WORKING REMOTELY: IS IT REMOTELY WORKING?

The pandemic has drastically changed the ways in which society functions, including a complete overhaul of our working habits and environments. Over a year of lockdowns, self-isolations and the potential danger that came with being near another human being has forced the educational and professional spheres to switch from being in person affairs to remote ones. Luckily, modern technology made the move to online work easier, with platforms such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Google Meet providing easy means to virtually connect colleagues and peers. But will remote working outlast the #WFH novelty or will we revert back to a traditional in-person format?

The move online has made connecting with those around the country and world much earlier. Travelling for interviews and meetings is now a redundant practice, and their move to online is more accessible and affordable. Accessibility of events has also increased for disabled people with immunocompromised people being able to join in on events from the safety of their homes and the working environment becoming more accessible.

For office workers that have established families and careers, it is easy to see the reasons behind a favouring of working from home instead of toiling away in the office. The benefits of avoiding a lengthy and irritating commute into the city — and instead having the ease of only rolling out of bed and walking a few metres to a desk — are certainly tempting. The perks of commuting less don’t just stop at the time saved either. According to the ONS, “half of homeworkers (50%) reported spending less on fuel and parking for commuting” and “two fifths (40%) reported spending less on commuting using public transport”. The alleviation of expensive commutes certainly strengthens the arguments of those championing remote modes of working.

Those with families and careers also have the benefit of spending more time with family. They also have less of a need to network with colleagues and establish a new physical presence in the workplace, benefits that don’t quite translate to younger professionals at the beginning of their career. For young professionals, remote working eliminates the candid networking and socialising that occurs in a workplace; a move to remote working prevents those at the beginning of their career from experiencing a workplace environment — which could have been an exciting prospect of graduate life — and inhibits the cultivation of a presence in the company space, a presence which cannot be replicated virtually.

When viewing the prospect of working — or, more specifically, learning — from home from a student perspective, the arguments championing remote working lose their novelty and are instead encumbered with the reality that online learning can be an incredibly unsocial and demotivating way to spend time at university, a time that is meant to be social and active. Most students also don’t have the luxury of having a separate working area — unlike some professionals well into their careers who might have a study or at least a separate area to spend their working day — meaning the work-from-home life could be a little more restrictive and confined.

It’s clear that when it comes to the future of the working environment, there isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach. The variety of the future, and current, working environment needs to mirror the variety of its workforce; a fully remote or in person office is reductive and will fail to consider the circumstances of both individuals and larger groups of people. Working from home has outlasted its immediate function as a measure to stop the spread of COVID-19 and it doesn’t seem to be going away soon, but neither does the good old-fashioned commute into the office. Even amongst the world-connecting technology that modernity has brought us, it seems there’s still a necessity for in-person connectivity.