No, there's nothing as isolating as working in a korporate office where you dare not trigger anyone lest they complain to Human Resources.
Coworkers are not your friends and never were. People who used coworkers as a pseudo social circle are self-absorbed and use others for their personal gain. Remote workers who complain about social isolation need to get a life, not force their coworkers to play a role.
When I worked from home, there were stretches when I went for days without leaving the house. It was not intentional, it just worked out that way. While it was nice not to have a commute, I’m not sure I liked having cabin fever.
The other thing is that if your wife knows you are home, she will make all kinds of requests of you. It does not matter whether you are working or not. Having to refuse these actually put more stress on our marriage.
Remote work was bad for me. I hated it. I like structure, and I didn’t have any working from home. I wound up going in five days a week, which was fine with my boss. Everybody else came in two days a week. Everybody is different. Flexibility no remote work is good.
I live in Seattle and work for a company in Florida. I’ve only met the CEO in person and really have no reason to actually meet the others. I LOVE it - no office politics, no distractions. This is the antidote to 15 years dealing with the BS at Nike.
Before COVID, I worked from home and on the road for more than ten years in a research job. I reported every day by email, text, and phone, with meetings in office as needed, usually once every week or two. My commute to the office was about five minutes. I worked harder than ever, but the task and schedule flexibility gave me better quality of life.
I liked working from home prior to retiring. I did not miss the 40 mile round trip commute each day. I did miss contact with some people at the office but not others.
In the 4+ years that I’ve been remote I experienced all the positives and none of the negatives. It doesn’t “blur” my work-life balance or performing cooking and cleaning tasks at home. If anything, it has freed up a lot of time for me to cook and clean. Loneliness? No. I don’t look to socialize at work. As a White Male and thus target numero uno of any HR department, socializing at work would only leave me vulnerable to possible BS claims against me. So at work, I’m all business. I don’t curse and I don’t even joke. The only things I will discuss aside from work are the weather and my dogs.
There are simply no downsides to me from working from home. The upsides are massive.
I drove 120 miles round-trip every day for 25 years. I was able to retire in 2021 because of my generous father, who is very hard on us and never mentioned that he was saving all his money for our inheritance. I’m very grateful when I worked from home for the year in 2020. I was just as productive if not more productive Than when I’m in the office however there’s something I can’t put my finger on it, but there is something good about having had that experience of going to the office every day despite the crazy commute you still have the routine working from home and I actually get used to get dressed and sit at my desk and and really Work a lot more than I was in the office when you’re working from home you’re on all the time I would work well past 6 o’clock, which was my cut off time and start sometimes at 7 AM. I think it’s a mixed bag. I think there are pluses to working in the office. I’m glad I experienced both and now I’m glad I’m retired Worked in that company for almost 40 years. God bless you.
Now I'll be the first to admit not every job (or every employee) is cut out for full time remote work. But I do internal accounting work, so don't deal with customers, and I really have no reason to need to be in the office for anything. I can access all my spreadsheets online. Also, I've done it for 20+ years at this point so don't need any handholding like a recent hire might.
But it has saved me a fortune, I was driving 45 minutes both ways. So not only did I save on fuel and maintenance costs, but I also get an extra two hours a day I was losing to the commute. I've even saved money on work clothes as all I need is a dress shirt and tie to slip on when I have a virtual meeting with the executives. Where before I probably spent $500 a year on dress shirts, pants, shoes, suit jacket etc.
At my company, we call this “Responsible Freedom.” As long as my deliverables to my customer are met, no one really cares what I do or where I work from. If it is sunny today, I am going to work from the pool. We have cabanas so I can work in the shade, fully plugged in and on the internet doing what I need to do.
The day starts at 6am and most times goes till 8pm.
It is nice to be able to drive my kid to private school in the morning (45 miles round trip) and the wife pick her up in the afternoon. Without being able to work from home the wife would have to quit her job to drive/pickup the kid from school, and without her job there would be no private school.
In the article about the ‘isolation’ from coworkers ... for me that is a super benefit. The last thing in the world I want is some personal friendships with my coworkers. Most of them are people you would NEVER want to have as neighbors or friends. So long as I and they do our jobs, that is fine with me.
The other benefit of Working from Home for me is ... “I'm saving the planet!!” by not driving 140 miles round trip a day to the office. /s
My God how did the human race survive before psychologists?
I was on vacation out of state last week. We were at my mother in laws house. My wife is still there for another week. Yesterday, While working in my home office, I realized that I could have just stayed there and worked.
Normally I’m out on the road most days, but didn’t have anything scheduled this week. Dummy
Forbes has sure sunk. Talk about a slanted article harking back to lockdown days. People don’t want to work at home, whaaa!, then go into the office or find another job, whaaa! People used to gripe about the office and commute time and lunch and the awful coworkers and blah, blah. Now that they don’t have those weirdo coworkers or the commute or all the other crappy things so they’ve transferred the gripes to their homes and families. Just get over yourselves and stop with the constant whining. Ya’ll are little 2 year olds who are in the middle of throwing a fit only it is 24/7. At least 2 year olds exhaust themselves into nice naps.
My 1:50 minute commute each way has ended and never will return...
I did that for 35+ years... and never really understood how much it drained from my life...
COVID was the best thing that ever happened to me... I survived getting and have thrived with WAH since...
Retiring in 12/31/2024... 39.5 years... one of the last with a private sector pension and partially funded healthcare...
I’ve been working since I was 12... at 63 in January, it will be time to enjoy what I have left!