Working in the Year of the Plague

This is a dual post, it applies to both my personal and business blogs.


I no longer set an alarm.  My body was used to getting up at 5:00 AM but I don't need to do that anymore.  Unless I stay up very late reading I am generally awake by 6.  I put on a robe, move to the desk in my bedroom, and fire up my laptop.


I don't work the hours I used to, when I would arrive at my desk at about 7:30 and depart at 4:30.  And I am available 24 hours a day, as my work emails and messages come to my phone as well as my computer.  And there are  the text messages that the server may send me in the evening if the backups run into a problem.   All this is no different than before.  The main difference is that without the hour long ferry ride each way I have reliable internet all day.


Although I can only bill for 8 hours a day, 40 hours a week, without prior authorization, I often find myself working longer.  Particularly if I am in the middle of something, now that I no longer need to rush to catch my ferry, I will work until I arrive at what seems to be a logical stopping point.


The department where I work did not have a policy that permits telecommuting.  Instead we are working from home.  I am not going to quibble about terminology, but it is a little amusing.


Now for someone working in IT, logging into a server remotely to do some work is not in the slightest bit unusual.  But this time, it is not only IT that is working from home, it is a cross section of the workforce, here in the San Francisco Bay Area, and across the country.  And I suspect things will never be exactly the same.


We still have meetings, we still interact with our co-workers.  We are not watching soap operas or smoking pot or drinking rum and coke all day.  We are getting the work done.


When this is over, managers all over will look back at this and realize that many of the objections they have had in the past to people working from their homes instead of traveling to a central location were really not valid.  If someone is not going to do the work, that will not really change when they are in the office.  They may look busy, but if someone is a bad employee they will be bad at home or in the office.


There will always be the need for people to assemble.  There will be hands-on training.  There will be in person meetings.   There will be documents to sign, and sometimes materials to be shared that may not leave the room.  There will be many reasons why people need to be physically together.  But all these things will in many cases be exceptions rather than the norm.


And let's think about this for just a few minutes, about what this could mean.


A parent can be home when their children return from school, meaning after-school care is not required.  And yes they will probably take a few minutes to get the kids something to eat or get them started on their homework.  How is that less productive than going into the break room to get another cup of coffee and talking for a few minutes with a co-worker about the house they are buying or their new dog?


If I am going into the office only occasionally, then the reference material I have always kept there, much of it my own, belongs here not there.  When I am able, I will go into the office and retrieve that.  And it will probably stay here.


The department where I work is a retirement system.  Part of that operation includes counseling members.  Those members make an appointment and take time off their jobs to come see someone to learn about their potential benefits and their options when retiring.  Seminars are also offered, for both new members, and groups of people thinking about retiring soon.  These are all virtual now.


Remote work like this opens up other potential opportunities.  What if the pension plan members had the option of an evening virtual counseling session, because each week one of the counselors worked from home and was available outside of normal working hours?  The counselors need not work overtime.  Once a month each counselor works one later shift, starting at one or two in the afternoon.  Everyone has occasional chores that can only be accomplished during the workday.  This integrates that into work life.


I can envision a conversation with my accountant or an investment advisor or a mortgage lender all fitting this model.  Would I buy a car without test driving it?  Absolutely not.  But the last car that I did buy, I spent an hour on the dealer's web site reviewing their prices and inventory so that I knew what I wanted to test drive before I got there.


You cannot build a house working from home.  You can't prepare meals in a restaurant or give speeding tickets.  There are any number of jobs for which a virtual work environment just doesn't work.  But for those where it does work, the genie is out of the bottle now.  I don't think we are ever going back to our old way of working, at least not completely.