原文標題：
Free exchange
Don’t be workshy
Whoops! Working from home is detrimental to productivity, after all
自由交流
不要逃避工作
哎呀! 居家辦公竟然不利于生產(chǎn)效率

The working-from-home illusion fades
居家辦公的虛假魅力消失了

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A GRADUAL REVERSE migration is under way, from Zoom to the conference room.

一場逆向演變正在進行中，人們從Zoom平臺回到會議室開會。

Wall Street firms have been among the most forceful in summoning workers to their offices, but in recent months even many tech titans—Apple, Google, Meta and more—have demanded staff show up to the office at least three days a week.

華爾街公司一直是最積極召喚員工回到辦公室的力量之一，但在最近幾個月，甚至許多科技巨頭--蘋果、谷歌、Meta等--都要求員工每周至少有三天到辦公室上班。

For work-from-home believers, it looks like the revenge of corporate curmudgeons.

對于居家辦公支持者來說，這似乎是辦公室辦公支持者們的報復。

Didn’t a spate of studies during the covid-19 pandemic demonstrate that remote work was often more productive than toiling in the office?
疫情期間，一系列研究不是證明了居家遠程工作通常比辦公室辛苦工作更高效率嗎？

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Unfortunately for the believers, new research mostly runs counter to this, showing that offices, for all their flaws, remain essential.

然而，對居家辦公支持者來說，新研究大多與他們的觀點相悖，研究表明盡管辦公室有很多缺陷，但仍然至關(guān)重要。

A good starting point is a working paper that received much attention when it was published in 2020 by Natalia Emanuel and Emma Harrington, then both doctoral students at Harvard University.

事情得從一篇論文說起，2020年納塔利婭.伊曼紐爾和艾瑪.哈林頓（當時都是哈佛大學的博士生）發(fā)表的論文受到廣泛關(guān)注。

They found an 8% increase in the number of calls handled per hour by employees of an online retailer that had shifted from offices to homes.

她們發(fā)現(xiàn)，一家在線零售商的員工從辦公室搬到家里辦公后，每小時處理的電話數(shù)量增加了 8%。

Far less noticed was a revised version of their paper, published in May by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. The boost to efficiency had instead become a 4% decline.
紐約聯(lián)邦儲備銀行5月份發(fā)表的論文修訂版則遠沒有引起人們的注意。這個修訂版本表明，效率實際是下降了4%。

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The researchers had not made a mistake. Rather, they received more precise data, including detailed work schedules.

研究人員沒有出錯。相反，她們收到了更精確的數(shù)據(jù)，包括詳細的工作時間表。

Not only did employees answer fewer calls when remote, the quality of their interactions suffered.They put customers on hold for longer. More also phoned back, an indication of unresolved problems.

員工在遠程辦公時接聽的電話數(shù)量不僅減少了，而且互動的質(zhì)量也受到了影響。他們讓客戶等待的時間更長了，還有更多的客戶打回電話，這意味著問題并沒有得到解決。

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Those working at home were 18% less productive than their peers in the office.

居家辦公的人比辦公室辦公的同事們效率低了18%。

Another study determined that even chess professionals play less well in online matches than face-to-face tilts.

另一項研究表明，即使是國際象棋專業(yè)人士，他們在在線比賽中的表現(xiàn)也不如面對面比賽好。

Yet another used a laboratory experiment to show that video conferences inhibit creative thinking.
還有一項研究通過實驗室實驗證明，視頻會議會抑制創(chuàng)造性思維。

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The reasons for the findings will probably not surprise anyone who has spent much of the past few years working from a dining-room table. It is harder for people to collaborate from home.

對于這幾年大部分時間都在家餐桌上辦公的人來說，這些研究結(jié)果可能不會令他們感到意外。人們居家辦公會更難協(xié)作。

Workers in the Fed study spoke of missing their “neighbours to turn to for assistance”.

研究中的聯(lián)邦政府工作人員表示想念“可以向身邊同事尋求幫助”。

Teleconferencing is a pale imitation of in-the-flesh meetings: researchers at Harvard Business School, for example, concluded that “virtual water coolers”—rolled out by many companies during the pandemic—often encroached on crowded schedules with limited benefits.

視頻會議只是現(xiàn)場會議的不完美替代品：例如，哈佛商學院的研究者們得出結(jié)論，“虛擬水冷卻器”——疫情期間的產(chǎn)物——常常會占用本就擁擠的日程表，且效果有限。

All these problems represent an increase in co-ordination costs, making collective enterprise more unwieldy.

所有這些問題都增加了協(xié)調(diào)成本，使集體企業(yè)變得更加臃腫笨拙。

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Some of the co-ordination costs of remote work might reasonably be expected to fall as people get used to it.

遠程工作的一些協(xié)調(diào)成本可能會隨著人們逐漸適應而有所降低。

Since 2020, many will have become adept at using Zoom, Webex, Teams or Slack. But another cost may rise over time: the underdevelopment of human capital.

自2020年以來，許多人已經(jīng)熟練使用Zoom、Webex、Teams或Slack。但隨著時間推移，另一個成本可能會上升：人力資本欠發(fā)達。

In a study of software engineers published in April, researchers found that feedback exchanged between colleagues dropped sharply after the move to remote work.

在4月份發(fā)表的一項關(guān)于軟件工程師的研究中，研究者發(fā)現(xiàn)，在轉(zhuǎn)向遠程工作后，同事之間的交流反饋大幅下降。

They documented a relative decline in learning for workers at home. Those in offices picked up skills more quickly.
他們記錄了居家辦公者學習能力相對下降的情況。而辦公室辦公者則更快地掌握了技能。

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The price of happiness

幸福的代價

There is more to work (and life) than productivity. Perhaps the greatest virtue of remote work is that it leads to happier employees.

工作（和生活）的意義不僅僅在于生產(chǎn)效率。也許居家遠程工作的最大好處是它能使員工更幸福。

People spend less time commuting, which from their vantage-point might feel like an increase in productivity, even if conventional measures fail to detect it.

人們花在通勤上的時間減少了，從他們的角度來看，這可能增加了生產(chǎn)效率，盡管傳統(tǒng)的衡量標準無法發(fā)現(xiàn)這一點。

They can more easily fit in school pickups and doctor appointments, not to mention the occasional lie-in or midmorning jog.

他們可以更容易地安排接送孩子上學和預約看醫(yī)生的時間，更不用說偶爾睡懶覺或上午慢跑了。

And some tasks—notably, those requiring unbroken concentration for long periods—can often be done more smoothly from home than in open-plan offices.

而且一些任務--尤其是那些需要長時間不間斷集中注意力的任務--通常在家里比在開放式辦公室里更容易順利完成。

All this explains why so many workers have become so office-shy.
這就解釋了為什么有這么多員工不喜歡在辦公室辦公。

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Indeed, several surveys have found employees are willing to accept pay cuts for the option of working from home.

事實上，根據(jù)一些調(diào)查結(jié)果顯示，有些員工寧愿接受降薪也要選擇居家辦公。

Having satisfied employees on slightly lower pay, in turn, might be a good deal for corporate managers.

反過來，以略低的工資讓員工感到滿意，對企業(yè)管理者來說可能是一筆劃算的買賣。

For many people, then, the future of work will remain hybrid.

對于許多人來說，未來的工作方式仍然是混合辦公模式。

Nevertheless, the balance of the work week is likely to tilt back to the office and away from home—not because bosses are sadomasochists with a kink for rush-hour traffic, but because better productivity lies in that direction.
盡管如此，工作周的天平很可能傾向于辦公室辦公，而不是居家辦公--這并不是因為老板們是喜歡早晚高峰堵車的變態(tài)狂，而是因為辦公室辦公意味著更高的生產(chǎn)效率。

（恭喜讀完，本篇英語詞匯量780左右，有刪減）
原文出自：2023年7月1日《The Economist》Finance & economics版塊

精讀筆記來源于：自由英語之路

本文翻譯整理: Irene本文編輯校對: Irene
僅供個人英語學習交流使用。

【補充資料】（來自于網(wǎng)絡）
虛擬水冷卻器Virtual Water Coolers是在線平臺或工具，旨在促進遠程團隊成員之間的社交交流。它模擬了實體辦公室中的輕松氛圍，使員工能夠分享工作和非工作相關(guān)的話題，建立聯(lián)系和互動。在實體辦公室中，水冷卻器通常是員工交流和社交的場所。然而，在遠程工作的環(huán)境中，人們無法親自參加辦公室的水冷卻器活動。為了彌補這一缺失，虛擬水冷卻器成為一種流行的替代方式。

人力資本的欠發(fā)達The underdevelopment of human capital是指在一個國家或地區(qū)或公司里，人們的教育、技能和知識水平不足的問題。

【重點句子】（3個）
Those working at home were 18% less productive than their peers in the office.
居家辦公的人比辦公室辦公的同事們效率低了18%。

The reasons for the findings will probably not surprise anyone who has spent much of the past few years working from a dining-room table. It is harder for people to collaborate from home.
對于這幾年大部分時間都在家餐桌上辦公的人來說，這些研究結(jié)果可能不會令他們感到意外。人們居家辦公會更難協(xié)作。

There is more to work (and life) than productivity. Perhaps the greatest virtue of remote work is that it leads to happier employees.
工作（和生活）的意義不僅僅在于生產(chǎn)效率。也許居家遠程工作的最大好處是它能使員工更幸福。