Asked to come back to office

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Gordon Gekko said:
You’ll have to explain that one to me, sorry. The point is that in lots of businesses, e.g. professional practice, aircraft leasing, financial services, etc, senior people get paid pretty well. However, the flipside is that they often work insanely long hours and operate in an environment where, in practice, niceties such as Organisation of Working Time Acts etc simply don’t apply. And the person who whinges about it gets zero bonus and gets managed out.
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Ironically Solicitors in large firms work crazy hours as well.
When I were a lad... sorry... when I was young we worked six and a half days a week. The first day off after Christmas was St. Patricks day.
There was nobody forcing us to work those hours and the overtime rates as the weekend were great; time and a half for the first 4 hours on Saturday and double time after that, double time for the four hours on Sunday. I used to get over 80 day hours a week. Now that would be against the law. That seems crazy to me; people should certainly not be forced to work overtime they don't want to do but if it's there and they want to work it...
 
Gordon Gekko said:
There’ll always be eejits looking to milk the system though, unfortunately.
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Sure isn't that how one earns their bonus, milk the underlings with 18 hour workdays, with a nod and a shrug to the rules, knowing if they speak up (in the wrong way) they'll be managed out? Milking the system is a culture and it cuts both ways.


My advice to the OP would be to consider how your organisation would handle moving their offices, to a different location.
Are they going to ask you to finish here on Friday and turn up there on Monday (maybe they would?) or is there going to be a detailed plan. Moving in stages, this team at this time etc. Laying out their expectations.
In a new location, people have to get used to new transport links (the commute is back, but different), personal routines get upended - it might take a few days to get used to, adjust your home life slightly. In this case, time to undo the adjustments people were forced to make in the first place. You might do two days the first week and build it up.
Your desk location - what will it look like now? In my case we have one-way systems in place, mask rules, coffee stations and some bathrooms are closed etc.
How is it going to be communicated, is it structured and regular, endorsed from the top - or is down to each manager to do a solo run?

Its a challenging environment that is testing organisations' management. Some will chose to focus on managing people and some will focus on managing output. There's a good few former martyrs employing the 'back in my day' style of management in this thread. Only when the tide goes out do you discover who's been swimming naked. Too often 'ability to manage people/teams' is not a key requirement for a management position. Now is a good time to evaluate the culture of your organisation and how its likely to handle adversity in the future ;)
 
Clearly the OP is not coming back but most offices are taking a gradual approach, 1-2 days per week, then 2-3 days per week, then back to capacity depending on social distancing rules.

My husband works in a factory so has been in all through the pandemic but the office staff have not and they were recently sent a strongly worded letter that they were due back in Sept and reminded that their place of work according to their contract of employment was the factory location.

So yeah there will be 20% desperate to get back to the workplace, 20% happy never to see it again, and 60% in the middle who will muddle through as best as they can.

But managers will need to be trained how to manage remote working, how to evaluate remote work, rather than just seeing John at his desk so he is doing great. And if you had a poor worker in the office you also have a poor worker at home.
 
ClubMan said:
Do you actually know how things work these days?
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Yep. Most of my friends work in the State sector.
Do you know how many people have lost their job in the State sector due to poor performance over the last 30 years?
 
Peanuts20 said:
I know in the case of my own employer (tech firm), our starting point now is that no-one needs to be in the office, ever. We're shutting most offices world wide, moving to home working and will retain some office space for things like client meetings, workshops etc but that is it.
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Might be worth a separate thread on this topic, would be interesting to see what the various return positions are and how they're working out for various industry types here.
 
LS400 said:
Your posts should come with a danger warning..

Ridiculous frame of thought.
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They had provided additional context though. See below, seems fair.

ArthurMcB said:
so if you have a situation (and the OP would need to confirm) where:

1. Gove guidance is wfh where appropriate.
2. Company has 90% staff wfh.
3. Manager asks particular individual to return to office in spite of there being no formal company policy to do so.

If that individuals presence in office isnt critical then that individual can reasonably say no to employer, that they would like to follow gove guidance and continue wfh like majority of colleagues.
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ArthurMcB said:
...i would be saying no to the compant if thats how I felt and unless they had a valid reason for requiring him in office.
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You have a situation here where the employee knows best. I could have taken any of his comments and applied the danger sign. I have had that thought process here before. Glad to say, they were "managed out".

The danger here, is that some poor gullible soul, will think its ok to confront your employers with the slim pickings of Government advice.
 
In some circumstances it might be ok for an employee to ask (no confronting) their manager if its ok that they continue working from home.

OP mentioned 90% colleagues still working from home so it might be ok for them to check with their manager if their role allows them to continue working from home.

They should not confront manager or refuse to carry out a reasonable request.

They can, however, question the request in light of the continuing pandemic.

Some roles may require the employee to go back to office so the OP should consider if this is the case.

Talk to your manager OP.
 
LS400 said:
You have a situation here where the employee knows best. I could have taken any of his comments and applied the danger sign. I have had that thought process here before. Glad to say, they were "managed out".

The danger here, is that some poor gullible soul, will think its ok to confront your employers with the slim pickings of Government advice.
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Most people in this country don't work in an office. Most employers don't have a HR department, let alone HR policies. They are small cafe's, shops, hair dressers, restaurants etc who are trying to keep the lights on. That is, by far, the hardest business to run.
Most employers don't have a queue of prospective employees outside the door. They value their employees and want them to stay working for them.
Most employees know that it is a struggle to run a small business and will go the extra mile to make sure everything stays above water.

Some employers are in the luxurious position that they can abuse their employees.
Some employees are in the luxurious position that they can abuse their employers.

For the vast majority of people it is a symbiotic relationship, to a lesser of greater extent, and chapter and verse of the GDPR or the Working Time Act or the legal position on bereavement leave or when and how they should come back to working in their usual place of work just never comes up.
 
jim said:
In some circumstances it might be ok for an employee to ask (no confronting) their manager if its ok that they continue working from home.

OP mentioned 90% colleagues still working from home so it might be ok for them to check with their manager if their role allows them to continue working from home.

They should not confront manager or refuse to carry out a reasonable request.

They can, however, question the request in light of the continuing pandemic.

Some roles may require the employee to go back to office so the OP should consider if this is the case.

Talk to your manager OP.
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This articulates better what i was tryin to say.
 
We seem to have lost the OP unfortunately so we can't clarify what position they are in regarding the differant stances here.
 
ClubMan said:
Not really surprised the way that so many topics get dragged off into bickering about stuff not really directly relevant to the original questions... :confused:
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Kind of inevitable that others will relate their own experiences where the OP chooses not to respond and clarify.
 
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