What is the future of working from home?

I was interviewed for a WalletHub feature (link here) examining the future of working from home. As part of these features, WalletHub includes an “Ask the Experts” section that explores some of the underlying questions about work and workplaces. Among other things, I was asked to consider the advantages and disadvantages of working from home, generically speaking. (You can access all of my responses here.)

Here’s what I said about the potential advantages:

• “Time and money saved, and stress and hassle avoided, from not having to regularly commute to the office by car or public transportation, are significant benefits.”
• “Remote work allows parents to care for children, and individuals to care for elderly family members and others while reducing if not eliminating costly childcare and caregiving expenses. This was a boon to many during the acute phases of the pandemic.”
• “Work-from-home options allow some workers to negotiate to live a considerable distance from the main office, perhaps in another state or even country.”
• “Some people simply work more effectively in a less social environment.”
• “Work-from-home policies may provide disabled individuals with viable employment options, without having to request reasonable accommodations.”

And here’s what I said about the potential disadvantages:

• “As many experienced during the heart of the pandemic, we may experience negative mental and physical health effects from spending so much time cooped up in our dwellings, staring at our computer screens.”
• “Especially if one’s peers are in the office more frequently, then one might lose out on opportunities to interact informally with co-workers and managers. And if an employer offers a work-from-home option only grudgingly, then employees who choose it may be perceived as being less dedicated or productive, even in the face of contrary evidence.”
• “When employers feel a loss of control, they may insist on installing electronic monitoring tools on home computers to measure work time and productivity, which many workers may find invasive.”
• “If there are too many distractions, responsibilities, or stressors at home, then working effectively at home may be challenging.”

Of course, this is hardly the last word on the topic, but if you’re interested in the future of working from home, then you might spend some time pondering the full feature, including insights from five other academic and professional colleagues.

Barista blues: On unions, coffeehouses, and memories of the end of the Great American Jobs Machine

Here’s a story from my neck of the woods (Greater Boston) that may have broader implications for the future of the labor market and the labor movement. In essence, it’s about what happened after baristas at a small independent chain of coffeehouses opted to unionize and then attempted to pressure the owners towards signing a first collective bargaining agreement.

Many readers are likely aware of the active, national campaign to unionize individual Starbucks locations in the U.S. In the Boston area, labor activists have been organizing not only local Starbucks stores, but also independent coffeehouses, which typically are staffed by younger, educated workers whose political views and financial needs are receptive to union appeals.

The Darwin’s story, briefly

Until recently, Darwin’s was an independent, family-owned chain of four coffeehouses in Cambridge, MA, in business for some 30 years. In 2021, baristas at all four locations voted to unionize. Subsequent labor negotiations proved to be contentious, and they apparently took their toll on the two co-owners. As reported by Diti Kohli for the Boston Globe (link here), in October 2022, owners Steven and Isabel Darwin:

…said that they will close their flagship cafe on Mt. Auburn Street by Nov. 22 due to “workload and personal health concerns.” The move inspired protests from unionized employees, who then picketed at Cambridge City Hall and the owners’ home. There, they demanded the owners guarantee employment to the workers displaced by the closure, raise wages to $24 per hour, and improve health care and the policy on paid time off.

In November, the Darwins decided that it was time to call it quits. They announced that they would be closing the remaining stores and retiring from the business. Co-owner Isabel Darwin told the Globe that “‘this protest march is what has resulted in the acceleration of our decision’ to step away and close the business. She noted the stores already offer a $14.25 [Massachusetts] minimum wage and other employee benefits like two free meals per shift and discounts on beer and wine.”

In December, Darwin’s closed all of its locations. And with that closing, several dozen jobs disappeared.

Living wages in Greater Boston

There are two “please walk in my shoes” perspectives that deserve our understanding, and both are important:

The first perspective recognizes the challenges facing a large cohort of young, educated folks with backgrounds outside of STEM fields, seeking viable employment in expensive areas to live, and often while carrying student loan debt. In the comments sections of Globe news articles on the Darwin’s situation, folks were quick to condemn and ridicule the union demands of $24/hour wages and beefed-up medical coverage and benefits. But when stacked against the cost of living in this area, $24/hour doesn’t go very far — not when average rents for a Boston studio apartment run between $2,000-2,200.

The second perspective recognizes the challenges facing small business owners in highly competitive retail environments, many of whom have sunk heart, soul, and personal savings into keeping their businesses afloat during the pandemic. While Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz earns significant compensation and probably won’t be found working on the store floor, the owners of indie shops are earning much less and may well be opening and closing their stores five days a week (if not more). The indie owners face tight profit margins in this business. And if they increase their prices too sharply, customers may vote with their feet — no small concern in this inflationary economy.

This raises a hard dilemma that I don’t pretend to know how to resolve, i.e., entry-level job categories that a generation or two ago were popular with younger high school and college students, now also being filled by folks who need that living wage, health insurance, and the like. They are working in retail settings originally built on a premise that most employees would be moving on to something more lucrative as skills, experience, and education grow.

Not the future of the labor movement

I believe that rebuilding the labor movement is an important part of the answer towards growing workers’ wages and benefits. It’s not by accident that the widening wealth gap in the U.S. has coincided with the decline in the percentage of workers who are unionized. In the case of Darwin’s, however, labor demands — including personalizing the dispute by protesting at the owners’ residence — may well have pushed the owners to decide it’s not worth the stress and hassle of continuing. This was not a corporate decision, it was a very personal one.

The result here is a small tragedy: Lots of folks understandably wanting better compensation and benefits suddenly out of jobs, and two long-time small business owners closing up shop because it likely broke their spirits to walk out their door and face angry protesters demanding compensation their business wasn’t wealthy enough to provide.

This scenario cannot be the future of the labor movement.

Would you like a union with that Happy Meal?

But maybe there’s another approach for organized labor that lifts more boats.

The specter of people working for low wages in the retail food and beverage industry is hardly a new one. In particular, if you opt for a fast food lunch at McDonald’s, Burger King, or similar spot, then you’re likely to be served by a non-union worker who started at something close to the minimum wage. Or maybe you prefer a regular iced coffee at Dunkin’ over the higher-priced brew at Starbucks. There, too, your server may well be earning around the minimum wage.

These jobs, too, once were the traditional province of younger people getting their starts in the job market. But here in Boston (and I presume other parts of the country), if you grab a burger or coffee at these establishments, you’ll often find folks of all ages behind the counter, and they appear to be very diverse in social class as well.

Indeed, what if some of the same folks who might be given to organizing unions at indie coffeehouses instead got jobs at national fast-food chain establishments and tried to do the same there? In terms of giving voice to those who would benefit over the long haul — including people whose present vocational options and income potential may be more limited — the long-term, positive impacts could be substantial.

Bearing witness to the decline of the Great American Jobs Machine

This is not the first time I’ve seen the retail sector become a backup source of jobs when more lucrative opportunities weren’t available.

In 1981, I graduated from Valparaiso University in Indiana with a bachelor’s degree and a political science major. My plan was to work for a year, live at home with my parents in northwest Indiana, and file my applications to law schools.

At the time, the nation was in a deep recession. Locally, the labor market was in especially bad shape, thanks largely to the sharp drop of available jobs in the steel mills. During the region’s 20th century boom, young men could graduate from high school and secure a unionized job in the steel mills, with wages and benefits sufficient to raise a family. By the early 1980s, those jobs were fast disappearing.

In my case, after several months of unsuccessful hunting for a full-time job befitting (in my mind) a college graduate, I contacted the local drug store chain I had worked for as a retail stock clerk during college summers and asked if they needed help. Fortunately they were opening a new store in the area, and they took me on. I would spend the next year working there, unloading trucks, stocking shelves, checking inventories, and assisting customers.

Among my memories of that year were how some of the women employees at the drug store, earning wages similar to mine, became primary family breadwinners after their husbands had lost their jobs in the steel mills. It was a big sign that the Great American Jobs Machine, which produced so many good paying jobs during the nation’s industrial heyday, was in a state of decline. And the jobs that replaced them tended to be low-paid retail positions in strip malls.

Looking ahead

Those low-paid retail positions have endured as a staple of the labor market, and all too many people rely on them to cover their living expenses and often to raise families. The extent to which labor unions can help to change that dynamic remains a question mark, but we know that before the industrial and manufacturing sectors became heavily unionized, low-paying jobs with scant benefits were the norm. If organized labor is to be a similar game changer for workers in the retail sector, it is likely to be at places like McDonald’s, Walmart, and Amazon, rather than at indie coffeehouses like Darwin’s.

***

Parts of this post were drawn from extended comments that I left on online news articles and a handful of past blog articles.

Labor Day 2022: There’s something happening here

On this Labor Day 2022, the world of work is certainly calling for our attention. Among other things, we’re seeing:

• A sharp uptick in labor union organizing, led by workers at Starbucks locations across the country, as labor studies professor John Logan explains in The American Commentator;
• A sudden outpouring of talk about “quiet quitting,” or doing the bare minimum at one’s job, as explored by James Tapper in The Guardian;
• A potentially permanent, significant shift to work at home options for many workers, as examined by Andrew Van Dam in the Washington Post;
• High job turnover driven by unhappy workers, deemed the Great Resignation, as Hope King describes for Axios.

Add to that a nation in civic turmoil, a continuing pandemic, a climate marked this summer by record-hot temperatures, an ongoing war in Europe, among other things, and you’ve got, well, very interesting times.

This is not a redux of the Sixties — what’s going on is even more dire than the events and changes of that era — but as I thought about today’s blog post, Buffalo Springfield’s “Stop Children What’s That Sound” came to mind. The lyrics sure do fit our times:

There’s something happening here
But what it is ain’t exactly clear
There’s a man with a gun over there
Telling me I got to beware

I think it’s time we stop
Children, what’s that sound?
Everybody look, what’s going down?

There’s battle lines being drawn
Nobody’s right if everybody’s wrong
Young people speaking their minds
Getting so much resistance from behind

It’s time we stop
Hey, what’s that sound?
Everybody look, what’s going down?

What a field day for the heat (Ooh ooh ooh)
A thousand people in the street (Ooh ooh ooh)
Singing songs and they carrying signs (Ooh ooh ooh)
Mostly say, “Hooray for our side” (Ooh ooh ooh)

It’s time we stop
Hey, what’s that sound?
Everybody look, what’s going down?

Paranoia strikes deep
Into your life it will creep
It starts when you’re always afraid
Step out of line, the men come and take you away

We better stop
Hey, what’s that sound?
Everybody look, what’s going down?

You better stop
Hey, what’s that sound?
Everybody look, what’s going down?

You better stop
Now, what’s that sound?
Everybody look, what’s going down?

You better stop
Children, what’s that sound?
Everybody look, what’s going down?

Of coronavirus and climate change: Zooming in on the future of academic and professional conferences

We’re about to go live with the Dec. 2020 Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies workshop (https://www.humiliationstudies.org)

Last May (link here), I speculated about the future of academic and professional conferences in view of the unfolding pandemic. I opened by affirming how meaningful these gatherings can be:

I am hardly alone in attesting that I can trace career and life changing collaborations, associations, and friendships to various conferences, seminars, and workshops. These events have introduced me to people, ideas, and research that have profoundly shaped the course of what I do and fostered communities that transcend distance.

I have written frequently about the importance and meaning of such events. . . . With these events and so many others, I could tell story after story about gaining meaningful, lasting connections and insights.

I went on to acknowledge that the pandemic was forcing the cancellation of many events and the moving of others to online formats. Although I understood that platforms such as Zoom were making online conferences doable, I lamented the inherent limitations:

But these platforms cannot deliver true alternatives to the fortuitous sidebar conversations, meals, and coffee meet-ups that are often the stuff of future projects and new associations. Great things can hatch from these more informal interactions. Online “chat rooms” simply do not provide the same space.

Fifteen months later

Since posting that entry, I have participated in many online conferences, workshops, and seminars, with the events originating as close as Boston and as far away as India and Israel. I have been grateful for the opportunity to connect with colleagues and friends from around the world. Some of these interactions would not have occurred had the program been held in face-to-face settings. The travel times and costs would’ve been prohibitive.

However, I also was reminded over and again of the aforementioned limitations of such events. The informal chats and get togethers that are connective highlights of many academic and professional gatherings were sadly missing. Who knows what great ideas and future collaborations never materialized because we couldn’t chat over coffee or a meal?

Looking ahead

Well folks, like it or not, for at least three reasons, I think we’re going to be online for many of these events during the years to come.

Viral matters

First, this virus appears to be spinning off variants and mutations that will make travel planning an ongoing and earnest game of whack-a-mole (public health edition) for the foreseeable future. These realities are especially acute for conferences that attract an international constituencies.

For example, I’m currently helping to organize a global conference in France, scheduled for summer 2022. Let’s just say that a lot of folks are in a wait-and-see mode, even in terms of submitting panel and presentation proposals. Very recently, the European Union took the U.S. off of its safe travel list due to our current outbreak. Who knows what things will look like next year?

Air travel and climate change

Second, there’s the impact of air travel on climate change. Global aviation (including both passenger and freight) accounts for roughly 2 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions. While this pales in comparison to the environmental impact of other modes of transportation (especially auto travel), commercial air travel — in particular — is disproportionately the province of people and businesses who can afford airline tickets.

I’m not suggesting that we should stop flying or shipping goods by air. But if people are going to fly, then let’s get the maximum bang for the buck. To me, that means prioritizing flights to maintain ties between families and friends, above all. I also think we need to value tourism, study abroad, and other travel purposes that enrich our lives.

In addition, I think we need to pick and choose between professional conference opportunities that require air travel carefully and wisely. On the one hand, piggybacking active participation in a favorite conference with seeing friends and family seems like a good use of a plane trip. By contrast, if one’s conference participation amounts to flying across the country to talk for 20 minutes on a panel and little else, then maybe it’s not a responsible expenditure of jet fuel.

Costs

Finally, there’s the matter of accessibility and affordability. Factoring in air fare, hotel room, registration fee, and daily expenses, a major conference can cost as much as a getaway vacation. For academics, especially, funding support for conference travel is unevenly distributed, to say the least.

Online conferences even the participation field a bit, notwithstanding their built-in limitations. Registration fees are often lower, and there are no plane tickets or hotel rooms to be booked. You can eat at home.

Of course, there’s a third conference or workshop possibility, and that’s a hybrid format that allows for both in-person and online participation. Unfortunately, the logistical nightmares from a planning standpoint make this an unrealistic option for most conferences, unless they’ve got oodles of money and first-rate, tech-equipped facilities and staff to go with them.

The professional benefits of high-quality, in-person conferences, workshops, and seminars with plenty of opportunities for informal interaction are significant, and thus I would hate to see these events disappear. For the time being, however, I think that we’re going to do a lot of our interacting online.

***

Some previous blog posts about conferences and workshops

A workshop as annual ritual (2019) (link here) — Photo essay on the 2019 annual workshop of the Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies network, held at Columbia University in New York City.

A short speech in Rome (2019) (link here) — Text of my speech praising our shared experiences of participating in the biennial International Congress on Law and Mental Health, delivered at the 2019 Congress in Rome.

Workplace Bullying University, “All Star” edition (2019) (link here) — Recounting experiences at an enhanced edition of the Workplace Bullying Institute’s intensive training seminar, hosted by Drs. Gary and Ruth Namie in San Francisco, CA.

Dr. Edith Eger’s “The Choice”: On trauma and healing (2017) (link here) — I had the privilege of meeting Dr. Edith Eger, noted trauma therapist, author, and Holocaust survivor, at a conference sponsored by the Western Institute for Social Research in Berkeley, California.

North of the border: On transforming our laws and legal systems (2016) (link here) — Report on a therapeutic jurisprudence workshop at York University’s Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto, Canada.

Conferences as community builders (2015) (link here) — Touting the many benefits of the 2015 Work, Stress, and Health conference in Atlanta, Georgia, co-sponsored by the American Psychological Association, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, and Society for Occupational Health Psychology.

What will America’s world of work look like as we emerge from the pandemic?

Second shot came 3 weeks later!

What will America’s world of work look like as we emerge from the pandemic? Now that vaccination numbers are up, new infections and COVID-19 fatalities are down, and businesses and cultural institutions are re-opening, it’s time to generate discussions about the future of work, workers, and workplaces during the months and years to come. 

Bullying and harassment

First, bullying, mobbing, and harassment at work — key topics for this blog — won’t be going away any time soon. As I reported last month, the Workplace Bullying Institute’s 2021 national scientific survey revealed that, during the pandemic, a lot of bullying behaviors simply migrated to online platforms such as Zoom. Furthermore, individuals of Asian descent have been targeted for racial harassment due to the apparent origins of the coronavirus in China. Also, retail workers across the country have been verbally abused and physically assaulted by out-of-control customers who disagreed with mask and public safety requirements. In short, while this pandemic has brought out the best in some people, it also has brought out the worst in others.

The face-to-face workplace

Second, we’re going to see a somewhat clunky and varied transition back to working in face-to-face office settings again. Some workers can’t wait to get back to the office, while others have found themselves working effectively — and more contentedly — at home. Employers have experienced differing productivity levels with people working remotely, and some have been re-evaluating their need for large office spaces. We may see greater reliance on hybrid approaches that mix-and-match working from home and coming into the office when necessary.

Restaurant recoveries?

Third, many retailers, especially those in the restaurant and food service industry, are going to be in recovery mode. For example, will the pre-pandemic fondness that many Americans have for eating at restaurants return as vaccinations and improved ventilation systems make indoor dining safe possibilities? Fingers crossed that these industries will make robust comebacks!

Frontline workers

Fourth, millions of essential frontline workers have been putting themselves in harm’s way to stock shelves, operate cash registers, produce and deliver goods and packages, and perform countless other tasks to help keep our society going during this time. Will a grateful nation reward them with higher pay, better benefits, and stronger job security? It’s anyone’s guess as to whether that will occur.

Women bear the brunt

Fifth, the labor market impacts of this pandemic have been very gendered, with more women than men bearing the brunt of caregiving at home for children and the ill. While it may be premature to assess how this will effect current generations of women workers in the long term, the short-term impact has been palpable and threatens to endure.

Health care workers

Sixth, health care workers across the country who have been treating COVID-19 patients face trauma, exhaustion, and burnout from working long hours under the most difficult circumstances. They have been in the trenches of this war against the virus, and many have paid a price in terms of their physical and emotional health. We owe them a debt of gratitude, which includes providing all necessary measures to support them as they recover from this ordeal.

Ch-ch-changes

Seventh, we may witness a stream of career transitions, job changes, and early retirements, the cumulative results of individual and family contemplations about their lives during this long period of semi-quarantine. As I wrote in my personal blog over the weekend:

The pandemic appears to have prompted a lot of self-reflection among middle-aged folks during the past year or so, and the results of these inner dialogues are starting to emerge. More and more we’re hearing about career and job shifts, accelerated retirement timelines, moves to places near and far, changes in personal relationships, new hobbies and avocations, and more active pursuits of “bucket list” plans.

This stuff is popping up in everyday conversations, Facebook postings, and news features about life transitions in the shadow of COVID-19. I don’t know if it’s a temporary blip on the screen or the beginning of some major social ground shifting, but for now the phenomenon is real.

Haves and have-nots

Finally, the pandemic has exacerbated the divide between the haves and have-nots. Those who could work remotely and safely, watch their retirement accounts grow amidst a strong stock market, and take advantage of generous, employer-provided health care plans are coming out of this pandemic in pretty good shape. Those who lost their jobs, tapped into meager savings, and have struggled to obtain needed health care have found themselves increasingly reliant on special safety net measures enacted by the federal government. This is among the reasons why I hope that the Biden Administration’s proposals to create millions of jobs with good wages and benefits to help repair our nation’s crumbling infrastructure and build a healthy green economy are enacted. 

These points raise but a few of the compelling matters related to the post-pandemic future of work in America. In all, they highlight persistent challenges of opportunity, equality, and worker dignity that existed before this virus transformed our lives. Accordingly, I hope that we, as a society, will take the high road in prioritizing the needs of those who have struggled the most during one of the most challenging times in our history.

Will “de-densifying” reduce workplace bullying, mobbing, and harassment in the COVID-transformed American workplace?

In a piece for The Guardian over the summer (link here), Cassidy Randall speculated on the future of American office life, as employers consider options for full or partial re-opening in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic:

As the coronavirus pandemic continues to surge in parts of the US, some companies have moved forward with plans to let their employees re-enter the office after months of working from home.

In the absence of federal guidelines around best practices, office managers will probably need to rely on an abundance of caution. This may turn offices into ghost towns of their former selves, with gatherings by the water cooler, big meetings and buzzing shared spaces disappearing for the foreseeable future.

Anticipating a possible uptick in infection rates during the fall, she emphasized the likelihood of “de-densifying” staffing patterns and staggered shifts to moderate the number of workers present in the office at any given time. This could mean, at least for now, the cessation of large, in-person staff meetings and crowded work areas.

The disturbingly stubborn rates of COVID-19 infections have no doubt caused many employers to continue to permit workers to spend parts or all of their week working from home. In some circles, this has raised the question of the necessity of maintaining large offices and on-site work requirements, even after we find our way through this pandemic. A prominent example of this revamping is Microsoft. As reported earlier this month by Tom Warren for The Verge (link here):

Microsoft is allowing more of its employees to work from home permanently, the company announced Friday. While the vast majority of Microsoft employees are still working from home during the ongoing pandemic, the software maker has unveiled “hybrid workplace” guidance internally to allow for far greater flexibility once US offices eventually reopen. The Verge has received Microsoft’s internal guidance, and it outlines the company’s flexible working plans for the future.

Microsoft will now allow employees to work from home freely for less than 50 percent of their working week, or for managers to approve permanent remote work. Employees who opt for the permanent remote work option will give up their assigned office space, but still have options to use touchdown space available at Microsoft’s offices.

Better work environments?

I’ve been looking at these assessments in part through a lens of whether the coronavirus-impacted work environment will affect prevalence rates and the nature of various types of workplace abuse. Back in May, I offered this preliminary forecast for when physical workplaces start to reopen:

First, I expect that most folks will be on their best behavior, at least initially. They will understand that we’re still in challenging times and be grateful to have paid employment.

Second, I think that various clashes, disagreements, and conflicts will arise, as a result of a mix of employer policies and heightened anxiety levels. Best intentions notwithstanding, a lot of folks will be on edge, and understandably so.

Third, I suspect that a lot of conflicts, incivilities, and micro-aggressions will move online, as we continue to conduct a lot of our work remotely and digitally. A barrage of email and text exchanges will accompany these transitions back to our workspaces. Some will get contentious; a (hopefully) much smaller share will be abusive.

Fourth, we may see a (welcomed, in my opinion) upturn in labor union organizing on behalf of our lowest paid workers in retail and service industries, many of whom have been the core of our essential workforce outside of health care providers. 

Finally, we’ll see coronavirus-related claims over disability discrimination, workers’ compensation, family and medical leave, workplace safety and health laws, and other legal standards related to worker health. Things could get quite litigious if managed poorly.

What I didn’t anticipate was the now very real possibility that some (many?) organizations may never return to the fully occupied physical workspaces that were the norm before the pandemic suddenly defined the contours of our lives.

To the extent that bullying, mobbing, and harassment are very relational activities, de-densifying via continued physical distancing and staggered employee shifts may help to reduce the prevalence of these forms of mistreatment. However, some of the bad behavior, as I mentioned, will simply port over to an online setting. After all, less-than-wonderful co-workers can be jerks on Zoom and scheme and manipulate in the digital fog. This could give rise to more covert forms of bullying, sabotaging, and undermining of others.

It’s also possible that, as I suggested in May, most people will try to rise above the fray, grateful to be employed, while recognizing that we should all bring a sense of team play to the current work situation.

For now, it’s too early to know whether these work-at-home practices will become a new normal. But this bears watching, especially by those of us who are attentive to the various ways in which workplace mistreatment may manifest itself.

Can we use this challenging time to plant seeds of creativity and compassion?

Will the coronavirus pandemic prompt us toward creating a better society? Exploring this possibility for the New Yorker, author Lawrence Wright interviewed Gianna Pomata, a retired professor at the Johns Hopkins University’s Institute of the History of Medicine, about how the pandemic may shape our futures (link here). Dr. Pomata is an authority on, among other things, the history of the Black Plague of the Middle Ages.

Now living in Italy, one of the original hot zones for COVID-19 outbreaks, Pomata shared her historical perspective with Wright:

When we first talked, on Skype, she immediately compared covid-19 to the bubonic plague that struck Europe in the fourteenth century—“not in the number of dead but in terms of shaking up the way people think.” She went on, “The Black Death really marks the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of something else.” That something else was the Renaissance.

…“What happens after the Black Death, it’s like a wind—fresh air coming in, the fresh air of common sense.”

Although Pomata expressed shock over the resistance of so many Americans to follow basic public health precautions such as wearing masks, she sees the potential for a similar revitalizing response on a global level once we get through this pandemic:

“What I expect now is something as dramatic is going to happen, not so much in medicine but in economy and culture. Because of danger, there’s this wonderful human response, which is to think in a new way.”

This article has prompted me to look at pieces I’ve posted during the past few months, examining our current state and speculating as to how we will come out of this in terms of our basic humanity. I see within my own thinking both hope and doubt.

Work and workplaces

I’d love to see waves of kindness, compassion, and creativity overcome our workplaces in light of this pandemic, but the evidence for that transformation is not exactly overwhelming. In fact, it may be pointing in the other direction. Here’s what I recently wrote about those prospects: 

I hope that our better natures will prevail. Perhaps the fears and ravages of a deadly virus affecting our health and lives, the economy, the state of employment, and the viability of our various civic, cultural, and educational institutions are humbling us and causing us to treat one another with greater understanding and care. Maybe we’ll see less bullying, mobbing, harassment, and incivility, as people welcome the return of some semblance of normalcy.

…Then again, it’s not as if bad workplace behaviors have disappeared during the heart of this pandemic. The news has been peppered with accounts of alleged worker mistreatment, especially that in retail, warehouse, and delivery employment. Many of these reports involve claims that management is strong-arming employees to show up to work without providing adequate protective gear or other safeguards. We’ve also seen an unfortunate and sharp uptick in harassment of people of Asian nationalities, linked to the origins of the virus in China.

Furthermore, as I wrote earlier this month, the news is now peppered with stories of retail and fast food workers being bullied and assaulted by not-so-wonderful customers who are angered by mask requirements and limitations on inside dining. Apparently these folks are taking out their ignorance and frustrations on modestly paid service workers who are simply trying to do their jobs safely.

Now we’re also learning of more extensive efforts to leverage this pandemic in ways that exploit workers and expose them to greater harm, all in the name of squeezing out more profits. For a detailed account of one such instance, check out Jane Mayer’s recent investigative piece (also in the New Yorker, link here), which examines how a “secretive titan behind one of America’s largest poultry companies, who is also one of the President’s top donors, is ruthlessly leveraging the coronavirus crisis—and his vast fortune—to strip workers of protections.”

Our better natures

Still, on occasion we read of extraordinary efforts to keep businesses afloat and workers on the payroll. For example, European travel guru and writer Rick Steves, who has built a very successful business organizing guided tours to Europe and publishing a popular series of travel guidebooks (I’ve purchased my fair share of them!), is digging deep into his company’s cash reserves to keep his staff of 100 employed for the next two years. This involves pay cuts but will allow retention of health insurance coverage. (You can read more about his decision and planning in this Seattle Times article, here.)

And we also read accounts of remarkable creativity and flexibility practiced by small business owners. Recently ZAGAT Stories (link here) featured restauranteur Barbara Sibley, owner of La Palapa, a Mexican restaurant in Manhattan’s East Village neighborhood. (Full disclosure: My cousin Judy, mentioned in this piece, is a manager there, and I’ve made modest financial contributions toward Barbara’s efforts during this time. I’ve also eaten a lot of their food over the years!) Here’s a snippet:

I didn’t shut down, not even for a day, not even for a minute. The next day after lockdown I was here with Judy, my general manager who’s worked for me for over 15 years, and my chef. I’ve worked with his family since I was 19. Having been through all of those different experiences, there were things that I knew right away. First of all, you have to hold onto your cash. You have to take care of your people. The most important thing is to make payroll and make sure nobody’s starving, and then put what you have to good use.

So we started to feed hospitals. We made a donation to the Catholic Worker. We had all this bread. I was very conscious about which purveyors I was going to shop from. There were people that had been with me through other crises and helped me up. I was very mindful about taking care of them. If I was going to spend any money, I was going to spend it very thoughtfully.

…Then Bloomberg Philanthropies decided it was important that we feed the public hospitals, because private hospitals had donors and board members that wanted to do wonderful things for those. Bloomberg teamed up with World Central Kitchen. I ended up doing 2,000 or 3,000 meals a week for the city hospitals. It allowed me to keep everybody busy, and to have really fresh food at La Palapa because we were making all these meals.

Jury’s out

So, wearing my law professor’s hat, the jury is still out for me on whether our post-pandemic world will be a more enlightened one. After all, here in the U.S., we are still in the heart of this pandemic. While many other nations have managed to wrestle down this virus, we are witnesses to some of the most appalling ignorance and selfishness when it comes to undertaking preventive public health measures, and we have an alarming absence of competent, caring leadership at the head of state. In late May, I wrote here:

Here in the U.S.,…the past 40 years have served as a case study of what happens when power corrupts and values become distorted. The past few years have taken us much deeper down that rabbit hole. Between this terrible pandemic and the pending 2020 election, I feel as though we in America have one last chance to turn things around. I hope we will summon the wisdom and humanity to do so.

And yet we have people like Rick Steves and Barbara Sibley, working tirelessly to keep their businesses going, while looking out for the interests of their employees.

Folks, if humankind can come out of the utter carnage of the Black Plague to create the Renaissance, then we have the capacity to emerge from this pandemic with a vision for a much better world as well — including more creative work and more compassionate workplaces. That’s all the more reason to wear those masks, wash our hands, and stay socially distanced. After all, we’ve got work to do.

***

Note: This is adapted from a piece recently posted to my personal blog, Musings of a Gen Joneser (link here).

The debt we are accruing to workers we now deem essential

Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer has proposed an ambitious new program to provide free college for workers deemed essential during the coronavirus pandemic. As reported by Wesley Whistle for Forbes (link here):

Today, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer (D) announced “Futures for Frontliners,” as a part of a series of initiatives to help Michigan families during and after the coronavirus pandemic. This new program would provide tuition-free higher education for those considered essential workers during the coronavirus lockdowns.

…According to the press release, this program would provide those without a college degree a path to a higher education credential or degree. Those specified as essential workers included hospital and nursing home staff, grocery store employees, child care workers, those manufacturing personal protective equipment (PPE), and more.

May this be but one small initiative designed to recognize the everyday contributions of service workers in our economy and society. Many of us are able to shelter at home and to practice social distancing because of retail and delivery services performed by workers who receive only modest pay and benefits at best.

We owe these workers a growing debt of gratitude, but here in the U.S., we are way behind when it comes to embracing employee dignity as a primary objective for our workplace practices and public policies. For millions of service workers classified as essential employees, the agenda for change includes better pay, safer and healthier working conditions, and health insurance and retirement plans.

Will we see the light?

Hopefully this public health crisis is shining a light on that need for change. And just maybe, wealthy folks are among those paying closer attention.

For example, Mark Cuban — owner of the Dallas Mavericks professional basketball team and co-star of the “Shark Tank” reality TV show for budding entrepreneurs — went on National Public Radio in April (link here) and explained how the pandemic has changed the way he regards the importance of corporate social responsibility:

Of anything as devastating and dangerous as the coronavirus has been, it’s also been a great equalizer. I mean, it can affect anybody. But within the business construct, just the idea that everybody has got to do their job or participate in a way that works for not just the business, but for individual families, but also customers. And so, I think it doesn’t matter what your role is. Each role is of equal importance.

The CEO is of no more importance than somebody cleaning the floors or that takes a bucket and mops the floors. I think that this is a time as a reset where we really have to reevaluate how we treat workers, how people are paid, how can we get them into a role where they receive an equity as part of their compensation. So that they’re not having to live paycheck to paycheck, they have something that appreciates. All these things I think are important as we go through this reset in business.

Labor unions are essential to solutions

Even if more corporate executives start to get it, we still need to ground these changes in a stronger labor movement. To illustrate, labor studies professor John Logan (San Francisco State U.) is an expert on working conditions in the retail grocery sector. Here’s a snippet of a recent piece he wrote for The Hill (link here) about grocery store workers, in connection with the coronavirus pandemic:

Researchers have long known that unionized workplaces – whether in mining, construction, manufacturing or warehouses – are significantly safer for employees than non-union workplaces. Now we are learning in real time that the same is true for grocery workers, who have been unexpectedly thrust onto the front lines of the fight against COVID-19. Previously treated as “unskilled” and “disposable,” grocery workers are now recognized as essential personnel who are helping to keep millions of Americans alive.

…Large non-union companies such as Walmart, Target and Amazon have introduced their own measures on worker safety and employment security, but their limited efforts have largely focused pay raises and bonuses to attract and retain employees.

…In the past, many food retailers have lobbied against measures such as paid sick leave that would have better protected workers and shoppers in this time of national crisis. The same companies cannot now be trusted to prioritize worker and public safety over their own greed.

The coronavirus pandemic has shaken us hard and fast, and we’ve got a ways to go before we are done with it. Nevertheless, it’s time for us to be thinking about how we can create a society that values the contributions of all workers. If we don’t learn these lessons now, then shame on us.

Takeaway from Philly: The knowing-doing gap is everywhere

At the recent Work, Stress and Health Conference in Philadelphia, it took three keynote programs and a panel discussion for me to finally reach my “duh” moment: We have so much of the knowledge and understanding we need to create healthier, happier, and more productive workplaces. But the gap between insights gleaned from psychology, organizational behavior, and law and public policy on one hand, and the implementation of these ideas on the other, is vast.

The biennial Work, Stress and Health Conference (WSH) is co-sponsored by the American Psychological Association, National Institute for Occupational for Safety and Health, and Society for Occupational Health Psychology. As I’ve written before, this is one of my favorite conferences, a wonderful, recurring opportunity to share research and insights and to meet with scholars and practitioners who are doing great work. Many WSH participants have become valued friends and associates. In fact, my participation in the 2015 WSH conference led me to write about “conferences as community builders,” in a blog post that was reprinted in the APA’s Psychology Benefits Society blog (link here).

The huge knowing-doing gap

In the opening keynote, major priorities for labor and employment stakeholders were beautifully framed by Jeffrey Pfeffer (Stanford U.), expounding on themes raised in his 2018 book, Dying for a Paycheck. Here’s a short abstract of his speech:

The workplace is the fifth leading cause of death in the U.S., and many workplace practices are as harmful to health as second-hand smoke. Worse than the enormous physical and psychological toll on people and the enormous economic costs to companies and society, is that no one seems to care as work arrangements move toward less, rather than more, healthful environments.

During his talk, Dr. Pfeffer identified workplace bullying and abuse as one of the most harmful work hazards.

He also referenced his previous writings on the “knowing-doing gap,” i.e., the gap between knowing the right thing to do and actually implementing it in organizations. Pfeffer developed this concept with fellow Stanford professor Robert Sutton (author of the popular bullying-related book, The No Asshole Rule). Throughout the conference, it struck me how the knowing-doing gap applies to virtually every aspect of employment relations.

The second day keynote featured Manal Azzi from the International Labour Organization (ILO). Dr. Azzi’s presentation, setting out the major initiatives of the ILO, captured how this global entity is serving as a base for enhancing the well-being of workers around the world. The ILO offers research, best practices, and policy solutions and fosters tripartite relationships between government, business, and labor. There are many keys to bridging the knowing-doing gap here.

The final day keynote program was a wide-ranging panel on work and technology, hosted by David Ballard of the APA. I was alarmed by the discussion of actual and potential employer excesses in terms of technology and employee surveillance. My main knowing-doing gap point is the obvious need for a revived labor movement to serve as a check on employer power, a point reinforced by panelist David LeGrande of the Communications Workers of America.

One path toward implementing solutions and best practices: Getting the word out

If we are to bridge this gap between knowledge and action, then greater sharing of research and insights via the media is part of our strategy. In that vein, I was part of a panel discussion, “Going Public: Sharing Our Work Through the Media,” also hosted by the APA’s David Ballard. I joined Angel Brownawell (APA), Carrie Bulger (Quinnipiac U.), Lisa Kath (San Diego State U.), and Gary Namie (Workplace Bullying Institute). From our program abstract, here’s a short preview of what we covered:

How can scholars, researchers, and practitioners in fields relevant to worker well-being and organizational performance engage the media, serve as subject matter experts, and help inform public understanding? How can we better translate research for the general public and promote our work in ethical and professionally appropriate ways? How can we build relationships with reporters that lead to being sought out as the experts of choice and how do we prepare for those opportunities when they arise?

The knowledge we need to create better organizations that embrace worker dignity is largely at our disposal. We need to mainstream those insights and understandings in the public dialogue about work, workers, and workplaces. Engaging the media in that effort can help us to bridge the knowing-doing gap.

MTW Revisions: August 2019

In this regular feature, each month I’m reviewing some of the 1,700+ entries to this blog since 2008 and opting to revise and update several of them. I hope that readers find the revised posts useful and interesting. Here are this month’s selections:

HR, workplace bullying, and the abandoned target (orig. 2013; rev. 2019) (link here) — “For me this was the latest example of a bullying target who was looking for a lifeline, but instead was tossed under the bus, with HR supporting their demise.”

What separates the “best” workplace abusers from the rest? (orig. 2015; rev. 2019) (link here) — “Indeed, I’m simply making connections grounded in years of immersion in this realm: Among those who bully and abuse others at work, the expert planners often rank in the vanguard.”

On creating organizational cultures: What if your boss simply doesn’t care? (orig. 2013; rev. 2019) (link here) — “Regardless of how they got there, bosses who practice benign neglect when it comes to organizational culture create a giant void for others to fill.”

Witnessing the “split-screen American nightmare” (orig. 2013; rev. 2019) (link here) — “By the time I left Indiana for the New York City in 1982, the region’s steel industry was gasping for its life. As we fast forward to today, Hammond and many surrounding towns and cities continue to exist in the aftermath of the deterioration of the region’s industrial economic base.”