[unity1001]

> As a team…we are definitely not more productive and no one wants to say that uncomfortable part out loud.

Can being in a loud, stacked office in front of computers with a bunch of other people be called 'more productive'?

The only thing that exists in such an environment compared to work from home is the supposedly better communication. But how many times do you communicate with a colleague over the course of a single workday. Nobody wants to be disrupted when they are concentrating. So people already avoid disrupting each other, limiting the interaction during work.

In such an equation, the only thing that is necessary for totally replacing work environment seems to be people getting used to collaborating through chat, voice and videos. That should fix the majority of the issues and only leave the watercooler aspect of the office unaddressed.

[kcplate]

> Nobody wants to be disrupted when they are concentrating. So people already avoid disrupting each other, limiting the interaction during work

This is where WFH is worse in my experience. Because someone cannot see that I am behind a closed door or heads down focused, there are more interruptions to me. Even marking yourself unavailable in chat is often not respected, mainly because products like Teams does a pretty shitty job of conveying status and no one pays its status any respect.

[unity1001]

> Because someone cannot see that I am behind a closed door or heads down focused, there are more interruptions to me.

Definitely its necessary to have some organization to adapt to wfh must be done in the household and also the household must be made aware that work is work and its not just someone 'studying in his room' like a teenager or college student.

> Even marking yourself unavailable in chat is often not respected

That's an adaptation on the remote workers' side though. With remote, the communication needs to be async. So people should be able to just drop stuff into chat so the remote people can respond whenever they can. Turning off notices while concentrating is a must for any chat app for that reason. You can turn the notifications off, let the messages pile up while you concentrate, then respond to the messages when you are going through a communication cycle. (unless on call though)

[kcplate]

>…adapt to wfh must be done in the household and also the household must be made aware that work is work…

My issue isn't the household, it’s the other remote workers.

[unity1001]

You can just ignore their messages and pings when you turn off notifications while you are concentrating - then when you are back you can respond to them. Similarly, you can assume that your messages will be asynchronously processed by your teammates in the same manner. It takes some time to get used to such an async communication style, but it works and its scalable.