Rituals for moving jobs when working from home
Terence Eden reflects on changing jobs when working from home and how… weird it can be. While I’ve been based from two different converted garages during the past decade, I’ve travelled a lot so it has felt different.
I can imagine, though, if that’s not the case, it can all feel a little bit discombobulating!
One Friday last year, I posted some farewell messages in Slack. Removed myself from a bunch of Trello cards. Had a quick video call with the team. And then logged out of my laptop. I walked out of my home office and sat in my garden with a beer.Source: Job leaving rituals in the WFH era | Terence Eden’s BlogThe following Monday I opened the door to the same office. I logged in to the same laptop. I logged into a new Slack - which wasn’t remarkably different from the old one. Signed in to a new Trello workspace - ditto. And started a video call with my new team.
I’ll admit, It didn’t feel like a new job!
There was no confusing commute to a new office. No having to work out where the toilets and fire exits were. No “here’s your desk - it’s where John used to sit, so people might call you John for a bit”. I didn’t even have to remember people’s names because Zoom showed all my colleagues' names & job titles.
There was no waiting in a liminal space while receptionists worked out how to let me in the building.
In short, there was no meaningful transition for me.
Working from home
I don’t know anything about the author of this post other than what he’s put on his about page. He doesn’t look very old, and he’s a developer for Just Eat, the food takeaway app. Neither his about page nor this post mention family, which is a massive red flag for me when people are talking about the downsides of working from home.
You see, while he may have problems concentrating, and miss the social element of the office, that’s not true for everyone. It’s particularly not true for those with a family. So I’m posting this as a reminder to myself and others, that context matters.
Much like the effect of the plague in medieval times, one of the effects of the pandemic has been to perturb the power balance between employers and employees. As an employee, I was initially excited by the benefits of working from home, but slowly realised that complete remote working was an alienating experience that has diminished the boundaries between work and leisure.Source: What Tech Workers Don’t Understand They’ve Lost by WFH | Michael Gomes VieiraI want to make a developer-centric argument that the current state of majority remote working is bad, not because it is bad for your company or for your salary but because it is not best for yours and others mental well being.