Working from home is fun, but have you worked from the office?

Working at the office is more than boring water cooler chats, with one generation at risk of missing out on these workplace perks.

Our next generation of office workers are missing a crucial part of workplace culture while working from home.

There is something about working in the office that a whole generation is missing out on right now.

Young workers in their late teens and 20s have gone straight from university or TAFE, or even high school, to working from home. They have gone from the lecture halls or their end of-year high school formals to dreaded back-to-back Microsoft Teams of Zoom meetings.

As the debate rages over when it is safe to return back to the office, some things are getting lost.

Those generations haven’t had a chance to experience what many of us as Generation X, Y, Baby Boomers or even Millennials did, and that is the great social times of working in an office in your 20s.

Looking back now, “growing up” in a newsroom at the Herald Sun in Southgate for my whole 20s in the early 2000s was such a joy — even boarding a packed 7.30am tram.

Every morning you’d say hello to Di at reception, go upstairs and have a gossip with Sue the secretary, then go to your desk and get to work.

Luke Dennehy worked as an entertainment reporter at the Herald Sun, pictured with Dave Hughes and Nui Te Koha. Picture: Eugene Hyland.

A trip to the vending machine for an 11am bottle of a Coca-Cola was a ritual, then lunch with friends or perhaps a quick walk to clear your head.

That meant going to the Myer food hall and later the David Jones food hall, both now sadly gone as it appears our beautiful city is a shell of its former self.

More walks for a sandwich are needed right now, as CBD businesses try to survive the pandemic.

After work we regularly went drinking with colleagues, where you’d not only socialise but bounce the day’s work off each other. You might have spent hours on the road chasing a story with no leads, but you had the support of your colleagues to get through it.

We’d drink at a Southgate pub called The River (sadly no longer) then turn up dusty to work the next day and Di at reception would give you a look, but it didn’t matter because you did your best work was inspired by the conversations and tips from the night before.

My routine was similar to millions of my generation in all sorts of industries throughout the city.

We need more walks for a sandwich in the city. Picture: David Crosling.

As Lord Mayor Sally Capp told the Herald Sun recently, working in the office is about more than saving city businesses. “I hope we’re told it’s time to leave our homes, return to the office and start being extraordinary again,” she said.

It’s that word extraordinary that got me. We had that chance to be extraordinary, but a whole generation sadly are not.

There is no question working from home for some is hugely beneficial, especially if you have children. But that doesn’t mean it’s right for everyone. It’s time.

Luke Dennehy is a Melbourne writer