WFH RTO

For almost two years, most of us have worked from home (WFH) but now the companies are starting to ask the employees to return to office (RTO). Although I understand the reason that it's because of pressure from the government to revive the economy, I believe it's being done in haste. Case in point: myself.

I had got COVID in the first phase, i.e., around August 2020. At that time, most people, including doctors, didn't know what it was, how to deal with it, etc. I ended up spending a lot of time and money on medicines, diagnostic scans and various other tests. Since then I've tried my best to not get reinfected by taking several precautions such as wear a mask at all times when we go out, got both doses of vaccine and also the booster dose just a couple of months back in June 2022.

I was one on the few employees to be recalled to work from office on all days, starting from the end of March 2022. Our company started asking employees to return to office based on seniority, so I was picked in one of the earliest tranches. Since then, our company has been recalling more employees in batches, with an aim to get everyone back to work from office by end of this year (2022), so there's been a lot more density on the floors in the recent past. Also, just about a month ago (July 2022), our company updated the policy to work from office on at least three out of five days per week (instead of working from office on all days of the week). The policy had worked fine up to some point because the strength and density of employees in office was still low. However, our company hired a lot more employees than the seating capacity, so the density has gradually increased eventually even with various measures in place.

It seems like we're going back to normal. However, I don't see it that way because COVID is not like any other disease. Falling ill due to COVID knocks a person off for days, or sometimes even for weeks. I tested positive for COVID about a week back (mid-August 2022) and had to take rest for a week at least. My suspicion is that I'd have got infected at the office. I know many others who are falling ill due to COVID. Suddenly someone disappears from the office without any notification as if they were hit by a bus. Only after a few days, weeks or months do we get to know, usually indirectly, that the person had got COVID.

The way our organization is managing it all needs significant improvement. Before I suggest the improvements and issues, following is the current process we need to follow if an employee tests positive for COVID. The employee has to inform a central security team that they've tested positive. Beyond receiving an acknowledgement, the employee doesn't receive any support on that call. The employee will then receive a call a few hours or a day later to check on the status from the Life Event Services team to provide assistance, if needed (in case it's severe). Then someone from Benefits team calls up to ask about further details and help with formalities such as providing leaves from the back-end. Since I consulted our family doctor, I didn't request any help. I'm not sure to what capacity our company would help though, apart from redirecting me to reach out to some other team or a generic helpline. The only benefit I received was a 7-day leave (including 2 days weekend) in addition to the usual set of annual sick leaves.

I have no hopes, but there's nothing wrong with wishful thinking. I don't wish WFH every day, but to begin with, I wish for better ventilation in the office since I realize that's perhaps the single biggest reason why there are so many cases. Secondly, I wish for a further reduction of days and time at the office to reduce the density. Our team is already dealing with enough attrition that we don't need more factors that exacerbate it. Alternative would be to get more office space but I'm sure that would cost a lot, so I don't expect our company would consider that. Thirdly, I wish our company provided better support and assistance to its employees instead of treating them as "resources".

From past experience, I've found that my hopes and wishful thinking about our company are almost always futile. However, we need to continue to hope for the best but prepare for the worst.