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Office Trends: In or Out Part 1
26 Plays1 month ago
In this fun and thought-provoking episode of Water Cooler Wisdom, hosts Jake Blocker and Rachael Grail take on the role of workplace trend judges in their newest segment, “Is It In or Out?” From artificial intelligence revolutionizing our workflows to the return of office Christmas parties and the evolution of the hybrid workplace, they dive into whether these trends deserve a spot on the “in” list or are better left behind.
Along the way, Jake and Rachael share personal anecdotes, weigh the pros and cons, and reflect on the cultural shifts shaping modern work. Is AI really a tool for good, or does it signal darker implications? Are office holiday parties making a comeback, and do they help or hinder workplace dynamics? And is the hybrid workplace the best of both worlds, or just another compromise?
Join the conversation as they debate hot-button topics with humor, insight, and a healthy dose of reality. Whether you’re working from home, in the office, or somewhere in between, this episode is sure to spark a conversation around your (real or virtual) water cooler.
Don’t forget to subscribe to Water Cooler Wisdom and follow us for more workplace banter and insights. Let’s make work, work better—together!
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Transcript
Introduction to Podcast Series
00:00:05
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Water Cooler Wisdom. I am Jake Blockard. And I'm Rachel Grail. Rachel, great to see you as per use. Yeah, great to see you too, Jake. I'm excited to continue our new... The new formats. The new formats. It's the four of four. This is the last and final of the new formats. Again, we'll see that I say that then the next episode is something totally different. But for now, this is the fourth of four.
Workplace Trends: In or Out?
00:00:36
Speaker
ah so This one's a little bit different than what we've done in the past. it is so What we talked about doing was, you know let's talk about what's going on in the workplace and ah think of our personal thoughts and opinions on these and decide for ourselves, is this trend, is this thing in or out? Again, these are our own opinions. this not trying to trash anyone's views or how they live their lives. You do you, you do your authentic self. I'm all for it. It is purely our own thoughts. This is a come as you are party. Exactly. Exactly. Anything to add there, Rachel? Uh, no, I think this will be fun to see. I want to hear what you feel and you know, as, as we go toe to toe on things, I feel like there's a lot we'll likely align on, but you know, we'll see. Yeah.
00:01:29
Speaker
yeah All
Is AI Here to Stay?
00:01:31
Speaker
right. So the first one I have, is it in or out AI? Rachel, is it in or out? I feel like that was a dumb question. Cause of course it's in. Although we listened to this one year later, then it's, you know, or it's taking over the world. And I think AI is here to stay. I think the format that it takes, the way that people interact with it, the way people feel about it might change, but this is a sea change.
00:01:57
Speaker
Yeah. you know it was I recently went to a conference, um those who know HubSpot Inbound, a great conference, highly recommend marketing conference. And it was funny, I went last year in person. Last year was when AIs just kind of started out and were like, oh, chatTBT, this is a great thing. And people were you know just dabbling in and some of the topics were about like scary, every you're losing jobs, we're assuring us we're not going to lose our jobs, and how it's taking over the world, and like things to be cautious of. And then flash forwarded this year, and it was just kind of totally different, totally we flipped it, of
00:02:37
Speaker
All right, here's how to use it to just make your job a little bit easier, a little bit and better. This isn't taking your job. This is going to help you do your job even better. And even to the point where last year, again, it was funny of like, you know, use chat TPT to create all this different pieces of content, create a blog and create a webinar, a million things from this one piece of content, this one prompt to where now it's like people can tell if something is hu QPT. And instead, a lot of the stuff was like, all right, I did not sound like how to use a prompt so that you don't people can't tell. And it's an interesting thing because I think we are not yet in a place of equalization. And I remember feeling like pretty positive about it from the jump and like, oh, this is going to revolutionize the way that we do work.
00:03:33
Speaker
And it's, it's not necessarily going to take jobs, but it's going to change things. And I have to say, I'm eating my words a little bit because I'm in California. Tech layoffs are real this year is hurting people. And they they're not saying it's because of AI, but it i think is a function. And so I do believe that there will be an equalization.
AI's Impact on Daily Life
00:04:00
Speaker
And I hope that like in a year from now, when I listen to this, it's going to be like, oh, artificial overlord. Like, yeah who knows? I can't possibly begin to predict the future, but I do see in my own day to day, the incredible power of using computational power as a resource, as a, as a partner. I mean,
00:04:28
Speaker
This could be a big segue, but also there's an incredible environmental impact of of these servers and what's happening. So I don't know, there's a lot there's a lot of factors. This can of worms is open though. I think it's here to stay.
00:04:42
Speaker
I completely agree. you know I think of even just how I used Google for so much and how I was researching just basic things of in my daily life of how do I do this or I'm having this issue, what is it or whatever it may be and now my nature is just go to chat GPT, which I have on my phone. I have as a desktop app. I have all my different GPTs that help me with various things that I do in life. And I go to it first. That's my first stop is to ask it. What, what is this? How can I fix this thing in my house? um What are all those questions? oh Yeah. I got an incredible solution for hanging curtains and a long span from chat GPT.
00:05:24
Speaker
I love that. I have it. Uh, I have some workouts. I have one of my workouts. It's just pull up and pushups and you have to do certain reps and I have it count. I'm like, all right, when I'm going to do pull ups first, push up second and give you each number amazing po for me. it's the other day I put, I took a picture of my refrigerator and maybe you were the one that hit to me to this and was like, what can I make for dinner? That's kind of healthy.
00:05:50
Speaker
and it's like generated various recipes. So there's all kinds of stuff that I do in a workplace setting for sure. Um, and it's just, I do think it's like the old school Star Trek. If you ever watched that where it's like computer the dadadadada and ah we're, we're getting into that. So, I mean, I think, I think it's here and I hope we can figure out a way to power the massive energy draw of all that computation yeah without, without,
00:06:20
Speaker
you know, continuing to, well, um yeah I'll just move on. I'll just move on. But I'm thinking about the that there's a lot of, there's a lot of implications. There's an environmental impact with yeah the amount yeah we're generating. Yeah. All right.
Office Christmas Parties: In or Out?
00:06:37
Speaker
Well, second one here. Yeah.
00:06:40
Speaker
This one, it depends on when this episode drops, but I think it'll be timely or maybe it'll be, you'll you'll think back to something recent. Office Christmas parties in or out. yeah I'm somewhere in the middle on this of we're a fully remote company so and we're all scattered. so we don't I think we occasionally do some meetups if we are in a specific location and it's the holidays. But me being, I think I'm the only one in Colorado really, so it's I just had my own Christmas party here by myself, preferred. That sounds like my kind of Christmas party. It's the introverse Christmas party. Yeah. yeah
00:07:19
Speaker
I think they're back in. I think they took a little hiatus with COVID and everything. It seems like they're they're back. um Not just office Christmas parties, but Christmas parties in general. Now, whether that's a good thing or not is a whole nother conversation. I mean, and that's really about your point of view um and probably your workplace culture, whether you enjoy your office Christmas party or not.
00:07:47
Speaker
What do you think, Jake? Yeah. If it's just feeling uncomfortable the entire time that you're there. Yeah. Or like, Oh God, I'm just forced to have conversations with my colleagues. Uh, which I mean, I, I like my colleagues, so I don't mind having conversations with my colleagues, but I would have been in workplaces where I did not and would find any excuse in the world to not go or like, Oh shoot, I think I have,
00:08:16
Speaker
something planned that day, I can't make it. no yeah But my perspective is is it's so hard because I am very introverted when it comes to this type of stuff. and share that proivity Yeah, my preference is was usually I don't want to attend.
00:08:39
Speaker
I don't want to go. I just did my nine to five with you all. I don't need to do my five to 10 with you all. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Oh man. Office Christmas parties are, um, it's one of those things where usually I kind of dread it. I end up having a decent time. yeah Um, but there's always, it's, there's a sense of,
00:09:07
Speaker
moderation that is think not always at play, which can kind of be, well, yeah, it's funny because everybody's there and they're trying to gauge like how much openness do I want to bring to this event?
00:09:23
Speaker
Yeah. If you're at a friend's Christmas party, you can let your hair down a little bit. It's a different experience. Be a little bit more free versus the office, which you're like, all right, I still have to come back here on Monday and not be looked at in a certain way. I've coached a lot of people and they always want to talk about the Christmas party before it happens. They're always like, how Am I gonna manage this? like what it So it's a real thing that people are trying to figure out because we have one level of presentation in our nine to five and then we're expected you know to be fun and be like a little bit more open and that can be...
00:10:00
Speaker
comfortable to different degrees for different people um and uncomfortable to different degrees for different people. So it's a bit of a um ah minefield, I think, for people. And sometimes that pays off because you do have opportunities to have conversations that allow you to build relationships that are meaningful, that do support your work relationships. um But ah boy, you got to just tread carefully, tread carefully on that one.
00:10:29
Speaker
You know, do not have the third drink, no matter what a good idea it seems. It's not no i mean worth it. Again, if you do you, I leave you in freedom, but I'm not sure. Some people have more tolerance than I do. It's more the advice to ourselves. Don't have that third drink. Exactly. Do not 22 anymore.
00:10:53
Speaker
All right. What's
Hybrid Workplace and Collaboration
00:10:54
Speaker
what's next? Do we cover that one? all right I think so. All right. The next one is the good old hybrid workplace. Ah, yes. I love that we can say the good old hybrid workplace. like you not just Five years ago, you would not be saying good old, but yeah, here it is. It's a hybrid workplace. Um, yeah, it's, I think, you know, I think it to some capacity, it's here to stay. Uh, just like remote work is going to be a part of our lives, whether you're experiencing it or not experiencing it, someone else works it. who
00:11:28
Speaker
And a lot of friends I have who went fully remote, like they were fully in office pre-COVID and went fully remote during COVID, of course. They now they would have never had the ability to even experiment that, even think about a hybrid workplace had they not been fully remote and shown like, hey, this is we can do this.
00:11:50
Speaker
So I think it's it's kind of a staple of a workplace now. And there was the time, we I think our very first podcast episode was around the return to office. Yeah, yeah. and That was almost almost a year ago. And we saw that mandate.
00:12:08
Speaker
just rolling through, people just being forced back to the office, still happening here and there. But maybe I'm out of it and just don't know. I feel like that's kind of stopping and there's been somewhat of a compromise. All right, we'll at least do hybrid. Whatever a company policy is for that could be Thursday, Friday is at home, the rest of the week in office.
00:12:31
Speaker
your own schedule, and they kind of have to do that because people don't um a lot of people do not want to go to an office full-time anymore. Well, and also I think a lot of businesses don't wanna say that if you're if you're feeling a little bit under the weather, know stay home and don't work, it's no longer, the lines are no longer black and white. And so if people are working from home when they have a little head cold, then it's it's hard to justify not working from home at all. So I agree with you that the hybrid workplace is here to stay. And I think we still have a little bit of work to do
00:13:08
Speaker
to Uh-oh, buzzword warning. But to optimize that, I don't think we've fully gotten to a place where we can have seamless collaboration, especially when there's people meeting in person and groups of people who are out of office. So different organizations have different levels of success with that. But I think there's still a little bit of work to do around that. I absolutely agree. But I do think that people are going to keep working from home.
00:13:39
Speaker
And it's really going to continue to be beneficial both for individual workers and for companies. So I think we're in it. I agree. I agree. All right, Rachel, should we do one more or do you want to? Yeah, let's do one more. Let's do one more. What do you think? Yeah. Yeah. Let's do this one.
The 'We're a Family' Motto
00:14:01
Speaker
Uh, this is a great one. We're a family.
00:14:04
Speaker
ah this is the ahta workplace motto or you know the team motto of quote unquote, we're a family. This is out, out. This is just red flags. It is, it's, I think it's, you know, so for some, I'll give some people a benefit out here that I think it's well-intentioned. Like it's not, totally. It's not meaning to say, not mean it's not meant to be a disguise of something else, of a bad workplace, but for far too many, it is the, hey, we're a family, so you need to make sacrifices for your family, just like you would your actual family.
00:14:42
Speaker
when that should not be the case. That should not be how you feel when you go to the workplace. Yeah, I think fortunately, like you said, there's some really sweet intentions about it and that they wouldn't necessarily people don't say, oh, it's because we want you to make sacrifices. It's it's like it imbues a sense of loyalty and caring for the whole person more than just like what you can do for us from a productivity level. But Let's be real. I mean, families are beautiful and I'm close to my family. But families are stressful. They're not always ah the picture of a functional working environment. yeah Clear boundaries are challenging. as You know, you may have even the most healthy family relationship and still it's like it can be fraught with
00:15:33
Speaker
um Habits that don't allow for evolution, for growth. So I think that most people when they see that, like a company advertising, we're a family, this is a part of our value set.
00:15:49
Speaker
That is i one that's not a value add. No, not at all. It's sad because I think it really does have some beauty behind it, some some sweet intentions behind it. ah But i I just, I think functionally it misses the mark. I completely agree. That's a no for me.
00:16:08
Speaker
I don't know if there's other verbiage to replace it with necessarily. I think it's more of just showing, not not using just a catchphrase to say, I respect you. How about you just respect people? I think that's right. I think like specificity is your friend. And if it's about we're loyal to you and we want you to be loyal to us, I think there could be some problematic themes there but I mean maybe if it's like we value you as a whole person um we want to make space for the rest of your life as well like then say that just like you said think about really what it is that you value and how that informs
00:16:49
Speaker
your business practices and say that the catchphrase of where a family it just it's it's too much interpretation. It's too. um know It's just it's people are gonna have different reactions to it. Yeah, what kind of family you're talking about?
00:17:04
Speaker
exactly Yeah, yeah, doesn't it's not a universal understanding or experience of
Conclusion and Future Content
00:17:12
Speaker
family? No, not at all. All right, well,
00:17:15
Speaker
That was our first one of the in and out. I love it. I think we started some good things out. We weren't very definitive on the Christmas parties. I got to give us, you know, I got to call us out for that. But I mean, what are you going to do? Usually the snacks are good, at least we like that.
00:17:30
Speaker
I'd say it's in if I had to like stake my claim, if I have to pick one or the other. But me personally, it may be out, but for the world, maybe it's in. Yeah, we have to think of our extrovert friends. They get excited about it, right? They want to wear a cute outfit or, you know, yeah, have some cookies. Yeah, let's be inclusive of the extroverts. Yeah. Agreed. All right. Well, this was fun, Jake.
00:18:00
Speaker
That was great. Yeah, that rounds out our new ones. And yeah, we'll come back with some more content. Looking forward to it. See you back at the water cooler. See ya. Thanks for listening to Water Cooler Wisdom. This podcast is brought to you by Interaction Associates, a leading professional development and leadership training organization whose mission is to help people work better together.
00:18:26
Speaker
If you'd like to learn more, visit interactionassociates dot.com. If you have questions, comments, or are interested in collaborating with this podcast, you can email us at watercoolerwisdom at interactionassociates.com.