Working From Home

yeah silby don't take a kid

Need a kid?
Take a kid

Have a kid?
Leave a kid

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/3/35/Babys_day_out_poster.jpg/220px-Babys_day_out_poster.jpg

how the fuck do you deal with people coming at you from a bunch of different directions simultaneously

skype and juggling two or three text conversations and every five minutes another "bing!" from the email, and i don't even have to deal with phone calls really!

i'm trying to remain social to keep my sanity, but the Urge to tell anybody who talks to me to fuck off i'm already having three conversations is pretty strong

we have now been banned from using zoom for work business because of its security problems

rush now add two bored kids into the mix 💀💀💀

Fuck me, Teams is SICK. Intuitive, audio/video quality are good, you can paste inline images in your chat sessions (which was a huge gripe I had with our previous software), and easy to share/upload files. Thumbs up!

last week, just about every one of our new classes had awful starts (I wasn't part of any of them), so they decided to start this week's classes half a day later to give them more time to work out their Day 1 logistical issues.

It was just as bad. Nobody could get into WebEx, nobody was listening, and of 20 people in the class, only 60% of them could get their credentials to work in Citrix, and of that 60%, only 1 got past the EPA scan, whereas everybody else was denied access due to failing said scan. and I'm betting it's because virus software and recent scans are required to access my company's network, and these hires are so underpaid, I bet none of them HAVE Antivirus software on their home machines, other than the pre-installed Windows Defender. What are you gonna do, lay all these people off a day into the gig?

so we got just about nothing done. I'm glad to have a job, but I would prefer if said job didn't make me want to scream. this class lasts until the 30th of April ffs.

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Third time is the charm - jackpot!

Teams isnt so bad - someone was talking to me the other day and got frustrated he couldnt explain what he meant and said "hang on a sec" and just started sharing his screen in the chat window and showed me.

The group videoconf in it is also pretty solid, we've been using it for daily standup meetings in our little team, which usually devolve into "I cant by any flour" "I keep telling you, go to the indian grocers" every morning.

Sitting on the sofa behind the other half as he has a work video call.

Carefully shuffled over to the side of the sofa that should be just out of view, but intermittently find myself nodding my head along to music on headphones or rubbing my nose (don't touch the face! and definitely don't do it in a way that might look like picking yr nose on someone else's video call) and having to remind myself not to do that, just in case

had to fight myself from snapping today. i have a hard time with constantly being interrupted and there was zero flow today because WebEx audio was so bad, and still not everybody's tech working.

would be nice if I could chuck whatever curriculum I felt like but now we're four hours behind in a mere two days which i somehow have to make up.

i stopped caring mid-day and just phoned the shit in. then my mom tells me she quit her job and my brother is messaging me frantic worried she won't get her unemployment and I'm just like...you gotta wait bruh.

Almost lost my shit at a manager this morning.

My boss's boss asks me out of the blue to pick five learners to yank out of my class and move into a 401k class, suggesting I should ask their manager if any of them have relevant experience. Boss's boss nags me about it end of day. A bit annoying, as my partner was out so I was leading the class alone, but I survey the managers and tell her I will have 5 names in the morning.

I come in to find out the learner's manager had forwarded my survey to his boss, who anxiously CCed one of our ops managers, Kevin, saying he wasn't sure how we could do it.

So the ops manager dresses me down in a two paragraph essay for reaching out to Kevin before her (which I didn't even fucking do). So I defendes myself and said I did exactly as my boss's boss said to do, and I didn't send it to Kevin. Boss's boss admitted fault and called her to explain that it was her goof.

Yet still no fuckin' apology from the person who humiliated me in front of peers because she didn't bother to obtain facts before blaming me.

Christ, i know we're stressed, but when I copped a negative attitude on Tuesday, I apologized to everybody without them even asking that evening. Just cos we're all in the shit doesn't mean you get to step on me. You had PTO yesterday. Mine was almost all cancelled this month!

I horribly mangled the details but you get the idea

I 100% get the idea.

I think a lot of people are ending up on each other's shit lists under these conditions, because they aren't accustomed to working like this.

Somebody shared this with me the other day, I thought it made some good points: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/its-pandemic-work-from-home-brad-judy/

Like many organizations this week, mine sent out the message that all employees who did not need to be on site should stay at home. As a manager and leader in my organization, I have been thinking a lot about what this means. I have read many comments from peers across the country who were excited that this surge of remote work would allow companies to see the value to employees and increased productivity. Pandemic work is unlikely to play out that way.

I definitely think there's truth to that because those of us who have WFH for years, like me, are relatively well-adjusted to it, but that's a fraction of us.

I just need to be RIFed already. I've stuck around because seniority and performance has gotten me to a salary that I won't get for this work elsewhere (I've tried - they all pay much less. I'm paid more for my reputation than the role at this point).

But maybe the massive severance and finding something else is in the cards

Yes, I think some WFH advocates (especially those with disabilities and/or kids) have been, I think, prematurely saying "SEE? We TOLD you we could work remote but you didn't believe us."

I know I'm not working at 100% - I'm stressed as fuck, barely sleeping, and also maybe a little bit terrified of dying. So I have made a couple stupid bonehead mistakes at work and am still kicking myself about them. The groups of people I interact with are pretty dysfunctional as well, and collaboration is suffering. I fear that some employers will say "SEE? We TOLD you that remote work isn't as good as being in an office.

Both interpretations are incomplete because lots of jobs are a mix of things that can/should be done in person and things that can/should be done at home.

Also once the pandemic is behind us, at least some people will likely be eager to go back to work, just for the novelty factor.

thx for that link el tomboto, good points indeed.

the standard rulebook has been consigned to the shredder.

I know I'm not working at 100% - I'm stressed as fuck, barely sleeping

i'm at 50 at best, probably less, and have the same collateral ymp. hang in there.

I’m lucky enough to have a boss who’s said that he doesn't expect anyone to work full days, and people with kids even less. And he's requiring everyone to take three days of leave before the end of May. If you have less than 30 days of leave left you can take "exceptional leave" which doesn't count against your total. Yes there is a strong history of unionisation at my work.

Microsoft is giving ppl 12 weeks of parental leave, which they can use in a chunk or in little bits at a time.

So yeah, the internet on our block is dead again and AT &T is backlogged wrt reps visits, so for five days I have to use my cell for meetings and such and I need a new cell cos this ones too cheap. I don't have all the equipment I need and basically have to transfer all files to my cell then upload them. On top of it all I have back and shoulder pain because ergonomics. Now I need furniture upgrades. There goes my stimulus check. This is a fucking disaster. No point in complaining I mean every time I go online someone died. By the time this is over, being confined all day will be a traumatizing memory - no thanks.

My company is stretching my patience. On the one hand, they've done well in a number of areas. There's a <Company Name> People Matter fund (I really REALLY don't like that they co-opted BLM, but....), and it pays $200 to those who are in need and apply. They are allowing people to use sick leave (which they already provide) when they can't come in, I mean....as far as other companies go, they're doing better than many of them in that regard. and they've moved something like 90% of our call center operations to work from home.

But there's just other little things that piss me off. for instance, the new 401(k) withdrawal that the IRS allows. No peep on this from them, so I finally piped up a second time and asked, and someone from HR told me they were aware of the provision, and were looking into whether to allow it or if what they currently had available for their 401(k) was sufficient. I was flummoxed because this plan only allows 1 loan at a time (and obviously loans are problematic due to it shrinking their paychecks to pay it back), and also, if you're under 59.5, unless you've made significant after-tax/Roth contributions over a specific minimum, your only withdrawal opportunity is a Safe Harbor Hardship, which by law you can only take for prevention of eviction/foreclosure, Funeral/burial expenses, purchase of a primary residence, unreimbursed medical expenses, tuition reimbursement, or unforseen damage to home.

But there's also supporting paperwork that requires being sent in, so it can take up to two weeks to see money (due to time needed to receive and return paperwork, and processing, and standard payment timing). also, it doesn't cover other reasons, such as "my significant other is out of work and is eligible for state/federal unemployment, but the state they live in is very backed up on processing claims, so until we get that money, we are struggling to eat", or "I had to take an unpaid FMLA leave to care for a sick relative who has COVID, so neither of us are getting paid, and we're waiting forever for unemployment", or "yeah, I can't be evicted right NOW, but I don't want to emerge from this in the winter and owe my landlord $5,000 that I can't pay". and it doesn't require paperwork, so the money would come sooner (our standard withdrawals are paperless). I feel like there was no reason not to adopt this other than they don't want their employees pulling money out of the plan. whereas my mother's company already has it available online.

and, they're not cutting us any slack right now. almost all of the training to get people who are working from home ready to go has fallen on my team. We're understaffed due to a RIF last year, and they froze hiring so we could not replace who we lost. Prior to this, none of us had experience with training CCRs who work from home, or even know how their VPN works. Despite this, no adjustments were made to the training schedule, they want us to finish in the allotted time we were given even though we sometimes start 2-4 hours late on Day 1 due to all of the technical problems. and they don't want the quality of the training to suffer. even though we're all largely distracted and aren't operating at 100%

When we told them about the technical issues on day 1 of the last two classes, the solution from leadership is "well these technical issues were probably a fluke and probably won't happen again" (they did! they aren't a fluke!). Also, after 25+ years of our IT being in-house, we outsourced it in 2018 when we spun off, and the current IT is overwhelmed to where tickets sit unanswered for weeks. I'm not an IT person, nor are any of us, so any problems we can't figure out sit unresolved for weeks, with learners and their managers frustrated and asking us what the holdup is. They gave us a workaround that allowed us to submit tickets by email, and....nobody does anything with them.

But more frustratingly, these IT folk keep claiming they called the people who started the ticket, despite their phones never ringing. or they say they tried the number, and they got a busy signal (which they claimed despite calling CELL phones), or that it says invalid number. Some of these resources are overseas and it's clear that they don't know how to dial internationally and none of their managers are telling them how, so we've had to resort to "FINE, let us call YOU, or create a Skype meeting".

years ago, when we were called something else, Florida got hit with 4 hurricanes in one season in 04, and they gave everybody a day off to take to spend at home cleaning up, as well as allowing people more time off as needed if they were more severely hit. they didn't care how it hurt operations.

nowadays, they only care about how we serve our clients. if a client is bitching about interruptions to service because they're 1% shitbirds who don't have sympathy, we apologize and say "we'll fix it", when we used to just tell them to "piss off" when we were a private company. hell, I had to listen to Birther clients go on a racist rant, only to hear one of our employees agree with him loudly, while my eyes bugged out, angry.

my boss is cool and he's one of the most empathetic people I know, but thinking of asking him "hey y'all need to cut budget? can I be your sacrificial lamb"? I could spend time at home with my father, and i'd get 30 weeks of severance.

Our online course curriculum timeout malfunctions.

It doesn't time you out after 15 minutes of inactivity. It times you out after 15 minutes... regardless!

So you are in the middle of presenting and the "you will be timed out" pops up even though you've been using it the whole time

That happens with our main internet-based system. Then the message is "you have been the portal!", leaving out the "logged out of" part. Really instills confidence in the 3rd party vendor who created and maintains it.

WebEx: "The meeting has ended."

Persons with approximately Catholic upbringing: "Let us go in peace."

Our online course curriculum timeout malfunctions.

It doesn't time you out after 15 minutes of inactivity. It times you out after 15 minutes... regardless!

So you are in the middle of presenting and the "you will be timed out" pops up even though you've been using it the whole time

― genital giant (Neanderthal), Friday, April 24, 2020 10:39 AM (thirty-four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

this is a weirdly common issue with videoconferencing/streaming for some reason

a supervisor has finally gotten her new email set up and just sent everyone a very confusing and badly written email as a google doc attached to the email, rather than just an email. another has sent out an invitation for a google meet with no subject for the meeting. then she sent another for the same time and it is called "wellness check." tbh i need more wellness checks when we are not working from home and doing nothing. i would probably cry at them though. lol i'm quitting this job soon.

On the positive side: I haven't had to commute by bus during all the rain we've been having.
On the negative side: Coping when there's no work and I'm longing to take a nap. Protestant Work Ethic FTL.

i gave in and took a mid day nap yesterday, don't want to get into the habit of that but it really was needed. and i ended up having to work until 7pm anyway, so it evened out

I have been taking FULL advantage of the ability to nap

That said I'm never as tired. Probably because I don't have the stress of 2 hrs of London transport to deal with!

These past two weeks have really been overwhelming and I've been working harder and much longer hours that I have in the past few years. Given that my position is tangentially involved in getting a campus ready for students to return into the fall, we are jumping through hoops and exploring worst case scenarios in how to plan for social distancing in the future. Which I get, but it's a lot. And I'm feeling the strain, compounded with any of the usual self care things having evaporated and the weather having been shit for the past four days so I haven't even been able to get out for a walk. Any free time gains I had by erasing my half hour commute on either end has been obliterated by my working hours extending 1-2 hours in either direction.

that's not fair. somebody else has got to help or your boss has got to understand that things will just go slower. we're living through an insane crisis. i know, easy for me to say, but really.

To be fair, my boss gets it, it's really our whole department that is overwhelmed and stretched thin right now. He's actually working to try and readjust expectations for the higher ups to be more reasonable, but it's the age old story. Orders come from above to figure out how to accommodate all of our students assuming 30% max occupancy in classrooms and they think it's adjusting a few lines on a spreadsheet, not actually pulling up floor plans for every building and doing multiple furniture layouts, etc etc etc. Summer is usually our busy time anyway, but this just adds to the stress. I'm reminding myself that I'm fortunate to even have a job... just this week in particular I can feel the cumulative effects catching up to me.

2 positives of zoom meetings:

- they start on time. or at least closer to when they're supposed to start than in-person meetings.

- tedious conversation dominators have less of an opening to ply their trade. it does still happen sometimes but their arsenal of f2f techniques for bulldozing everyone doesn't work nearly as well. with zoom/hangouts/teams etc the limitations of the technology encourage each person to have their 'turn', almost like they're holding the 'talking stick' at a hippie pow wow. it's much more obvious when someone gets interrupted.

Our Monday morning meeting always begins with 10-15 minutes of "how was your weekend?" talk, and always runs 30-60 minutes over time; it's supposed to be 9-10:30 and it sometimes ends as late as 11:30, wasting the entire morning.

Any way to politely ask for the invite to either be adjusted or the meeting to end on time? I get furious at stuff like this - it feels completely disrespectful of everyone's time. As if there's nothing else to do.

v glad there's a general culture of no-longer-than-needed meetings at my work. the standard meeting time is 30 mins.

I have been taking FULL advantage of the ability to nap

I will miss these siestas

I'm an inveterate napper and am taking full advantage.

I think I'm actually missing the fitness center at my workplace--my back has been bothering me, maybe because I'm not lifting weights currently?

goblet squats!

definitely been taking advantage of the ability to nap during the day, easy enough to make up the difference with work in the evenings/weekends since there's no sports to watch anyway. i even canceled my Sling a couple of weeks ago because sports was the only reason I had it anyway, though I am already regretting it a tiny bit because now I can't watch the Jordan doc series on ESPN.

I went for a piss during a meeting today and no-one noticed.

Our Monday morning meeting always begins with 10-15 minutes of "how was your weekend?" talk, and always runs 30-60 minutes over time; it's supposed to be 9-10:30 and it sometimes ends as late as 11:30, wasting the entire morning.

This is indeed the worst. We have a department meeting every other week that is often interminable. It was originally scheduled for an hour, but it kept running way over. The organized bumped it up to 90 minutes for the invite and now we routinely pass two to two and a half hours. There's probably 30 minutes of good material every week, the rest is small talk, idle complaining and the rest of us essentially sitting in on conversations that should be one-on-ones. Unfortunately this is my entire department and run by my boss' boss, so little more than just grinning and bearing it every two weeks.

I hate small talk in meetings band often bail when meetings run over even if i don't have another scheduled after

I went for a piss during a meeting today and no-one noticed.

pro bathroom break tip: turn off your wifi and turn it back on when you return. "oh my wifi blipped"