in your home than you did when you went to an office each day. This might also mean that certain real estate situations are no longer viable or are at least less desirable than they used to be. Having roommate or living in a small crowded space can be detrimental to remote work. Leaving a city center with high cost per sq ft for a less dense residential area might be the trade off you have to make in order for remote work to work for you and your employer long term.
For me it meant getting a house and setting aside a specific bedroom to be an office. I do use it for hobby activities but those uses are easily put away at the start of the work day. It's not used as a spare bedroom for visitors.
There are also certain security issues that employees and employers are going to need to come to an understanding on now that remote work is getting more common. Some discussions should not be able to be overheard by spouses, roommates, friends, or if your walls are thin enough, neighbors. So far there seems to be very little discussion around the security side of things, likely because everyone knows for most of those suddenly thrust into remote work, there's only a limited amount they can do about it right now.
Re: The social and economic costs borne by young people without offices
#4This article appears in the October 2020 print edition with the headline “A Cubicle Never Looked So Good.” To be honest, I've never really had a cubicle. Usually just a desk in a bullpin type arrangement. No privacy. Distractions galore. The sound of co-workers flushing the toilets in the restrooms nearby. Nothing to reflect fondly upon in my opinion. If I had wanted or needed a new job, completely changing careers w…
The social aspect is interesting because the pandemic induced remote work has happened at the same time as many people's non-work socialization has also been taken away. Whenever people start going back to the office, they may try to use socialization there to make up for the socialization that has been taken away from them due to restrictions on public gatherings. I've been doing remote work for three years, so I'm used to not socializing with coworkers in an office context, but the general restrictions on the public as a whole has been a bit rough. I have no desire to go back to working onsite in an office but could be tempted back in if it were the only way to have some level of socialization again. My guess is that offices probably won't become the primary white collar work location again until well after the restrictions on public gatherings have been relaxed so maybe going to the office to regain socialization won't be necessary (knock on wood).
Re: The social and economic costs borne by young people without offices
#5WFH has a huge difference in result depending on who you are, when you are (in your career), and where you are in a company (of organization).
-- For the budding young developer who can't wait to show ideas to teammates and demonstrate being a go-getter by asking random questions and finding unaddressed issues to innovate on, WFH might be terrible. You're going to schedule time to fortuitously run into the senior person who takes an interest in your idea?
-- For the working parent whose productivity has been slashed by 50% and stress has gone up by 50% due to parenting obligations, WFH might be terrible.
-- For the middle manager who can coast along and not need to move greatly in his/her career, WFH might be great.
-- For the developer who works by tickets on very concrete things and this is nothing new, WFH might be great.
-- For the small company CEO who relies on force of personality and everyone in the same room urgently working to get something done, WFH might be terrible.
There's a huge variability in what WFH means, depending on what you want from the situation.
For some people, remote working is really not good.
And that's aside from the point that, when everyone is remote, you're also competing with the world who is also remote. Jobs and job qualifications (and competition) may change...
Re: The social and economic costs borne by young people without offices
#6Currently subletting an apartment with an eat-in kitchen and two offices. Incredibly opulent by Brooklyn standards, but it's utterly essential for both me and my partner to have isolated space to work in. The kitchen is a nice bonus, because we can have coffee breaks together.
Re: The social and economic costs borne by young people without offices
#7I'm doing home-office since 2013 and I'm doing fine. Have my surf and social life in my routine. Work focused, produce more and spend less time trying to get stuff done. Cook daily is hard but sometimes a joy and a must if you want to leave healthy. I would never come back to a 5 days in the office routine. Never.
Re: The social and economic costs borne by young people without offices
#8WFH has a huge difference in result depending on who you are, when you are (in your career), and where you are in a company (of organization). -- For the budding young developer who can't wait to show ideas to teammates and demonstrate being a go-getter by asking random questions and finding unaddressed issues to innovate on, WFH might be terrible. You're going to schedule time to fortuitously run into the senior per…
> And that's aside from the point that, when everyone is remote, you're also competing with the world who is also remote.
Yup... once everyone is remote anyway, won't take too long for some manager to decide to offshore work to cheaper countries. Even if that doesn't happen to you, if it happens to enough people elsewhere it'll bring salaries down for everyone.
Re: The social and economic costs borne by young people without offices
#9As a recent graduate with an overseas job offer who has been left with no choice but to work remotely until Japan re-opens its borders to foreign workers, this really hits home.
My student apartment is not equipped for this lifestyle. I do not have a home office in a sprawling estate in the suburbs on several acres of property where I can enjoy the sounds of nature. I live in a small apartment on a busy street surrounded by highways and golf courses who don't let plebs like me wander around inside.
When I'm at home, I just feel this anxiety about working that just never subsides. I feel much more relaxed when I'm able to be outside, but the nearest public green space is campus, which I avoid as much as possible now that school is in session. The nearest park is a thirty minute drive, but I have to check the air traffic before leaving due to a nearby airport.
At home, work seems to never end, especially with the 13-hour time difference that necessitates 10:30pm meetings twice a week. On one hand, I really enjoy this rare occasion to talk to my co-workers, but on the other hand, I can't shut off my work brain until after the meeting is over. On these days I end up going to sleep at 3 or 4am, adding to the cycle of stress and sleep deprivation.
I figured this would last one, maybe two months at the most. But now it's been four months since I started remote work and six months since I accepted the initial offer. There's no word about Japan issuing new work visas any time soon.
I want my life to begin.
Re: The social and economic costs borne by young people without offices
#10“The stubborn human desire to stare at one’s own face” (on Zoom)
So others do that too?