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In the process I found an old APC magazine from 2002 which had an article from Phillipa Yelland about the future of work, featuring a much younger me. At the time, the article stated, about one in 16 Australians were doing some or all of their work at home or away from the office. Yes, in 1998 my family moved away from the city to the NSW Southern... Highlands. Armed with an eye-wateringly expensive ISDN connection, I started working remotely about three days a week. I carried a concertina of paper files with me between the office and home and I had to remember to divert my office desk phone to my WFH number (these were the days before unified communications!). I often forgot to do this, so had to sheepishly call one of my office colleagues to redirect it for me. With a home Internet connection charged on a time used basis, I was very judicious about when I would go online during the day. Since COVID-19 hit, suddenly just about everyone is WFH. Theres already been a deluge written about WFH and how it has changed our working lives, so Ill quickly mention the two things that quickly became apparent for me, and then Ill stop there on that aspect. First, I realised that your productivity, your output and your results defined how well you were working which is actually how it should be for any role, but isnt always the case in organisations. Second, you have to be far more present, available and responsive. People cant see you at your desk or walking around the office, so if they cant reach you straight away (or if you dont respond to them quickly) theres a perception that you arent working. You dont have to live up to that same expectation when you are physically in the office. What I really wanted to talk about is some of the macro trends or the new normal of WFH post-COVID. In The Register, Simon Sharwood predicts a corporate backlash against WFH, and pens an imaginary all staff email in 2022 from a CEO cancelling the organisations WFH arrangements, calling everyone back into the office. ( A memo from the distant ...Read More