WLP263: What's Going On: "Remote" Is Not The Only Current Challenge
In today’s episode, Pilar Orti and Maya Middlemiss discuss what’s going on in remote work and how it is being experienced right now, some of the practices we’re seeing emerging, and how the tech we've known and loved for ages is evolving too.
This episode was recorded on the 9th February 2021.
02:08 The state of remote work right now
We still need to remind people that work in early 2021, is not typical of remote and home-based work. Issues and problems with the way are working today are being casually labelled as ‘problems with working from home’, in ways which completely miss the point. Mandy Garner from WorkingMums has been writing about this recently Pandemic working is not remote working (and there are been lots of others, including this from Maya last year But this wasn’t what I meant, when I said working from home was great!)
As Mandy highlighted, long hours and failure to disconnect, generalised anxieties about everything from our own health to the future of our jobs and businesses… So many factors contribute to making life harder right now, without conflating working from home with lockdown stressors. While some European countries are getting a grip on working hours and disconnection through legislation, many workplaces seem to have let ‘all hands on deck, this is an emergency!’ thinking become the ‘new normality’, perhaps unconsciously. Sustainable practices and deliberate strategies are what we need now, to move forward with.
Another factor continually resurfacing is the unevenly distributed impact of forced WFH, and this Older employees are adapting to remote work better than younger workers highlighted one aspect:
“The Nintex report found that only half of younger employees felt productive while working from home, compared to 80% of older workers."
Feeling and being productive are not the always the same thing, but the issue of choice (and the present lack of it) is what we return to over and over again. Younger workers have different needs, for learning, socialisation, and visibility, and they are less likely to ample personal accommodation for a home office. policymakers need to address this one too, and we’re going to hear a lot more about the needs of ‘generation covid’ (however we define that) in future. And it’s a timely a reminder for every manager to remember that different team members need different kinds of support, to thrive in remote work.
17.10 Location independent lifestyle
Very interesting to see more gorgeous places around the world embracing the potential for remote workers, to bring work/income to new locations. Maya likes the look of this one and is hurrying to pack up her swimsuit: Hawaii's Remote Work Program Comes With Free Flights, but the programme makes clear that it’s not all basking on the beach after work:
"In exchange for the opportunity to live, work, and play on some of the world’s most beautiful islands, participants are required to contribute their time to local non-profits for several hours each week."
Digital Nomads are often criticised for not contributing to local communities they visit, hanging out in isolated bubbles, so this is a good response. And closer to home we have RePeople (formerly Nomad City) in Gran Canaria, seeking to attract longer staying remote workers with coliving solutions, encouraging people to be a meaningful part of a community for a time - living, spending, and enjoying life, more like a local, in a way that enriches all parties.
23.38 New tech for remote
Pilar discussed this one with Richard MacKinnon in episode 81 of My Pocket Psych, about the ‘Moodbeam’: A wristband that tells your boss if you are unhappy. You’re supposed to tap the happy or unhappy face whenever you feel either of these things, to communicate this to your employer.
Both Pilar and Maya see a range of problems with this idea. If you want to know how people are, isn’t it better to talk about it directly? Wellbeing is a nuanced and complex topic, not a binary one, and the intrusiveness of a wearable also impinges on boundaries which are vulnerable enough when you work from home. It feels like an attempt to relegate emotions to a piece of tech, and while it may provide useful data on trends at an organisational level, the real danger is that it replaces proper conversations and support.
One piece of tech that Maya and Pilar do use daily, including for the management of this podcast, is Trello. Lots of changes are going on there - The Future Of Trello Is On The Horizon: Take a Sneak Peek came out late last year, then this week Going Beyond The Board: A Whole New Trello Is Here. Beyond simple cards, the new look seems to be going for a mixture of Asana and Microsoft Project, but it does look like you could manage quite complex team endeavours with the new functionality, (even ones more complex than this show). It’s also interesting the way both the appearance and uses of so many collaboration apps are overlapping each other, and making it more complicated to choose between them - though Pilar has some great facilitation tools to help teams do just that.
Zoom has new studio effects, for those so inclined. It’s easy to be snooty about this, but we should remember the lack of choice people have about so many aspects of work and life right now, so anything that makes you feel a bit better, even about meetings well it sounds pretty harmless. (Maya also has a video for you about adjusting your video settings, if you want to join the Healthy Happy Homeworking mailing list: Don't be a Zoom Zombie!)
And a final tech update, we note the launch of Microsoft Viva - the 'employee experience platform'. It feels like an interesting intersection of trends in the digital workspace, and a need for culture and connection to be built into the platform and place we go do work online.
We’ll be keeping an eye on this as it rolls out, and will doubtless return to this topic in the future. Please tell us, if your workplace is using Microsoft Viva, we’d love to hear your user feedback. It might be a great fit with our Podcasting for Connection service, for amplifying your culture.
Which brings us to:
45.37 Virtual not Distant news
We recently had a great discussion on LinkedIn, about what you would advise someone whose business has just gone remote. Pilar collated these responses into a blog post, because it generated some amazing insights we wanted to capture and share - what would you add?
As well as a forthcoming blog post on culture to look out for on our website, Pilar recently co-wrote an article with Simon Wilson on asynchronous communications and tools as a facilitator, Making the Most of Virtual Facilitation: Using the Asynchronous Space. The article includes lots of great ideas for extending the facilitation process before and after the main session, with plenty for non-facilitators to learn from too about how to make all group interactions more multidimensional.
Maya is building a community for homeworkers: Healthy Happy Homeworking Facebook group, where anyone doing (or interested) in working from home is welcome. And Richard MacKinnon is building the Work Life Psych club WorkLifePsych.club over on Mighty Networks - so there are lots of places you can hang out and connect when you work from home.
These two are not Virtual Not Distant communities, but don’t worry, we’re always listening to you as well (and we appreciate you listening to us!)
Please contact us, or you can tweet Virtual Not Distant, or Pilar and Maya directly, with any of your thoughts and ideas. Let us know if you have any interesting publications or research to share, or if you’d like to hear more about our training or ‘podcasting for connection’ service, helping remote teams work together better for 2021.
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