Will you go back to the office?

This - so much easier to initiate a conversation when everything is in one spot. If I am already on a call with someone and we have a question for a third, I just send them a message in teams, if they are available click a button on the same screen and they have joined the conversation. I think it is almost easier than being in person - who you are looking for is always at their desk even if they are in a meeting, and can find a second to respond at any time. No walking back and forth just to find them away from their desk.

It also seems to be slowly replacing email. That seems to be down a good 30%, maybe closer to 50%. No more short back and forth emails, that all ends up in a teams chat.

When in the office I could usually tell that someone was at their desk cause their name appeared with a green dot in outlook.

Iā€™m pretty bad with teams. Keep forgetting to have it open, so Iā€™d get an email notification that someone contacted me on teams hours ago.

I think I probably would have agreed with you before Teams became our primary messaging and collaboration app. I often had it closed and missed messages and it seemed like just another way to video conference. Regardless, the way my ā€œteamsā€ have adopted it, the struggles you are raising really arenā€™t an issue.

The thing that seems to be missing the most are the hallway conversations, or things you overhear that are important that you may not find out being away from the office. That is difficult to replace virtually.

itā€™s not like itā€™s hugely challenging to open teams. i just forget.

This.

And running into ex co-workers in the hallway and briefly catching up. Iā€™ve been setting up ā€œvirtual coffee datesā€ with prior co-workers, but itā€™s a lot more work to maintain my network than it was in person.

You can set it to automatically open when you start your computer.

When we went remote we basically ā€œrequiredā€ people to keep it open by telling them that is how we were planning to communicate with them and that would be the easiest way to ask me questions. It isnā€™t as convenient for non-work chats but it has been great work wise.

I donā€™t have a work computer. I use gotomypc from my personal laptop and teams does not work in gotomypc. I have to go on the internet outside of gotomypc and make it a point to log in. When I worked in the physical office from my computer there it opened automatically. Does not from home. I think eventually Iā€™ll get a company laptop, but dont have one now, so it is an extra step.

I agreeā€¦and this is one of the reasons that despite being mostly WFH even pre-pandemic, I miss being in the office.

However, my department has partially handled this by having semi-weekly ā€œcoffee breaksā€ on Teams, which end up being a blend of social and work chit-chat. This is in addition to daily team huddles most teams within the department have.

Itā€™s not the same as going down to the cafeteria together, or the occasional gathering that occurs when someone brings baked goods in for the departmentā€¦but it works, under the circumstances.

Itā€™ll be interesting to see what the standard practice is when the offices open back up, especially if (as we expect) most of us will remain at least part time WFH.

Where I live in the south, I find that older homes tend to be smaller, and most of them donā€™t have a garage. We found a town with a great value relative to nearby towns without being too far off the beaten path, and bought a cheaper and larger house with a garage.

Is there an easy way to have a friends list like in Skype? Weā€™re slowly transitioning to Teams and it seems good, but I do like being able to easily glance at who is around or in a call or w/e.

Iā€™m no Teams expert, but this aspect is lacking for me (if someone else knows of a way to get a friends list, let me know).

Because of the way Teams is set up, I have IMā€™d someone thinking I was IMing just them, but it turns out itā€™s a group chat from a prior meeting and they were the last one to post in it, so their name is listed first. That could be very bad at some point, so Iā€™ve gotten better at double checking before typing anything.

After posting that, I pulled up Teams. Looks like there is a way, I changed the setting from ā€œChatā€ to ā€œContactsā€. I suspect that when group chats come up, I may have to switch views, but Iā€™m keeping it like this for now.

Thanks! Thatā€™s helpfulā€¦ now itā€™d be nice to have just that little piece of the windowā€¦

And Iā€™ve also discovered I may be one of the few people on my team who have Teams going everydayā€¦

Scratch that, I think it took a second to update statuses

Yes, I copied all my Skype contacts over to Teams contacts, in the same groups. I use that feature a lot.

If your list of friends that you want to keep track of is small you can pin the chat to the top.

Itā€™s so weird that Iā€™m now at the 2nd valuation year for most of my cases where itā€™s all done remotely. Last year I had to run to the office to scan the prior years paper files or ask someone else to do it who was in the office. Now itā€™s all electronic and no longer a need for that.

congrats on joining the 21st century!

I honestly didnā€™t think it was possible prior to covid for us to go full remote with all that paper, but here we are and I was wrong.

I work very closely with one coworker in particular, and we share work IMs almost every day and occasionally have a call every month or two. Itā€™s about 80% work but also 20% play. I may not be talking much with co-workers but instead I get to see my family more and Iā€™ll take that tradeoff even though I get on fine with all my colleagues.

I would continue staying remote, and if I have a good interview this week maybe it will stay that way. Even though I have an effortless commute, saving $2 of gas and 30 minutes round-trip each day and not being trapped somewhere I donā€™t really want to be 8 hours a day looking always busy is worth a lot to me.

I believe Humana may make everyone who has been working from home permanently agile moving forward (we can work wherever we want). They will also get rid of all leased workspaces in Louisville.