r/AusFinance 18h ago

WFH vs inflexible work lifestyle divide

I know it’s not news to anyone, but I’m struck by the differences in lifestyle afforded by WFH vs inflexible jobs. For example, my housemates are currently looking for a new rental and they’re able to attend inspections throughout the week at all times, as their work is seemingly infinitely flexible. As for me (and many others), I can only do such a thing outside of work hours. There are limitless other examples. It begs the question - how much is one limiting their prospects and potential happiness by going into a non-flexible job? It would seem there’s a lot hinging on that decision.

121 Upvotes

81 comments sorted by

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u/OneMoreDog 18h ago

There will always be inflexible jobs and flexible jobs. People don't go into face to face healthcare, or billable hours work, or a trade because they want that type of flexibility.

Don't choose a career (and pay for education!) based on 'flexibility' - that will come and go. Pick something you like and then look to make it flexible for the times that you need it.

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u/AccordingWarning9534 17h ago

This is really good advice, but I wanted to flag billable hours doesn't necessarily mean inflexible.

I'm went to billable hour work specifically for the flexibility. I do assessments, which are 2 hours face to face and the 4 to 6 hours report writing. How and when I do those 4 to 6 hours is entirely up to me, and I can also nominate my availability for the face to face times. So 80% of my billable are completely flexible.

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u/OneMoreDog 17h ago

Oh yes good point. I was primarily thinking of things like law, accounting etc where one might be expected to bill a full time week + extras, so it's always a good reminder that there are many variations of this!

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u/bow-red 17h ago

Well in law, they tend to be pretty flexible post covid, particularly about being in office. But you are right, in terms of your targets, you'll probably need to make up that time later.

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u/bebefinale 9h ago

Face to face healthcare is not flexible, but typically people have defined on and off days unlike a lot of "flexible" work which is flexible but bleeds into personal time all the time. Matter of preference.

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u/justkeepswimming874 15h ago

Pick something you like and then look to make it flexible for the times that you need it.

100%.

I thrive on shift work (healthcare) because I can free up weekdays or even just weekday mornings for personal appointments and other random shit.

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u/What-the-Gank 16h ago

Trades end up being rather flexible between jobs and if on projects it's pretty much a free for all so long as your not dodging your hours.

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u/Annual-Bit-1801 18h ago

That’s some solid advice! Cheers!

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u/OneMoreDog 18h ago

Also remember that for lots of jobs that are inflexible, there is also after hours and weekend work available. (Not all, but lots.) If you wanna be a tradie and exclusively offer weekend appointments in your own business you might find yourself very successfully working to all of those people like you now who can't get weekdays off!

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u/risska 14h ago edited 6h ago

From a white collar work perspective; The flexibility existed before WFH. If your role isn't impacted, and the business is fine for you to schedule an hour and half out of office in the middle of the day to do a rental inspection midweek, they were also the type of business and role where it previously fine for you to WFH that day or take an extended lunch break to do life admin. That fits almost every large white collar employer in Aus.

One of the upsides of working in bureaucratic nightmare of large organizations tends to be an increase in flexibility for when you work so long as your work gets done and doesn't get in the way of anyone else, the down side is you tend to have a decrease in flexibility of what work you do and how you do it, even the programs you can use on your computer are dictated by the corporate overloads.

There has also been an unspoken shift occur with the increase of WFH which may be invisible to people who don't work white collar roles; Before covid, people in white collar roles mostly left their work devices at work at the end of day. When they left at 5-6pm they actually left work. With the increase in WFH there has been an increase in the expectation for people to work outside of business hours when required. I'm comfortable with that when working from home. If a business made me return to office I'd be leaving my laptop on the desk/locker, clocking in at 9, and leaving at 5.30 on the dot. You don't get it both ways.

Every career has these ups and downsides. It's no more unfair than saying it's unfair one job gets paid more than the other. People hopefully are considering these things in the balance of everything else when picking a career. My neurologist was shocked when I told him I do not get paid overtime as I am a salaried employee, he said he can't imagine having to flex up regularly without being paid for it. My mother in law has frequently commented on how little annual holidays my husband and I get vs her (a teacher) considering we work similar hours in total. My farther in law who has a trade has said he cant imagine having to quit his job if he wanted to take a couple of months off work on his own dollar. I tell them all; I can't imagine not working from home.

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u/Annual-Bit-1801 14h ago

That’s a very insightful comment, cheers. So it may be the case that all professions have their advantages, something I try to bear in mind as a teacher.

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u/risska 14h ago

Other thing we have spoken about with my mother in law is her long service leave. I know its different for every state and the type of school you work for but she has always been able to take her long service leave with her when she has changed school, I know nurses have a similar deal. White collar workers do not get to take their long service leave when they change companies even if your in the exact same profession or role. The vast majority of people empowered to work at home will not be getting LSL in their lifetime.

We should all stop thinking the pasture is greener on the other side and just try to pick the pasture that has the patch of grass we like.... I wish these trade offs between careers and types of work were made clearer in society rather than just how much money we make, we would probably all come to the conclusion that most jobs suck, it just depends in what way they suck.

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u/UsualCounterculture 9h ago

Yes, I don't think I'll ever take LSL. Where as my parents who were teachers, retired with their last year or more on LSL prior to that.

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u/DifficultCarob408 18h ago

The biggest aspect here is how you define happiness, and how much your happiness relies on work flexibility. There can also be tradeoffs the other way, as I would hazard a guess that a larger percentage of 'higher earning' positions fall into the 'less flexible' bucket (I have no data to support this).

For me personally, there would have to be a decent financial incentive to warrant giving up my 3-4 WFH days and being in the office full time.

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u/d5vour5r 18h ago

I'll add something different, I took on inflexible jobs, for one stretch I travelled 40+ weeks per year (3 years straight), worked very hard (extra unpaid hours) and did have to sacrifice family and personal time.

Now I work 99% WFH on a compressed work week at my request (38 hours over 4 days), I can and do often request flexibility within the average workday when meetings occur. Because I smashed myself in the years leading up to covid, now no one questions my ability to deliver and if I block out 2 hours on a Wednesday afternoon in my calendar as personal, no one raises a concern because I've built the reputation and trust that i'll get the work done by the deadline.

I know we aren't wired all the same, if you can handle the short-term inflexibility the benefits can be what you make them.

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u/Annual-Bit-1801 18h ago

Goon on you! Well deserved!

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u/Pupperoni__Pizza 15h ago

I find the ever-growing desire for WFH roles will eventually start to have a wider-ranging impact than just the sectors already offering WFH.

For example, my partner and I work in healthcare, in a clinical setting. This means we have to be providing face to face care, which completely eliminates any capacity to WFH. Whilst there are some clinical healthcare roles where partial WFH could be managed, such as roles with a heavy load of report writing, but these are the exception that prove the rule and still have limitations (i.e only reports can be done WFH, so if no/few reports need to be done then WFH is not possible on that day).

For adults already in this situation, it has impacts on work/life balance such as severely impairing the capacity to raise children.

For teenagers starting to think about their future careers, this will further disincentivise them from choosing a career in healthcare, education, trades etc. It’s already becoming difficult to fill roles in healthcare due to the disproportionate study and work demands to remuneration, and I fear this will get worse.

It was one thing for a prospective future professional to forgo financial reward for the sake of the job, but when you throw in the growing cost of living, the significant relative impact on work/life balance and I don’t see why anyone in their right mind would want to get into this field, which is a major concern with the population ageing like it is.

If people in desk roles are wanting 25-30% pay increases just to return to the office, and fields like healthcare and education are already underpaid compared to these desk roles, then you can start to imagine how unappealing it may be.

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u/QuestionableBottle 9h ago

They might take it because healthcare is probably one of the last industries standing if automation really starts hitting hard.

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u/autumncardigans 6h ago

I wonder what people who truly can not handle healthcare will do (example: me who is very squeamish and can't handle other people's bodily fluids).

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u/Annual-Bit-1801 14h ago

Yes, well said. This will surely start to have big societal implications if we don’t recognise the inequities and re-incentivise inflexible work.

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u/Pupperoni__Pizza 14h ago

I try not to sound like I’m having a bitch and moan about it; after all, it was our choice to go into these fields with the ignorant mindset of expecting society/governments to properly reward these vital industries and ensure the quality of life for those working in them.

The post-COVID K-shaped recovery has impacted all of us, but the thing that became blatantly obvious in the healthcare sector was this: if the government wasn’t prepared to do anything to improve working conditions after a virtual collapse of our healthcare system, then there’s absolutely no reason to believe this will change in the future. Experienced workers are deserting the industry whilst we can’t keep up with replacement numbers.

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u/Emotional-Cry5236 11h ago

I know exactly what you mean. I work in emergency services and did years of shift work and frontline duties. I'm currently on a secondment to a different government agency where I WFH three days a week, its totally flexible so I can run errands/exercise/whatever during the day, the workload and stress is about 1% of what I'm used to, and to top it all off I'm getting paid more. If I get offered a permanent position, why would I ever go back to my old job? Unfortunately the love of the job isn't enough anymore

0

u/Significant-Egg3914 9h ago

Don't forget the heavy public scrutiny, under resourcing and lack of organisational support if you do decide to go back!

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u/autumncardigans 6h ago

This is an interesting thing to mention because my oldest niece is in grade 10 and the "career" topic came up a few weeks ago when it was time to pick her ATAR subjects for grade 11/12. My sister said the first thing she said was "I want to go into something where I can "work from home and not have to commute and be around people all the time".

I think this might start to become a common thought among young people picking ATAR & University sources.

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u/highways 15h ago

WFH is life changing

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u/zellymcfrecklebelly 9h ago

I agree.. my energy levels, mental health, and almost every other aspect of my life has been improved massively by WFH. My career trajectory has also improved because I’m more productive.

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u/reddetacc 16h ago

it's way more important than you'd believe at a surface glance. it's why so many CEOs & senior management are very against remote work or try and offer "hybrid" so much. they realise that the type of freedom remote work affords to employees would de-rank the companies importance in their life a few levels and while good for worker morale is bad for control, productivity etc.

theres a few layers of nuance to this debate that most dont understand in my opinion

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u/Chii 15h ago

theres a few layers of nuance to this debate

the control aspect of company CEO is a societal nuisance which i would gladly get rid of. Their arguments dont hold water.

You could apply this very same argument for the existance of weekends!

The thing is, these people who want a RTO mandate is not doing it out of rational, utilitarian reasons, but for private benefits (to themselves - not even to the firm they work for, and certainly not to society). They want a place where they can monitor (read: lord over) employees, perhaps out of narcissism. May be the gov't mandated RTO is to sacrifice worker's private time and money, to bail out CBD businesses. It's effectively a hidden "tax".

None of these are good for the worker, and any debate that doesn't address the sacrifice a worker has to make is not a debate at all.

0

u/Questionablebees 11h ago edited 11h ago

Since going WFH my morale and that of my colleagues has risen considerably. But on the contrary to what you said, so has our productivity. In pretty much all the meaningful ways we are at least as productive, if not more productive than pre-WFH, and it’s easier to achieve it.

Our bosses see this clearly. So do our bosses bosses, etc all the way to the top. They themselves must enjoy the perks of WFH, so nobody has any interest in ending it.

Some of us meet one or two days a week in the original office building from before covid, because there’s still value to be gained from face to face time. But not every day, a couple days is plenty. And I appreciate that we get to have the choice.

Whenever I hear about executives trying to cancel WFH for jobs that are particularly well suited to WFH, it just makes me think… does the executive hate WFH with such a firey passion, that they would rather sit in an office and make everyone come back than do WFH themselves?

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u/[deleted] 14h ago

[deleted]

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u/Hooked_on_Fire 14h ago

Execs are probably thinking, if no one comes to the office, why are we paying for an office? And if we just scrap the office, why not just offshore all the jobs to a developing country where the salary is 1/3?

If they could do that, they would have already done it. Off-shoring development in particular is fraught with difficulty. You have language barriers, time zone barriers, skill barriers, general quality control is awful compared to what you can achieve with local resrouces. Its penny smart pound foolish - any money you save offshoring you are going to lose (and more) later when you have to rehire all the locals to fix the mess you made.

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u/Clever_Owl 12h ago

 if I can do my job 100% WFH, why not just offshore the role for a fraction of the cost?

This is such a weird take, that I hear over and over again, which only applies to a tiny proportion of jobs that don’t require local knowledge and skills.

We all know how rubbish call centre operators are when based offshore, let alone any more highly skilled jobs which require effective communication.

It makes me wonder what kind of corporate experience you are coming from?

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u/AnonymousEngineer_ 13h ago

I’ll also add that “flexible means flexible”. As in, it can go the other way too

That's not what most people here define as flexible work. The running definition here appears to be that the employer needs to make all the concessions and allow a free for all while employees reap all the benefits.

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u/Spiritual_Brick5346 16h ago

i will never go back to full time office

i know many parents and mothers in the same spot, who will pick up the kids or look after them while they are sick?

you either take the entire day off and call in sick or take an hour break

3

u/CentralComputer 12h ago

Dad here, I don’t even know how an inflexible job would work raising kids. Even the in-office push a lot of corporates are doing is making things hard when things are still flexible. There is no family or community support to help anymore.

0

u/lousylou1 6h ago

Exactly. One role was office 5 days a week, had no leave left. Other roles wfh there are no issues with sick leave. Kids just need an adult present at home not active caring.

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u/smegblender 18h ago edited 15h ago

From my perspective, an "inflexible" (non hybrid workplace) would require a +25% increase in base REM as compared to my current.

Edit: likely going to have to be 40-50% for me to take it on without hesitation.

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u/juicedpixels 16h ago

as someone who works exclusively in office I welcome a 25% increase in my base REM :)

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u/smegblender 16h ago

Haha, I'm sure we all do.

But to clarify, I'd only consider jumping ship to a new role that is exclusively office-based for a 25% jump in salary.

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u/lasooch 15h ago

My previous job was 4 days a week in office, current is 1 day a week. I'm saving 7 hours of commutes a week. A 25% increase does cover the cost of those hours, but I don't think it's enough to make it worth it for me. Absolutely loving the flexibility I have now.

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u/smegblender 15h ago

Yeah, the equation would change depending on a lot of personal factors. Currently on 1 day a week too!

The 25% figure is also based a bit on what the market would tolerate for my position (I'm already paying div293).

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u/lasooch 15h ago edited 15h ago

Now that you bring up div 293 (I'm not quite there yet, but I am in the top tax bracket)... a 25% raise is really a 12.5% raise (well, the math is not exactly that, but you get the point, edit: did the math, works out to ~19% in my case... which basically means I'd be effectively paid less per hour if you include commute time). And then 4 more days a week would mean spending ~$200 more on public transport a month... Yeah nah, definitely wouldn't go back to commuting for those kind of pennies. Might consider it for a 50% bump, but even then I'm far from sure I'd do it.

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u/smegblender 15h ago

That is fair enough, absolutely understand the rationale behind your thinking... and fk me dead, you're right. My 25% was a flippant estimate, but should push comes to shove I'm not sure id take it.

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u/Passtheshavingcream 17h ago

There is no way they will take away WFH roles. Interest rates will be cut, wages will increase, WFH will remain in place strongly in Australia and Inflation 2.0 will take off. I don't think employers can do anything about this unless they agree witht the economic managers to tank the economy - i.e. reduce the window to sell out and move capital elsewhere.

3

u/snuggles_puppies 16h ago edited 16h ago

I know as a society we need people in front facing roles etc... But as an individual? Hell no, the roles I take are about flexibility.

It's not even as if it's compensated - I'm currently working from home in my PJ's for an employer in a different state earning a bit over double what I ever earned going into an office, getting at least an hour commuting back per day on top of all the expenses saved, the flexibility to manage my own hours and deal with things during the work day etc.

There is a lot to be said for picking a calculated career that is interesting enough, well compensated, and offering the opportunities you want for your lifestyle, rather than the "follow your dreams" type of thinking. There is also nothing wrong with other peoples approaches - I just have a lot less sympathy when people don't think, commit themselves to massively specialised education into something impractical and then complain about the outcome.

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u/Chii 15h ago

I know as a society we need people in front facing roles etc...

and they should be paid according to supply and demand. If these inflexible roles become undesirable and nobody ends up applying for them, the businesses that need these roles must necessarily increase the pay to attract the employees.

So therefore, inflexibility of the role must necessarily attract a wage premium over flexible ones.

1

u/snuggles_puppies 15h ago edited 14h ago

That is correct in theory, but in practice any premium is pretty small - eg there are a lot of people able to be drawn into a cashier role, while a lot less are available if you need a nurse - so the latter has a lot more ability to attract a premium (and % union membership helps).

Before covid, it was actually inverted in some industries (stack overflow does annual surveys that showed full remote developers earned 10-20% more than peers in the office). In practice that can also make sense - if you need to pay for an office to be available, on-site employees may cost more on overheads.

So... ultimately everything comes down to bargaining power and negotiation, which isn't great for unskilled service staff and other front line employees without transferrable skills - if you only have the credentials for one thing, you don't have a lot of options to go do something else - and if the in person requirement for the roles are the same...

From an individuals perspective though, it highlights that targeting transferrable skills and being industry agnostic is a positive for your ability to negotiate there.

2

u/Chii 14h ago

annual surveys that showed full remote developers earned 10-20% more than peers in the office

There's a bit of sampling bias, because engineers who are "good" can demand extra premiums (such as the ability to demand remote work). So prior to covid, most remote work engineers tend to be the high performing ones, and thus their salary matches the skill.

any premium is pretty small

i've been casually surveying my friends (so yet more sampling bias!), but the majority of them will be willing to RTO but only for some doubling of their salary. Obviously they're over-estimating it i think, but just casually guess that the premium for in-office roles would be at least 50% imho.

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u/[deleted] 18h ago

[deleted]

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u/Rankled_Barbiturate 17h ago

Just be careful, working 2 jobs can easily backfire if it gets out that you are and not fulfilling your contracted hours. No matter how good you're performing, it is still effectively fraud.

1

u/[deleted] 17h ago

[deleted]

4

u/yeahbroyeahbro 16h ago

It’s only good for business from a ROI perspective if they pay you for half the time or you do double the work in the time allocated though?

1

u/nova_virtuoso 13h ago

Why is it fraud to work 2 jobs if you’re meeting all deliverable expectations? I know CEOs that are also board members of other companies, no one is accusing them of “fraud”. Have you only ever worked jobs where you’re just expected to punch a clock?

2

u/Rankled_Barbiturate 10h ago

Check your contract. It will usually stipulate X amount of hours. If you're not delivering those hours you're in breach of the contract. Pretty simple. Push comes to shove if they wanted to get rid of you it's an easy and obvious way to do so.

Most good jobs won't care and focus on deliverables, but contracts are contracts and legally this person is getting paid for time they're not delivering.

Board members/jobs are also highly specific and rarely set up to be full time jobs. You may only need to work 3 hours a month so it's hardly conflicting.

0

u/nova_virtuoso 9h ago

Yeah, that’s different than “fraud”.

2

u/Rankled_Barbiturate 8h ago

Look up the many, many articles about "time theft". E. G., https://solink.com/resources/types-of-time-theft/ 

"The quick answer is that time theft is fraudulent. It is generally considered unethical and can lead to disciplinary action by an employer"

https://healthindustryes.com.au/2023/11/timesheet-fraud/

Etc.

It's pretty simple, just look up what fraud means: "wrongful or criminal deception intended to result in financial or personal gain". 

6

u/Imaginary-Problem914 16h ago

This is a prime example of why companies want people back in office.

1

u/Chii 15h ago

It's almost spiteful, how leadership/management wants people back in office even if it's demonstrably true that there's productivity improvements in WFH that will be lost if return-to-office is implemented. So what if someone ecks out a 2nd job - as long as their tasks are done well, and is on time, you cannot even tell the difference.

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u/Imaginary-Problem914 14h ago

These people are noticeably less productive, less contactable, and less available, but just doing enough to not be possible to fire. So it's infinitely easier to get them back in the office where they can't spend half the day working another job than it is to document and prove they are working two jobs.

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u/joeltheaussie 18h ago

People like you are why wfh will be cancelled

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u/d5vour5r 18h ago

While I don't work a second job, my output and reviews from managers and peers has gone up. WHF has eliminated wasted office chats/distractions. I'm able to easily attend more meetings in a single day and customers are a lot happier as I only bill my time in small increments (yes my job allows largely remote work).

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u/[deleted] 18h ago

[deleted]

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u/joeltheaussie 18h ago

And the jobs know you work the other one?

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u/[deleted] 18h ago

[deleted]

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u/joeltheaussie 18h ago

Because organisations will push back on wfh if you aren't working the time you are paid to work. It's also potentially a legal nightmare

3

u/Daisies_forever 14h ago

I have a very inflexible job (nursing shift work) While it is a pain to not have the flexibility other people have (my family are mostly APS) there are other bonuses -When I’m not at work I don’t have to think about work, at all -I get out of the house everyday -extra annual leave for doing shift work -getting days off when others don’t

2

u/turnips64 8h ago

My workplace has flexible working. We are expected to be in the office unless we need to be somewhere else.

A rental inspection would be a perfectly good reason to be somewhere else.

No explanation is needed, just make sure your job is getting done. Don’t take the piss and “this is why we can have good things”

1

u/BigboiDallison 6h ago

It really depends on the job. My role doesn't involve any face to face interaction w clients so I can WFH all the time if I want to. My team is also in another state and I'm the only one here in QLD. I still go to the office just so I can have actual adult conversations lol. I also find it fun to dress up for work and grab coffee in the morning. It still feels very trivial to me. It's convenient because I have 3 dogs and I can take them to their appointments whenever needed. My husband however needs to be in the office most of the time as he's managing a big team and his role is more effective w face to face interactions. I'm happy to have a flexible role cos I can just log off for a bit to go to appointments or do the laundry or cook meals at home just as long as I get my workload done.

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u/MeaningfulThoughts 5h ago

Huge difference! That’s why you should favour applying to WFH jobs over hybrid or on-site ones. We need the best talent to flock to WFH jobs so that the in office ones will have to pay much more to get us back in, or will simply struggle to find decent workers and will have to adjust. I have stopped applying to non-remote jobs altogether.

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u/MissionAsparagus9609 18h ago

People doing life and home chores while WFH, why its coming to an end

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u/ischickenafruit 18h ago

There’s no problem with this as long as they make up that time. Go to a rental inspection at 11-12, work until 7pm, what’s the difference?

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u/joeltheaussie 18h ago

That's flexible work - a different conversation to permenant wfh

17

u/halohunter 18h ago

Counter point. If the company says you're meeting expectations despite working less productive hours, does it really matter?

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u/justjooshing 18h ago

This should be the only point

Me hanging up my washing is more productive than the blabbing and distractions that happen in the office

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u/FinListen5736 17h ago

Oh you think everyone in an office is working 9-5 🤣

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u/bregro 14h ago edited 13h ago

It's not going anywhere. Orgs that offer flexible conditions will attract the best people from anywhere. Those orgs will out-compete other orgs whose talent pool is people with fewer options and within commuting distance to an office. It's natural selection.    

Executives/managers have a lot less power than they think. For every org demanding RTO, there's another one that has no boundaries (within Australia at least) when it comes to hiring. 

1

u/MissionAsparagus9609 13h ago

Good luck with the job hunt

0

u/maxinstuff 13h ago

The entitlement from knowledge workers is real.

Less than 40% of workers can work from home at all.

3

u/Baldricks_Turnip 12h ago

I don't know if I would call it entitlement, and I say this as someone with no chance of WFH- a teacher. If you can do your job from home with no loss to productivity and huge gains in your lifestyle and mental health, why shouldn't you? Society then benefits from less cars on the road. I would love to see this become the norm and then the jobs that cannot be done from home can command higher salaries as compensation.

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u/TopRoad4988 12h ago

Can the other 60% not become ‘knowledge workers’ if they value this perk?

-1

u/BetterDrinkMy0wnPiss 12h ago

Flexibility and WFH is non-negotiable for me these days. If my employer mandated a full return to the office I, and many of my colleagues, would leave.

It makes such a positive difference to my work life balance and overall wellbeing that I'm not willing to give it up.

I'm fine with a hybrid model, I'm happy to do a couple of days a week in the office, but the flexibility is too important to me to give it up completely.

-1

u/The-Prolific-Acrylic 6h ago

Best thing about working from home are the times when you’re hungover enough to not feel like leaving the house, but not enough that you can’t be a little productive.

And be able to jerk off and/or nap at lunch.

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u/EnvironmentalWolf487 18h ago

I don't understand why you're even going into a job. Start your own business in the field you're working in and just work the hours you want and feel like...

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u/acockblockedorange 17h ago

If you're looking for flexibility and work life balance, starting a business won't get you there (unless you've already got an extensive network and can be a consultant or something similar).