[ThePadawan]

I was interviewing for a job in the middle and towards the end of 2020, and regardless of my chances of success or interest, I asked the interviewers how work from home had gone for them so far.

I encountered this sentiment most of all - 40 year old dads who were suddenly stuck at home with the wife and kids, working from an improvised home office.

When I asked about returning to the office, most of them were clearly looking forward to it, with a sentiment of "Of course working from home is less efficient and comfortable, what do you mean?".

It was quite a surprise for me, who had finally gotten away from the noisy open-plan offices and meetings where everyone shouted at each other until the loudest person "won".

[helij]

I'm 40+ year old dad as well. I don't feel stuck at home with wife and kids. I don't want to ever return to the office. I'm in managerial position and know that WFH is not any less efficient or less comfortable. I find office to have more distractions. Sentiment is shared across the team as well.

[Tade0]

I found that most such people didn't originally plan for work from home, so their experience was predictably horrible. Also during the pandemic daycare/schools were closed, adding to the problem.

Meanwhile me and other young dads who did plan for remote work have now a designated room for an office and children at daycare/kindergarten for most of the day.

Until my child was old enough to attend daycare it was indeed chaos, but with just one you can get used to this. It's much like having a co-worker who likes to chat a little bit too much.

[Bouncingsoul1]

I planned for this as well, 2 months before Covid happend, so a bit lucky. Anyway it works great and I don't want to go back. The thing I don't subscribe to is the "co-worker" part. you see if my child cannot attend daycare because she is sick, I cannot work full. we have an agreement at my work that in such cases we go into "50% or best effort"mode. I guess it depends on the child and maybe the job, but I cannot code/think/debug while a 4 year old wants to be entertained, also I don't want to sit her in front of a tv/mobile just to calm her down, so 50% it is

[noisy_boy]

I would guess that if we further split 40 year old dads into introverts and extroverts, the sentiment would also split into loving wfh and being happier working away at the office.