01 导读
原文阅读外刊翻译
02 听力|精读|翻译|词组
Working hard for the money 俯首甘为打工人
20210612年经济学家商业版英语
Bartleby 巴托比
A new study questions the effectiveness of remote working 一项新研究质疑远程办公效率
The return to the office is well under way, just as summer in the northern hemisphere begins. Pretty soon, people will be able to resume the habit of staring wistfully out of the window, hoping it will still be sunny at the weekend. As many workers embrace a hybrid pattern, perhaps commuting 2-3 days a week, the experiment in full-time home-working is ending. At the same time, assessments of its effectiveness are proliferating.就像北半球的夏季模式开始一样，人们开始有序地回到办公室。很快，人们就能恢复过去的习惯，望着窗外，期待着周末的晴朗天气。随着许多员工开始接受混合办公模式——每周只有2-3天，整天在家工作的日子即将结束。与此同时，对远程办公有效性的评估也在日益激增。
注：Wistful: thinking sadly about something you would like to have but cannot have, especially something that you used to have in the past(因为得不到想要的，尤其是曾经拥有的东西)悲伤、忧郁、思念，依依不舍： a wistful smile 失落的微笑Early surveys of employees and employers found that remote work did not reduce productivity. But a new study* of more than 10,000 employees at an Asian technology company between April 2019 and August 2020 paints a different picture. The firm uses software installed on employees’ computers that tracked which applications or websites were active, and whether the employee was using the keyboard or a mouse. (Shopping online didn’t count.)对员工和雇主的早期调查发现，远程办公并没有降低生产力。然而，一项由亚洲科技公司进行的新调查得到了完全不同的结果。调查从2019年4月持续到2020年8月，公司在1万多名员工的计算机上安装软件，监控员工访问的应用程序和网站，以及员工是否使用键盘和鼠标。（不包括在线购物）
The research certainly concluded that the employees were working hard. Total hours worked were 30% higher than before the pandemic, including an 18% increase in working outside normal hours. But this extra effort did not translate into any rise in output. This may explain the earlier survey evidence; both employers and employees felt they were producing as much as before. But the correct way to measure productivity is output per working hour. With all that extra time on the job, this fell by 20%.毫无疑问，这项研究显示了员工的努力。与疫情前相比，总工作时间增加了30%，包括18%的非工作时间加班。但这些额外的努力并没有转化为产出增加。这可能解释了早期的调查结果，员工和雇主都觉得产出和以前一样。但衡量生产力的正确方法取决于每小时的工作产出。再加上所有额外的工作时间，每小时工作产出下降了20%。
The interesting thing is why this happened. The academics were able to analyse how much time the employees spent in “collaboration hours”, defined as various types of meetings, and how much time they had as “focus hours”, uninterrupted by calls or emails, where they could concentrate on their tasks. Despite working longer hours, the employees had less focus time than before the pandemic. Instead, all their extra time was taken up by meetings. Long-time readers may recall Bartleby’s law: 80% of the time of 80% of the people in meetings is wasted. This study certainly offers evidence for the proposition.这一现象背后的原因耐人寻味。专业学者分析员工花在合作时间(即各种会议)和专注时间(即不受电话或电子邮件干扰，专注于手头任务)上的时间。分析结果显示，员工的工作时间比疫情前长，但专注时间缩短。他们额外的工作时间都在开会。忠实读者可能会想到巴托比定律：80%的人在会议上浪费了80%的时间。显然，这项研究也为这一论断提供了证据。
One possibility is that managers are less certain of their team’s commitment and are holding more meetings to check on them. Another is that managers call so many meetings to validate their own existence when they are not in the office. However, the academics suggest the greater need for meetings is the result of the greater difficulty of co-ordinating employees when they are working remotely—another hint that the process is inefficient. When working remotely, employees also spend less time being evaluated, trained and coached.会海现象频发，可能与经理无法实时确认团队成员的工作投入有关。为此，他们只能召开更多的会议来检查员工的工作表现。此外，经理们可能会开更多的会议，以便在家工作时刷足够的存在感。然而，专业学者认为，会海现象背后有强烈的需求，即解决远程办公带来的巨大合作困难，这也反映了远程办公的低效率。同时，由于员工不能在办公室工作，他们花更少的时间进行评估、培训和指导。
This seems a raw deal for the employees. They received no more money for the overtime. Although they saved commuting time, this did not offset the extra hours spent in meetings. Not all workers behaved the same way. Those who had worked at the company the longest tended to be more productive, suggesting that they found it easier to navigate the hazards of home-working. Employees with children worked around 20 minutes a day more than those without, implying an even greater fall in their productivity, presumably because they were distracted by child-care duties.这对员工来说似乎是不公平的。工作时间越来越长，但工资一动不动。节省通勤时间，但未能抵消海洋占用的时间。然而，它的优缺点因人而异。研究发现，该公司的老年员工通常更有效率，这表明他们更擅长解决家庭办公的缺点。相比之下，家里有孩子的员工平均每天工作20分钟左右，这意味着他们的工作效率下降了更多。这可能与他们需要照顾孩子有关。
注：raw deal：the fact of sb being treated unfairly.So does this mean companies will abandon remote working altogether, even its hybrid version? The academics point out that the staff at the firm under study are nearly all college-educated and their roles “involve significant cognitive work, developing new software or hardware applications or solutions, collaborating with teams of professionals, working with clients, and engaging in innovation and continuous improvement”. Such work may have posed a particular challenge in remote settings, compared with occupations like responding to customer calls, say, where employees may work to a scripted set of replies.这是否意味着公司会放弃远程办公，甚至混合办公模式？专业学者指出，参与研究的公司员工基本上都是大学毕业生。他们参与了大量的认知工作，开发新的软硬件应用程序，制定解决方案，与专家小组合作，与客户对接，研发创新，探索持续进步。这种工作在远程模式下比那些只需要根据回复模板回答的职业要困难得多，比如接听客户的电话。
It is hardly surprising that there would be some teething and co-ordination problems involved with remote working. The practice was, after all, imposed suddenly. The study stopped last August and one wonders whether employees have learned to use their time more efficiently since then. And the research shows that employees were able to achieve as much output with slightly less “focus time” than they had at the office. The real source of inefficiency—surprise, surprise—was the time spent in meetings. And the answer is simple; don’t call as many, and keep them short.远程办公的实施会暴露出一些初始和合作的问题，这并不奇怪。毕竟，它的实施是突然的。调查于去年8月结束，但有人怀疑员工是否学会了更有效地利用自己的时间。调查显示，员工在家工作的专注时间略低于办公室的专注时间，也能达到相同的工作产出。人们一定难以置信，效率低下的罪魁祸首是开会时间。提高效率很简单:少开点，开短点。
注：teething problem 初始问题翻译组：Gretle,女，in-house英语翻译Lambert,热爱微世界的幼稚小学生 Humi,CATer，躺平or 这是一个问题校对组：Cristina,决心成为最懒的懒猪Lixia, Life is chock-full of FUN Elle,女，哎…怎么说呢？情绪复杂。…其他平台编辑作者：
B站编辑：Daisy，勤奋的工具人，B站客服的好朋友知乎编辑：jill，会展经济，想跨境英专英语学渣微博编辑：Erin，一个大学生，TE爱好者
03 观点|评论|思考
本次感想 VeRy，男，电气民工，经济学人才浅爱好者有人称她为时间管理大师，可能是因为她可以在和别人聊天时完成家庭作业，写论文，甚至做一些翻译来赚取一些零花钱。其他人做不到，应该说很多人做不到。但她对自己并不满意，总是觉得如果她专注于一件事，她可能会取得更大的成就，或者做出突破性的贡献。
也许她错了，她的大脑适合并行操作，大脑的广度，深度不好。她擅长在不同的任务中行走，不同的任务可以保持大脑的活动，但从长远来看，大脑对单一任务的兴奋会下降，长期处理单一任务的能力和注意力会下降，因为大脑已经习惯了多任务的刺激。
我似乎很难与远程工作的话题产生共鸣。即使我想了很长时间，我也找不到任何与之相关的东西。我认为有两个原因：一是作为一个以制造业实体经济为主的国家，几乎很难想象远程办公室可以部分取代实体经济。目前，我们对疫情的态度也很严格，几乎都是一刀切的原则，所以在这种情况下，远程办公几乎是最后的选择；第二，我们的工作时间被严重挤压。996到处都是，小城市可能是896。因此，讨论看似科学的问题，如增加工作量或工作效率，对我们来说缺乏现实的土壤。
我们总是被灌输努力致富，努力工作。因此，如果你谈论公司或社会的工作效率，人们会警惕你是否想懒惰，因为当你提到工作效率时，你可以以此为借口和基础，提出各种条件。因此，人们对工作的态度是时间到位，效率不提。很难区分效率。一旦能区分效率，自然效率高的人会提出更高的待遇要求，而效率低的人会被要求提高效率。当然，由于效率第一，人们往往以计件制、多劳多得为手段灵活。
在我看来，脑力劳动很难用效率来衡量，这可以作为区分脑力和体力的界限。你可以让一个代码农民或电气工程师在规定的时间内调试某个程序或设备，但如果你向上走，进入创造力和创造力水平，很难用规定的效率来衡量这个人的产出，有些人愿意这样做，因为我们区分脑力劳动和额体力劳动结果的一个重要因素是，脑力劳动的结果是独一无二的和独一无二的。虽然资本家没有告诉你浪漫，但这一特点决定了他们的劳动成果有更高的溢价，换句话说，他们可以以更好的价格出售；体力劳动是相似的和可重复的，所以它可以大规模生产，这决定了你所能做的就是别人所能做的。
你想做什么样的工作？
6月翻译
04 愿景
打造 独立思考 | 国际视野 | 英文学习 小组
