Back To Work?

A curated collection of can’t-miss news from this week, including 2021 workplace trends and more. Sign up to get the TURNER Weekly Download in your inbox.

Quitting After Covid

The pandemic changed the way we work — and we’re still dealing with the fallout. Now, many workers who are being told to return to the office are quitting (or threatening to quit) instead. “We’re in a moment of reckoning, and employees are claiming power in different ways than they have before,” writes Slate’s Alison Green. “The companies that are best poised to adapt to that new reality are the ones that treat people well and have been treating people well even when the labor market didn’t make it as much of an imperative.”

Juggling With Kids

One issue that parents faced last year was how to juggle working from home with childcare. As reported in the Wall Street Journal, a recent study “reveals the extent to which  working parents, particularly women, juggled their jobs and child care simultaneously. At any one 15-minute interval in the afternoon, roughly 12 percent of employed women with children reported working while also taking care of their children.”

Return of the Office

One partner of a Houston law firm thinks that everyone should return to the office in person. “Our choice to reopen the office was not just about our bottom line,” writes John Zavitsanos in the New York Times’ Op-Ed section. “Nor was it just about the collaborative nature of a physical office space or about keeping our administrative staff employed. We wanted people driving to work and supporting our many energy-sector clients and stopping for coffee and lunch to keep the city’s local economy going. We felt some moral obligation to help our city thrive again.”

Work-From-Home Reality

But wait — some studies suggest that productivity and job satisfaction grew during the pandemic. “The reality is that American workers have stumbled upon a new freedom in the wake of a terrible pandemic, and a good many are now rightly loath to give it up,” says USA Today’s Editorial Board. “It will give new meaning to celebrating Labor Day this September – from home.”

Weekly Moment of Zen

She shreds! 13-year-old Olympic skateboarder Momiji Nishiya becomes one of the youngest gold medal winners ever.