Nothing to do with sound in that case.
Use a headset so you can operate the keyboard with both hands. Touch typing. And use a mouse. Most programmers can type and often need to type when they are on the phone. Especially when you are assisting someone, or are being assited by someone else.
If you hunt and peck, it probably wouldn’t matter as much.
Why does using the built in speaker/mike affect my typing? I’m lost.
Actually, i guess i sometimes use my land line when i need tech support, so that if i need to reboot or something i didn’t lose the connection. But then i use speaker phone.
I’m talking about serious desktop hardware. Not laptops. That’s we have in our offices. Laptops are to take to a conference or something. We don’t work on laptops with cameras and mic’s. Not enough power or screen real estate.
But the crew chooses to gather around a table with our one teams laptop, instead of just buying a headset and camera for their desktop. It drove me crazy.
I suspect they wanted as many people as possible to physically be in the same room. But you can only use one microphone if you do that. Did they use their desktops when they called you one-on-one?
I lobbied to do all our meetings fully in person or fully remote, because i felt the remote people were always a little left out in hybrid meetings. But my boss, and most of my coworkers, liked to get as many people as possible into the physical conference room.
Once everyone remembered to mute their laptops, the sound worked fine, though.
They could just be in their work offices, and I would be in my home office. Screen sharing would have been much easier too. They could share their work station screen. The computer they use for, you know, work (all their drive mapping and all of that).
They shared one laptop screen and mic and speaker. So I would not be able to see their screens from that one shared laptop. We did not use laptops, at all really. I’m not sure of all of their home set ups, but they could meet remotely from home on their personal computers as I did.
Having headseats and cameras for their work stations would have solved it. It’s easy. Work would have bought them for them. I would have bought them for them. I just don’t get it.
I assume they did it because they wanted to be physically in the same room. And doing that, they needed to share one mike and one speaker, and you are only going to present on one screen at a time, so why not.
We had conference rooms with a big screen so it’s easy for everyone to see, but you’d only hook up one laptop to it.
I didn’t like “hybrid” meetings, either, but i understand why people who are in the same building want to sit in the same room when they meet.
Because the shared mic sucked. And as programmers it was a good idea to share your screen with what you are working on. And you can’t do that if your just using a common laptop.
That’s why not.
Not so much anymore.
Nope. I’ve had full-time co-workers as old as 83 to 85. As long as you can physically do the job you have you can keep working here.
If anything, it’s the people in their early 20’s who face ageism around here.
My original plan - even as far back as when I was in my early 20’s - was to work until 70 then re-evaluate where I was. With the caveat that if “something happened” I’d reconsider.
Up until a few years ago that was still the plan.
Now, after three years that included two rounds with cancer, a serious retina issue that threatened to half-blind me, cataracts (fixed), seven operations, and six months of chemo (which appears to have beat that cancer) I have concluded that “something happened” and I am re-evaluating so in a sense still on the original plan, just on the alternate fork of that path.
Now planning to retire at 65. I want to increase the odds of actually, you know, having a retirement and getting to enjoy it. I don’t want to, say, spend my last year of life struggling to work while undergoing medical treatment as a possibility that seems more likely than it used to.
But it’s not that I’ve entirely ruled out working - I just want to stop having to work full time, first - if I don’t have to worry about slaving away to keep that juicy, juicy health insurance then I can drop down to part time. I will have more time for me and my projects and interests (of which I have many), and between part time work at my present hourly rate and the “widow’s benefit” from SSA I’ll be able to maintain my income and current “lifestyle”, such as it is. Then retire fully when I’m old enough to collect my full SS benefit.
Or I’ll just say “screw this place” and opt to leave the rat race entirely.
It will be really wonderful to have a choice, you know?
The other thing is that me and a few friends are pooling our retirement resources to live communally on a property in the North Woods. We’ve been working on that for several years now, but due to various reasons we’re thinking of breaking ground and actually building sooner rather than later. That’s another reason for me to seriously consider retiring at 65 rather than 70. The area has summer tourist traffic sufficient that I could pick up some local work to get me out of the house part of the year, but again I won’t have to work all year round. Or maybe I’ll turn a hobby into a small business. Or I’ll read, play World of Warcraft, and go for daily hikes for the rest of my life except for the occasional trip.
Although I’m now thinking of retiring earlier rather than later I already have plenty of activities planned to fill my time. I won’t be sitting in an easy chair in front of the idiot box all day.
Yes! And i love love love working part time and having flexibility.
I really wish my agency had a part time option but they don’t. That would be ideal.
Glad you have that option!
You need to beware of “part time” jobs that are just underpaid full time jobs. But actual part time work is awesome. You get to travel and do hobby stuff and also get the stability and interactions of working.
what I’ve noticed is that part time jobs that are ALWAYS available - because they suck - happen here at all the grocery stores and other retail outlets. They expect you to let them schedule you whenever they want to - days, evenings, weekends - no matter if you want to work only 15 hours, say. They don’t think they have to be flexible for some reason. Does this happen everywhere?
Happened to friend of mine who retired early after a nice package on a buy out. Several years into a content enough retirement he was tempted back by old associates starting up a new business who wanted him in as a part time consultant … hemmed hawed and figured okay. Only to quickly realized that while he wasn’t going to be underpaid for the work he was doing it was definitely full time that was needed. He un-unretired pretty quickly.
It depends on the nature of the work. If it’s something like a grocery store, or nursing, that needs a certain number of people on staff, that tends to happen (although my friends who have worked at trader Joe’s and a local grocery store had a certain amount of influence over their schedules after they got some seniority. And my friend with a job as a nurse was able to request a few long weekends off each year. But it was a big deal to manage.)
But most of the work i do needs to be done “this week”, sometimes even “this month”. So even at the job where i ended up working way too many hours, i generally had a lot of choice over which hours, and which days.
I asked about requesting/reporting vacation time at my current job, and was told, "we’re scheduling you for 20 hours a week please let us know in advance about any weeks you won’t be able to work 20 hours "
To some extent they can’t be flexible - if the grocery store needs a cashier or the doctor’s office needs someone to work the front desk Mon, Wed Fri from 12-8 , that’s what they need even if you only want to work 15 hours a week. But it’s also that they don’t have to be flexible to some extent - they will always find someone willing to work those three shifts , even if that person might prefer working more or fewer hours.
I get they may have needs, but I’m talking about places that are literally ALWAYS hiring. if they aren’t even willing to listen to how my needs and theirs intersect we can’t get anywhere. Maybe I will only work mornings, but they have trouble getting people to work mornings on the weekends, I don’t know. the point is: they will not talk to me, I have to agree up front that I’m always available. That’s what one grocery store chain told me and - sure enough - they never stopped having jobs they need filled. One manager gave me the standard answer (when asked why they were always hiring) “nobody wants to work anymore” which is such BS IMGO
Covid sent me home working full time though. It was great, and got me used to being retired (2 weeks fully retired). I basically made my own hours. But working from home for years made it an easy adjustment. Only difficulty is remembering what day of the week it is. I’ll take it.
Hope you don’t think I was getting on your case about the laptop mic thing. But the situation I was in really got under my skin. Would have been so easy for them to ‘fix’.
No problem. I understand that it was annoying, but i also understand why the coworkers did it. It worked better for them than what you would have preferred.
I did lobby against it in my own job. But when we had a hybrid meeting, i joined everyone else in the conference room if i was in the office.
A little survey.
Do you feel a need to be useful?
Personally I think that is part of my desire to work? I already recognized a need for external validation, but this not the same. So I wonder if those of us who want to delay retirement have more of that need than those who look forward to it as soon as possible (FIRE being the extreme case). Possibly as big of a factor as job enjoyment.
I do, but there are a lot of ways to be useful that didn’t involve paid employment. You can babysit your grand kids. You can babysit your neighbors’ kids. You can volunteer. You can be active in other activities.
When i was retired, i volunteered teaching English to an immigrant, i volunteered tutoring stats in a prison, i organized square dance events, i volunteered on several committee for my professional organization, i helped run my local square dance club…
(I’m still doing several of those things, although not as many hours.)
I don’t need a job to feel useful.