The coronavirus pandemic has left offices empty. But what was the point of them anyway?

[Poetical Poltergeist]

I like it too

But there are some things I wish I was in the office for.

Beside getting away from the wife I don't wanna go back at all lmao.

 

[CarmelBarbie]

I could give a fukk if I never see a coworker in person again... that is except for a few Brehs that I liked seeing each day...
A lot of people are anxious to get back to the office. I’ve been more productive at home.

 

[Lucky_Lefty]

So how does this work for companies that deal with classified info? You’re begging for someone to hack into your shyt having Earl and Todd work from home.

 

[Geek Nasty]

I could give a fukk if I never see a coworker in person again... that is except for a few Brehs that I liked seeing each day...
A lot of people are anxious to get back to the office. I’ve been more productive at home.

me too, my boss asked why my production was so high I tried to tell him politely that "well ,when Im at home I don't have people popping in every hour for something and if anyone hits up on email/slack I can just ignore them until I finish my train of thought."

 

[Wargames]

So how does this work for companies that deal with classified info? You’re begging for someone to hack into your shyt having Earl and Todd work from home.

you give workers computers that use virtual machines to log into the office network. For all intents and purposes they working from their office PC when it comes to access to files. Of course setting this up during a pandemic is going to be hard as hell and expensive

 

[ColdSlither]

Offices aren't going away. They still have their uses, and there are going to be a lot of people who don't care for working at home. I do think that many businesses will start looking at their spaces, and reassess what they really need. I know that's in the pipeline for my job. Our headquarters is in NYC, and my managing director lives in Atlanta. She has a whole big ass office suite, that she's in probably 7 times a year, three days each. Our organizations executive director, lived in NJ, but moved to Texas to be close to his new grandchildren. We have a brand new director, that none of us have met physically yet. I forget which southern state he's in. Another coworker is in Arizona now. One of our HR people moved to Florida. Another director in my department, he's in the office because he lives in Hell's Kitchen, but everyone that reports to him are WFH. I'm even considering it. I'll come in on Thursday and Friday which are my clique's happy hour and lunch days.

 

[CarmelBarbie]

Offices aren't going away. They still have their uses, and there are going to be a lot of people who don't care for working at home. I do think that many businesses will start looking at their spaces, and reassess what they really need. I know that's in the pipeline for my job. Our headquarters is in NYC, and my managing director lives in Atlanta. She has a whole big ass office suite, that she's in probably 7 times a year, three days each. Our organizations executive director, lived in NJ, but moved to Texas to be close to his new grandchildren. We have a brand new director, that none of us have met physically yet. I forget which southern state he's in. Another coworker is in Arizona now. One of our HR people moved to Florida. Another director in my department, he's in the office because he lives in Hell's Kitchen, but everyone that reports to him are WFH. I'm even considering it. I'll come in on Thursday and Friday which are my clique's happy hour and lunch days.

They will soon enough. Baby boomers and Gen X are keeping them alive. Gen Y will shut this office shyt down as soon as we takeover. It’s on its last legs.

 

[ColdSlither]

They will soon enough. Baby boomers and Gen X are keeping them alive. Gen Y will shut this office shyt down as soon as we takeover. It’s on its last legs.

Even boomers are like fukk this shyt. I was talking to one manager before a meeting last week and she loving working from home too much. She said that she doesn't have to be up at 4am to start getting dressed and get on the subway. Wake up at 6am, maybe even 7, and just feel relaxed and even get more accomplished. Another one said the same thing. She don't need to come back in, and it makes it easy for her to look after her dad and that he's doing what he needs to be doing. The only ones who are going to like the office and the social butterflies.

 

[CarmelBarbie]

Even boomers are like fukk this shyt. I was talking to one manager before a meeting last week and she loving working from home too much. She said that she doesn't have to be up at 4am to start getting dressed and get on the subway. Wake up at 6am, maybe even 7, and just feel relaxed and even get more accomplished. Another one said the same thing. She don't need to come back in, and it makes it easy for her to look after her dad and that he's doing what he needs to be doing. The only ones who are going to like the office and the social butterflies.

Gen Y social butterflies don’t want to be at the office either. They’d rather be social butterflies with their friends, outside of work. And social butterflies? Sounds like a personal problem—work isn’t meant to fill that gap for you. Make some more friends and get a life outside of work. That’s what irritates me about those trying to get us reintegrated into the workplace now... most of us have proven we are productive and able to work from home. Why are we being forced to come back to the office? As I said before I’ll rest easy and peacefully if I never see another coworker face to face again.

 

[greenvale]

I think there's a difference between how much of your job can be done remotely vs how much do people actually want to do remotely. I value remote work, but nothing beats in person collaboration for my field of work.

Edit: I should add that employers need to make sure they're solving for both questions and not just the former bc I can easily see a dramatic shift to permanent wfh backfiring.

 

[Loose]

I think the amount of workspace is a problem not office's in general you could have rotating desk

 

[MMS]

 

[Lucky_Lefty]

you give workers computers that use virtual machines to log into the office network. For all intents and purposes they working from their office PC when it comes to access to files. Of course setting this up during a pandemic is going to be hard as hell and expensive

That would be cool if it was that easy. The security protocols that are necessary to do work that is classified is crazy expensive and more cost effective to do in office since the firewalls (military grade) and monitoring of those computer systems are already in place. Now imagine having to do that for every employee involved. The he costs would be astronomical. There are security key Encryption fobs that can be used but those aren’t always reliable and that’s before you get to always needing to be synced with the network for almost daily security updates for your workstation. It’s super complicated and one I don’t think those organizations are prepared for at the moment.

 

[The Bilingual Gringo]

While it's definitely a generational thing, I still believe there is value in having an office space for personal collaboration, etc. I see a lot of companies morphing to a hybrid set up with regular telecommuting, etc.

Going to be interesting to see how commercial real estate trends afterwards, but then again, could turn everything into data centers

 

[Conan]

That would be cool if it was that easy. The security protocols that are necessary to do work that is classified is crazy expensive and more cost effective to do in office since the firewalls (military grade) and monitoring of those computer systems are already in place. Now imagine having to do that for every employee involved. The he costs would be astronomical. There are security key Encryption fobs that can be used but those aren’t always reliable and that’s before you get to always needing to be synced with the network for almost daily security updates for your workstation. It’s super complicated and one I don’t think those organizations are prepared for at the moment.

This is correct. Where I work, employees who work with classified data are still required to go into the office. You can't take that kind of work home.