[COVID-19] General Discussion

[Leonormous Boozer]

I want back in the office asap. My contract in my current job ends at the end of the month and I start my next job in August *touches wood*. I'm a fairly bad procrastinator at home and I like the social aspect of office work and I'd miss the two. Fortunately I don't see corporate law going WFH in the long run so I should be ok... Granted my job offer isn't rescinded, although I'd have expected them to do that by now if they were going to considering they've pushed the start date twice.

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

This is the problem when you elect a party leader on the basis that he is deemed to be your best chance of winning an election as opposed to being the best candidate to run the country for five years. The Sunday Times article was pretty damning and suggests that he's not exactly a workaholic. If you have aspirations to be PM then you should be prepared to put a shift in and work around the clock.

Absolutely although I was more questioning whether he's physically / mentally up to it at the moment.

His public appearances don't suggest that he's near full throttle, which is where he needs to be. When he was in hospital any number of doctors publicly warned that it would take months for full recovery but he was back in something like 3 weeks. Chuck in sleepless nights from a new baby and anyone would struggle in any job, then add in the high stress this situation brings and you really have to wonder about his ability to govern effectively. And that compounds whatever you think his ability / attitude anyway.

 

[ncurd]

Chuck in sleepless nights from a new baby

Genuine question is the baby actually at number 10? We are talking about a man who hasn't exactly shown himself to be paragon fatherly virtue in the past.

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

Personally I find I am not as effective working from home compared to working in the office. Too many distractions. Still, I get your point about cost saving.

I still have justify my time on a timesheet and this is in turn is reflected in the billing of clients.

I tend to find my output is pretty erratic....either excellent or moderate but seldom consistently fine.

I've now got a full PC set up upstairs which means there are fewer distractions but in the bad old days with a laptop on the sofa it could be v hard to concentrate - Aerobics Oz Style was a regular distraction of choice.

Timesheets used to be the bane of my working life - glad I don't have to do them any more. If I did there would have to be a code for TRF.

See that tests and people tested remain well below 100K. Why is it so difficult to ramp up?

 

[pagliaccio_euforico]

I think workers are going to want to go back to the office for the social aspect but I can management looking at downsizing.

I'm interning at a state government this summer and they are thinking of having us telework half the time and come in some days. I don't know if want to get housing if I'm only going to be in office a couple days a week.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

Timesheets used to be the bane of my working life - glad I don't have to do them any more.

Ah man, we're supposed to be tracking time from home - I'm always "forgetting"

 

[Leonormous Boozer]

Ah man, we're supposed to be tracking time from home - I'm always "forgetting"

Monday - 8hrs
Tuesday - 8hrs
Wednesday - 8hrs
Thursday - 8hrs
Friday - 8hrs

That would have been an unacceptably short week in February, now it's a lie!

 

[Bada-Bing!]

Timesheets used to be the bane of my working life - glad I don't have to do them any more.

You're so lucky.

Partners to me: "Yes we want to you to record all your time so it accurately reflects how long it takes you to complete a job, so we can bill the client and ensure you write an accurate description of your time, so we can put it on the narrative of the bill. We will make the decision whether to bill all the time or not"

Me - does this.

6 months later, when it comes to bill the time.

Partner: "Why did it take you so long to do this?"

Me: "Err read the narrative on my timesheet and because you told me to and that's how long it took me. "

 

[Which Tyler]

Reading all of this - reminds me why I took on all the risk and started my own business!

Of course, that means my 80% of earnings runs out in a few weeks...
Bugger

 

[Kiwiwomble]

My company has suggested they will be reviewing their office requirements, both how much is needed and where they are located. Currently we're in the CBD so reopening the office has the added concerns of making the majority of people catch public transport. Some of our competitors are based out of the CBD in business parks so most of their staff drive to work anyway.

I did point out on our Team Lead meeting that just because we've successfully stayed productive over the last couple of months doesn't mean we're all not slightly more insane they we were before. Two of my team and one of the other TL's have all showed some signs of...stress,

One of the guys rocks up to after work virtual drinks...but freely admits he's on his third or fourth...one call he was just walking around the CBD with a bottle of wine in a paper bag. He lives alone and i think thats big part of it

 

[Reiser99]

I understand the mental health issues with working from home, but you have the take into account that it will be exacerbated by the lockdown and having to stay inside constantly regardless. If you were working from home but there was no lockdown and you could go to the pub with your mates then I imagine a lot of the stress would disappear.

 

[Kiwiwomble]

I understand the mental health issues with working from home, but you have the take into account that it will be exacerbated by the lockdown and having to stay inside constantly regardless. If you were working from home but there was no lockdown and you could go to the pub with your mates then I imagine a lot of the stress would disappear.

thats probably true, will be interesting if the productivity keeps up then, whether we've only been so good because we dont have much else to do

 

[Reiser99]

thats probably true, will be interesting if the productivity keeps up then, whether we've only been so good because we dont have much else to do

True as well. There are also issues around building relationships with people you only ever see for meetings online. I imagine most will switch to a more flexible working policy where you have some time at the office and some time at home. It will still cut costs as you won't need to same office space, but still have the physical connection.

 

[RedruthRFC]

Me: "Err read the narrative on my timesheet and because you told me to and that's how long it took me. "

But is the answer always exactly what your time sheet said? If so I sympathise. If (for want of a better example) I'd asked an employee to make a cup of tea, and they booked 5 minutes of their time sheet for it, all's well in the world. If they'd booked half an hour for it, I'd want to know why it took that long. If they'd booked 10 minutes for getting petty cash, 15 minutes to pop to the shop for milk and 5 minutes to make the cup of tea, I would understand why it took that long.

For a year or so of a job that I eventually walked out of, I had to fill out a time sheet. I'm not sure they ever got read, I certainly never received feedback on it, which I was expecting, given that I booked out the last slot of each day to "filling out time sheet"!

 

[Kiwiwomble]

True as well. There are also issues around building relationships with people you only ever see for meetings online. I imagine most will switch to a more flexible working policy where you have some time at the office and some time at home. It will still cut costs as you won't need to same office space, but still have the physical connection.

relationships are key, i worked on high rise construction when i lived in london, our head office was in cannery wharf but we'd just go from one site to another...the xmas party was really weird, you'd go and introduce yourself to someone "how long have you worked for they guys?"...."five years"...."me too!....how have we not met?....

 

[RedruthRFC]

True as well. There are also issues around building relationships with people you only ever see for meetings online. I imagine most will switch to a more flexible working policy where you have some time at the office and some time at home. It will still cut costs as you won't need to same office space, but still have the physical connection.

That's a really good point. I can see how it could work better in the first instance when everyone knows each other having shared an office together, but after a few years of staff turnover this would break down. I read an article that mentioned (all IIRC) a marketing agency with 20 staff who were planning on saving 10% of turnover by getting rid of their office having been impressed by how well being away from it has worked. They were going to replace it with meetings in a local hotel every other week followed by a social.

 

[Ragey Erasmus]

Trump be like "Dr Fauci can't testify the House as that's wrong, he is testifying to the Senate though". Fauci then gives a testimony to the Senate and Trump be like "That's not an acceptable answer".

This guy literally thinks Fauci is there to do nothing more than spread propaganda and tell everyone the president is doing great. This is on top of Trump demanding the CDC reclassify the way they record Covid deaths months into this just so the numbers appear to have gone down. Remember at the very start how he wanted to keep the infected people on the ship not for anyones well being but because he wanted the number of infected to be counted as being on the ship.

HOW can anyone still support this narcissistic, corrupt and petty *******?

 

[Bada-Bing!]

But is the answer always exactly what your time sheet said? If so I sympathise. If (for want of a better example) I'd asked an employee to make a cup of tea, and they booked 5 minutes of their time sheet for it, all's well in the world. If they'd booked half an hour for it, I'd want to know why it took that long. If they'd booked 10 minutes for getting petty cash, 15 minutes to pop to the shop for milk and 5 minutes to make the cup of tea, I would understand why it took that long.

For a year or so of a job that I eventually walked out of, I had to fill out a time sheet. I'm not sure they ever got read, I certainly never received feedback on it, which I was expecting, given that I booked out the last slot of each day to "filling out time sheet"!

In my line of work an hour of my time is chargeable and a partner will bill that time to the client for doing say a tax return.

the problem is they have this notional figure of how much a job will cost. It's basically their recoverability figure. If time costs exceed that recoverability figure then they don't like it and have to write off excess time costs.

It doesn't really matter what I put in the narrative to explain my time because like a lot of the clients I deal with they don't read their tax return they just look at the figure they have to pay or in partner's mind how much they can bill the client. This is despite my charge out rate going up each year and a client's tax affairs not always staying exactly the same. I am supposed to get faster on a job and partners expect to Bill the same each year and only bill extra if there is additional work.

so if I put my time down to accurately reflect my job I get questioned if it doesn't meet their notional figure of how much they can recover, if I rush to get it within the budget I am liable to make mistakes, which will just need correcting later on at the firm's cost. Or I could just fudge my timesheet and basically defraud my firm.

Yeah it's a Bonkers system.

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

Sounds like Roche has come up with a reliable antibody test. While the virus still isn't fully understood, this has to be a step in the right direction.

 

[Bada-Bing!]

Trump be like "Dr Fauci can't testify the House as that's wrong, he is testifying to the Senate though". Fauci then gives a testimony to the Senate and Trump be like "That's not an acceptable answer".

This guy literally thinks Fauci is there to do nothing more than spread propaganda and tell everyone the president is doing great. This is on top of Trump demanding the CDC reclassify the way they record Covid deaths months into this just so the numbers appear to have gone down. Remember at the very start how he wanted to keep the infected people on the ship not for anyones well being but because he wanted the number of infected to be counted as being on the ship.

HOW can anyone still support this narcissistic, corrupt and petty *******?

Fauci is not on Trump's message, who has run his Administration like a Mafia boss (Comey's words coming true). He'll hang Fauci out to dry like anyone who is not loyal to him.

At the end of the day Trump supporters don't care because it's all about identifying with his brand and that he is standing up for them. It's those swing state supporters and getting the democratic support out in force in those key swing states on 3 November to get this utter disgrace of POTUS out of office. Yeah might have to put up with 4 years of Biden, but at this point I would take that.