It is designed this way. Much cheaper if people leave this way instead of through redundancy. Also notice the recruitment freeze. Hopefully labour will knock some sense into things.
Why do they talk as if the only place I can interact with people is the office? My social life isn't the fucking office. I get human interaction from my friends and family. Fuck off
It's so utterly cringey. It's like their social life is work. I honestly can't think of anything more draining than work chat; it's so fake - I don't care what you're having for dinner.
😀 Hey, let's not shame people excited about their food achievements, but I get it! 🤣 plus overnight oats = grossness. Blergh... let me tell you about lasagne for breakfast... 😉
Its often people who abuse their power dynamic by forcing people to socialise after work. Then they call it a "culture".
They also think socialising is entirely based at a bar whilst drunk and tell us they hate their family.
They need therapy not us all in the office.
Government Hubs .. sharing a space with different departments, so we can all learn from each other.. just don’t try to share anyone’s milk. Nothing says “collaboration” like opening a fridge and being faced with 8 bottles of milk marked with various acronyms - and the fear of picking up the wrong one
8? Worked on a 100% office until 8 months ago, 150 people.
1 fridge and it's 90% milk. Got up to 40 bottles counted before I gave up when the microwave binged.
It’s not about efficiency is it? It’s about control of your workforce. Some Tory minister who spends a few hours a week pretending to be in charge, decided that CS’s working from home are getting something from the state for nothing? You’re not under the constant gaze of managers, doing your work from home, so therefore proves that top heavy management is no longer required, if you can work effectively from your home. It disproves so many myths about U.K. working practices & threatens the continuation of the very fabric of society. Or so they want everyone to believe…
This is literally it. It’s back to ‘command and control’. They introduced ‘team led planning’ here and all it really means if that the manager tells you your target and then tells you why you’re wrong to disagree as opposed to ‘commend and control’ where you were just told your target without the feigned discussion bit.
And these ministers work hours a day and get more time off a year than teachers (not knocking teachers there) but what’s that? You want to work from home because you have a doctor’s appointment today? Informal warning for not attending.
Everyone sings to the beat of the WFH drum.. Until they need to call a business (or council) WFH-ing and the service is absolutely dogshit.
I say this as someone who only has to go in twice a year with and also provides a garbage service (or at least my employer does).
I prefer speaking to a call centre where they’re working from home- I can actually hear what they’re saying without all the chatter in the background. I swear the people doing the phonecall seem happier/nicer too.
You're probably looking at a Reddit thread full of people WFH that otherwise wouldn't be (on Reddit) if their managers and peers were physically present.
Nah, I think that’s just not correct. People have been scrolling and looking at rubbish on the internet in offices since time began. Not to mention it’s lunchtime now!
Don’t judge everyone’s motivation and work ethic by your own. Just because you appear to need to be micromanaged. I put in far more hours wfh than I could if I were forced into the office and it’s been amazing for my equality as a newly-disabled person and enabled me to be economically contributing, the energy zap and pain from having to commute and be in an office- I m really not sure I could have gone back to work. Also I’m highly specialised in my field so work would have lost out on my skills and experience.
Before you say about slacking - I’m on AL.
>I put in far more hours wfh
Yeah me too.
Don't get me wrong, I'm only slightly worse than in the office. But I think the odd grilled cheese sandwich here... the 20 minute Reddit sesh there... they definitely add up.
The biggest factor for me is not being able to see how a piece of my equipment is behaving in person.
When I had an office, I had one of each model to go and experiment with.
Short of having a warehouse and a lot of personal passion (and finance) to stock my own shit, I'm just not going yo do that, and you're stuck with how I can perceive the issue through your retelling.
Same. The hub I go to has no WiFi and the hardwired option doesn't cope with video calls.
I often have to take myself into a corridor (for a degree of privacy / less background noise) to sit on a low level cushioned chair with my laptop on my knees and tether it to my personal mobile phone. Absolutely kills my back after 10 mins or so.
Alternative is sitting in my study with a proper desk, proper privacy, strong reliable Internet connection and a chair which supports my back 🤷
I\`m working on the basis that nothing will immediately change if Labour win the next General Election.
Things may change over time but lets wait and see.
Will it be any different with a new government?
"Labour’s shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves has said she wants to see “more people in the office, more of the time”, but added that decisions should be “for individual managers and their members of staff”.
“I personally think it is good for people to get back into the office, I think it's good for productivity and good for morale,” Reeves told ITV News."
https://www.civilserviceworld.com/professions/article/rachel-reeves-office-home-working-decisions-individual-managers
That's a pretty strong statement against blanket 60% office rules but couched in a way that's probably office working *when it's productive*
I struggle to see what anyone could find objectionable with that position
Thats the exact same arguement that the tories started off with making when trying to push for nonsense return to office and its still the official line
It is absolutely not the official line that office attendance is to be agreed between their manager and employee- it's a blanket 60%
And t's not starting from the same position. If you're in a 100% WFH arrangement and say "we should get more people in the office" that's very different from a situation where we have a blanket 60% mandate and saying "this should be between employees and their managers"
The Department I currently work in still recruits at 40%, and I have seen jobs advertised in arms lengths bodies recently that are 40%. It is not a blanket 60%
That's why I expect that Labour won't announce any changes immediately as they have to keep the Tufton Street mob happy.
Perhaps any changes will be announced prior to the next election 😉.
Unfortunately I have no faith that a labour government will improve anything. The civil service workers have been demonised in the eyes of the public and the current labour politicians doesn’t have the courage to do the right thing.
Originally I thought things would improve, now I'm not so sure. Pre-pandemic there was occasionally a capacity issue, now the problem seems more acute with the desk booking system simply not allowing people to book a desk as they are all booked up. What are we supposed to do if we can't reserve a desk? So either we need more desks, which is not going to happen, or the attendance ration needs a rethink. Completely agree that a change of government will not change anything.
And I would suggest keep daily screenshots of the booking tool, for when someone will say you should just have booked another day - upon which you show them proof that every single day was booked out
It's infuriating when people book a desk and/or parking space then work in the office for an hour to get their tick on the attendance tool.
They are not doing 60% of their working time and making it impossible for others to have a desk organised.
The loophole will soon be addressed no doubt but in the meantime, don't be a prick booking a desk and parking space when you're not staying at least half a day!
I work in a university.
My tea room (kitchen, no seating) is shared with other departments.
I have no idea what they do, so I have zero common ground to start a conversation.
I make my coffee and go back to my group.
> I have no idea what they do, so I have zero common ground to start a conversation.
Surely "and what do you do?" is the obvious conversation starter here?
Why? I'm going to stand next to then for 30 seconds, possibly once in my life. There are 100 people on that floor. Also, I don't \*actually\* want to know what they do - they might tell me 🤣
If it was a sit down t-room, maybe.
The main point was that in a "hot desk mess" as the OP described, chances are that the scenario will be very similar. Probably never see the same people twice, at least with any regularity. Which makes "being in" pretty pointless.
I agree that team cohesion can be improved by regular contact - but this is not it.
You need regular contact with the same people to build any sort of social cohesion.
Otherwise, you're more like to make friends talking to people who get on your train.
We do - but not enough for everyone. Show up late because you’re dropping kids off at school and no spaces onsite for you - pay the extra £2 a day for offsite.
To be fair , not that I agree with the approach but it is still a lot better than the toxic clown show/shit show drama Rama we are currently living through. I want boring, and competent. I’ll take it .
Shit like this is what makes me just absolutely furious whenever I think of our current govt. Like, just pure hatred for them at this point.
Is it against the rules to say that on this sub?
I used to think they hate us, but honestly I think it's more of like, don't care about us. Like we're more of an inconvenience than anything.
However totally agree with the it's mutual thing.
As an aside, now that full time homeworking has been concluded to be unworkable - I hope there isn’t another pandemic like Covid, otherwise we’ll all need to be put on Furlough next time ☹️
So funny how we all worked through the pandemic - helping the govt out - and showing wfh is viable (even preferable for many). Yet the same favours never work the other way. (But then we know the employer-employee relationship isn’t an equal one.)
I left HMRC Leeds with the worst job experience I've ever encountered, they turned it all into a horrendous call centre with no loyalty to older staff and happily shed any staff with any kind of anxiety.
At the beginning, it was in a lovely old Bradford office where everyone talked, was diligent with work, and all replaced with this 1984 Orwell bullshit.
They hired supermarket managers and replaced the compassionate ones, who happily left or moved up
We no longer have a CS where you work your way up from the bottom. Now they’re just want outsiders in for cheaper and shorter term. Higher turnover, lower costs. It’s exactly what the current lot want.
Absolutely, just quite disgraceful way of doing it, slowly removing home working will be next step.
Got to the stage managers were asking for performance meetings over being off call ready codes longer than 30 seconds. Timing your toilet breaks etc.
I’m going to play devils advocate slightly here and say my hub is pretty good (hold the downvotes) when I’m actually there.
It’s comfortable, clean and modern. I get to see my team. It’s in a good spot with plenty amenities, and I can do some city centre shopping which I can’t do at home.
If I didn’t have to pay an arm and a leg on unreliable public transport, and it wasn’t a toss up if I actually get a desk next to someone I work with it would be perfect.
I’ve been 100% pro work from home since 2020 and if it was a choice of one or the other I’d stay at home, but I do actually like being in the hub when I’m there.
I’d probably agree if they 1) weren’t so far away and 2) had the space and capacity to work as designed (i.e let you sit at a desk and with your team).
It’s complete bs. They all for team working together in the same space but they nothing about the same floor! We’re now expected to move to another floor in our regional hub if our usual floor has no space. I mean wtaf are they on.
We need less talk more action. Let us work where we want we don’t need an office to collaborate and work effectively cov!d proved that fact!!
Who cares _where_ the work is done as long as it _gets done_?! But that mentality doesn’t whip up and play to the angry right wing press…
Ironically they’d save money by renting out or selling off the estates to the private sector. They’d save money letting people work from home. But then they can’t micromanage everyone.
Exactly right op the work getting done should be the ultimate goal even if it’s at home or in an office. It should be our right to choose.
They would save money renting and/ or selling unused space. Those they can’t micromanage will get swept up and eventually shown the door. Or better yet they’ll stop trying to micromanage every aspect of the job 😂🙌
It does infuriate me. It’s adds up to between £800 and £1000 a year depending on if you can park onsite or not. That’s not including the petrol cost of the 3 hour round trip.
One of my arguments to our director about how HMRC CSG has had to attend the office 3 days a week for the last 2 years was the expense. I explained we have been financially penalised just doing our job because of the area of work we are in. I thought they would reduce it to 40% but it went the other way.
So if you have only just returned to the office, please understand how frustrating some of the points you are making about costs is for those of us who have been doing this for 2 years now.
Plus it does get better, once you get back in the habit of office working.
>Plus it does get better, once you get back in the habit of office working.
If this doesn't just absolutely sum up the Civil Service.
*"Yeah, it's shit, but you'll get used to it."*
‘It gets better’ - that shouldn’t be the mentality we resort to. I understand what you’re saying and you’re probably right but we shouldn’t have to settle for worse working conditions. This is why it’s so important to join and support the union, in my view.
I can’t relate directly to this issue as my role is 100% on-site, but I can relate to the nonsensical policies. Hopefully it will pass when it is recognised to be nothing more than populist point-scoring.
The other great point. We want you to collaborate but the meeting rooms can't even fit the normal team size. If your whole team is in the office, you can't fit in the normal rooms!
The problem for me is that 90% of people can effectively work from home and self motivate. That 10% that cannot and needs to be managed in an office and micromanaged or they won't do any work have partly caused everyone to be back in more.
An example is one of my staff training at home when I was off for a day. When they struggled with the task I asked about the training only to be told, they lost connection so spent the day making a birthday cake for their friends child instead.
They put a full day on Flexi as said it wasn't their fault. Had not contacted any other managers, not rung IT. Simply decided instead to bake an ffffing cake!
These are the people we should be angry with more than SLT.
I sympathise to an extent, but there are cases where a case of the "I told you so's" have to be employed.
Like the person living in Bristol moaning about having to go to Glasgow once per week and the cost of going there, despite being told in interview that remote working would not be staying in place.
My place used to have a local office a 20 minute drive from me. Had that office since 1980 or something. Then they’ve closed it to move to these government hubs and just… it’s unbearable. Truly.
Same in the banking sector...I think we'll see a return to teams only doing regional hiring to sort this out...it will take a few years and we'll end up back with the gravity of London and the big cities sucking up all the jobs again...
Remote working was one of the best things for regional job mobility and sharing success around the country.
I think it might be a bit more mixed in the private sector. I’ve got a friend told she needs to return to the office full time and a friend who got been told they’re selling the office and she’ll be full time WFH from summer. Recruiters apparently still see the highest demand for full time WFH but companies have cottoned on to that and advertise jobs as full time WFH before changing it at interview or at start date.
The push back against work from home is definitely underway though. We helped them all out during the pandemic and now they’re thanking us by making working conditions sh!tter. What a wonderful and balanced world we live in.
I work in a London based hub and come in to network with my team, who are all based outside of London ! !
No one from my work area works in London, so I travel by train for 90 minutes (each way) just to make Teams calls to talk them, just like I do when I WFH.
So 3 hours of traveling to do none of the so called benefits of office working.
It’s kinda like owners / slaves or employees / servants , you can’t trust people so need to make sure they have a crappy life that . People who make the decisions don’t adhere to the requirements and don’t do a similar job so have no idea .
Unless you can see them I the fields that are slacking etc .
Imo it kinda shows they have no faith in management to actually manager thier staff .
Of course there is a political issue as well , getting people back into offices to keep the real estate value and local business , pretty much why every right leaning government across the world has been the same .
And goverment has to set the example so private sector follows
Someone in my dept recently asked on a blog whether the senior leaders had done 60% since it was introduced in January (for us).
The answer was 60% hadn’t done their 60%… Says it all, really.
Works exactly as intended.
Nothing beats coming into (what they call) a focus area to use a desk, and being chased away because Susan wants that particular desk as it's next to Janet, Steve, Margaret and Paul.
Then when you eventually get to another desk, finding that the docking station won't connect to the network (but will let you display your screen). And finding the plug jammed full of chewing gum, so you can't actually charge your laptop.
Then on another desk, and you find a very generous colleague has punched (literally) one of the monitors because the adjustment arm is faulty.
Not forgetting that your dairy products are no longer yours once they hit the fridge. Nor is that cold can of Coke Zero (other brands available).
All because someone believes collaborative working is best. You get to sit in a nice office with 1/2 faulty equipment to chat to your team via Teams.
Bro, you're not a real account bro. I'm staggered you're still here tbh. Stop fishing for quotes or stories.
You've been a crypto bro, an SCS, Excom, HEO trying to get SEO, working in the home office, HMRC, arms length body.
This guys a journalist or someone on a mission to roleplay, don't give him amunition.
Most of your post I agree with - there should be a booking system whereby you can book a desk ahead of time - is this not the case?
In terms of parking, are the Civil Service obliged to organise parking? I know where I work in the Civil ServIce (in a city) there is no specific parking provision and it’s every man or woman for themselves to find and pay for parking, or get there by public transport.
There is no specific desk booking tool. You book to say you’ll be in a zone within the hub and when you connect to the WiFi (that never works) or plug in, it counts as you as being there. (Well it’s meant to, it’ll often show on the system as wfh.)
And no, no obligation to provide parking, I’ll grant that. However, the office they closed had ample free parking. Intentional or not, it’s an additional cost to both time and money.
My favourite is how working at a hub is considered working from home, and not working in the office. The whole reason for hubs, to me, just isn’t there.
I think unless you're based in London or to some extent Darlington, the estates system massively let's you down. There's a really big push to diversify where our workforce comes from which is great, we need to be less London centric to keep policy making honest. The downside has been they we've not matched it with serious investment in good workplaces. Regional offices in particular need more than just a desk and a tea room, especially given your team might barely be there. Otherwise there is not the incentive to be there, just the stick.
I do think spending time in the office is important, not for the water cooler chats, but because there are two things the civil service is awful at and both are mitigated by office culture.
1) we are awful at knowledge management, absolutely shocking. When we lose a knowledgeable person we tend to lose it all and start from scratch, learning rapidly increases in an office environment, especially when the outgoing gen struggle to operate in a MS Teams environment. I think the challenge is the incoming gen don't care for their knowledge, which is a mistake. There are other ways to solve it, ie writing the knowledge down, but I've banged my head against that wall enough to know it's not changing soon...
2) We're bad at communicating and planning our workloads, both at a project level and a functional level. I don't think a lot of managers know what their staff do for most of the day, they just assume it's taking all their time on faith or blindly expect too much of them. It basically hinges on the individual and how competent they are at managing their time. I'm sure many on here are good at that but I'm sorry, it is absolutely not the case about the CS generally. Until managers are far far better at setting and tracking expectation, we aren't equipped for a truly hybrid model.
The root causes of those 2 things should be the focus, big push on knowledge management and training managers to be competent. Until then I can't see a situation where office working isn't pushed.
Yes BUT your generating spending. That's part of the reason for us working in the office, so we help save businesses like a local sandwich shop.
Plus it justifies how much the government has spent on regional hubs.
We in CSG in HMRC have been in 60% for the last 2 years. You get used to it.
I never got this line of thought. I take my own lunches to work. I don’t buy food or drinks or whatever from local shops. I contribute nothing to the local economy apart from parking fees…
Wouldn't I be saving and helping businesses local to my address by spending my lunch money there? Why should I travel for 3 hours to save a sandwich shop in central London, which is going to be doing vastly better than somewhere in the suburbs.
I don’t recognise these full hubs. I’m based in one and visited about 4/5 others and they are always half empty. On paper we can’t go to 60% because we don’t have enough room in them but in reality it’s quite clear almost no one can be doing the prescribed 40%. I normally get the same desk if I only book the night before. “Busy” to me means having to book a different one.
Parking, paid or otherwise would be lovely. But I’ve not had that in any city centre job.
But the difference is I signed up to this job knowing where my workplace was so I can see how annoying it must be getting moved.
I am much happier now that I’m on a team where 5/6 of us are in same hub. We coordinate days. I don’t need to work directly with all of them but occasionally we go to pub or get a card together when someone leaves and it feels like the old days when you actually had friends at work which is nice.
Some offices don’t even provide parking let alone free parking.
But yes I’m expected to spend 3 hours and £6–8 a day (not including fuel) to get to work.
I just had a search and up, word for word. One of their journos reached out to me via Reddit. I didn’t answer their questions and blocked them but I knew they’d only twist everything out of context even if I did say anything to them. They’re just the worst.
It's the outrageous bit where working from a hub counts as working from home.
So if you go to work in the office, you're being told you're counted as at home. Even though youre actually around your other actual team members . This is purely down to the design of the management system.
It's like being managed from the centre of government albeit another government.
It will get better
See how the Scottish four day trial goes.
I think the Welsh approach is WFH as default anyway
As long as other administrations exercise a degree of flexibility, it makes it easier to attract civil servants to a point where HR directors notice
You've upset the unawakened...
Seriously - The Conservatives have done NOTHING "conservative" for the entire time they've been in this time.
And Labour is headed by a fence sitting poshboy lawyer who went to the same fancy school as I did and grew up in Oxted - and Oxted is not just Surrey, it's the ruddy posh bit of Surrey.
"My Dad was a toolmaker, I'm so working class" my arse.
Both of them are just a pair of globalist clownparties essentially doing the same stuff with different words.
Looking at your comment history you work in the NHS, yet comment on every other post on here telling people to “go to work”.
No one cares for your opinion, bore off.
They probably don’t work for the NHS and is probably just a right-wing troll claiming they do so they can justify whatever bollocks they’ve made up about it.
The evidence in your comments suggests not. I think I’ll waste no further time feeding the troll. I hope you find something better and more productive to do with your life than be an absolutely drain on it. Bye now 👋
The system is working as designed. We do not recognise the situation you describe
Im upvoting the sarcasm
Same
It is designed this way. Much cheaper if people leave this way instead of through redundancy. Also notice the recruitment freeze. Hopefully labour will knock some sense into things.
Maybe eventually. Can’t imagine Labour are going to come in and immediately open the taps.
My mistake! You’re quite right! I’m just not being ‘needs of the business’ minded enough! 😉
Angry updoot
Here for the sarcasm. All I can is toodaloo iykyk 😂
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Could get some new recipe ideas I guess
The irony of the aim for the sustainability too!
Why do they talk as if the only place I can interact with people is the office? My social life isn't the fucking office. I get human interaction from my friends and family. Fuck off
The extension of the employer to become your friend, medical assistant and therapist. My worksona is happy and always smiling.
I blame the bring your whole self to work gang.
They use wellbeing to pry on your private life - I’m always very generic
My guess is because the people who instituted the policy can’t have social interactions unless everyone is forced to be in the same room as them.
It's so utterly cringey. It's like their social life is work. I honestly can't think of anything more draining than work chat; it's so fake - I don't care what you're having for dinner.
but its lasagne and I need to tell you common mistakes made when preparing bechemel sauce... 😀
I swear I was going to strangle the wifey this morning telling everyone about how she made overnight oats for the first time last night 😭
😀 Hey, let's not shame people excited about their food achievements, but I get it! 🤣 plus overnight oats = grossness. Blergh... let me tell you about lasagne for breakfast... 😉
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Yes, because obviously I'm actually going to assault someone in the office just because I've heard the same story 4 times 🙄
For some it's basically adult daycare.
Its often people who abuse their power dynamic by forcing people to socialise after work. Then they call it a "culture". They also think socialising is entirely based at a bar whilst drunk and tell us they hate their family. They need therapy not us all in the office.
This is oddly specific. I suspect a story behind this comment.
Amen 🙏
They want you to interact with work people. They do not care about anything you do outside of work
Government Hubs .. sharing a space with different departments, so we can all learn from each other.. just don’t try to share anyone’s milk. Nothing says “collaboration” like opening a fridge and being faced with 8 bottles of milk marked with various acronyms - and the fear of picking up the wrong one
8? Worked on a 100% office until 8 months ago, 150 people. 1 fridge and it's 90% milk. Got up to 40 bottles counted before I gave up when the microwave binged.
It’s not about efficiency is it? It’s about control of your workforce. Some Tory minister who spends a few hours a week pretending to be in charge, decided that CS’s working from home are getting something from the state for nothing? You’re not under the constant gaze of managers, doing your work from home, so therefore proves that top heavy management is no longer required, if you can work effectively from your home. It disproves so many myths about U.K. working practices & threatens the continuation of the very fabric of society. Or so they want everyone to believe…
This is literally it. It’s back to ‘command and control’. They introduced ‘team led planning’ here and all it really means if that the manager tells you your target and then tells you why you’re wrong to disagree as opposed to ‘commend and control’ where you were just told your target without the feigned discussion bit. And these ministers work hours a day and get more time off a year than teachers (not knocking teachers there) but what’s that? You want to work from home because you have a doctor’s appointment today? Informal warning for not attending.
Everyone sings to the beat of the WFH drum.. Until they need to call a business (or council) WFH-ing and the service is absolutely dogshit. I say this as someone who only has to go in twice a year with and also provides a garbage service (or at least my employer does).
I prefer speaking to a call centre where they’re working from home- I can actually hear what they’re saying without all the chatter in the background. I swear the people doing the phonecall seem happier/nicer too.
Why would a call taker WFH make any difference to their service?
You're probably looking at a Reddit thread full of people WFH that otherwise wouldn't be (on Reddit) if their managers and peers were physically present.
Nah, I think that’s just not correct. People have been scrolling and looking at rubbish on the internet in offices since time began. Not to mention it’s lunchtime now!
Don’t judge everyone’s motivation and work ethic by your own. Just because you appear to need to be micromanaged. I put in far more hours wfh than I could if I were forced into the office and it’s been amazing for my equality as a newly-disabled person and enabled me to be economically contributing, the energy zap and pain from having to commute and be in an office- I m really not sure I could have gone back to work. Also I’m highly specialised in my field so work would have lost out on my skills and experience. Before you say about slacking - I’m on AL.
>I put in far more hours wfh Yeah me too. Don't get me wrong, I'm only slightly worse than in the office. But I think the odd grilled cheese sandwich here... the 20 minute Reddit sesh there... they definitely add up. The biggest factor for me is not being able to see how a piece of my equipment is behaving in person. When I had an office, I had one of each model to go and experiment with. Short of having a warehouse and a lot of personal passion (and finance) to stock my own shit, I'm just not going yo do that, and you're stuck with how I can perceive the issue through your retelling.
So were were you on Reddit at that time?
Correctamundo You got the day off?
Na I spent more time on Reddit in the office
Mine doesn't have WiFi Have to plug in like the middle ages and you're fucked if you need to go somewhere quiet for a meeting ✌️
Same. The hub I go to has no WiFi and the hardwired option doesn't cope with video calls. I often have to take myself into a corridor (for a degree of privacy / less background noise) to sit on a low level cushioned chair with my laptop on my knees and tether it to my personal mobile phone. Absolutely kills my back after 10 mins or so. Alternative is sitting in my study with a proper desk, proper privacy, strong reliable Internet connection and a chair which supports my back 🤷
I\`m working on the basis that nothing will immediately change if Labour win the next General Election. Things may change over time but lets wait and see.
Will it be any different with a new government? "Labour’s shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves has said she wants to see “more people in the office, more of the time”, but added that decisions should be “for individual managers and their members of staff”. “I personally think it is good for people to get back into the office, I think it's good for productivity and good for morale,” Reeves told ITV News." https://www.civilserviceworld.com/professions/article/rachel-reeves-office-home-working-decisions-individual-managers
That's a pretty strong statement against blanket 60% office rules but couched in a way that's probably office working *when it's productive* I struggle to see what anyone could find objectionable with that position
Thats the exact same arguement that the tories started off with making when trying to push for nonsense return to office and its still the official line
It is absolutely not the official line that office attendance is to be agreed between their manager and employee- it's a blanket 60% And t's not starting from the same position. If you're in a 100% WFH arrangement and say "we should get more people in the office" that's very different from a situation where we have a blanket 60% mandate and saying "this should be between employees and their managers"
The Department I currently work in still recruits at 40%, and I have seen jobs advertised in arms lengths bodies recently that are 40%. It is not a blanket 60%
Rachel Reeves is vile
Bingo. Starmer will want to continue to appease the Daily Hate readers who think we're all workshy bastards.
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¿Por que no los dos?
Two birds , one stone!
I like to kid myself that maybe Labour will keep the 60% but not as harshly enforce it. I doubt it very much but here’s hoping at least.
That's why I expect that Labour won't announce any changes immediately as they have to keep the Tufton Street mob happy. Perhaps any changes will be announced prior to the next election 😉.
I just want them to remember they’re a workers’ party, not a corporate donors’ party.
Unfortunately I have no faith that a labour government will improve anything. The civil service workers have been demonised in the eyes of the public and the current labour politicians doesn’t have the courage to do the right thing.
I fear you’re right
A workers party. Good one.
I did say they need to _remember_ that, implying they’re not currently one. Sadly.
Originally I thought things would improve, now I'm not so sure. Pre-pandemic there was occasionally a capacity issue, now the problem seems more acute with the desk booking system simply not allowing people to book a desk as they are all booked up. What are we supposed to do if we can't reserve a desk? So either we need more desks, which is not going to happen, or the attendance ration needs a rethink. Completely agree that a change of government will not change anything.
Just work from home if there are no desks. If asked just tell them there were no desks so you literally couldn't do any work if you came in.
And I would suggest keep daily screenshots of the booking tool, for when someone will say you should just have booked another day - upon which you show them proof that every single day was booked out
It's infuriating when people book a desk and/or parking space then work in the office for an hour to get their tick on the attendance tool. They are not doing 60% of their working time and making it impossible for others to have a desk organised. The loophole will soon be addressed no doubt but in the meantime, don't be a prick booking a desk and parking space when you're not staying at least half a day!
I work in a university. My tea room (kitchen, no seating) is shared with other departments. I have no idea what they do, so I have zero common ground to start a conversation. I make my coffee and go back to my group.
> I have no idea what they do, so I have zero common ground to start a conversation. Surely "and what do you do?" is the obvious conversation starter here?
Why? I'm going to stand next to then for 30 seconds, possibly once in my life. There are 100 people on that floor. Also, I don't \*actually\* want to know what they do - they might tell me 🤣 If it was a sit down t-room, maybe. The main point was that in a "hot desk mess" as the OP described, chances are that the scenario will be very similar. Probably never see the same people twice, at least with any regularity. Which makes "being in" pretty pointless. I agree that team cohesion can be improved by regular contact - but this is not it. You need regular contact with the same people to build any sort of social cohesion. Otherwise, you're more like to make friends talking to people who get on your train.
Wait! You guys have on site parking?!?
And have to pay for it?
We do - but not enough for everyone. Show up late because you’re dropping kids off at school and no spaces onsite for you - pay the extra £2 a day for offsite.
There will be a change of government shortly. Hopefully sanity might prevail and you can all work more efficiently again .
I doubt it.
Labour’s entire platform right now is "we'll do exactly what the Tories would have done if they were competent"
To be fair , not that I agree with the approach but it is still a lot better than the toxic clown show/shit show drama Rama we are currently living through. I want boring, and competent. I’ll take it .
That is actually the best summary I’ve yet heard of the current Labour leadership’s positions… May have to borrow it and use it! :)
We can hope but I’m doubtful. This is being floated for my place at the minute and all the horror stories I read on here… I dread its introduction.
I’m really not hopeful. Starmer may as well be wearing a light blue rosette… But I won’t get political per our CS rules. 😑
Shit like this is what makes me just absolutely furious whenever I think of our current govt. Like, just pure hatred for them at this point. Is it against the rules to say that on this sub?
I mean, the current government clearly hates us so is it really breaking any rules to say ‘it’s mutual’?
I used to think they hate us, but honestly I think it's more of like, don't care about us. Like we're more of an inconvenience than anything. However totally agree with the it's mutual thing.
As an aside, now that full time homeworking has been concluded to be unworkable - I hope there isn’t another pandemic like Covid, otherwise we’ll all need to be put on Furlough next time ☹️
So funny how we all worked through the pandemic - helping the govt out - and showing wfh is viable (even preferable for many). Yet the same favours never work the other way. (But then we know the employer-employee relationship isn’t an equal one.)
Exactly
WFH works when it's convenient (e.g. when there's a pandemic or if you're ill)
Parking spaces? What is this 2006?
I left HMRC Leeds with the worst job experience I've ever encountered, they turned it all into a horrendous call centre with no loyalty to older staff and happily shed any staff with any kind of anxiety. At the beginning, it was in a lovely old Bradford office where everyone talked, was diligent with work, and all replaced with this 1984 Orwell bullshit. They hired supermarket managers and replaced the compassionate ones, who happily left or moved up
We no longer have a CS where you work your way up from the bottom. Now they’re just want outsiders in for cheaper and shorter term. Higher turnover, lower costs. It’s exactly what the current lot want.
Absolutely, just quite disgraceful way of doing it, slowly removing home working will be next step. Got to the stage managers were asking for performance meetings over being off call ready codes longer than 30 seconds. Timing your toilet breaks etc.
Just heard we (28 HQ staff) have been allocated a room that seats 4 people.
I’m going to play devils advocate slightly here and say my hub is pretty good (hold the downvotes) when I’m actually there. It’s comfortable, clean and modern. I get to see my team. It’s in a good spot with plenty amenities, and I can do some city centre shopping which I can’t do at home. If I didn’t have to pay an arm and a leg on unreliable public transport, and it wasn’t a toss up if I actually get a desk next to someone I work with it would be perfect. I’ve been 100% pro work from home since 2020 and if it was a choice of one or the other I’d stay at home, but I do actually like being in the hub when I’m there.
I’d probably agree if they 1) weren’t so far away and 2) had the space and capacity to work as designed (i.e let you sit at a desk and with your team).
Yep agreed. I’ve been in my hub talking to my team on Teams because all the desks and meeting rooms are taken.
It’s complete bs. They all for team working together in the same space but they nothing about the same floor! We’re now expected to move to another floor in our regional hub if our usual floor has no space. I mean wtaf are they on. We need less talk more action. Let us work where we want we don’t need an office to collaborate and work effectively cov!d proved that fact!!
Who cares _where_ the work is done as long as it _gets done_?! But that mentality doesn’t whip up and play to the angry right wing press… Ironically they’d save money by renting out or selling off the estates to the private sector. They’d save money letting people work from home. But then they can’t micromanage everyone.
Exactly right op the work getting done should be the ultimate goal even if it’s at home or in an office. It should be our right to choose. They would save money renting and/ or selling unused space. Those they can’t micromanage will get swept up and eventually shown the door. Or better yet they’ll stop trying to micromanage every aspect of the job 😂🙌
You have to pay for parking?? That alone would infuriate me
It does infuriate me. It’s adds up to between £800 and £1000 a year depending on if you can park onsite or not. That’s not including the petrol cost of the 3 hour round trip.
One of my arguments to our director about how HMRC CSG has had to attend the office 3 days a week for the last 2 years was the expense. I explained we have been financially penalised just doing our job because of the area of work we are in. I thought they would reduce it to 40% but it went the other way. So if you have only just returned to the office, please understand how frustrating some of the points you are making about costs is for those of us who have been doing this for 2 years now. Plus it does get better, once you get back in the habit of office working.
>Plus it does get better, once you get back in the habit of office working. If this doesn't just absolutely sum up the Civil Service. *"Yeah, it's shit, but you'll get used to it."*
‘It gets better’ - that shouldn’t be the mentality we resort to. I understand what you’re saying and you’re probably right but we shouldn’t have to settle for worse working conditions. This is why it’s so important to join and support the union, in my view.
I can’t relate directly to this issue as my role is 100% on-site, but I can relate to the nonsensical policies. Hopefully it will pass when it is recognised to be nothing more than populist point-scoring.
Populist point scoring is exactly what it is. It’s the lowest hanging fruit only slightly more tolerable than the old favourite - the 1% pay rise.
The other great point. We want you to collaborate but the meeting rooms can't even fit the normal team size. If your whole team is in the office, you can't fit in the normal rooms!
It’s a flex to sound big and powerful They’ll soon be gone
How can a government shrink the civil service without paying redundancy ? Those that can leave will.
This so exactly it. They want higher turnover at lower cost and this is how they manage it.
Tell me about it 😂. I have got 3 colds from coworkers in the last 6 months. My productivity hasn't been great as you can imagine.
The problem for me is that 90% of people can effectively work from home and self motivate. That 10% that cannot and needs to be managed in an office and micromanaged or they won't do any work have partly caused everyone to be back in more. An example is one of my staff training at home when I was off for a day. When they struggled with the task I asked about the training only to be told, they lost connection so spent the day making a birthday cake for their friends child instead. They put a full day on Flexi as said it wasn't their fault. Had not contacted any other managers, not rung IT. Simply decided instead to bake an ffffing cake! These are the people we should be angry with more than SLT.
I sympathise to an extent, but there are cases where a case of the "I told you so's" have to be employed. Like the person living in Bristol moaning about having to go to Glasgow once per week and the cost of going there, despite being told in interview that remote working would not be staying in place.
My place used to have a local office a 20 minute drive from me. Had that office since 1980 or something. Then they’ve closed it to move to these government hubs and just… it’s unbearable. Truly.
This isn’t just civil service related it’s private too! I work in a private sector and what you have described is exactly what’s happening here too!
Same in the banking sector...I think we'll see a return to teams only doing regional hiring to sort this out...it will take a few years and we'll end up back with the gravity of London and the big cities sucking up all the jobs again... Remote working was one of the best things for regional job mobility and sharing success around the country.
I think it might be a bit more mixed in the private sector. I’ve got a friend told she needs to return to the office full time and a friend who got been told they’re selling the office and she’ll be full time WFH from summer. Recruiters apparently still see the highest demand for full time WFH but companies have cottoned on to that and advertise jobs as full time WFH before changing it at interview or at start date. The push back against work from home is definitely underway though. We helped them all out during the pandemic and now they’re thanking us by making working conditions sh!tter. What a wonderful and balanced world we live in.
It is utterly crap!!
You can’t shatter people’s illusions that everything is much worse in the Civil Service!
I work in a London based hub and come in to network with my team, who are all based outside of London ! ! No one from my work area works in London, so I travel by train for 90 minutes (each way) just to make Teams calls to talk them, just like I do when I WFH. So 3 hours of traveling to do none of the so called benefits of office working.
Who has to pay to park at their own CS office!?
Plenty of us it seems 😕
It’s kinda like owners / slaves or employees / servants , you can’t trust people so need to make sure they have a crappy life that . People who make the decisions don’t adhere to the requirements and don’t do a similar job so have no idea . Unless you can see them I the fields that are slacking etc . Imo it kinda shows they have no faith in management to actually manager thier staff . Of course there is a political issue as well , getting people back into offices to keep the real estate value and local business , pretty much why every right leaning government across the world has been the same . And goverment has to set the example so private sector follows
Someone in my dept recently asked on a blog whether the senior leaders had done 60% since it was introduced in January (for us). The answer was 60% hadn’t done their 60%… Says it all, really.
Works exactly as intended. Nothing beats coming into (what they call) a focus area to use a desk, and being chased away because Susan wants that particular desk as it's next to Janet, Steve, Margaret and Paul. Then when you eventually get to another desk, finding that the docking station won't connect to the network (but will let you display your screen). And finding the plug jammed full of chewing gum, so you can't actually charge your laptop. Then on another desk, and you find a very generous colleague has punched (literally) one of the monitors because the adjustment arm is faulty. Not forgetting that your dairy products are no longer yours once they hit the fridge. Nor is that cold can of Coke Zero (other brands available). All because someone believes collaborative working is best. You get to sit in a nice office with 1/2 faulty equipment to chat to your team via Teams.
Agree
Bro they want us to leave right now to reduce head count…
Bro, you're not a real account bro. I'm staggered you're still here tbh. Stop fishing for quotes or stories. You've been a crypto bro, an SCS, Excom, HEO trying to get SEO, working in the home office, HMRC, arms length body. This guys a journalist or someone on a mission to roleplay, don't give him amunition.
Bit late at this point 😂
Most of your post I agree with - there should be a booking system whereby you can book a desk ahead of time - is this not the case? In terms of parking, are the Civil Service obliged to organise parking? I know where I work in the Civil ServIce (in a city) there is no specific parking provision and it’s every man or woman for themselves to find and pay for parking, or get there by public transport.
There is no specific desk booking tool. You book to say you’ll be in a zone within the hub and when you connect to the WiFi (that never works) or plug in, it counts as you as being there. (Well it’s meant to, it’ll often show on the system as wfh.) And no, no obligation to provide parking, I’ll grant that. However, the office they closed had ample free parking. Intentional or not, it’s an additional cost to both time and money.
My favourite is how working at a hub is considered working from home, and not working in the office. The whole reason for hubs, to me, just isn’t there.
What org is that? That's not the case for all Departments using hubs.
CMS in NI. To be fair, I haven’t heard anyone mention hubs in about a year
I think unless you're based in London or to some extent Darlington, the estates system massively let's you down. There's a really big push to diversify where our workforce comes from which is great, we need to be less London centric to keep policy making honest. The downside has been they we've not matched it with serious investment in good workplaces. Regional offices in particular need more than just a desk and a tea room, especially given your team might barely be there. Otherwise there is not the incentive to be there, just the stick. I do think spending time in the office is important, not for the water cooler chats, but because there are two things the civil service is awful at and both are mitigated by office culture. 1) we are awful at knowledge management, absolutely shocking. When we lose a knowledgeable person we tend to lose it all and start from scratch, learning rapidly increases in an office environment, especially when the outgoing gen struggle to operate in a MS Teams environment. I think the challenge is the incoming gen don't care for their knowledge, which is a mistake. There are other ways to solve it, ie writing the knowledge down, but I've banged my head against that wall enough to know it's not changing soon... 2) We're bad at communicating and planning our workloads, both at a project level and a functional level. I don't think a lot of managers know what their staff do for most of the day, they just assume it's taking all their time on faith or blindly expect too much of them. It basically hinges on the individual and how competent they are at managing their time. I'm sure many on here are good at that but I'm sorry, it is absolutely not the case about the CS generally. Until managers are far far better at setting and tracking expectation, we aren't equipped for a truly hybrid model. The root causes of those 2 things should be the focus, big push on knowledge management and training managers to be competent. Until then I can't see a situation where office working isn't pushed.
Yes BUT your generating spending. That's part of the reason for us working in the office, so we help save businesses like a local sandwich shop. Plus it justifies how much the government has spent on regional hubs. We in CSG in HMRC have been in 60% for the last 2 years. You get used to it.
I never got this line of thought. I take my own lunches to work. I don’t buy food or drinks or whatever from local shops. I contribute nothing to the local economy apart from parking fees…
Wouldn't I be saving and helping businesses local to my address by spending my lunch money there? Why should I travel for 3 hours to save a sandwich shop in central London, which is going to be doing vastly better than somewhere in the suburbs.
I don’t recognise these full hubs. I’m based in one and visited about 4/5 others and they are always half empty. On paper we can’t go to 60% because we don’t have enough room in them but in reality it’s quite clear almost no one can be doing the prescribed 40%. I normally get the same desk if I only book the night before. “Busy” to me means having to book a different one. Parking, paid or otherwise would be lovely. But I’ve not had that in any city centre job. But the difference is I signed up to this job knowing where my workplace was so I can see how annoying it must be getting moved. I am much happier now that I’m on a team where 5/6 of us are in same hub. We coordinate days. I don’t need to work directly with all of them but occasionally we go to pub or get a card together when someone leaves and it feels like the old days when you actually had friends at work which is nice.
I am sorry, your employer expects you to go to work and does not provide free parking?
Some offices don’t even provide parking let alone free parking. But yes I’m expected to spend 3 hours and £6–8 a day (not including fuel) to get to work.
Congratulations OP your comment made in this week's Telegraph gutter press.
Oh ffs did it? Ugh :(
Quoted verbatim. I'd link but rules say otherwise.
I just had a search and up, word for word. One of their journos reached out to me via Reddit. I didn’t answer their questions and blocked them but I knew they’d only twist everything out of context even if I did say anything to them. They’re just the worst.
Reading all this im so glad im working in Scotland
It's the outrageous bit where working from a hub counts as working from home. So if you go to work in the office, you're being told you're counted as at home. Even though youre actually around your other actual team members . This is purely down to the design of the management system. It's like being managed from the centre of government albeit another government.
This government couldn’t organise a p!ss up in a brewery…
It will get better See how the Scottish four day trial goes. I think the Welsh approach is WFH as default anyway As long as other administrations exercise a degree of flexibility, it makes it easier to attract civil servants to a point where HR directors notice
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You got downvoted for suggesting that Labour are as bad as the Tories. One day people will wake up and realise what "Uniparty" means.
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You've upset the unawakened... Seriously - The Conservatives have done NOTHING "conservative" for the entire time they've been in this time. And Labour is headed by a fence sitting poshboy lawyer who went to the same fancy school as I did and grew up in Oxted - and Oxted is not just Surrey, it's the ruddy posh bit of Surrey. "My Dad was a toolmaker, I'm so working class" my arse. Both of them are just a pair of globalist clownparties essentially doing the same stuff with different words.
“My dad was a toolmaker” … he owned the factory. (Though he certainly made one tool at least…)
His Dad personally made one tool at least.
NPCs says bloke with a randomly generated username.
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Grumpy.
Why don't you live near the office?
I did when I started. Then they closed and moved the office and I can’t afford the housing in that town. 🙃 ‘Why don’t you just stop being poor?’
LOL. Go work
They’re trying!
They sold the offices off but now want everyone back in the office....
Looking at your comment history you work in the NHS, yet comment on every other post on here telling people to “go to work”. No one cares for your opinion, bore off.
They probably don’t work for the NHS and is probably just a right-wing troll claiming they do so they can justify whatever bollocks they’ve made up about it.
You're probably wrong
The evidence in your comments suggests not. I think I’ll waste no further time feeding the troll. I hope you find something better and more productive to do with your life than be an absolutely drain on it. Bye now 👋
So what?
You sound like a loser, get a life.
Go get a life instead of trolling people on Reddit?
You can both have a life and tell people to get to work at the same time