Returning to the Office . . . While Black

The New Yorker Radio Hour

WNYC Studios and The New Yorker

Politics, Arts, News, Wnyc, Books, David, Storytelling, Society & Culture, Yorker, New, Remnick

4.2 • 6.2K Ratings

🗓️ 22 March 2022

⏱️ 20 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

“Coming back to work is partially about surveillance and micromanagement,” Keisha, a podcasting executive, says. “Everybody feels it, but people of color feel it in a different way.” For workers who have been remote for the better part of two years, returning to the office is undeniably complicated. For some Black workers who didn’t feel at ease in majority-white offices to begin with, the complications are even greater. Racial microaggressions abound, and, for some, the stress of excessive visibility that comes with being a minority never goes away. “I would love to be ‘feet on the couch relaxed,’ like some of my colleagues in the past,” Keisha says, but “I don’t know if I could allow myself that.” As an entrepreneur named James put it, “Black folks aren’t really allowed to have bad days.” The Radio Hour’s KalaLea talks with four Black professionals and compares their experience to that of Robert Churchwell, a Black reporter hired by the Nashville Banner in 1950. Churchwell was excluded from the white newsroom and worked from home for five years. Audio from an interview with Robert Churchwell comes from the Civil Rights Oral History Project, Special Collections, Nashville Public Library.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is The New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker.
0:10.1	This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. It was two years ago that our office, like so much of New York and very shortly much of the nation, shut down.
0:21.3	And businesses everywhere suddenly put those work-from-home contingency plans to the test.
0:27.1	For people who have been working from home for the better part of two years,
0:30.5	going back to the office now is undeniably complicated.
0:35.1	Here's the radio hours producer, Kalalia.
0:42.2	On March 11th, 2020, I was sitting on the A-train on my way to the office,
0:49.3	listening to music as I do on most mornings.
0:56.4	The band, Tame Impala, had recently released some new music.
1:02.2	Actually, it was an album.
1:07.6	And then an email came in.
1:11.2	It was addressed to the entire staff.
1:14.5	It said, if you're on your way to the office, turn back and work from home.
1:21.3	If you're here, make your way home.
1:25.0	My first thought literally was, dreams really do come true. I get to work from home.
1:43.3	Two years later, many of us who have had the privilege to work from home are going back to the office.
1:49.8	And honestly, I'm not feeling good about it.
1:54.4	It's really tough admitting this, because I like my teammates and the work that I do.
2:01.4	Yeah, I can see some of the benefits, face-to-face collaboration, human connection.
2:08.5	But for me, these things don't outweigh the benefits of working in my own space.
2:15.0	What's wrong with not going into the office if the work gets done? A research group called
2:20.7	Future Forum conducted a poll in 2021 and found that 21% of white professionals were looking forward
	...

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