来源：《新科学家》
原文刊登日期：2021年12月15日
本文适合2023考生
The covid-19 pandemic has forced millions of us to participate in one of the biggest social experiments of our time: what would happen if office workers largely abandoned their workplaces and began working from home? More than 18 months in, it is time to take stock.
新冠大流行迫使数百万人参与了我们这个时代最大的社会实验之一：如果上班族基本上舍弃了工作场所，开始在家工作，会发生什么？18个多月过去了，是时候盘点一下了。
One thing seems clear: more people working remotely has brought some benefits for the environment. With less commuter traffic, wildlife has been able to reclaim urban spaces while people have been tapping away at their home keyboards.
有一点似乎很清楚：越来越多的人远程工作给环境带来了一些好处。随着通勤的减少，野生动物已经能够在人们家中敲击键盘的同时重新占据城市空间。
But what about the benefits to people? The major perks of home working include people having more flexibility to mould jobs around their family, exercise and leisure time, being able to wear whatever they like, controlling their own heating and lighting and not having to commute. The lack of commuting may be the biggest bonus, since surveys show that workers typically rate their commute as the worst part of their day, unless they walk or cycle.
但是对人们有什么好处呢？在家工作的主要好处包括有更大的灵活性，可以根据家庭、锻炼和休闲时间安排工作，可以随心所欲地穿着，控制自己的取暖和照明，不必上下班通勤。不用通勤可能是最大的好处，因为调查显示，除非步行或骑自行车，否则上班族通常会将通勤视为一天中最糟糕的部分。
Many people have also been able to get more done while working remotely, possibly due to fewer distractions. A survey by Boston Consulting Group of 1500 managers at large European companies found that more than half had seen productivity levels rise as their employees shifted to remote work during the pandemic.
许多人在远程工作时能完成更多的工作，这可能是因为干扰更少。波士顿咨询集团对欧洲大型公司的1500名经理进行的一项调查发现，随着员工在疫情期间转向远程工作，一半以上的经理发现员工的生产力水平有所提高。
“There used to be a lot of resistance to working from home because managers thought employees would just goof off and watch Netflix, but there’s a lot more trust now,” says Sue Williamson at the University of New South Wales in Australia.
澳大利亚新南威尔士大学的苏•威廉姆森表示：“过去人们对在家工作有很多抵制，因为经理们认为员工只会消磨时间，看网飞(Netflix)，但现在信任增加了很多。”
However, the experiment hasn’t been all positive. Many people forced to work from home have reported feeling isolated and finding it harder to switch off due to the blurred boundary between work and home life.
然而，实验结果并非都是积极的。许多被迫在家工作的人报告说，由于工作和家庭生活之间的界限模糊，他们感到孤独，难以转换角色。
Many managers have also reported declines in innovation, which is probably because “it’s hard to get those unexpected conversations between people that spark ideas” when everyone is physically separated, says Anne Bardoel at Swinburne University of Technology in Australia.
澳大利亚斯威本科技大学的安妮•巴多尔表示，许多经理也报告了创新能力的下降，这可能是因为没有面对面的接触，“很难在人们之间进行那些激发创意的意想不到的对话”。
Then there is “Zoom fatigue”, the drained feeling that often accompanies virtual meetings, even though they tend to be shorter than in-person ones. This may be because people have a stronger sense of being on show while on screen and feel more pressure to present well, says Allison Gabriel at the University of Arizona.
然后是“Zoom疲劳”，这种疲惫的感觉经常伴随着虚拟会议，尽管它们往往比面对面的会议要短。亚利桑那大学的艾莉森·加布里尔表示，这可能是因为人们在屏幕上有一种更强烈的被展示的感觉，因此有更大的压力来展示自己。
As vaccines help to control covid-19, many organisations are hoping to reap the best of both worlds by letting employees work from home on some days and travel to the office on others. The coming months and years will undoubtedly involve trial and error as companies and employees settle on the optimum mix of office and work-from-home days. But one thing seems certain: now that office workers have been given a chance to really think about how they want their work lives to look, there is no turning back.
由于疫苗有助于控制新冠疫情，许多组织希望通过让员工在某些日子在家工作，在另一些日子去办公室上班，从而达到两全其美的效果。毫无疑问，在未来的几个月和几年里，公司和员工都将尝试和犯错，以确定办公室和在家工作的最佳组合。但有一件事似乎是肯定的：既然上班族们有机会真正思考他们希望自己的工作生活是怎样的，那就没有回头路了。