Working Remotely – A Week Twelve Retrospective

[#1]

Hello again Friends!  Well, we’ve made it to day eighty-four… week twelve… three months… one business quarter…

This week was a significant improvement over last week.  I’ve also been able to sleep better so I’m feeling much less zombie-like than I have been in previous weeks.  Let’s dive into the specifics:

What went well:

• Our son has been in a better temperament this past week, which makes balancing work and home life easier.
• We have enjoyed the nice weather working in the garden and playing in the yard with our son, which has been quite relaxing (also I can’t express enough how stress relieving blowing bubbles is, I highly recommend it for all ages!)
• People at work have been much more understanding this past week. Expectations have been set that response times and project completion times are simply going to take longer until we are able to back-fill my teammate’s position.  In addition, I have also received several offers to help where possible to share the load, which has me feeling much more supported.

What could have been better:

• Even with all the understanding, support and offers to help, there is still more work than I can reasonably complete in a given week. I think that is just going to be the sad reality until help arrives.
• I have also continued to have a lack of focus while I’m “fire-fighting” to unblock others as quickly as possible. This has left me feeling like I’m not accomplishing much at the end of the day, even though the numbers show otherwise.

What I will change:

• Recently, I have been using video games as a method to hide form everything that is going on, and I’m starting to feel a bit of a void that wasn’t there near the beginning of quarantine, I realized that I haven’t been doing any sorts of continued learning recently and I’m going to fix that. I’m going to take advantage of the fact that Atlassian’s Learn From Home Training is still available and has been extended until the end of June.  I’d recommend other might want to check it out as well.
• With nicer weather, comes the opportunity to be outside more. I had also done an excellent job of hibernating during the colder months and I now need to get back in better shape, so I’m planning to get out on my bike more often this week.

What will stay the same:

• My wife and I will continue to support local businesses when and where we can.
• I will continue to do an early morning walk with the dog.
• I will continue to interact with friends in a virtual capacity for some social interaction.

From what my company is currently indicating based on information from our local government, I may continue to be working from home until September (or possibly even longer).  That would mean that we are only halfway there, but as I said on week one, I will continue to connect, and share will you all every single week until we reach the end of lock-down.  If that means I have the wonderful opportunity to share another 12 posted with everyone, I look forward to it!  If you enjoyed reading this article, you might also enjoy last weeks post here.

Until next time, keep stay safe any healthy!

[Kat Warner]

It's 102 days since the first diagnosed case here and the first day of 'Alert Level 1' where there are no enforced restrictions within New Zealand - just tight border controls. It's been over 2 weeks since the last new case.

"Just because you can, doesn't mean you should" seems to apply with some workplaces supporting employees to continue to work from home either full-time or part-time though the encouragement to "buy local" may not be enough to help the many businesses that rely on people coming into the cities for work.

[Steven Mustari]

I'm glad to see you've found healthy in all the unhealthy going on in the world right now.

Where we live I look around and see business as usual or a strain to get back to a sense of normally, and unfounded optimism coming from every direction. I don't want to be a pessimist (and by no means am implying you are being overly optimistic here), but there is a fine line between reality and how the vast majority are acting.

I've been a remote worker now since Oct 2019 for reason unrelated to the pandemic, and I've already come to adapt to and deal with many of the challenges people are facing with #remotelife now.

There is a lot of good in it, more time for family, more time to reflect, less time to travel, get ready for the day, and a greater sense of independence. That's of course very subjective. I hope at the end of this we learn from it, as it is an opportunity to remember what is truly important to us.

As far as embracing the remote-side of work. Easy for me, as my situation already allowed me to embrace it before it was forced upon the world. I hope I am able to help any one where ever I can, to help also do the same.

To be my own critic - there is always some good to be found in something even if it is truly unknown.

[Jimmy Seddon]

That is a very insightful comment @Steven Mustari!  I couldn't agree with you more about the false optimism.  I'm quite nervous about some of the changes that will be coming to my part of the world as of this Friday as I fear people may treat it as though everything is back to normal even thought we still have quite a ways to go before being able to make that declaration.