Even After the Pandemic, 43% Say They'll Want to Work Remotely More Often (cnbc.com) 64
Long-time Slashdot reader gollum123 quotes CNBC:
Nearly 43% of full-time American employees say they want to work remotely more often even after the economy has reopened, according to a survey released by business publishing company getAbstract. Of the more than 1,200 employees surveyed between April 16 and April 17, nearly 20% said their employer is actively discussing how they can make remote work more of an option in the future...
Andrew Savikas, chief strategy officer at getAbstract, says one of the biggest reasons why employees prefer to work remotely is because they get to save time on their daily commute. On average, Americans spent roughly 27 minutes on their one-way commute to work in 2018, according to the Census Bureau. This equates to over 200 hours spent commuting per year... "People like having that time back," Savikas says, while adding that employees also like the flexibility of working remotely because they can "structure the day how they want."
According to a joint CNBC/Change Research survey of more than 5,000 voters in swing states, 47% said the time they would normally spend on commuting has now been used to spend more time with their family. The survey, which gathered responses between April 17 and April 18, also found that employees have been spending the time they save on their commute to sleep more, focus on various hobbies and get more work done.
Andrew Savikas, chief strategy officer at getAbstract, says one of the biggest reasons why employees prefer to work remotely is because they get to save time on their daily commute. On average, Americans spent roughly 27 minutes on their one-way commute to work in 2018, according to the Census Bureau. This equates to over 200 hours spent commuting per year... "People like having that time back," Savikas says, while adding that employees also like the flexibility of working remotely because they can "structure the day how they want."
According to a joint CNBC/Change Research survey of more than 5,000 voters in swing states, 47% said the time they would normally spend on commuting has now been used to spend more time with their family. The survey, which gathered responses between April 17 and April 18, also found that employees have been spending the time they save on their commute to sleep more, focus on various hobbies and get more work done.
Absolutely (Score:5, Interesting)
My organization's ancient, creaky leadership which still prints out emails and highlights them was very much against remote work prior to this. Now they're looking at the same amount of work being done and questioning why they're paying so much for facilities.
I've always wanted more remote work, along with most of my coworkers. I think we're actually going to get it after this. Our leadership is in the high risk group for dying from COVID-19, so they are very much not interested in going back into our giant office building anytime soon. I'm hoping that their selfish self-preservation is what tips us into a much more permissive remote work policy when (and if?) we go back to the building.
... 57% Say They DON'T Want to Work Remotely. (Score:3)
But the headline is backwards.
It should read "Even After the Pandemic, 57% Say They DON'T Want to Work Remotely More Often".
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Why? This isn't a vote. It's a discussion of people who have discovered the advantages that can have on a regular basis. The fact that a portion of people have not is irrelevant to the story at hand.
Re: ... 57% Say They DON'T Want to Work Remotely. (Score:1)
I don't have a strong preference. I commute about 90 minutes a day, but my desk at work is nicer and quieter. Also the cafeteria cooks better than I can in the time available for lunch. But I save money on lunch and gas.
I think my preference depends on if my family has been locked in for 2 months or not.
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No, it should say that 57% either don't want to work remotely OR don't really care either way.
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Not just workers (Score:3)
According to a CFO survey conducted in April by Gartner [gartner.com], 74% of respondents indicated a willingness to shift at least 5% of their formerly-onsite-only positions to telework.
The times, they are a-changin'.
It's like a raise (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:It's like a raise (Score:5, Insightful)
if more companies committed to letting people work remotely, it would help balance out the entropy in the housing market.
I don't love paying $1M for a house just because I want choice in employment, in my field.
let me move to somewhere cheaper and keep my job - and I'll even take a pay cut. we'll both win.
lets see if companies finally admit they were wrong, all along, by forcing the open-office and being 'at work' all the time.
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if more companies committed to letting people work remotely, it would help balance out the entropy in the housing market.
Entropy?
I don't think that word means what you think it means.
Unless maybe the housing market is releasing waste heat to the environment?
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I work for the California state govt. (that agency that processes unemployment claims) and "face time" is still highly favored.
I have actually had more productivity working from home because it's been harder to separate quitting time from home time as I just keep working, and I'm not limited to commuter times where I have to quit and try to pick up later. I catch a commuter bus or train, and it takes me 1 - 1.5 hours EACH WAY, every day. And I would LOVE to gain back 10 hours (or 15 hours - see below) a w
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Bullshit. Its way way down. We're over a month behind schedule due to mental health issues, the need to watch children, and difficulties in communication. Word has come down from upper management to expect 50% or less productivity per worker, and that seems to be accurate.
I have news for you (Score:3)
"Even After the Pandemic, 43% Say They'll Want to Work Remotely More Often"
Oh honey, I've set foot in my last office building, period. I worked a lot of remote stuff previously but from now on it'll be 100%.
No, I am not going to get up, shave, shower, get dressed, drive to an office, and sit there all day working. Not gonna happen. Fact is, I'm no longer comfortable doing that until there's a vaccine or everyone's been tested.
I've no doubt I could get a note from a doctor advising me not to sit in rooms full potentially-infected breathers.
But either way, no matter what, I'm never going back into any office anywhere to work.
"After the pandemic"? (Score:4, Interesting)
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Keep everyone in a constant state of terror and panic, that's the stuff!!
That's what was done after 9/11. Every day we heard how we need to give up our privacy, give up some of the freedoms we had because around every corner was a terrorist waiting to kill us. The TSA, Homeland Security, and the PATRIOT Act were all implemented in record time because of the unrelenting pressure to keep everyone in a constant state of terror and panic.
2,700 people died on 9/11 and we were told we have to change our ways.
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My biggest concern is NOT the virus but the people living in fear of others. Shaking hands might never come back for some individuals.
That's ironic, because the alleged origin of handshaking was to allay mutual fear that the other may be palming a weapon.
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What do you mean by "after the pandemic"? How do you know when the pandemic ends?
When there is herd immunity. This may happen as a natural result of getting it or mass inoculations with the release of a vaccine. Should this COVID become endemic then there will be a large push for advanced development of vaccines.
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200 hours of driving is 5 40-hour weeks!!! (Score:5, Insightful)
It is FAR better to work from home. You don't lose the time getting ready for work, driving to work, driving home, and changing your work clothes. No charge for fuel, less car maintenance.
Less pollution because you didn't drive.
Also, I find that I often need to stop and think about some coding problem. I can go do something else in my house while my brain is working on that. At work, doing something else besides working may not be accepted.
We access our customer's computer systems from home. We don't need to go there often.
There is no 'new normal' (Score:1)
Re:There is no 'new normal' (Score:4, Insightful)
Or, maybe they say this because there's a chance we'll gain valuable new insights from this experience and will be able to extract something good out of it that actually benefits our lives. Not everyone walks around with an agenda trying to beat people into submission with fear.
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Not everyone walks around with an agenda trying to beat people into submission with fear.
Only the people in power. And it works just fine for them.
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But what I'm also talking about is the idea that we're all going to have to be 6' away from each other forever, or have our faces covered forever, and so on -- basically, we're not going to be living in some pos
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we're not going to be living in some post-apocalyptic 80's disaster movie forever, IT WILL END, IT WILL END, IT WILL END!
Have you ever seen pictures of people walking around cities in China from before the current crisis? It was quite normal for them to wear masks. I used to think it was because of the air pollution there but apparently is from before that.
They started wearing them because of the "Spanish" flu a hundred years ago. People just kept on wearing them, taught their children to and it kept on. Many people who wear them now do so because they, mistakenly, think that this will stop them getting the current nasty.
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Firstly, I am not missing your point. It's just wrong.
I am not worrying, I can't. I didn't worry when bullets were flying over my head. I ran though!
Normal will change - or already has done. People are going to want much more personal space. Shaking hands will continue not to be done much - except by the idiots wanting to prove that they are not scared of viruses. Perhaps, like people in the far east, many people will wear what looks like a surgical mask - for no discernible personal benefit. Working
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So 57% don't want to work remotely (Score:3)
Remote work mixes your personal and work life in a way many people find undesirable. I like to keep my personal life separate, so when I'm at home I don't have to worry about work. Remote work blurs the line, so you're never truly away from work because your home is your workplace. This can lead to you spending a lot more time working.
Remote work also makes communication very difficult, so a query that can be resolved in seconds in an office can take a lot longer when working remotely. These delays would all add up and would ultimately destroy productivity.
The other problem is that, given half a chance, many people won't do any work at all. Remote work makes it easy for the slackers to avoid work, which increases the workload for more diligent people.
I hate everting about remote work, but fortunately it seems the majority of people feel the same. Hopefully we can all get back to the office soon.
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Remote work also makes communication very difficult, so a query that can be resolved in seconds in an office can take a lot longer when working remotely.
I find that this is more true if only a few people in a team are working remotely. With *everyone* working remotely, it works much better since in normal office environments, informal meetings tend to have much influence. At least with everyone remote there is less of that undercurrent, and I see a positive move towards better processes around decision making. And yeeeeah, there's definitely people who do not like that and prefer to influence differently.
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If your career progression involves influencing people, you will have an advantage if you can see them face to face. Managers need to have the skill to prevent "whispers in the ear" gaining special advantage. Sadly...
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Remote work doesn't equate to working from home. Under normal circumstances, I work from either a coworking location or some sort of coffee shop or whatever. Still firewalls my work from home life, and retains 90% of the advantage of not traveling to the office.
As to your slackers comment, that's idiotic. It's easy to put metrics on the work produced without tying it to the amount of time chained to a desk.
Everyone I have worked with is generally more productive and dedicated than those that assume
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"Remote work mixes your personal and work life in a way many people find undesirable. I like to keep my personal life separate, so when I'm at home I don't have to worry about work. Remote work blurs the line, so you're never truly away from work because your home is your workplace. This can lead to you spending a lot more time working."
Sure, but that's a you problem. You can also spend a lot less time working because you don't feel the peer pressure of waiting to leave until lots of others have even if you
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Remote work makes it easy for the slackers to avoid work, which increases the workload for more diligent people.
Remote work will continue as the worries of uninformed managers turn out to be mistaken. There are no figures around yet, but anecdotally, it seems that more work is done by people working from home. If you don't want to work from home, that is for you and your employer. If you are less productive away from the office, that will help but home work can often be a win-win.
Working from home saves you commuting time, fuel, "business appropriate" clothing and hurried lunches. It means businesses can have sma
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I've worked at 3 different companies that tried to replace US workers with foreign workers, and it was a failure at all 3 places. They may have been cheaper, but the quality of work was unacceptable to the business folks. These places have all drastically limited the scope of foreign workers to stuff like tech support and testing. I doubt any future effort will result in a better outcome. You do get what you pay for, and subpar technology is rarely acceptable.
With schools open, please! (Score:1)
Sure, for many jobs remote work is a great way of working ... as long as the schools stays open.
With kids at home, juggling home schooling and work is nigh impossible. Each evening, we're completely exhausted, and just collapse on the couch quietly sighing, while nursing ourselves to sleep with some mindless TV.
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I don't have kids, so I could care less about school being open, from the standpoint of working from home. Those I have worked with that DO have kids manage to figure out a way of making it work.
Opening schools too early is going to make this pandemic MUCH worse. School aged children are a major vector of infection in the best of times.
Re: With schools open, please! (Score:2)
A job that can be done from home... (Score:2)
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Markets (Score:2)
Well to that I say, if 43% of people wanted to work from home, why didn't companies respond to that market demand?
Yes there is a market but it isn't free to every individual. There are rules and forces out of the individual's control.
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Still obsessed with Uber? jesusfuck. Give it a rest. That's not even part of this conversation. Neither are your beloved Taxi Cabs.
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The title is "43% Say They'll Want to Work Remotely More Often." There isn't enough information in the summary or full article to know if that means they could work from home before and now want to do it more often, or if they didn't work from home previously and now want to do it more often.
Without the background information about the survey, everyone they questioned could have
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I would even consider moving out of state, but that could be complicated with taxes as my company only has offices in CA.
Move to a state with no income tax and work as a contractor for your company. Tell the state of California to go f* themselves.
The unspoken benefit everyone has (Score:2)
Monday to Thursday casual has reached unprecedented levels
In other news... (Score:2)
Even After the Pandemic, 100% of employers expect their workers to... well... work.
BUT! BUT! THEY MIGHT CHEAT! (Score:1)
One of the stupidest objections to remote working is that people might take advantage of it. This conveniently ignores the fact that people can and do goof off at work. If your evaluation of productivity relies in any way on "in sight, in mind" you are too stupid to evaluate either style of working.
Too bad (Score:2)
It doesn't matter what people want in this instance. It matters what the companies want. You'd think they would want their workers to be happy and productive, but I see little evidence of that in the U.S..
27? (Score:1)
If you get 27 minutes in a big city, you're fucking lucky.
no (Score:2)
I wish (Score:2)
On average, Americans spent roughly 27 minutes on their one-way commute to work in 2018
try 90 - 120 minutes each way - bay area traffic man.