Is WFH your new normal?

Very true with respect to outsourcing. During the covid 19 and WFH situations, the true qualified professionals proving they are efficient. Philipines and indian software companies(outsourced) aren't really productive during this period. Now we know what to do slowly in 2021.

 

Pay peanuts (or crap working conditions) and get monkeys. In the business of consulting the skills and experience of your employees is everything. Putting monkeys on the job is the easiest way to loose your clients.

 

BTW, I wasn't referring to 'you' in context just addressing the point. Never my intention to offend anyone.

Anyway back to the thread, yes sought after personnel or highly skilled individuals can lay their demands on the table but for the majority of us, it's 'if you can't take the heat, get out of the kitchen'.

I mean, how do you think this will go down at the end of the job interview with a HR consultant/employer?

'BTW, I'd like to WFH 5 days a week and whilst I don't mind coming in for the odd team pow wow every few months, I don't intend to come into the office....ever'

Whether or not you're a gun, most prospective employers would see that as a red flag and will move on to the next suitable candidate.

Its not that companies won't move to being more flexible, because I think they will, but it will be on their terms.

 

This article stays that companies have indicated that ONLY 40% of employees can work from home (not sure where the data came from).
40% is a large number of people. Despite being a big WFH advocate I didn’t think the number would be that high.
https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/bu...n3-THh12xxDEdJsH5ZknMm_3ELVFmtYck-g9b_q1udTSc

 

This is spot on! It is a huge misconception that other countries can supply endless quality skilled labor for a fraction of the cost.

The truly skilled ones are much harder to find and in those cases are costed accordingly.
The cheap ones have a real communication issue and the skills are sub par at best.

I am personally yet to outsource with any success. Admittedly my outsourcing goes only as far as Fiverr but the experiences to date have been terrible.

 

I have similar experience. I am development lead in a medium size company and we have some members who overseas. In my past jobs and personal business ventures, I have also used overseas contractors very mixed results, I would say majority of results are more negative than positive. A good engineer who understands cultural and business context, able ask the right questions, fill in the blanks in the requirements and also able to identify issues quickly is invaluable to a company. this type of engineers/developers that ticks all the boxes are not easy to find here, but almost impossible to find overseas. I don't think there are many real success stories, if any, that outsources the whole team overseas.

 

In relation to the topic of WFH is a new normal? it is for me and for my company. we tried to go to the office once a week, but that's optional.

 

fair, and particularly in the current economic climate there will be plenty of other commodity workers nipping at the heals come March...

A previous place of employment was extremely anti-WFH - and they definitely lost good workers because of their strict policy. Come Covid, they had to support WFH, and for those dinosaur managers, hopefully they have seen that their employees are actually responsible people, and some balance will be found.

 

Is anyone else in a situation like me and considering moving down the road for more living space and land size?

If so are you noticing any trends? The area I am considering ticks most the boxes in desire-ability and will provide space and size and most importantly is around 200k on average cheaper.

However the last 4 weeks prices have been going nuts! It’s like everyone is thinking the same thing and demand is through the roof. One place I liked was listed 750-800 and sold for 1.03!

The issue I’m seeing is it doesn’t appear to be relative. My area is going up but nowhere near at that pace and I think it’s due to house and land size. My area has a lot more development and townhouses.

I think WFH is going to cause a big shift from “we don’t need a yard and a townhouse will do” to “we need a big yard and a big house with an office”.

 

Not sure if you are correct. COVID is gone the super markets are now open till midnight again. And every single job posting I see in my industry has guaranteed WFH or completely remote option. I guess time will tell.

 

Agree to an extent. Most people I speak to are burnt out this year, very little segregation between work and downtime at home and hard to switch off.

For people that are in a unit/towhouse set up on the living room table - I can see they would be scrambling to move into something bigger.

I think the idea of 2-3 days in an office, is ideal.

 

I wonder how much of that is a HR buzz fad?

Train tickets, gym memberships, Friday drinks, childcare. Would not be the first time a carrot is dangled by employers and later rescinded.

Time will tell.

 

That could be it but given that many companies have announced it publicly that they will not ask their employees to come back I guess it will be a thing one way or the other.

 

It is going to be a standoff for a while in 2021 as each side pushes back, but I think WFH is here to stay in a big capacity for many industries.

In IT especially, good specialists are very hard to come by. Often I'll only get 5 good CV's over the course of a month that even match we need.

Employers can try, but end of the day such people don't have to join an organisation if they don't get what they want. If they pass on enough applicants they won't get the skills they need. Simply getting a fresh import won't be easy too for a while, but maybe that will change in later 2021.

My current employer only gets 1/4 employees in the office on any given day and there have been no restrictions for 6 months now. Early 2020 it was 100%

 

Most of my friends are back to the office apart from one.

The one thats not is 50:50 or so.

 

I work in the lockdown capital of Australia. Here only 25% of the office staff can go to the office. The premier's orders. Personally I was there 2 days last week and i do not think that we had more than 5% of staff in the office. We do not believe that the situation will change in the early new year either.

 

At my workplace, the dynamic is interesting..senior (and to lesser extent, middle) managers are comfortable with staff output and collaboration whilst wfh.

The big driver of esp middle management in wanting to get back to the office after Australia Day is the increased capacity to jostle for position in the limelight and engage in subtle water-cooler gossip with their peers around what senior management are thinking/planning. These activities are harder to do when you need to actively web call or email someone (and that leaves a paper trail).

This activity is what fuels them as individuals, the organisation’s customers and staff are incidental to their thinking.