Читать книгу Suddenly Virtual - Karin M. Reed - Страница 13

Work changed for many. With the noted exceptions of many essential workers, the so‐called “knowledge workers” were required to work differently. Instead of commutes and coffee at the corner shop, many began to roll out of bed, dress for success on the top half, make some passable coffee in a home brewing machine, and flip the laptop open for a long day of work from home. We would write our reports, crunch our numbers, take out the garbage, answer some email, fix our child's phone, deal with some urgent texts from a colleague, walk the dog, and log out an hour or two later than we did when we worked in the office. In fact, the average U.S. worker increased their hours worked per day by as much as three hours (Davis and Green 2020).

In this new work‐from‐home environment, we found ourselves no longer meeting with our colleagues face‐to‐face. The face‐to‐face meeting was banished and essentially vanished. Our video cameras came on, our cats started making cameos in our meetings, our children were now understood interruptions, and our pants became optional (hopefully unbeknownst to our colleagues). And with all of these elements of our new normal . . . the rise of the virtual meeting.