So I’m so sick of all these posts i see everywhere now, on FB and other subreddits about wfh, like “time to stop milking the cow and get out of your jam jams and go back to work.”
People that are going to slack off, will slack off in the office. My one coworker used to sleep at her desk, watch baseball, and Amazon shop all day (though she eventually ended up being let go after 2 years). The remote people that were hired that didn’t do anything, we figured it out quickly and they were let go before a month had passed.
If your job has deadlines and work you can’t goof off. For example, during the peak of the pandemic, we were so overwhelmed with work that we were all regularly working 60+ hours a day. There was one month i worked like 21 days straight at like 71 hours per week. And no, i wasn’t browsing Reddit then, i was responding to requests one after the other with no break. Sitting at my shitty desk for 10 hours a day with no lunch break (eat while working) did a number on my back and wrist. Also we had to be on call when we weren’t working from like 7am to 10pm. If I would’ve had to spend 3 hours a day commuting on top of that there’s no way I would’ve been able to do that and maintain my sanity as I barely maintained it as it was. My one manager was like oh now that we can work from home he can start working at 5 AM . Oh, also they cut our salaries then. I worker for a non profit and our CEO makes almost 2 mil a year.
I wish when there was downtime we were allowed to flex our time. Like there was one year I don’t think I got more than three days off (for surgery )because I had to use all my PTO for doctors appointments and PT (I got in a super serious car accident driving home from work in shitty weather) even though I was regularly working 60+ hours a week. But We have to work eight hours a day or have to take PTO. Also my manager said i needed to come into the office (on the second floor) even though i couldn’t walk or drive after the accident so i had to pay for an Uber drive me 45 miles to work and back every day for months.
Recently, I heard our client is starting to complain we’re billing them so much for all this time (which we, the workers, don’t get paid for). At one point our managers told us that we needed to work a minimum of 50 hours a week. Some of us who were on track or ahead with our work were like, well we don’t have much to do. Our managers said just keep working further ahead. The nature of our work is such though, that our client often doesn’t know what they want, so working too far ahead leads to massive amount of rework. So then our managers say well if you can’t work farther ahead help people in other areas. But our work is so specific it is hard to help people out in others areas really. But I’m sure it was just a tactic to bill the client as much they could.
Ugh it all makes me so mad. And the thing is, everyone, my managers etc would say I have a really good worth ethic (mostly because I get anxious about missing deadlines) I’m also very clever and quick which I have learned isnt something valued at all. I have been interviewing so hopefully something pans out.