Franglo

In a blink of an eye, Covid is a thing of the past, and we will pick up where we left off. The challenge with this logic is that we took the “red pill” during the pandemic and have all seen how much better and balanced our lives can be. We don’t want to take the “blue pill” now and put the blinders back on. 

Like most, I struggle with the life balance aspect; we went from being remote 100% of the time to being asked to return to the office gradually. 

It started with one day a week, and it was nice to get dressed, leave the house, and see some familiar faces. I live in the burbs, so heading downtown again to feel the buzz of the city was nice. I could still spend time with family, walk the dog, and hit up my favourite fitness class the balance of the week. 

Fast forward a year later, and the ask has become more significant; we want you in three days per week, or there will be disciplinary actions. 

The narrative for this mandate is better collaboration and fostering culture. However, when you work for a national company, your teammates are across the country, so you are still spending your day on video calls, but just at a desk in the office. 

There are several underlying factors for the decisions by senior leadership. 

• Most stock market portfolios include corproate real estate that is now sitting vacant and could dramatically affect the economy if this sector was to fail. 
• Most senior leaders do not live the life of their employees. They are fortunate to have a city apartment or house near the office. They are not spending hours commuting to the offices and can outsource the day-to-day tasks, housekeeping, cooking, child care etc.

These decisions are made without full contemplation of the impact on their employees who have diligently worked from home, keeping the company profitable while homeschooling their children. The pandemic has shown remote work can be successful.

As an extrovert, I crave being in the office and enjoy being around people; I am not saying we should stay in our basements forever and never leave, but life balance should also be a consideration. 

If you look at the region of Montreal specifically, they are trying to entice people back downtown to revive the downtown core; however, they are also taking on multiple infrastructure projects that make it nearly impossible to access the downtown core easily. 

Most companies need to remember the challenges they were addressing for their Montreal employees before the pandemic hit with the closure of the Deux-Montagnes train line. Organizations considered opening offices outside the downtown core and allowing employees to work from home. 

To put this in perspective, I am referring to the burbs, but I am still on the Island of Montreal and only 30 kilometres from the downtown core. For me to commute to work, it’s 1.5 hours each way. I feel for my off-island colleagues because a bridge adds to the complexity.

My options to get the office are undesirable at best: 

• A sporadic 45-minute commuter train to get into the city, plus 15 minutes to get to the parking lot and 15 minutes to walk to the office. Easily 1.5 hours each way. 
• Or I can spend up to 2 hours in the car driving into the city because the highways are also under construction and pay for parking at $25 per day; there is an early bird fee, but I never seem to be able to leave in time actually to get that rate. 

For the past couple of months, I have attempted to return to life pre-pandemic, adding 3 hours of commuting time to my eight workday hours. It was a self-sacrificing attempt to please everyone by checking all the boxes thinking this would somehow garner my points for compliance. It did not; I have gained weight, am lethargic and don’t have my typical joie de vie. 

Fortunately, I have a supportive spouse still working from home and picking up the slack, but this is not fair to him either. 

This week, I am considering re-writing the narrative on what it means to be back in the office. I will only be at my desk for part of the 8 hours and use some of my commuting time on the train to work. 

My mental and physical health are important to me and my employer.