Working from Home vs. the Office
by Jack Guarnieri, Jersey Jack Pinball & PinballSales.com
How do you get the “kids” to play ball with each other? I’m talking about your company’s team players.
With the pandemic fading further away in the rearview mirror, there are still more workers returning to the office. Once there, what is the benefit to productivity and the bottom line? I think offices in general are places where workers can collaborate and get things done, which is important to productivity, team building and more.
Despite its benefits, not all employees welcome the return to the old ways. The work-from-home change that took off during Covid was one that many embraced. There was no wasted travel time, no travel expenses and no long lunches. But there wasn’t any face-to-face interaction with colleagues either. Zoom and Teams meetings bridged the gap, but there’s nothing like in-person communication.
From an employer standpoint, companies were lucky to have remote workers but, in general, they didn’t particularly like it because it made tracking some work product results and people more difficult.
If we’re all in the office, I can see when Bill is at his desk, and if I can see him, he must be working. Now that Bill is still working from home, is he working when he should be? And if he’s not in our physical office, why do I need to rent expensive space for him?
Good workers always seem to be in short supply so if Bill is doing his job and won’t come to the office every day, I guess the boss must either accept that or lose Bill. In many ways, it’s the worker that seems to have the upper hand over the employer today.
That said, it’s your job as the boss to build a team wherever they may be. You need your team to be made up of people who buy into your business with passion. It’s difficult, but it’s worthwhile despite whatever challenges you face. It’s all about building your brand and a culture that fosters the “three Cs”: cooperation, collaboration and communication.
The last C, communication, is vital. Use any opportunity to be physically present with your colleagues to build work relationships that create great teamwork. Share the burden of your work and share your successes. It makes the job much more rewarding.
Play ball!
Jack Guarnieri started servicing electromechanical pinball machines in 1975 and has been involved in every phase of the amusement game business since then. He was an operator in NYC, then began a distributorship in 1999, PinballSales.com, selling coin-op to the consumer market. In January of 2011, he founded Jersey Jack Pinball (named after his RePlay Magazine pen name), which builds award-winning, full-featured, coin-op pinball machines. Email Jack at jack@jerseyjackpinball.com.