Work is changing everywhere, and it’s messing with our lives
Companies are splitting into two groups:
Companies that prefer you to be in the office daily, and work long hours, all about speed and hustle. They believe faster and better when they are together in person. However, a lot of employees become stressed, exhausted, and even sick. We saw OpenAI (the big AI company) close for a week because their people were exhausted. Many good people leave these companies, and it is getting harder to find new workers
Others that provide greater flexibility: work at home, flexible hours, focus on results, not time in the chair. Workers here are more likely to stay, are happier (57% more satisfied), and companies lose fewer people (25% less turnover). However, remote work is not ideal as well. Some feel lonely and at times you may be left out of promotions or salary increment, especially when you are a woman or have a family to care for
Are we creating a healthy future of work or new methods of burnout? Are these so-called flexible jobs fair to all or are we creating a new form of workplace inequality? How can we make work better not just to the company but to real people?
Of course employees prefer to work at home and it is practical if you can trust the employee while monitoring their productivity. However there are plenty of real world jobs that simply cannot operate away from a factory or service industry - office jobs are just a portion of everything available out there. You give all the negative points about office jobs, but you won't have to burn out if the company policies are responsible and not always pushing beyond the limits. You can just as easily overwork and burn yourself out by being at home, as it can be harder to separate working hours. It is entirely business specific and trying to ram everything into two near little boxes when there is plenty of room between is a bit silly.