|
| Featured Contents |
| Question of the Day |
|
| The Voice of the DBA |
Daily Coping Tip Think about what you can learn from a recent challenge I also have a thread at SQLServerCentral dealing with coping mechanisms and resources. Feel free to participate. For many of you out there working in a new way, I'm including a thought of the day on how to cope in this challenging time from The Action for Happiness Coping Calendar. My items will be on my blog, feel free to share yours. |
Research on the Changing Workplace One of the things that I have admired about Microsoft is their desire to invest in research and try to learn more about subjects that relate to their core business. Microsoft Research has a number of fascinating projects underway all the time, and I enjoy browsing the site once in awhile. However, they don't just limit research to this group. They are a data driven culture, and it seems they are constantly using metrics and instrumentation to measure how the entire business works and to glean insights into how they might work better. Recently I saw a report on Microsoft's new work-from-home workforce, driven by a group that helps companies better work with their own employees. Work has changed for many people in the world in 2020, and very dramatically for some. At the same time, many companies have had to drastically alter they continue to do business, recognizing that many technical employees could work from home and be as effective as they are in an office. Microsoft has analyzed their own data, and continue to do so as they seek to understand how the pandemic has changed things for employees. They do find some longer work days, more networking, and more social events. Interestingly, meetings are slightly shorter, which is something I've noticed as well. It's almost as if the effort to walk to a conference room means people have invested more in spending an hour there. With remote meetings, I find more people are willing to cut short a meeting and end it early when they can. The importance of management is something they noticed, as well as a larger burden on managers that they must deal with. I've actually gone to every other week meetings with my manager for a time, though I'm not sure I like that. I'll give it another month and then see what I think. The two most interesting things in the piece to me were that some of the authors' clients are planning on a two year work from home, and that work-life boundaries, especially on weekend, are blurring. For the latter, I think we sometimes fine work to be an anchor, and we may need to spread our 40-ish hours across 7 days to deal with the challenges of family during the week. For the former, if you plan to be at home for two years, why not just make that forever? I'd think the adaptations employees, departments, and workflows make after that amount of time might not be worth undoing. Steve Jones - SSC Editor Join the debate, and respond to today's editorial on the forums |
|
| Featured Contents |
