Changing Workplace Concepts

Abstract

As I’ve quipped more than a few times to colleagues over the past year-and-a-half of COVID-19 restrictions, I’ve been practicing for a pandemic for more than 20 years. I am all too familiar with the pros and cons of working from home over extended periods. I was a pioneer in that arena, starting in the days (about 1999) when using a modem and my home telephone line to dial into the Internet was a technology breakthrough. I couldn’t have started my at-home business without that outside link to the world and a way to exchange digital files with my designer, who had moved to the other side of the continent. But, even with the blistering speed that fiber-optic cabling now provides for efficiently exchanging ever larger files between us (we still work together and we still live far away from each other), I appreciate more than most the value of working face-to-face daily with colleagues.