Homework

Like a lot of people, I work from home.  When I first started working from home, I didn’t exactly care for it.  I liked the clear divide of work life from not work life and that divide was work life was over there in that office and not work life was over here at home.

My first impulse if left to my own devices is to take a nap. It’s easier to fight that impulse when the distance to my bed can be measured in miles rather than in feet.  

But exclusively working from home for the last few years, I am hard pressed to imagine doing this any other way.  I don’t miss the commute or the gas bills. I certainly not spending money on breakfast and lunch like I did when I worked in the office.

A lot of other Americans have made similar calculations on the benefits of working from home.  But as the COVID pandemic emergency recedes into the past, there are some employers who exerting a lot of pressure to get people back into the office. 

• Jamie Dimon declared that working from home "doesn't work for those who want to hustle."
• Elon Musk demanded that employees commit to an "extremely hardcore" schedule consisting of "long hours at high intensity."
• Steven Rattner railed against working from home as evidence that America has "gone soft."

Notice none of that applies to any actual productivity.  Me, I am as productive working from home as not, perhaps more so. Knowing that no one can actually see me doing my job, I tend to stay logged in and ready to work. It’s not like I can get away with much. Everyone in the modern work environment is monitored by some kind of time or work flow management system. 

But working from home gets in the way of some traditional management power tactics.  Like showing up early to make people who show up on time feel like they’re late.  Staying late to make people feel guilty for leaving on time.  

Quite frankly, if I was working in the office, I might be less productive. If I was there, I might be hanging over a cubicle wall flirting with a co-worker. 

Yes, I can flirt. I mean, I’m not going  to get anywhere with it.  I’m old and I’m married.  When I was young and not married and desperately needed it to work (I mean, NEEDED IT), I had no idea how to flirt. 

But I digress….

Joan Williams at the University of California College of the Law had this to say: "People like Elon Musk, everything is a masculinity contest, and the workplace is the key arena. They have no desire to continue to work from home. This is not about workplace productivity. It's about masculinity.”

Williams came up with the concept 30 some years ago of what American management considers the ideal worker: "The ideal worker is seen as someone who starts to work in early adulthood and works full time, full force for 40 years without a break, taking no time off for childbearing, child-rearing, or really anything else."

As outdated and sexist as that might seem, it's still the mindset of management 3 decades later. And by God, it's not enough to look at the metrics to see if you have your nose to the grindstone all day, they want to SEE you in PERSON wearing out that proboscis on the grindstone. 

Because that is what REAL MEN do!  

Even if working from home is ultimately beneficial to a company's bottom line. 

But what the fuck does Elon Musk know about running a company anyway. Twitter has lost 25% of it's value since Musk acquired it. 

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