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Andile Tshuma
MEN and women’s experiences of working from home have been different.

Working from home during the pandemic has been generally seen as a breeze and convenient but the actual experiences have been different.

Being at home, with work, children and all is bound to affect productivity.

As I was preparing for this article, I reached out to my tribe to share some of their experiences of the past five months.

For most women, the experiences are different from what is touted to be the reality.

When the Covid-19 pandemic hit the country and indefinite lockdowns came into play, working from home quickly got its pace in the discourse of work-life integration.

Even before the pandemic, remote working has been gathering pace, especially in the global north.

It has been a product born from the marriage of tech companies and technology nestled in the cradle of flexibility, convenience and the millennial mindset.

The Covid-19 pandemic however, changed life as we know it and working from home became the only way to work for many and not just an option or one of the few interesting perks about one’s job.

For the first 21 days of the lockdown, Bulawayo was a complete ghost town. The streets were silent. One could tell that something was different.

Only supermarkets and a few other essential services were available.

For most men interviewed in Bulawayo about their work from home experiences, a similar answer was chorused, it was business as usual although home confinement was quite boring and depressing for some.

Remember during the first 21 days, people were still obedient sons and daughters and respected Covid-19 regulations, the virus was feared. People seem to be indifferent now, although they still wear masks in public, the relaxing of some regulations in the country has made some people lower their guard, and the risk perception is also dropping, generally.

Some women celebrated working from home as it spared them from the crazy mornings of school runs, preparing school lunches, sports kits and dressing up themselves.

It gave them a little bit of extra time, most said around two hours.

However, having those little people in the house and not at school, meant that they had to be entertained all day and one way or the other the mother would pay for those spared two hours from the morning.

Working from home would not be as successful as imagined.

Managers and supervisors who like micro managing subordinates are having the most difficult time now.

For them, work is continuous breathing down the necks of their subordinates.

So, with remote working coming into play, they will want to call every hour to check on progress and to get updates, which is not very practical.

Some women I spoke to said working from home to them presented challenges as their families failed to understand that while they were at home, they were still at work and had to fully attend to work duties and stick to deadlines.

Some families expected that if the woman is home, whether she is the wife, the mum or the daughter — whatever her domestic role, she had to tick her feminine duty boxes and start performing them during office work time.

This has been the horror for most women. Children not understanding why you are home but not coming out to play much, spouses expecting to be pampered and expecting you to cook trotters or a seven colours meal daily just because you are home most of the time.

They get shocked when you serve them a sandwich and orange juice for lunch because you are busy with work.

Domestic workers have not had it easy too as they are used to having the home to themselves for the greater part of the day. Having to spend the day with the ‘‘madam boss’’, and her entire family seven days a week has surely been getting helpers crazy.

Remember that some of our children are spoilt brats, to be brutally honest, so they create a thick ugly mess of everything and the helper has to follow them around cleaning up after them, and then you and your million cups of coffee left all over as you try to get your mojo and your creative juices flowing. This has not only affected corporates, even those that take care of our homes have been affected, a lot. Imagine, they cannot even entertain their friends at your mansions anymore (with a tongue in cheek) because you are always there.

Some women say working from home has been pure bliss. A colleague says she took her kids to her mother and they seemed to be having the best time with their Gogo, and she was happy to fill up her empty nest.

So, she could work in peace. The house was clean all day. There was structure in her daily routine and her productivity increased. She just fears that weaning herself off working from home will be her biggest dilemma as she feels that she has been most productive while working remotely.

For many men, working from home has been an eye opener as it has shown that there is a lot that happens in the house while they are at work. An accountant with a nurse wife said he had to stay home and work while attending to the kids as his wife was on duty at work. While the helper was there to do the domestic work, the man could just not stand working on his numbers with his little offspring pacing up and down around him, and coming with little stories and updates of what they are up to.

And then the helper had a story and needed to go to her village for the week, meaning it would be him and the kids full time while their mum was at work. The morale of the story is that he now thinks his wife is a superwoman to come home after a long day at work and cook for the family, or to come from night duty and not sleep much but start attending to the home, after hours of attending to patients.

Some women have been struggling with structure and routine, especially those with creative work that requires a certain mindset to get their creative juices flowing. Their biggest undoing has been being home not for office work but for the domestic work as well, as it has been almost automatic that being home means “being home”.

With all being said, working from home has not been the same for everyone and no one formula works, because homes are different, families are not the same and people’s jobs are different too, however, there have been notable differences in the experiences of men and women working from home.

As people start trekking back to their offices, remember to appreciate each other and the big roles that you play in each other’s lives and cherish whatever time left you have working from home, if ever you will go back to the office.