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Frank Busch had this fantasy of working from home.
In it, there was no having to drive to work, no more time-consuming business trips and no need to dress up.
All have come true.
But the fantasy has lost some of its lustre.
"The kids are driving me nuts," says Busch good naturedly.
"And there seems to be no separation from work and home anymore. It's now fair ball to take calls at dinner time and be on a Zoom call at 7 pm."
Like most of us, Busch was forced to work from home when COVID hit in March.
He's still working from home with no end in sight.
Busch and two business partners own and operate Nation Fund, a West Kelowna-based financial consulting firm that works with First Nation communities across Canada.
Previously, the job averaged 130 flights a year and two or three nights a week away from home to visit First Nation bands.
"We now do those meetings by Zoom and it's much more efficient," says Busch.
Busch and his two business partners had plans to build office space in West Kelowna before COVID came along.
"We wanted that separation from work and home so that when we left the office and came home you were off the clock," he says.
"That certainly hasn't been the case for the past six months."
A good alternative for Busch is working occasionally from Big Bear Innovation Centre in West Kelowna, a co-work space.
"I know we're in a pandemic," says Big Bear owner Keith MacIntyre.
"But people are craving human contact. We can physically distance 10 to 15 people in our co-work space and we also have two small offices and a large and a small boardroom."
MacIntyre is also the owner of Big Bear Software, which has a remote workforce that MacIntyre motivates with working from home tips and flexibility.
"I encourage them to get exercise, take breaks and definitely pack up your work at the end of the work day and separate work from home," he says.
The mixed bag of feelings on working from home are also reflected in a survey done for consulting firm Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
Prior to the pandemic, 82% of working Canadians did so from an office.
That plummeted to 27% during the worst of COVID.
While 78% of employees expect a partial return to the workplace by the end of the year, most don't want it to be full-time.
Eighty percent of workers want a choice and a combination of in-office and remote work.
Those that want the option know about the positives and the pitfalls of more remote work, from the flexibility and fewer commutes to life-work and productivity challenges.
At the beginning of the COVID crisis, Amber Hall, a local small business solutions account specialist with Telus, continued to dress to the nines as if she were going into the office and meeting clients.
"It started to slide to sundresses in the summer and then leggings and a hoodie to be completely comfortable. Now I've settled on business casual to keep my head in the game."
Hall loves her husband, who has a home office for his contracting business, and their two kids.
But she does like to get away from them every once in a while.
"I miss the office, for sure," she says.
"Telus isn't having workers back into the office until spring 2021 and because of COVID policy we aren't meeting face-to-face with clients, so it's a lot of email and Zoom for sure. I'm looking at utilizing co-work space one day a week so I can be with other people for collaboration and support."
Gavin Mader of Propeller IT in West Kelowna had been happily working from home pre-COVID.
But when the pandemic forced everyone else home he started sharing with his girlfriend, who was laid off from a retail job, and her son, 11, who had to do school work from home.
"We quickly became work colleagues as well as a family," he says.
"But, eventually, you want to talk to people that aren't your family, which is why I like to go out to clients for installations and tech support and I'm going to co-work space once a week. There are efficiencies working at home, but there's also no separation between work and home unless you can physically and mentally make it happen."
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