Home Office or Commute to Work?
Dear Carie— I've been working from home since the pandemic started. Now my supervisor, ‘Betty,’ wants me to come back into the office regularly. She doesn't seem to understand my health concerns, and the fact that I can be just as productive at home. She says I am missing out on the opportunity to have personal encounters with my colleagues which, she says, would improve my relationships with them and could result in better collaboration and new ways of approaching our work and solving problems. I want to stay at home. I feel safer here. But I am afraid I might lose my job. What should I do?
Derek
Dear Derek:
To negotiate successfully, you’ll need to understand what you really, truly want in your broad range of possibilities. You could keep doing what you are doing, or agree to what Betty is asking for. You could embrace a new job if it actually gives you more than Betty can or will. And, of course, you and Betty could negotiate a hybrid scenario.
My first suggestion is to think very seriously about your statement ‘I am afraid I might lose my job.’ Is a new job possible? Could you have one that let you work at home? If the answer is yes, cultivate that possibility.
Why? For two reasons. First, I get a slight sense of yes/no tunnel vision, and embracing a third option is a good way out of that. Second, you want to have, and to project, a sense of confidence and groundedness when you negotiate with Betty. Knowing you have options just changes feeling of the conversation. You don’t even have to tell her. Know it yourself.
My second suggestion is to jump forward in time. You have at least four future scenarios: stay home, work in the office, negotiate a hybrid or get a different job. All but the first require some sort of kerfuffle, whether it is the negotiations, the move, or the job-hunting. Don’t let the near term bobble over-influence your long-term happiness.
In pursuing your best alternative, in understanding what you really, truly want, there’s a mix of ‘what would be pleasant for me over these years’ and ‘how will this shape me?’ Think ahead to the length of time this decision-making with Betty will start to be incorporated into your daily life… after a while changes sort of smooth out in the timeline… and now, looking forward to that smoothed-out time—3? 5 years from now?—think of who you will be, how you will have been shaped, by your upcoming decisions. Who is your future you under each of these scenarios?
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What’s the mood of your future you? The shape, the attitude, the look of you? Negotiate for the future self you want to be.
Be very specific about the differences. For instance, you mentioned feeling safe. Is your future you safe in one scenario but not in another? How so? You might realize that ‘safe’ is less about germs and more about noise and hubbub, or less about hubbub and more about the commute, or maybe it is Betty’s collaboration tendencies that are truly frightening. (I feel that!)
When you sort through these future scenarios, you’ll see what you like but you’ll also see who you like. A picture of what you want to negotiate for will start to emerge. Maybe this will clarify for you that you really don’t want to come back to the office under any conditions, so you must negotiate with Betty in this narrow window, and accept the possibility of looking for another job. (Or maybe it will show you something quite different.)
Spend some extra time with the hybrid scenario. For example, maybe you have negotiated for fewer days in the office, or a different office set-up, or that you can come in at a different time to avoid the worst commute. Tune different features in and out and see whether that future self perks up a bit. Or not.
Now you have a notion of the things that really, truly matter to you. If you have that, you will be miles ahead of most people in a negotiation.
But. Let’s say you actually had a little bit of fun with this imaginative exploration. If so, you could strengthen your negotiation position even more by imagining you are Betty and going through the same scenarios from her perspective.
Then go and advocate for the things you really want, and trade those for some of the things Betty really wants (but maybe didn’t even know she wanted).
Good luck!
Conflict Skills
Negotiating on behalf of your future self.
So you don’t pay disproportionate attention to immediate kerfuffles
So you think not only about your comfort over time but also about how you want to shape your future self.
Generate at least three quite different options, to keep the conversation limber
Assume the person you are negotiating with does not truly understand her own interests, and try to imagine what they might be… (you’ll be in a much more powerful position)