When all this is over, I’ll never moan about the tea-run again
MILLIONS of us are already at it but even the National Assembly for Wales managed to work from home this week.
As members of the Senedd used Zoom video conferencing to gather virtually for their weekly plenary session, the Assembly became the first major democratic institution in the UK to meet remotely.
For the viewers who watched the broadcast online, the screen may have looked like Celebrity Squares but the meeting was still very much a formal affair.
Stories of half’n’half video conferencing outfits – corporate on top, pyjamas on bottom – have abounded in recent weeks but anyone hoping for a glimpse of Ken Skates in leisurewear would have been disappointed. It was business as usual on the attire front.
As for the home backdrops which usually keep interior design voyeurs transfixed, there were few distractions – apart from Caroline Jones’ rather ornate ornaments and the fact that Neil Hamilton of all people appeared to have the banner of Owain Glyndwr draped behind his desk.
Indeed, the novelty of the format soon faded as the technology allowed statements to be heard on Covid-19 from First Minister Mark Drakeford, Health Minister Vaughan Gething and Ken Skates, the Minister for Economy, Transport and North Wales and questions to be posed and scrutiny given from other members of the Senedd.
The Senedd has set an example MPs are now urging Westminster to follow.
While Wales keeps connected and carries on, Parliament is in recess until April 21st.
No wonder MPs increasingly frustrated at their inability to hold the UK Government and its coronavirus crisis strategy to account are calling for the creation of a virtual House of
Commons.
While Wales leads the way in digital democracy, will we see a transformation of the way we work across the wider employment spectrum when we emerge from the dark days of lockdown?
As millions of office workers now attempt to hold down their jobs with a laptop in the back bedroom, some of their bosses are predicting a revolution as major firms are seeing the benefit of shifting their employees from the workplace to their home space.
One executive, who asked not to be named, told BBC environment analyst Roger Harrabin yesterday that they didn’t expect to revert to previous office-based patterns of work at their professional services firm.
“First, it’s better for our employees,” he said. “We can offer much more flexible conditions – which will suit a lot of people. It will have to be a two-way street, and if people want only to work five hours a day we’ll want to pay them five hours’ worth of salary.
“But also it’s going to save us a fortune in office costs. And the technology will open the opportunity for firms to bid for work at a distance.
There are some very big changes under way in the way we work – and they have deep implications.”
The savings could be ecological, of course, as well as economic.
With roads now quiet enough to be reclaimed by the goats of Llandudno and the sheep of the Rhondda, the impact of the zero commute is plain to see.
President of the AA Edmund King predicted this week that a reduction in travel will continue beyond the current crisis as so many have adapted successfully to home-working.
He suggests government funds would be better spent on the information superhighway rather than the six-lane tarmac variety, telling BBC News: “Arguably in future, we should invest more in broadband because what this current crisis has shown is that the majority of companies can continue working from home, and it can be more efficient.”
But is homeworking the dream for all? Ask those who must balance the day job with home-schooling stircrazy kids and caring for elderly relatives through windows how efficient they feel at the moment.
And, while some may relish the thought of increased independence, the news that software allowing bosses to spy on employees remotely is enjoying a sales boom suggests while you may be out of sight you won’t be out of mind and trusted to get on with it.
The family fight for bandwidth, meanwhile, has never been more intense – as anyone who’s attempted to Zoom their colleagues while their teenagers are on Netflix streaming two seasons of American Vandal will tell you.
That’s if you’ve even got a wifi signal. Sky broadband was down for six hours yesterday, a scenario that must have left thousands of homeworkers wishing Brent from IT was in the next room rather than a distraught adolescent bemoaning her lack of boxset access.
Homeworking will not suit everybody. Yet the fact that so many will now have experienced it should
change perceptions of the domestic coalface.
I’ve worked from home every Friday for almost 20 years and know the plusses, the minuses and the stereotypes that have been attached to it in more normal times.
I’m my own boss so haven’t had to endure employer spyware, but it has been hilarious how family and friends could misinterpret the work ethic of the housebound.
Those confined to their corporate cells assumed you were just skiving in your jim-jams in front of Homes Under the Hammer.
My home-working day was routinely referred to as my “day off” by commuting chums, envious of a journey that involved crossing the landing. When I had a builder in for several months he was so amused by the concept that tapping on the home computer was real work, he spent half the day popping his head round the door offering cups of tea and yapping nineteen to the dozen.
People thought you were available for visits, long lunches or even an illicit shared viewing of Loose Women. Retired neighbours gave you a knowing smile but just because they had a long afternoon of crossstitch and Countdown ahead, it didn’t mean you had.
Indeed a government survey reckoned home-workers slaved for an average 45 hours a week compared with the 37.2 hours clocked up by their office counterparts.
And the shocking truth is you do get more done.
There’s nobody to talk to for a start. It’s impossible to have a solo water cooler moment.
That daily dose of office gossip, banter and dissection of last night’s episode of Gogglebox is somewhat wasted on the cat.
The lunch break was a quick trip to the fridge for a pierce-and-ping carbonara rather than a canteen blow out or a latte in the café with colleagues.
And the 9-5 routine was without a pack up and go deadline – how do you know when it’s home-time when you’re already home?
And there are other drawbacks. While there’s no other option at the moment, when we do return to normality I couldn’t do it every day.
It’s too lonely. I’d miss the camaraderie of the office – even when we’re arguing about opening/closing the windows, car-park etiquette and whose turn it is to do the tea run. There’s the need for creative company too – the sharing of ideas and the synergy that can only be formed through face to face contact; the nuanced conversations that are lost in email, or on phones or screens.
What we can hopefully take from the current experience, however, is how a balance of home and office can work– rather than an either or scenario that could see greedy firms be more concerned with cutting their overheads than the needs of their staff.
The good thing is home working is now demystified and destigmatised.
All those companies that paid lipservice to flexible working practices but never really felt they could trust their employees to focus on the job rather than Holly and Phil should have their prejudices removed.
Technology always promised to democratise the workplace but it has taken a mass collective experience of how it can be possible to enlighten the suspicious.
Embracing the remote working approach would be transformative for parents, carers, people with disabilities and indeed anyone for whom it’s not possible to fit in with the rigid norms of traditional 9-5 office life.
But it won’t signal the end of the office. Even for colleagues, absence makes the heart grow fonder – I’ll never moan about doing the tea-run again.
For those of us still fortunate to be working through this crisis, another thing we may take away from this long period of enforced solo employment is how much of our job satisfaction is derived from the friendship of our workplace.
When it’s over, many of us will want to be back in the room not on Zoom.