# What's the Work From Home situation?



## bwin12 (May 22, 2021)

I'm curious to know the WFH situation in the engineering world. Are companies back to normal operations- i.e. how they operated in January 2020? Does anyone have new policies in place for WFH? 

I've read the articles online that companies are recanting on there WFH plans, I'm wondering if that's the case in this industry.


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## ruggercsc (May 22, 2021)

We are working in the office two days a week until the end of June, then back 4 days a week. We are going to try to WFH one day a week and see how that works out.


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## jeb6294 (May 22, 2021)

Been working at home since March 16, 2020 (Gov’t). Ohio is set to go back to business as usual on June 2nd, but the talk has been to keep working from home because we’re still producing well


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## DoctorWho-PE (May 23, 2021)

We are mostly all back in the office, but the official return to workplace date is June 1. The biggest issue with WFH was that new staff were struggling without anyone to help them


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## DLD PE (May 23, 2021)

We are mostly back in the office full time. I'm pretty sure I could WFH 1-2 days per week if I wanted to, but I enjoy the office environment and my commute is relatively short. 

Ironically, I will probably push/choose to WFH 1-2 days a week in the near future simply because with the increased traffic from everyone going BACK to the office in our metro area, my commute is starting to increase and become more aggravating and I'd like a break once in a while.


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## Dleg (May 23, 2021)

State-level government here, we've been back to 50% in-office work since January. That's a minimum in-office time, though. We have so many vacancies that even if everyone was 100% in-office we would still be pretty sparse, so several of us just work in-office all the time now. I find that I am more effective at my job (division head) when I am here 100% of the time. Back when we were working from home I thought it was pretty efficient, and it was in terms of stuff that I can do on my own, and for meetings. It was perfect while I was on COVID incident management duties. But in my day job, having the perspective of being back in the office now, I think remote work has too many disadvantages. I'd say a solid 30% of my staff just can't handle it, and don't get any work done at all when working from home. Less than 30% seem to do pretty well with it, though. But the problem going forward is how to be "fair" in a way that would allow the good workers to continue WFH, but keep the irresponsible ones in the office.


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## jeb6294 (May 23, 2021)

vhab49_PE said:


> We are mostly all back in the office, but the official return to workplace date is June 1. The biggest issue with WFH was that new staff were struggling without anyone to help them


We had three new guys start several months after we’d already gone telework full time...shoot, I’d only been there about two months when we were sent home. Still not as good as being in the office, but we’re making pretty good use of Zoom, Webex, and soon, Google Teams.


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## DoctorWho-PE (May 23, 2021)

The quality varied by group. One of them the manager is.... not excellent, so even in-person training is crap. So if they were struggling, noobs didn't really even know who to reach out to for things.


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## Supe (May 24, 2021)

Full time WFH. Company has reopened offices with a mask mandate for "anchor" employees/employees not eligible for WFH status. Company has transitioned to primarily WFH for corporate employees, sold a lot of real estate and has invested a lot of money in systems/processes to continue working remotely at an international level.


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## bwin12 (May 24, 2021)

Sounds like a lot of companies revised (or created) their policy. I'm in this weird inbetween:
- most of the office is back 
- some people work from home when they want

I think some people were proficient at home and others were not.


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## bwin12 (May 24, 2021)

Oh, and I was really surprised how much I liked working in the office again, even with a 35ish minute commute each way. In April I said I could care less about going back to the office ever again. Having the flexibility to be in the office when needed is very nice.


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## mudpuppy (May 26, 2021)

We can't work from the office until July 1. After that, pretty much everyone has the option to work from home forever. Over half the company has chosen that option, though they may come into the office from time to time as necessary.


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## JayKay PE (May 26, 2021)

Wait. You guys got to work from home?


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## mudpuppy (May 26, 2021)

JayKay PE said:


> Wait. You guys got to work from home?



In many cases you don't even have to live in the same state. And we're hiring engineers like crazy.


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## JayKay PE (May 26, 2021)

mudpuppy said:


> In many cases you don't even have to live in the same state. And we're hiring engineers like crazy.


HMMMMMM. But I'm not really an engineer. I'm def more of a project manager, unfortunately. Got to stay with the government one more year before I can bounce due to contract nonsense. T_T


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## Platypus Engineer (May 26, 2021)

Partial return to office after July 6. for those that want to. I will probably go back one to two days a week. Depends on mask situation, if wear mask all the time then no. Especially since vaccines are not being mandated likely means masks required. My personal feeling no vaccine, then permanent WFH.

I am at central office of water/wastewater utility. Most of the staff at plants and field maintenance have been going in. And the 24 hour system monitoring.

I go in periodically couple times a month if I need to for field work or on site precons. Used a microfilm reader for first time since college a couple months ago. Kind of old school, sometimes print plans out and line them up to see overall project layout, even though use electronic plan review

WFH has given me some flexibility with personal stuff. If I need to duck for an hour or two to take family member to doctor, I can. Don't have to budget two plus hours for a one hour commute because of traffic idiocy.


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## SoVA Eng (May 26, 2021)

We've been back in the office full time since about August last year. But there are also only 7 of us and we all have our own office.


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## leggo PE (May 26, 2021)

We’re going back in (kind of mandated, it’s a bit unclear) 2x/week starting on June 14th. I’ve already been going back about 2 days a week for the past month or so. Not sure how long that’s going to last before it changes for one way or another! But I do actually like going back into the office for a few days a week. I get my bike commute back in, and can see my two direct coworkers because we’ve coordinated the days we’re going in.


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## Supe (May 26, 2021)

JayKay PE said:


> HMMMMMM. But I'm not really an engineer. I'm def more of a project manager, unfortunately. Got to stay with the government one more year before I can bounce due to contract nonsense. T_T


Hell, most of our PM's never worked in the office to begin with. PM's and contracts/subcontract managers I saw like once a year.


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## Platypus Engineer (May 26, 2021)

Supe said:


> Hell, most of our PM's never worked in the office to begin with. PM's and contracts/subcontract managers I saw like once a year.


There is one PM at my job who oversees renovation projects at plants, might see him in central building twice a month. Has on site office too, more like a resident engineer


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## Ble_PE (May 27, 2021)

I probably won't be back in the office until September. We're going to transition to what they are calling a hybrid work environment where we'll be in the office a few days a week and home the rest. We're still not sure what it's going to look like exactly, but more than likely it's going to mean not having an assigned space in the office. They've already started sending out headsets to people to replace their desk phones using an app on our computers. They've made it abundantly clear that this is a financial decision for the company, not a benefit to the employee, so I'm interested to see what happens to our office space. At least I get to spend the summer at home, that means more time at the beach since I can work from there.


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## jeb6294 (May 27, 2021)

One of the things they talked about was doing a hybrid work week with people staggered throughout the week. They asked for my opinion a lot because I was the only one who was 1) still new, and 2) had the benefit of working in the office before we started teleworking. We've got a really good remote system. Being on computer at home is almost exactly the same as if I was in the office. The biggest downside of not being in the office was not having the other people around when you have questions or need some guidance on something. I told them that if there were only going to be 2 or 3 of us in the office at a time, it's really no benefit and we might as well be at home.


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## Fisherman504 (May 27, 2021)

I had to do WFH right after Covid was announced (March 23ish, 2020), then they slowly staggered us back in with days in office and days at home. I was never given an opportunity to telecommute due to the fact that I'm an engineer and most of my job requires steady state modeling. Now the company sees that it works, so they have offered me 2 days at home WFH, even though non-engineers were already offered that incentive years ago.


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## ruggercsc (May 27, 2021)

No masks at work if you are vaccinated, but it is on the honor system. You get a sticker on your access card to show you are vaccinated if anyone asks. I had my Vaccination Card and asked one person if I need to show and they said they can't legally ask for it, while another said HIPPA does not apply to private employers outside of a healthcare operation and I should have it on me just in case. They explained it that it was like a school requiring proof of vaccinations. Honestly I think that latter may be wrong, but I am not going to get worked up about it.


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## P-E (May 27, 2021)

I’m looking forward real soon to going in late, leaving early, taking a long lunch, shooting the sh!t around the office, taking a couple 1/2 hour dumps and 5 or so coffee breaks. Damn I miss the office.


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## Dleg (May 27, 2021)

Employers are NOT prohibited from asking you about your vaccination status. HIPAA only prohibits your health care organization from sharing your information with someone other than you, without your permission. But anyone else can ask, even a store employee.



https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/wellness/hipaa-vaccine-covid-privacy-violation/2021/05/22/f5f145ec-b9ad-11eb-a6b1-81296da0339b_story.html


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## Dothracki PE (May 28, 2021)

I've been going back to the office at least two days a week since September. Started 4 days at the beginning of the year although it's kind of been optional. Can't wait for full return to normal, it's been boring with the same few people in the office and few places to go to sit and enjoy breakfast or lunch when I'm going from different jobsites.


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## DLD PE (May 28, 2021)

I've been slowly losing weight since going back to the office. I worked from home for the first time in a while this past week since I had to go to a job site on the way to the office. I had fried eggs, homemade fries and smoked sausage for breakfast. Now I know how I gained those extra pounds during COVID.


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## csb (May 28, 2021)

I've been back since last May. Most of my people came back in the summer and then we sent a few of them home again when COVID spiked in November. Now most everyone is back. We'll have one guy who's permanent WFH and another will be alternating. I had a large number of employees who could not WFH ever.


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## ruggercsc (May 28, 2021)

Dleg said:


> Employers are NOT prohibited from asking you about your vaccination status. HIPAA only prohibits your health care organization from sharing your information with someone other than you, without your permission. But anyone else can ask, even a store employee.
> 
> 
> 
> https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/wellness/hipaa-vaccine-covid-privacy-violation/2021/05/22/f5f145ec-b9ad-11eb-a6b1-81296da0339b_story.html


Thanks for info. I have my vaccination passport on my phone and a paper copy on me in case I am asked, but for now we are on the honor system and just reporting vaccination dates, location, and type of vaccination with no proof.


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## Edgy Cheesy Graphite PE (Jun 9, 2021)

I'm still 100% WFH.

I work for a manufacturing company and my company has been VERY careful with people coming into the office. The touch-labor, who are actually making our products, HAVE to be on site. And if they get sick then we lose money because we can't fulfill our orders. So during the height of the pandemic, the company policy was basically: _The production people have to be here; everyone else stay the fuck away so they don't get sick!_

The company is working on its return to work plan now, even though my city/state has been open for a while now. Like I said extra careful.

The official plan hasn't come out yet, but from what we've been told. WFH vs on-site vs hybrid will be a decision made between each employee and their supervisor. The company is not trying for consistency; the goal is to arrive at the best individual answer. So it depends on:

your specific job responsibilities (e.g. engineers doing hands-on equipment work or running tests have been back at the office for a while)
how effective you are at home vs in the office
what you want to do
Most of our employees have been very effective working from home. All the engineering managers have said productivity has stayed the same or *gone up* since COVID. So if your job doesn't require you to be on-site, it's going to come down to personal preference for most people. From the rumors I hear, it sounds like it will be ~10% WFH permanently, ~25% on-site permanently, ~65% hybrid.

Interestingly, if you decide on WFH permanently, they are taking your cube/desk/office away. I think that's part of the reason more people are choosing 100% WFH. 

Edit: I will add that my company culture is pretty special. I've worked a few different places and this one is uniquely great.


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