Work from home versus Covid

Every night I check up on the Covid numbers and I read the news to see how the “work from home” (henceforth wfh) wars are going.

So first the Covid numbers, but without the chart this time. Right now, I don’t have time even though my original intention was to go over the graphs that I’m seeing from Power BI. Currently, case numbers (which are highly suspect due to testing being done at home and most likely not being reported in to the government) and deaths have flattened out at an elevated level. The level is nowhere near what January/February was but seems to be close to last summer (summer of 2021), so nothing to sneeze at. I see the level as kind of high.

Hospitals, though, are going up but my graphs are telling me going up at a slower rate now. Does that mean hospitals are now leveling out? It remains to be seen.

The news have said that cases are going up (which I actually don’t see, I see it as leveled out) but they also mention hospitals are seeing signs of increasing input patients. In addition, they also mention that wastewater data (which I haven’t found yet) indicates infection rates are as high as the wintertime (January/February) levels, leading to the prognosis of raging infections in the community throughout the U.S.

In the meantime, more and more companies want their workers back in the office, using productivity, engagement and creativity as the reason. Personally, I don’t think those are the reasons because I think productivity was just as high if not higher and engagement improved for some people because they did not have to deal with long commute times and work-life balance improved. I think it’s more a matter of senior executives and other managers lacking the flexibility to adjust to the new work world or knowing how to manage remotely. They may not even have the skill set for managing people, other than checking if people came in to work. I think they are facing the conundrum of: if people can self-manage themselves and get the work done without being in the office, what is the point of having managers? I think a lot of the managers feel that being managers is about looking over the employees’ shoulders and determining if they came in to work through their physical presence.

But really, there are other ways of being a manager. Companies still need managers; it’s just not as a babysitter.

Right now, most articles are saying managers are forcing workers back to the office, but one Fortune article says that in the fall, wfh will win because Covid infection will rise to the level such that most employees will be forced to stay home.

The latest variant, Omicron BA. 5, apparently evades the vaccine and is extremely infectious that one needs a mask outdoors – not just indoors. In addition, I read one article that the BA. 5 may cause more serious sickness, but I’m not sure about that. Not all articles are saying that. But I do read that each time one gets re-infected with the virus, the odds of getting long Covid or having a bad illness or death increases. Each re-infection ups the odds that one will have diabetes or heart disease or attack.

You don’t want re-infections.

And that’s why the wfh will win – at least that is the reasoning of the Fortune article. Doctors project that we will see 100 million infections this fall.

But it is hard to say in which direction Americans will proceed. The attitude right now is “I’m done with Covid” and so everybody is out without a care in the world. There is no social distancing, masks are rare, and there has been no outcry from hospitals.

I would like wfh to win simply because it is a better way for some people to work.