Readers: How is work going for you, three years post-pandemic?
We want to hear from all workers — in-person, hybrid, remote, and never-remote — about our “work from anywhere” world.
In the three years since the COVID-19 pandemic began, the way we work has gone through many iterations and changes. At the start of the pandemic, white-collar jobs shifted online and office buildings shut down. A new era of work was born as some workers clocked in from their couches and kitchen tables and others on the frontline continued work in a more fraught landscape.
Even with the end of the federal public health emergency in May and the reopening of offices, many white-collar workers are still trying to find the right approach to in-person work.
Workers, if they haven’t already, are championing their mental and physical health by “quiet quitting,” taking on a “lazy girl job” that offers flexible hours, adequate pay, and better work-life balance, or opting to work in a hybrid or fully remote role.
We’ve been keeping tabs on how Boston.com readers are feeling with the ever-evolving landscape of work. Last fall, you told us you were actually kind of happy at work, with many readers pointing to their newfound flexible schedule (i.e. hybrid, remote, or a four-day workweek) as the reason.
According to a poll from Gallup, 52% of American workers were working a hybrid job as of May 2023. Combined with the 29% of workers in an exclusively remote role, that means 81% of the American workforce is working outside of the typical office setting — a figure that looms over the 60% of Americans who were working on-site pre-pandemic in January 2019.
Take Zoom, the company that saw explosive growth during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic as companies scrambled to shift to remote work, for example. The company recently asked employees who live within a 50-mile radius of its offices to work onsite two days a week, a move that hints at the stronghold hybrid work has on the workplace.
But not everyone, or all jobs, can be easily transitioned to hybrid or fully remote schedules. Frontline workers in health care, hospitality, the trades, food service, manufacturing, building maintenance, sanitation, public safety, and more have not had the option to work from home.
Now, as we approach the three-and-a-half year mark since the pandemic began, we want to check in again. This time, we want to hear from all workers: in-person, hybrid, remote, and never-remote workers.
If you’ve never been remote, what has the last three years looked like for you? How has it been since people return to their offices — is traffic worse? Has your commute changed?
For those who are hybrid workers, were you remote at some point? What are the advantages and challenges of each? How are you spending your time on-site versus at home?
And for fully remote workers unchained from their desks and eager for a more flexible lifestyle, have you turned to non-traditional work environments to get your work done – such as a café, a dedicated coworking space, or even a rock climbing gym?
We want to know about how you’re navigating our “work from anywhere” world. Fill out the survey below or e-mail us at [email protected], and your response may appear in a future article.
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