> Give me a dedicated office with a door that can shut, allow me to commute during off-peak rush hours, and raise my pay or shorten my work hours for the same rate... then we will talk about coming back in.
If you can talk like that post-pandemic, why couldn't you walk like that pre-pandemic? You could've had a remote job then, too.
I do like remote work, but it's not all upsides. If there's a big shift to remote work, it will suppress wages because now you can hire from across the country, where living expenses are low.
Prior to the pandemic I never liked working at home. I didn't have a dedicated work area and so I ended up working at the dining room table, whose chairs hurt my back when sitting on them for long hours and I hated calling in to meetings. Often you couldn't see what was being projected in the room.
Now things are completely different. Once it become apparent that working from home was going to be long-term and not just for a "couple weeks" I started making changes. I now have a dedicated office at home. I have a proper chair that doesn't kill me to sit. Everyone (at my company) now uses WebEx for meetings so meetings are no longer the pain they used to be.
The result? My work/life balance has completely changed. I'm no longer spending 1.5 hours/day commuting to work. I'm saving money on parking, saving money on food, saving money on clothing, saving money on gas...no joke, I'm saving $200/month. Easy.
On the work side my team and I have never been happier - or more productive. We do have team activities allowing us to get together from time to time. We're more fully engaged with the business and have been delivering better solutions.
Bottom line? Spending over a year now working remotely has taught me a lot of things. The most important being I never want to go back to an office on a daily basis.
If you can talk like that post-pandemic, why couldn't you walk like that pre-pandemic? You could've had a remote job then, too.
I do like remote work, but it's not all upsides. If there's a big shift to remote work, it will suppress wages because now you can hire from across the country, where living expenses are low.