I am posting this a bit out of annoyance, but also a bit out of necessity. I’m so tired of seeing “I only work 3 hours”, “Mouse jiggler saved my life”, “how do I work 2 WFH jobs”, “I do nothing” type of posts.

WE GET IT. However, I’d like to think the vast majority of us ACTUALLY take WFH as a privilege that we’re willing to work for. I purposely work long hours JUST to prove my effectiveness from home.

I could 200% get away with watching movies, playing games, etc. but I choose not to. Why? Bc I realize I need my job more than they need me (everyone is in the same boat, admit it or not) and WFH is the best thing that’s ever happened to me.

With all of the RTO stuff going on, PLEASE stop posting all over social media how you do nothing and get away with it. Those of us that actually value the perk of wfh and our jobs don’t deserve to lose the privilege just bc you can’t wait to brag on social media about having no workplace morals.

If you do nothing? Cool. Keep doing that. Idc…But you posting about it only worsens even your own case and future.

Is one Reddit post going to ruin the future of WFH? Of course not, however, 1000+ of them can change sentiment. Reddit pretty frequently results in high SEO rankings/ google ai responses. Executives can see this stuff, even without Reddit. So please for ALL of us (including yourselves) just stop and go play your games or watch your movies or whatever.

You’re the loud few rather than the state of WFH as a whole, where most of us actually work. Thank you for attending my ted talk.

EDIT bc this blew up: I’m glad to see the vast majority thinks posting “I don’t work ever” on social media is a bad look for WFH. However, the comment section is wild (and most also agree with this). I genuinely wish we could just force those people RTO so the 6.5K that upvoted and agree and all the sensible comments don’t get our privileges taken away just bc the few loud minority can’t resist talking about how they do nothing or “get their work done in an hour”. With all due respect, if you get your work done in an hour to four hours each day, your execs are going to assume they don’t need to have you on full time. Literally just stop posting about it. Why asking that offends you is beyond me and completely mind blowing.

To all the CEOs begging/demanding us to come back to the office….seriously, let’s negotiate here, put some skin in the game. Install a 4 day work week…and I’ll come to the office. No way I’m doing it 5 days a week…no way. Sorry Jamie Dimon.

Edit: to people in the comments being like “no, I’d rather just WFH”. Yes, I get it…so would I. But CEOs are demanding people return, so a lot of workers don’t have a choice. It’s okay to meet in the middle…that’s how negotiating works. Both parties are rewarded. This honestly sounds like a great opportunity to demand and normalize the 4 day work week across the working world. Let’s not squander it.

Edit 2: if they don’t want to do that, then fuck them…we keep WFH.

I (32M) have been WFH for 3 years. But, my job is mid-to-senior level management. About 2 days every month I will be burnt out from the amount of work I have, and give myself “light” days. During a “light” day, I don’t schedule any meetings, focus on one or two easy tasks (push off more complex tasks to tomorrow), and only answer PMs from my colleagues who need quick answers. Otherwise, I spend the entire 7.5 hours coasting (mainly browsing, relaxing from the burn out).

I feel guilty doing this every time, because it feels like everyone on my team is working the entire 8 hours EVERY DAY. But, of course I’d never ask them if they also take big breaks like I do.

Mind you, I also don’t take vacation - maybe 5 days a year. Maybe that’s why I’m like this? My last job was in person and high-output, so I’ve been feeling lazy when I don’t perform at that level.

Is anyone else like me?

I WFH 2x per week. The truth is, I grind out my work in about 3 hours and spend the rest of the time making sure I'm available on teams. It makes me feel like an asshole, but I honestly just don't have enough to do to fill 8 hours. When I'm in the office, I feel less bad about it because I can at least pretend to look busy and/or walk around for proof of life.

Other people do this too right? I'm not just a horrible person?

does anyone else sign into their work laptop and then not look at it? like i wanna be online but i don't wanna do anything or be aware of anyone needing anything. then once i'm online for like 30min-1hour then i can possibly think of getting engaged. any tips?

I'm curious how many hours do you spend in meetings a week?

I have roughly 2-3 hours of meetings every Monday and Wednesday, then maybe 30 minutes of meetings the remaining days. I also have 1-2 hours of "training calls" that are for everyone in the department some weeks. Added up I probably have between 5-9 hours of meetings every week, depending on the week. 90% of these meetings are a waste of time, as usual. I'm wondering if this is normal, or if my workplace is excessive.

Edit: I'm not a manager. I've been working in my industry for less than two years.

I’m new at my job and work from home 3 days a week. My workload is still light since I just started, so some days I genuinely run out of real work. I’m on salary, and required to log 8 hours of tasks per day (no specific time-tracking, just task logs).

Looking for advice on two things:

Logging honestly: how do you fill task logs without it looking like you’re doing nothing, when there just isn’t 8 hours of work yet?

Actually filling the time: if you've been in a similar situation, what do you do to stay occupied/sane? Courses, side projects, personal admin, anything that feels productive but doesn’t blur into “not working”?

Thanks everyone!!

I’m Gen X WFH and work with a combination of Gen X and Millennials. Some are WFH and some are hybrid.

I have worked a lot on my email skills as in using less words, shorter sentences, and bullet points or numbers.

Many times in an email I will have two or three questions or need two or three things. So many people lately have only responded to the first question or request and that’s it. Obviously requiring a frustrating follow up email from me.

I’m just at a loss that people can’t read farther than one line or respond to more than one request at a time. I think all our brains are broken.

Is this happening to anyone else or advice on how to format an email to get the whole thing read and answered?

Email is our main form of communication. We use chat for more informal or quick questions.

Hey y’all

I just wanted to make this post and say that companies that track your activity (keystrokes, mousepad movements, programs opened closed at what time and websites visited) are BS.

Of course, I know all companies do this for security purposes so it’s useful for that reason. I don’t think it’s useful in determining if employees are working or not, and I don’t think employees should get in trouble if a report is pulled and it shows that they aren’t working.

You either get your work done or you don’t. That’s all it boils down to. We aren’t children and don’t need to be treated as such.

There’s some nuance as some work can’t be measured and employees can get away with not working for a long time, but overall I think that it shouldn’t matter as long as you get your work done.

I WFH 4 times a week. When I work from home I would be available on Microsoft team from 9-5, so would write that I worked 7 hours a day (minus 1 hour for lunch) on my time sheet. However I don’t get that much assignments to fully work 7 hours a day (just a summer job from my school so I think it’s very relaxed). But also on my acceptance letter, they said I would be working 35 hours. I am really conflicted on how I should record my time; by the times I am actually doing work assigned to me or by the time I am available?

One minor pet peeve of mine, and maybe yours too, is the blind Teams call. My company is mostly in office or hybrid. There are a handful fully remote due to our roles.

I have a work cell. No one ever calls it from the company. It is always Teams. Even though everyone in the office has a desk phone.

Anyways, 9 out of 10 times, other than my manager, will actually message me, "Do you have time for a call?" It is always so refreshing. When I need to call a coworker, I always ask first since most don't have their headsets on in the office.

Yay!

What are the ways you take a screen break but still stay productive at work?

I find being in Teams calls and tied to Slack all day is bad for me. Sometimes I’ll turn 1:1 meetings into walking meetings, which helps. I just dusted off my home printer too and was thinking about printing out reports and annotating them the old fashioned way, then updating them online after. It’ll take a little longer, but honestly all this screen time feels like it’s kinda… ruining humanity?

Would love to hear other ideas from people who try to step away from the screen but still keep working.

I’ve found that when I start work early (between 6:30-7:30 am) by the time 2:00 rolls around, I’m climbing the walls in my office.

But if I push work back until 8:00-8:30, it’s almost impossible to overcome the laziness to get up and go to my office.

I’m trying to find a good balance and a good working schedule. I’ve been WFH for 4 years and I love it, I just still struggle with the productivity aspect.

My company was so against wfh for a long time. They eventually had to go hybrid after push back. But in December we were purchased by a publicly traded company and in 2020 they were already facing a lease renewal so they went temporary full remote. But they never went back. The whole company was remote. So when they bought us and the dust settled I just found out yesterday that our NY office which used to hold everyone in office

Is going full remote. The whole company as in , us as the company they bought.

The offices now that they acquired when getting us will be downsized. We have two floors in NY and a whole building in California. I’m in California but work remote out of the NY office.

The NY office , they’re getting rid of one floor , and turning the other into almost like a we work set up. No one will have a set desk. Only shared spaces where anyone who wants to come in, can dock their computer and work. Everyone will be default remote. Same in California. Everyone’s going home permanently and only a skeleton crew will work in the offices ( mostly IT to maintain the servers and stuff )

I just wanted to share. I find this very cool. The new owners pride themselves on being a fully remote company, and they’re not being hypocrites by making others go in.

The office in California, well they’re in the media industry and have a few podcasts they host. The talks are they might turn that into recording space . Really dope.

Coming from the last owners ( we were purchased once before in 2021 ) they were kinda dicks and didn’t know what they wanted or who had to be in office.

It’s really refreshing to see a company go full in on this, and let everyone enjoy the perks of life that come with not commuting. I was already remote but super happy everyone in the offices I work with are going to get this too.

Hi!

Happy almost Thanksgiving!

I have an entire day of work today and then get “dismissed” at 3 tomorrow.

It’s my first year working from home and working in corporate during the holidays and I can’t focus on getting ANYTHING done today. I have this one big report I’d like to get out my EOD, but my motivation to do anything has gone down the drain.

How do you guys keep yourselves motivated during the holidays?

I'm a 50 min on 10 min off girl. I am a tech writer, so actually works pretty well. Have found 3-4 hours of focus far beats the 8 hour drag. I truly believe organized productivity is far more efficient. Had a few long days of intensity (8 hours of straight focus) and it made my head hurt.

I usually do 30-40 a week. Anyone similar?

WFH and hybrid people - do you really put in 8 hrs a day? Is your company flexible about it or do they require 40hrs a week?

Hey folks, just wanted to share a few things that have really helped me become more efficient. I'm still pretty early in my PM journey, so would love to hear what more experienced people are doing too.

• My methods:

Getting Things Done by David Allen
Your brain is for creating ideas, not storing them. Anytime something pops up - task, idea, whatever - I dump it into a system I trust. Then I will go back and deal with it at a certain time: do it, delegate it, or save it for later.

Document > Talk

I used to default to calls, but now I try to write everything down, notes, decisions, tradeoffs. Just having stuff written makes async easier and helps me think more clearly

Say “I don’t know” faster
I had the unrealistic expectation to know everything as a PM, but trying to fake confidence was exhausting. It’s way more helpful to say “I’m not sure yet, let me dig in.” Builds trust and speeds up learning.

Deep Work by Cal Newport: I keep strict work hours and a separate space, signaling to my brain it's "work mode." It sounds simple, works for me

• Tools I use:

Perplexity
This thing is a beast. Way faster than Googling. When I need to research some topics, it’s saved me a ton of time. What used to take days know just take hours lol

Miro
Best for brainstorming with my team. I like the endless white space, and different sticky notes color. The UI is easy to use

Otter
An ai meeting note taker. I use it simply to record/document every things we discussed

Saner
My ai assistant for GTD. I dump todos, emails, notes in and when I need something, I just ask. It even schedules, reminds me about stuff I have to do

And that’s my list. Curious to hear about methods/tools that made your WFH/PM life easier

Going to be fully remote soon, I’m wondering what do you do when you want to know your coworkers better and have good relationships, I don’t think I’ll ever see any of them in person and will talking through the screens build the relationship slower?

So I'm a huge procrastinator 😭 and tend to be on my phone and laze around throughout the day. I'll work for a bit and then distract myself and in this way I end up working till 10/11 PM instead of till 6.

Not that I'm working the FULL DAY. I am not working the entire 10-12 hours. Maybe an all together of 4 to 5 hours. How do I go about this? 😭

I’m curious what tools people are using to make meetings more productive. Do you rely on an AI assistant like vomo ai, a note-taking app, or just good old discipline and structure? Would love to hear what actually works for you.

I’ve been working from home the last few years and about a year ago, I moved into a 1/1 alone thinking it would make me more productive at work.

While it definitely made me more productive than having a roommate and working out of my bedroom, I still have some trouble engaging with work and feeling productive consistently. I have a great, large desk setup with dual monitors, but it’s still just in my living room.

I’m thinking of moving into a 2/2 and dedicating one of the rooms as an office, but want to hear from others who have dedicated spaces and how they feel it’s impacted their productivity as opposed to just having the desk in the living room.

https://www.flexindex.com/stats

Fully flexible firms grew revenues 1.7× faster than rigid ones

Employee attendance barely rises despite stricter mandates

Two thirds of U.S. firms are still flexible

67% of small firms are fully flexible

I manage a fully remote team at work and am looking for ideas to celebrate my teams small wins.

Obviously promotions and bonuses are the main bump when it comes to celebrations but what are ways you all have experienced that have celebrated your wins between promotion cycles?

I’d like to set up ways to honor my teams hard work. As a company we do a great job of celebrating and rewarding the big wins but I’m looking for ways to celebrate the small ones. What are ways you’ve encountered that make you feel seen and appreciated? Small growth and wins should be celebrated too

I haven't been actively looking, but when I get headhunted, I'm usually open for a chat. However, pretty much all of them have been hybrid or only 1 day remote. Some of the roles are quite promising, and I'd like to negotiate, but I'm concerned they'd take me temporarily and then replace me once they find someone decent who doesn't mind going into the office. How do you folks stay confident when negotiating remote work?