With the permanency of Remote and Hybrid work models concretely established, it is important to now separate them from the context in which they arose (i.e. the Pandemic).
For many workers, the first contact they had with remote work was during the pandemic – a time when they were battling health concerns, hospitalization, loneliness, uncertainty, paralyzing boredom or unremitting fear.
For these workers, their first experience with remote work reasonably felt tainted with negative feelings. Despite this, the fact that there is so much clamour for remote or hybrid work speaks volumes about the positives attached.
That said, in a post-pandemic world, when remote work no longer carries the association of doom and gloom that the pandemic has cast upon people, let’s imagine how life changes with remote or hybrid work post-pandemic! A picture is worth a thousand words, so let us paint a picture. Hopefully, you see your life in it in some form or another:
It is 2023.
The pandemic has now moved to the rear-view mirror.
Sheila, 31, stays in Mumbai with her husband Aman, 36. She works remotely for a design firm in New Hampshire while Aman works for a marketing firm headquartered in Delhi – the marketing firm has a Hybrid work arrangement wherein Aman goes to the Delhi HQ for two days every two months and to the Mumbai branch once every week.
Sheila and Aman wake up to a new day. They’ve got enough time on their hands to make fresh pancakes for breakfast. Their morning routines are calm and at no point do they find themselves rushing. Aman surprises her with a new kind of syrup he had got and hidden for a pancake day.
After a ninety-minute breakfast and news session, they head to shower and change for work and head to their respective workstations. After spending an hour on prep work, Sheila attends a video call meeting from 11:00 AM to 12:00 PM after which she spends an hour updating her presentations with the outcome of the video call.
Aman has to design a promotion strategy for a client today. He works at it full tilt in a darkened room with instrumental music on headphones that he feels spikes his creativity. He does this till the afternoon and then heads down for lunch.
Sheila has just started cooking vegetable pasta for them. Aman helps with the sauce, whips up a fresh salad and they have lunch together.
After finishing up, Sheila goes for a stroll with her neighbour around the block and picks up some dog food on her way back. Aman, on the other hand, wants to finish the last three pages of the book he was reading last night.
They resume work at 2. Towards the evening, Sheila is done with her presentation and budgetary assessment due that day. She inquires with Aman and he says he would need an hour more. She snips her plants, waters them, awards her dogs a belly rub, makes some coffee and sits near him on the balcony enjoying the sunset reflecting off the glass facades. There is comfortable silence between them.
After Aman finishes up, they go for an hour-long walk with their dog and then come back to a plate of momos that they have ordered. They love the momos because they go very well with a sauce Aman buys from a vendor in Delhi during his visits and the rice crispies he buys on his way to work every week. Monday momos they call them.
Over dessert (a plate of Apple Cider Donuts from Sheila’s supervisor), they decode to watch a movie together. Since it was Aman’s turn to pick, they picked a sci-fi movie. Though it’s now quite late at night, they don’t have to worry about commuting as they can afford to sleep in an extra hour the next morning and shorten their breakfast from 90 to 60 minutes.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
A senior banker from the complex global markets space, Mr Nishant Shah has worked for more than two decades across Citibank, Standard Chartered and JPMorgan Chase before taking over as our Managing Partner. Passionate with word and pen about finance, technology, macroeconomics and future trends, he is a Chartered Accountant by education and the winner of various prestigious awards during his career, including the ‘India Awards for Excellence’.
