Four Lessons for Life When this Is All over. By Delela Ndlela
It has been almost a year since South Africa went into its first COVID-19 lockdown, and in that time, a whole decade’s worth of change has occurred in the way we live. Most of us are completely different from what we used to be. I am, and the world certainly is. The changes COVID-19 brought were momentous, and the devastation heartrending, but it has not changed the fact that there is still a world out there, one for which we are responsible. When all of this is over, or becomes the permanent normal, we will need to slip back into a full rhythm of life. To do that, we will need to remember everything the pandemic has taught us about ourselves and the world around us. Here are some things the pandemic has shown me: 1) The office is dead; long live the remote workspace! Here, I’m not talking about the hit sitcom (that would be blasphemy) but the idea of a fixed workspace. The closure of office spaces during lockdown would have rendered most businesses unproductive for huge periods had they not moved online and worked remotely. In fact, according to a study at Harvard University, not only did remote work salvage production, it raised productivity. It makes sense that workers are more productive at home, given that they spend less time travelling and preparing for work, and are thus able to sleep longer. Remote work also saves costs on fuel, reduces traffic and the need for cars, thus making our cities and towns more walkable spaces. However, remote work is not an unalloyed good. Cleaners, gardeners, security guards and the other workers whose livelihood depends on people working
in offices, were hard hit by the impact of the transition to remote offices. Further, some companies in the US have taken the success of remote work as an excuse to pay workers less. ‘If you don’t need to travel or live nearby’ goes the argument, ‘we shouldn’t have to pay you as much.’ The final detriment of remote work is the erasure of the work/life division. It is much easier to separate life from work when the two live in separate places, but when the dining table is also a workstation, things tend to bleed into one another. 2) Avoid fox fake news Over the course of 2020, we saw stunningly ridiculous narratives, such as the 5G conspiracy theory and antimask ideology, gain traction. These narratives were spread and started not just in the deepest reaches of the internet, but in tabloids, on social media, and on television networks. Fake news is not only an evil, but it also does harm in the real world. BusinessTech, the largest business news website in South Africa, ALTUM SONATUR
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