The average workday increased during the pandemic’s early weeks (2020)

The remote work era exposed a strange paradox: while we saved time on commutes, we often ended up working longer. Maybe it’s because our calendars became too accessible, or perhaps the "out of sight, out of mind" fear kicked in for managers. Either way, the true cost of this shift is still playing out.

The WFH shift also exposed the ones who have self discipline and the ones who are not. Nobody is asking you to go beyond the contracted hours. Inability to stop working is a fault of the person and not the mode of working. Agree that the managers fear kicked in so they start to pretend to do work for "visibility". However, that's a sign of a rotten culture and these people were most likely NOT productive in the first place and now they are being exposed therefore they have a need to over-compensate for it.

There are plenty of us who became extremely productive and can finally enjoy life rather than constantly play the spectacle in the office or sit in traffic for hours. And don't get me started on the ones who are neurodiverse or have any kind of disability.

    And don't get me started on the ones who are neurodiverse or have any kind of disability.

But that's what I want to hear more about!

This may be true for a lot of people, but it's not universal and is readily avoidable. A few tips that have worked for me:

* Don't install any company apps or log in to any company accounts on your phone.

* Set your working hours in your calendar and stick to them.

* Set your Slack status to automatically show you as away and snoozed outside your working hours.

* When you're done with work, shut down your laptop and walk away.

I've never received any complaints from sticking to this pattern. When I'm in my working hours I'm consistently reachable and I do my job, when I'm not you can't get hold of me if you try. This is how it was in the office, I don't see why the expectation should be different in WFH.

I do think that a key thing that makes this work well for me is that I'm consistently online during (and only during) my specified hours, rather than mixing and matching my schedule on a day to day basis. I'm not always reachable, but I'm predictably unreachable.

Seems that was an unpopular comment, but it's basically correct.

Overwork can be corrosive to productivity and quality, but that can happen in-office, as much as at home.

But also, working at home does require self-discipline, and not everyone is able to do that. It's also like being a manager, or a company owner. These require a certain type of personality/skillset, and not everyone has it. There's a good possibility that we need external structure. I know folks who rented a desk in a local incubator, during COVID, because they needed the time away from home.

That's not necessarily a bad thing. Some of the most materially successful people in history, have been right bastards, in life. There's a lot to be said for a healthy work/life balance.

As far as neurodiverse folks; some of them can do very well at home.

I don't think it's a paradox at all. I saved X hours a day by not commuting, and spent maybe .25X to .5X extra hours working (which actually felt pleasant, because I was sleeping in later, getting "home from work" sooner, and taking zero-friction breaks when needed by walking to my kitchen instead of driving to lunch, etc.)

In a staff or lead level role with Indian team members active at 6 AM ET (and our day officially starting at 8:30 ET so we can interact with them), West and East Coast teams with the West Coast often working 10 AM - 7 PM, yeah, that means I’m going to be reasonably working from 8 AM - 5 PM or 6 PM.

During the WFH era which for me was 2017 - 2022, I made up for the 9 - 10 hour workdays by not using up PTO for doctor appointments, car repair shop trips, and so on. This worked reasonably well - and nobody minded if I was getting my oil changed or sitting for an hour at a doctor’s office lobby and responsive on Slack. It was a compromise that worked reasonably well.

We also carved out time for people to pick up/drop off kids at school. In exchange, the work day expanded from basically 8 to 5 or 9 to 6. Everyone was comfortable with this. I certainly didn’t mind people on my team doing this at all and really appreciated the extra availability - we just knew to plan around the school pick up and drop off times, which were also in the calendar as a recurring meeting.

What’s not working now is imposing RTO and trying to have the same extended hours. Sorry, but no, I’m not going to drive in from 7-8, work from 8-6 without breaks, and then drive home from 6-7.

I can't remember where I was reading someone the other day remarking how since they had stopped working extra hours, they had suddenly been promoted, after years of trying.

They now stuck to their hours, got used to saying no, but worked hard while they were 'at work'. Part of the thinking was this moved them out of the group who were always staying on to finish something off, which can make you look ill-prepared or behind - despite the fact that you only there are you are taking on additional work.

> When you're done with work, shut down your laptop and walk away.

I think this became the driving force of "always at work". When you sit at home all day, you're online. And the inevitable "let me just check..." habit I know I formed starts to occur. At some point its 6 or 7pm as you're playing catch up on work and since its still "early" its fine to respond to that small email or Slack message. Next thing you know its 11 or 12 at night and you're still sitting on the computer browsing or working or doing something in between. The 24/7 chatroom is always open and there's always someone willing to socialize.

My work really flourished during WFH. I was actually headhunted back to a place I'd worked before with the (verbal) promise they were now and always would be 'remote first'. During the last 2 years my productivity has exploded. I get up, make myself a coffee, and start working at 6am. Then after a shower and a walk in the forest, I work a full day of intense and focussed work. I've been happy, fit, fulfilled. I've often visited the office and love the social interaction. I've often worked weekends and evening because it's been fun, and I've felt loyalty to the company. Then 8 weeks ago the CEO suddenly announced RTO.

But this has been such a wake-up call. I stopped doing the extra work, no longer respond to questions that are out-of-hours, and have finally realized that the company really isn't my 'friend' or 'family'. But best of all, when I'm at the office I can just coast and do practically no work whatsoever - and not only does no-one notice, I've even been getting more managerial praise for my performance.

We're living in a mad world.

The key is to have different computers, or at a minimum different user accounts. On the work computer no private stuff, on the private computer no work stuff.

Once I've logged out of my work account it has never happened that I'd log back in the same evening, open the VPN, restart the browser etc just for a quick check of emails or chat messages.

> But that's what I want to hear more about!

My own anecdotal experience: I'm on the spectrum, albeit pretty high functioning, and diagnosed ADHD Inattentive type. WfH has really allowed me to excel in my work like I never have before, especially in the early days.

Working in office is exhausting for me. I have a lot of tics/stims that I have to try and mask when around others, the lighting is usually horrible and distracting, open office plans or cubicles are a sensory nightmare. Just trying to mask alone is exhausting enough that I can't focus on work at all, and my performance suffers from it, and I get burned out really fast.

Now, I get to be comfortable in my own skin at home. I have my office set up exactly how I want, I can wear whatever I want, and at my job there's no expectation of cameras on for meetings. One of the best benefits, for me, is almost everything is done via written communication now. I take very few phone calls, and outside of meetings, all communication is done over chat or email. There's no one to just barge into my workspace to ask a question, interrupting my focus, which would essentially ruin the entire day's of productivity for me.

I also have a delayed circadian rhythm, and having to commute can be dangerous. There are many times that I just can't wake up enough in the morning to be alert enough to drive, even after a full night of restful sleep. I still have this problem, but with WfH I no longer have to drive, and there's some flexibility to start whenever I want as long as I'm on the first meeting of the day or there's no urgent tickets waiting for me (I'm not a dev, I'm a sysadmin).

With in office work, I can ask for accommodations, but it's difficult and has a stigma to ask "I need my own office, with a door, with plenty of natural light, my own control of overhead lighting, and for people to not interrupt me. Oh and I need flexibility to be able to come in whenever I want within a 2 hour window because some mornings I just can't wake up enough to be safe driving."

Lastly, there's no pressure to "fake work" or pretend to be productive beyond my own limits. Like one of the commenters earlier said, most people especially in knowledge work are probably only truly productive 4 to maybe 5 hours of the work day. I'm totally dead after about 4 hours of real work, so an 8 hour work day just doesn't make sense to me. When at home I can go do other things when I'm done with my work for the day, and just have alerts on my phone for tickets or calls/chat messages, I don't have to stay at my desk and pretend to work.

So yeah, WfH has been a godsend for me and I couldn't ever go back to in office work. I have no ambitions for promotions or management, so I plan to stick with this job basically until I retire so long as they continue to allow WfH. If that doesn't pan out, not sure what I'll do. While everyone else was down about the COVID lockdowns, it was basically some of the best times of my life and I was the happiest I've been in a while. WfH, less crowds, less traffic, and grocery stores had sensory hours.

> I stopped doing the extra work, no longer respond to questions that are out-of-hours, and have finally realized that the company really isn't my 'friend' or 'family'. But best of all, when I'm at the office I can just coast and do practically no work whatsoever - and not only does no-one notice, I've even been getting more managerial praise for my performance.

Perhaps I’ve been jaded by the industry after being in it so long but this struck me. I haven’t felt this way about any company, good or bad, in a long time. After surviving probably my 10th layoff across 5 different companies I can’t imagine ever being loyal, considering anyone at a company a “friend”, and most certainly not “family”.

I agree with your feeling that remote has really made me more productive. But I believe that’s because of the opposite of what you stated. I loved the ability to get a bunch of stuff done and then zone out the rest of the day. Without the constant interruptions, open office, etc I was able to get one giant burst of productivity and then check out. I was on paper “10x” and just omitted the fact I was only working 2/3 time.

Recently with RTO and myself being remote only I’ve been led to burnout. The company I am at has changed the merit equation from good work to showing up to the office. As a result, I end up picking up more slack during my workday as my coworkers get lunches, game rooms, parties, etc. I am still expected to grind and they are not. I sure do miss the remote first days.

My employer is tightening the screws. I get it. RTO externalizes costs and privatizes benefit. The incentives are not aligned for remote work, and it’s a publicly traded firm with an obligation to maximize shareholder value. I get it. While middle management should know if line of business employees are actually producing useful work, regardless of location, expecting 40 or 50-somethings to be engaged at work and not spend their day running personal errands is not realistic. So physical presence is the shareholders’ only option.

I see it as a pay cut where commute and prep hours are uncompensated, and I adjust my valuation of the job accordingly.

> Nobody is asking you to go beyond the contracted hours.

Remote work killed the concept of core hours. I started seeing meetings at 7am and 7pm as well as late messages because everyone was flexing their time. So yes, work hours did increase.

A lot of people I know who work from home feel the need to prove they are just as productive (or more) at home, so they can keep doing it and keep their job while being out of sight. They also take fewer breaks, because it feels like they aren’t working, or getting away with something. Those in the office take liberal breaks and just chat a lot, while still feeling like they are working, because they are at work.

I look at it as trading one evil for another (lesser one). I would say that I definitely work more hours now that I'm fully remote but at the same time I wouldn't want to back to the office even if it meant working less hours.

If anything remote work gave me flexibility. There might be some days I'm cranking code for close to 8 hours straight and others where I work maybe 3-4 hours because I have other things on my plate.

One key for me is to have a separate desk. My work machine is in its own corner where only work things can happen. The physical separation makes the habit that, “here is where I work” vs “here is where I live”.

I don't really have space for two separate computer desks. But I enforce the divide with pants: work hours means work pants, the same I'd wear to the office, and after work I "commute home" by changing the pants.

It's a stupid thing but I started doing that at the beginning of the pandemic lockdowns and have kept it up ever since.

It's a bit challenging in academia, where many of the students send their messages later in the evening. I've made it a habit to not respond after 6pm for that exact reason - if they see I'm "on" then its okay to communicate. However the past year has reminded me about the reasons I started making YouTube videos and whatnot, because I DON'T want to be bothered outside of class and so my students have all the resources available when they choose to work on my course.

Some of this is a 'me' problem, needing to remember to disconnect from the world and all of the literal fires going on. I've been using the hyperbole that essentially my brain "exploded", so I deleted Reddit, been on an unsubscribe phase with my YouTube channels, and joined some smaller communities. That last one still keeps me online, but I look at as smaller community means silly memes and a group of people that eventually clock out for the night.

It's so much more quiet! I missed this.

My own experience matches yours almost exactly. Thanks for sharing.