Covid Contradictions
It seems people fall into two camps when it comes to work from home patterns brought on by the current pandemic. It’s either “this is great, I would like to keep working this way for a few days a week once Covid 19 is contained” or “I can’t wait to go back to my old routine”.
I am more in the former camp and am living with the pandemic quite well for now. For those that I know in the latter camp, it mostly seems to be the reduction in direct human contact that is driving how they are feeling. For some it’s also about not having the defined separation between home and work life they are used to. That’s understandable, and it has been interesting to see how people deal with that. In fact, there was an amusing article in the newspaper a week or so ago about an academic that gets in his car and drives around the block for 20 minutes each morning and night to simulate his normal work commute. Quirky, but if it works for him, why not?
Notwithstanding the physical separation that we are all experiencing, I have found myself ruminating on the pleasure of working with others several times in recent weeks. The circumstances that led to these reflections have been varied and include:
Seeing what putting different people with different skills and experience in a virtual meeting can do to solve problems I would have struggled with on my own
Marvelling at the “more than the sum of the parts” outcomes that can arise through workshopping creative responses to a specific situation
Feeling grateful for the diversity of skills in the people I get to work and engage with
Being blown away by a colleague’s Excel skills to create a powerful new reporting tool
For me, these pleasures are not only undiminished in a Covid world, they somehow seem more noticeable and less easy to take for granted, even if the reality is that they are no more frequent. Counter intuitively then, being at more of a distance from other people seems to have me enjoying them more than ever. Our fellow humans really can be pretty fabulous at times and it’s nice to feel alive to that.
This is not an argument for the abandonment of communal working spaces; that would be a terrible thing, particularly for young people and those who may feel lonely at home. Rather, I it’s a recognition that human engagement, collaboration and teamwork is continuing to thrive in the work from home world.
Best wishes to all. I hope you are ok and that it’s not too long before it’s your decision, rather than external circumstance, that governs how and when you get to interact with others.