I’m thinking about Ottawa where the two biggest sectors are gouvernment and technology. Both industries always wanted to experiment with all employees working from home eventually. However, the blessing came when the pandemic started and everyone was kicked out of the office.
This paradigm shift was a free experiment for consistent WFH. Soon, organizations started to see what an advantage it was to close down their offices. Rent, Internet, Utilities, Parking and so on were no longer a consideration for payment. These organizations reaped these benefits of huge cost savings.
Now that everyone is at home paying their own Internet services and whatever else needed to work from home such as larger desks, more screens and so on without having to expense them to the company.
There are currently hundreds of thousands of gouvernment employees working from home. Their offices are a massive maze and I can’t imagine how expensive it is to run their offices. Now, this is all gone.
As for me, I really can’t adapt to working on the same desk all day. I try to talk walks between work and home projects to gain a different perspective hoping that I would regain some of that energy lost.
I am hoping that soon enough I’ll be working in coffee shops and Universities. Essentially work wherever I want without my boss breathing over my shoulder. I vaguely remember reading research that working in theses kind of settings enhance creativity and productivity.
We’re currently in uncertain times but it seems that this forced experiment has been a success. I’m one of the very few people who hate working from home mainly from the isolation and the fatigue that results from it.