◼ COVID-19 / US Bloomberg Businessweek March 16, 202046
How can
WFH go
wrong?
Given Covid-19’s seemingly minor impact on
children, schools might not be the best target this
time around. All the more reason to stay out of the
office. Also, such moves have generally been most
effective when a virus has only spread to a small
percentage of the population. Waiting until the
epidemic is raging is too late.
Just you staying home from the office isn’t
going to have a major impact, of course. But it’s
still something, and—unlike, say, forgoing restau-
rant meals or movies or travel—it comes at a low
cost to the economy. It may even come at no cost
at all, considering that remote workers generally
appear to get more done than their in-office peers.
One big experimental test of this: In 2010 and 2011
at Shanghai-based travel agency Ctrip (now Trip.
com), productivity rose 13% among call-center
workers who were allowed to work from home.
So, seriously. Do it for your co-workers. Do it for
your fellow commuters. Do it for firefighters and
delivery workers. Do it for humanity. If you can,
work from home. —Justin Fox, Bloomberg Opinion○ A relentless office schedule dubbed “996”—9 a.m.
to 9 p.m., six days a week, plus overtime—has long
been a burdensome reality for China’s tech work-
ers. With the new coronavirus outbreak forcing
hundreds of thousands of the sector’s employees
to log in remotely, they’re discovering that work-
ing from home can be even worse.
Instead of bringing employees greater freedom,
telecommuting means professional life is encroach-
ing even more on private life, as bosses subject work-
ers to hourslong conference calls, regular check-ins
to ensure they’re not slacking off, and expectations
that they’ll be available 24/7. Compounding the prob-
lem are unstable virtual office tools that frustrate
smooth communication, stymieing productivityand deepening the sense of seclusion.
China’s notorious tech culture—espoused by
business leaders including Alibaba billionaire Jack
Ma for driving productivity—was already starting to
encounter resistance from workers, as the biggest
slump in the sector since the 2008 financial crisis
spurred job losses. The worsening morale among
tech foot soldiers, some in isolation weeks before
the virus spread beyond China’s borders, might
be a lesson for the world’s corporations contem-
plating similar contingency plans on how not to do
work-from-home.
A recently hired employee at the Shenzhen
branch of ByteDance Inc., which owns TikTok,
has yet to meet her colleagues in person because
the epidemic forced the company to temporarily
shut its offices. The product specialist, who asked
to be identified only by her surname, Huang, says
her days are so packed with teleconferencing—
brainstorming sessions with her team can last four
hours—that she can start to tackle her workload in
earnest only at night. “I feel I’m enduring the pres-
sure of work but not enjoying the benefits,” Huang
says. “I didn’t even get to know my new colleagues.
I’m just a machine that works all the time.”● Does it increase
the workload?
Mobile applications manager Stella Ma’s mornings
start with a team conference call that she takes
from bed. After briefing her manager, the 28-year-
old hits mute, brushes her teeth, and downs a bowl
of oatmeal before settling in at her dining room
table for 12 hours or more on her laptop. She says
she’s putting in longer days than ever. “I was stu-
pid to think working from home was easy,” says
Ma, who asked that her company’s name not be
disclosed. Sunny Chen, a 26-year-old Beijing-based
product manager in NetEase Inc.’s online education
unit, also says she’s facing a heavier workload than
usual because of increased demand for remote
learning during the public-health crisis. “Being on
standby 24/7 is more of a norm under the work-
from-home situation,” she says.
Managers at Huawei Technologies Co. are
requiring workers to complete a survey about
their health condition every day before 9:30 a.m.
Allen Chen, a 26-year-old engineer at Huawei’s
research institute in Wuhan, says it’s also a way
for the company to keep tabs on attendance. A
Huawei spokesman says the checks are intended
to monitor the health of workers, not attendance.What I’m
telling my
stuck-at-home
students
Andrew Hancock,
director of education
at Cognita, which runs
international schools in
Hong Kong
In Hong Kong at the
moment, the schools
are not open to
students, you’re not
meant to go out in
the community, and
the apartments are
notoriously tiny. One
of the schools has
been in an online-
learning situation
for quite some time.
They’ve been talking
a lot about routines. If
they’re at home, kids
can start sleeping in,
not brushing teeth. So
they are spending time
communicating with
kids about getting up
in the morning, having
breakfast, taking brain
breaks. At the end of
the day, the kids need
routines—they need
to have that structure
and cadence to the day.
The physical education
group has also been
communicating
the importance of
exercise—exercise that
can be done in a small
space. A regular routine
allows them to deal with
the ambiguity outside.
�As told to Joanna
Ossinger