Hot desking, anyone?

Hiya,

I probably should have posted this before the last one but I’m sure you’ll forgive me 🙂

So, you’re not gonna believe this but I’ve been thinking about work a fair bit recently. Probably because the time is drawing near when I will have to step out of maternity leave and back into the world of work. The only problem is I realise just how much I don’t want to be a garment tech anymore.

The other day, Mr E was a bit short with the girls in the morning as he was rushing to get out of the door and he seemed to think they were moving at a sails pace. To be fair, when you use the words ‘hurry’ or ‘quickly’ to my girls it does seem like they do the exact opposite and move as slowly as they possibly can. But that day they were pretty on the ball so I had a word in his ear and Mr E apologised to them. He didn’t feel the apology on its own was enough so he pulled out a chair and made them both sit on it.

Mr E: “And that’s what happens when I don’t get to work early”

Little Miss: “You have to share your seat?”

Mr E: “No – I just mean there aren’t enough desks and I won’t get to sit at my desk if I get in too late.”

‘My’ desk? It reminded me of when career break came back to work – do you remember I told you how weird she was? She walked in and the first thing she said was “I guess I’ll have to get used to sitting over here now”. I nodded because yeah – she was gonna have to get used to it.

Then there was the fuss a year or so later when our team had a desk move and career break point blank refused to move becasue she didn’t want to lose her shelf – seriously! It then meant that we were left on the end whilst the rest of the team filled up the empty spaces – anyone walking past always stopped and asked why we weren’t sitting with our team. I wanted to say “because Career Break thinks it’s better to keep a shelf than to interact with the rest of our team”.

She wasn’t the only one that got all bent out of shape about it – one of the assistants nearly cried because she was now sat the opposite way and couldn’t see what was happening on the rest of the floor (personally, I think it was because her back was no longer to the wall and she couldn’t be on the net all day but what do I know…).

2022 Update:

Oh, those were the days! Who would have thought a virus would completely change the way we work? Who would have thought that the flexible working that I had to fight so hard for would become commonplace? A lot of those former colleagues have left the fashion industry all together – something I would have thought ridiculous if you’d have told me back then.

As for Mr E, he now works from home and never has to worry about someone using his desk. He does, however, have to contend with me switching off the TV that he’s fallen asleep watching on his two-hour lunch break…

Speak soon x