Interview P02 | SYNTHETIC transcript for training | Topic: hybrid working and campus
Participant: lecturer, architecture (pseudonym P02) | INT = interviewer

INT: Could you describe how your working week is organised at the moment?
P02: My teaching days are fixed by the timetable, so I'm in on Monday and
     Wednesday whatever happens. Studio teaching has to be in person. The
     rest of the week is flexible, and I tend to do research at home.
INT: How do you get to campus?
P02: I drive, which I'm not proud of. The bus would take over an hour with a
     change, and I often have models or drawings to carry. Parking has gone up
     twice in two years, though, so I'm starting to resent it.
INT: What's the space like when you're here?
P02: This is my biggest frustration. We lost our own offices when the school
     moved to hot-desking. So on a teaching day I arrive, I hunt for a desk,
     and I carry everything around with me in a rucksack like a student.
INT: How does that affect your work?
P02: You can't leave anything out. You can't pin anything up. For a design
     tutor that's odd, because pinning work up is how we think. And there's
     nowhere private for a difficult conversation with a student.
INT: Can you say more about that?
P02: If a student is upset about a mark, or something's going on at home, I
     need a door I can close. Now I have to book a room days in advance, which
     isn't how pastoral conversations work. They happen on the day.
INT: What about the days at home?
P02: They're good for writing. I've published more since we went hybrid, if
     I'm honest. But I'm also answering emails at ten at night, because the
     laptop is always on the kitchen table.
INT: Do colleagues coordinate when they're in?
P02: Not formally. We've drifted into Monday being the busy day, because of
     the timetable. On Fridays the building is a ghost town. It's a shame,
     because the corridor conversations are where the school's culture lives.
INT: Is that a loss for you personally?
P02: For me it's mostly a loss for the junior staff. I've got my networks.
     Someone who joined last year hasn't really met half the department. They
     see us as little faces in boxes.
INT: Is the arrangement fair across different roles, do you think?
P02: No. I can choose, mostly. Our technicians and the school office can't.
     They're here every day keeping the place running, and some of them feel
     like the rest of us have quietly left them to it.
INT: If you could change one thing, what would it be?
P02: Give us back some fixed space. Even a shared room with walls we can use
     for pin-ups. A building designed for hybrid working would look very
     different from one designed for everyone at a desk, nine to five.
INT: Anything else?
P02: Only that the design of the space and the policy have to be thought about
     together. At the moment they feel like two separate conversations.
INT: Thank you.

[End of interview]
