SPECIAL ISSUE #51 🖥

REMOTE HYBRID OFFICE

Is 150 Change & Evolve Letters a milestone? For me or most certainly is and I still love doing this, writing to you and for you - ok, and of course for myself.

I am not very active on LinkedIn but I saw something there recently, something that really triggered me and I have not quite been able to let it go. So I thought I would share it with you and see what your thoughts are.

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It was a post with this photo and the caption:

Relative to the #1 issue of 2022 for the world of work, this was by far my favorite cartoon.

My comment on that post was:

My view on this is possibly not very popular. I would like to emphasise that I am not fundamentally against remote or hybrid working. However, as a leadership and life coach, I also see how people are becoming more and more isolated and they are forgetting how to personally interact with other people. It is a development that I see as rather worrying. People are becoming more and more isolated and lonely.

Of course, there is a lot more to it than that. I did not get a shitstorm but while reading some of the comments I got seriously pissed off. As I can be a little impulsive at times, I refrained from adding more comments and just sat on the topic for a while.

There are so many aspects to this topic and I have had quite a bit of experience with this. My own very personal experience, the experiences that friends shared with me, the ones clients shared with me, and the ones even my children shared with me.

I want to start with my own personal experience with remote work. It has - as with pretty much everything - an upside and a downside. I already worked remotely before most people even considered this an option.

Upside:

• no commute - no time loss

• more time with family

• freer time management

• fewer interruptions from colleagues

Downside:

• no social interactions with others

• many distractions

• more interruptions from family

• too much screentime

• fewer opportunities to brainstorm or toy with ideas

• loneliness

• no opportunities of getting to know your colleagues (it just doesn’t happen via video chat)

• no possibility to feel the atmosphere in the company

• no possibility of a company culture

• procrastinating

• always being at work

• working absurd hours

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Unfortunately, working from home all the time is also one of the causes of increased child abuse. For many, this may sound unbelievable at first, and it is not something anyone likes to talk about. When work suddenly takes place in the home environment and smaller children in particular do not understand why their parents, even though they are at home, do not have time, then this can lead to tensions.
What many people forget is that abuse is not only physical but also psychological. Both forms are horrific and the biggest difference is that you don't see the psychological abuse on children as quickly. There are no bruises, no wounds, and no broken bones but the soul is wounded and sometimes even broken.

I know this form of abuse only too well. I didn't have nurturing parents, I had providers. It wasn't a loving home I grew up in - except when guests came to visit. My mother never held us and was manipulative and self-centred. My father was cold and rather threatening to me. When we made a mistake and apologised, we were told it would be okay - in three days. We were then non-existent for three days and punished with the withdrawal of love. Okay, it was more like attention deprivation. When I was about twelve, the sword of Damocles was always hanging over me. If I didn't "function" properly, I was threatened with being sent to a home for “difficult-to-educate” girls, i.e. being expelled from the family.

I am not writing this in an attempt to gain sympathy or even pity. I got over it a long time ago and very consciously did things differently with my children, but I admit that there are still things that trigger me today. I was incredibly lucky in this situation as I had my big sister. We gave each other support and saved each other. Unfortunately, my little brother was not so lucky because he was a latecomer (he was almost 13 years younger than me) and was more or less left alone with my parents and took refuge in drugs that cost him his life at the age of 27.

I'm not saying that everyone who works remotely abuses their children or partner - I'm not one for stereotyping - but the risk increases.

I was away from home as often as I could as a child, staying with friends or playing outside, and I don't want to imagine what my life would have been like if my father had worked from home.

There are often good reasons to separate work and private life.

However, as I mentioned in my comment to the post, I am absolutely not against working remotely but it should not, in my eyes, become the rule for everyone. Like everything in life, there are pros and cons and risks that need to be considered.

I truly believe though that remote work, or rather seeing it as the new normal is just another part of the plan to isolate people from one another, to deprive them of their abilities to interact with others socially. How much do you care about people you don’t really know? The lockdowns were a step in that direction and remote working is the logical sequel to ensure social distancing in the future.

Once again this Letter has turned out very differently from what I had originally intended so I will leave it at this.

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🎶My Song of the Day

Is one that always gets me on my feet - Donna Summer - She Works Hard For The Money

For more good music, go to this Spotify playlist where you can find all the songs from the Change & Evolve Letters!

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📚My Poem of the Day

Is by Matthew Arnold (1822-1888)

Quiet Work

One lesson, Nature, let me learn of thee,
One lesson which in every wind is blown,
One lesson of two duties kept at one
Though the loud world proclaim their enmity--

Of toil unsever'd from tranquility!
Of labor, that in lasting fruit outgrows
Far noisier schemes, accomplish'd in repose,
Too great for haste, too high for rivalry.

Yes, while on earth a thousand discords ring,
Man's fitful uproar mingling with his toil,
Still do thy sleepless ministers move on,

Their glorious tasks in silence perfecting;
Still working, blaming still our vain turmoil,
Laborers that shall not fail, when man is gone. 

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👀Impressions

Once again Lake Starnberg

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To begin any kind of transformation, you have to know what your story is before you can navigate to something better and write a new story, becoming the best possible version of yourself. This is what the Enneagram and I can do for you. I would be happy to take the time for a speed coaching call that you can reserve right here go to my website or simply hit reply and get in touch with me directly.

Thank you for reading and if you enjoy it, share it, leave a ❤️, or a comment. I would love to hear about your experience with remote, hybrid and office work. Wishing you a wonderful day wherever you are!

Yours

Tanja 🤗