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Work from home owns and if white-collar workers weren't such cowards we'd strike to keep it.
I do miss interaction with my coworkers--they're a pretty good bunch of people. But I certainly don't miss my commute and I'm loving working in my jammies. I maintain some level of structure by having "day jammies" and "night jammies," but I'm definitely not dressed for the workplace!
I maintain some level of structure by having “day jammies” and “night jammies," but I’m definitely not dressed for the workplace!
:geordi-yes: Unless you work at Starfleet
I always thought "you can tell at first glance Star Trek's utopia because people wear sweatpants at work". Then 2020 happened.
Thank you, I have a new metric to measure civilizations by: "But can everyone wear sweatpants at work?"
I've WFH for ~3 years now and none of my "outside" clothes fit anymore. I've achieved full Lebowsi. :cat-confused: also cat-visits are the best. i totally understand people wanting office-cats now.
I’ve WFH for ~3 years now and none of my “outside” clothes fit anymore. I’ve achieved full Lebowsi.
I'm working on it! (No beard for me though)
Maybe I'm not hermit enough, but essentially when working from home I still leave the house on the daily, because a man's gotta eat and a dog's gotta get his walks. Am I doing it wrong?
I try to get around my neighborhood twice a day. I find I have to walk myself to keep the depression from setting in.
How are you ever going to organize a strike with co-workers that you've never met in person and with whom you have no outside of work interaction (e.g. break time, happy hour)?
One of the positive things that work in its current sate has going for it is it's a social experience. Without that camaraderie, work will become even duller and more alienating.
Anyways, workers won't have to strike for work from home because it's in the interest of bosses to have and all-remote workforce. In addition to significantly reduced risk of organizing, there are huge cost savings to be had by 1) not having to pay rent and 2) companies which currently employ in high cost of living cities can hire outside those cities and save loads on payroll.
What happens now to public transportation? Office workers are already fleeing cities (and the high/rents property values), and these are people that generally pay higher taxes. Cities will have fewer riders and less funding, and you will see an accelerated decay of public transit. This will correspond to more time spent in cars which is gonna be great for the environment.
I'm sure there are many more knock on effects that I haven't thought of.
Work from home is the future (we were already heading that way, covid just accelerated the trend), and it's not a pretty one. It's frustrating that everyone I talk to seems oblivious to this.
Interesting ideas here, I hadn't considered much of this. However,
How are you ever going to organize a strike with co-workers that you’ve never met in person and with whom you have no outside of work interaction (e.g. break time, happy hour)?
Choose any external communications platform: Discord, slack, whatsapp, facebook, etc. I'm not yet convinced that WFH is the death of organizing, but it certainly changes the dynamics. We're still going to need transportation systems, but they're not going to be clogged with 2-ton-single-passenger-SUVs. In my experience, management hates WFH because they can't micromanage.
In my experience, management hates WFH because they can’t micromanage.
This. My boss was talking about us potentially coming back to the office in September, but then the comrade corona hit again.
Choose any external communications platform: Discord, slack, whatsapp, facebook, etc.
I'm admittedly more pessimistic here than you. A big part of organizing is trust and familiarity, and I think it's way harder to trust someone that you've never met in person.
management hates WFH because they can’t micromanage
Micromanagement software will be the next tech craze. I think you will start to see startups pop up all over the place that are focused on this. That being said, there are other methods of coercion. I have a software dev friend that participated in an """optional""" work session a few Saturdays ago. Basically everyone was in a Zoom call together, but just working/coding and not really in a true meeting or anything. Virtual panopticon.
I think it’s way harder to trust someone that you’ve never met in person.
For better or worse, I think digital nativism is changing this. I grew up with online-friends and even met a few of them IRL - something that never would have happened in any previous generation. We have applications that bootstrap and abstract this whole social interaction now (for the worse imo). I think there is a kindof workers-bond, a trust that develops as you work with and support eachother.
Micromanagement software will be the next tech craze.
Easy to imagine, harder to implement. Working in an office doesn't solve or prevent this in any way either. Whether you log in to your VDI from a cubicle, or your couch, the tracking software would work the same.
Fucking hear that! Instrumental music was absolutely essential for me focusing for long periods of time when I was at my most productive.
Instrumental music hits the sweet spot of being distracting enough to shut down some of the distractions going on in my brain, without being too distracting on its own.
music is life. i work retail and the greatest thing i ever saw was another manager wearing a single wireless earbud (we have to wear radios in one ear). i spent years as a delivery driver listening to music while i worked and being forced to hear the same 20 pop songs over the PA has nearly melted my brain but it's been nice to have my own secret radio coupled to the wi-fi now. still got to be DL around the boss and pause when interacting with customers.
When I worked retail there was no music, and no music allowed, and no hats allowed unless you were my supervisor bc you could hide music with a hat. Folding towels/picking up the toy aisles/putting candles in order/pulling rugs forward/aligning lightbulb boxes/etc for 3+ hours without seeing another person in total silence was agony. There's zero mental stimulation because the work is just easy enough where you can shut off your brain but then the boredom sets in. After Covid we closed early so we could clean and keep the store nice and tidy and we were allowed to listen to music, at which point every day of work was me just waiting for those last two hours so I could listen to music and podcasts
ugggh fucking blocking is the worst. if my place ever cracks down on the earpods i'm going to be pissed and will defy them and accelerate my unionization efforts. the few people i'm in charge of can listen to all the music/pods they want. i keep battery packs in my desk. shit has been too hellish for anything less
blocking/facing/zoning(at target) was my entire job. That, and putting gobacks back. Also being basically just a grunt I got stuck everywhere they needed someone extra for a few minutes and then they'd complain I didn't get the whole store zoned it was ridiculous, like yeah I'm halfway done you called me away every 10 minutes to go do something else
