Now, we all know (with 1 or 2 notable exceptions and my apologies to any aristocratic reader out there) that none of us have ever lived in a castle. However, it has long been accepted that your home would provide you with the same security from the outside world as a castle once protected some medieval lord from revolting peasants.

Until recently, your front door would be your drawbridge, your windows would be your ramparts, your home would be your safe space and you could return home from the office every evening in full confidence that you had securely locked the outside world out.

That is, perhaps, enough of the medieval comparisons.

In the past, what happened in the office stayed in the office, whilst the home remained the sanctity for your private life.

Unless your work required it (emergency services, politician, doctor), it was possible to separate your job from your home life.

But the last 15 years have blurred this separation.

Mobile phones, emails and Wi-Fi provide more flexible access to work, and we no longer have the expectation of working from an office than we once did. Working from home, once seen as the privilege of the semi-retired company director, became a lifestyle choice.

The covid pandemic and its lockdowns accelerated this transformation, ensuring that remote working was here to stay.

Please don't worry, this blog shall not reiterate the countless articles along the "what are the advantages or disadvantages of remote working," which I am sure we have all read.

The reality is that we have all experienced remote working in the last few years, and no doubt many of us will continue to do so.

But let us be honest with each other.

Before trying to understand the challenges of remote working, we need to know why we need to understand them.

Remote working is a challenge; it can be a challenge for employers as much as it is for employees. Done well, it can help facilitate productivity. Implemented badly, it can drain a team, lead to mistrust, and adversely affect mental wellbeing.

Quite simply, how well we remote work affects our output and our success.

Remote working is a challenge to our traditional mindset; for decades, there was the expectation that once you left school or graduated, you would work in office for 5 day a week.

You would leave your castle in the morning, commute to the office, work and then commute home again to the sanctity of home.

Now, for some people, remote working has helped to erode that sense of sanctity.

There is another challenge that we need to be discuss. Perhaps it is more of a question rather a challenge...

And this question is...

IS REMOTE WORKING RIGHT FOR ME?

I appreciate that this is a somewhat obvious question (and I am sure that you all saw it coming) but you would be amazed how many people have failed to ask it before transitioning to hybrid working.

There are people (perhaps your colleagues, maybe even yourself) who have made the transition and have never even taken a few seconds off to consider whether it is the correct choice.

The challenge is not only asking the question but answering it honestly.

I appreciate that this is easier said than done; many of us do not have a choice but to work remotely. I was forced to write this blog at home, thanks to yet another ASLEF strike on the Southwestern Railway network...

Granted, it can be difficult to answer the question without first experiencing it, but thanks to Covid, many of us already have.

It is also easy to be seduced by the arguments in favour of it; work/life balance, no commute, greater autonomy, saving the expense and greater productivity. And honestly, how many of us have seen the photos of the parent with the toddler on her lap and a laptop in front of them, or a worker playing with a puppy whilst talking on his phone and thought, that could be me.

But the reality is different. What the photos don't say is that toddlers cry and dogs bark. Indeed, until recently, a teams meeting would not be the same without my German Shephard joining it as she warned of yet another imaginary intruder.

Of course, in certain situations, pets can make the best colleague; those of us with cats appreciate that they can get away with far more than we can, especially during particularly difficult meetings when they flash their backsides to the camera. I have been known to place Gem the cat by the camera, encouraging him to strike whilst trying to deal with yet another software salesperson...

This leads onto one specific challenge when you work remotely: the sense of loneliness. Whilst office politics is never missed by anyone except for the deranged, office banter and interaction with your colleagues is key requisite for helping to build a cohesive team.

If your remote work consists of solo projects rather online meetings, then it becomes too easy to start missing your colleagues, and to feel isolated from your work.

As soon as this happens, productivity suffers.

To help ward this off, we start seeking interaction and contact with the outside world. Perhaps that 10 minute conversation with a colleague becomes half an hour in length as you both long for socialisation, exacerbating that downturn in productivity.

Self-discipline is at the heart of this, and is a key skill that every remote worker must acquire. Granted, it can be difficult to remain focussed at 4 o'clock on Friday afternoon, and it is especially difficult to wake up early on a cold December morning, but remaining committed to your work is key to attaining success.

This is just as important for the team leaders as it is for the team members, and this is a challenge in itself to maintain the team's productivity, when the team is split across numerous locations.

It is easy, when you don't have to wake up to catch the 7:40 train, or complete your work to catch the 8:00 home, to have an extra 10 minutes in bed, or to use the excuse of the school run to put off an assignment until the following morning.

The trick, and this is where self-discipline kicks in, is not making this a habit. You can get away from it a couple of times a month (please don't tell my team...), but every day? Absolutely not.

One aspect of self-discipline which is often overlooked is the need to de-compartmentalise.

Until recently, it was unnecessary. Our workday routine did this for us.

We woke up, commuted to the office, worked until lunch, took a lunch break, went back to work, then commuted home in the evening. As we have already said, what happened in the office stayed in the office.

Remote working has destroyed this. You do not need a half an hour commute from your kitchen to your desk (unless you live in a castle). Likewise, you don't need a commute from your desk back home again in the evening.

This may seem like a trivial matter, and before you all start complaining about the lottery that is public transport, there is 1 key benefit to commuting; it acts a buffer between your professional and personal lives.

In other words, it ensures that any stress in the office doesn't impinge upon your family life.

The issue with remote working is that you no longer have that buffer, or at that outlay. You, therefore, take your stress with you straight into your family space, your safe space, your castle.

De-compartmentalising is a skill you must learn.

As soon as you close your door into your home office or shut down your computer at the table you have requisitioned for work, you must learn to switch-off. As James Bond once commented when questioned by his umpteenth lover on his ability to switch-off, "I wouldn't be very good at my job if I couldn't."

But your job is more than your work. You are a partner, a wife, a husband, a parent, and learning to switch-off is key to success.

It is no coincidence that the divorce rate in the UK rose by 10% during the covid lockdowns, and it is too easy to say that the surge in remote working was the sole cause of this surge. However, it cannot be in doubt that the stress of 1 more party now working from home added to the stress.

Where you're able to work is also a key consideration. Ideally, you would have your own study or outdoor office, but for many of us this is simply not possible. Remote working therefore occurs on the requisitioned table, or your family's living room.

This represents a strong violation of your castle and makes it almost impossible to switch-off.

Technology is a double-edged sword. Whilst it helps to promote hybrid work, it also means that we are available to clients, colleagues and everyone under the sun. Inevitably, this affects our ability to switch-off, and the temptation is to remain on our phones beyond reasonable hours.

As my wife once said, "there are 3 people in our relationship. Me, you and your mobile phone."

Difficult meetings are inevitable, regardless of whether you are the one receiving criticism or providing it.

You can leave criticism at an office, with remote working you cannot.

This happened to me fairly recently.

I had to inform a service provider over a teams call that we were dispensing with his services due to poor performance. Unfortunately for him, this teams meeting took place in his office, which was an alcove of his living room.

It was difficult conversation, as they always are.

But what made it more difficult for the parties was knowing that we having this conversation in his home, the place he supposed to feel confident. It was hard for me as I wanted to respect that, but it would harder for him; partly because he lost a client, but also because he would be reminded of this fact over the next hours and days.

My apologies, I am no doubt overestimating my own importance but the point is, I think, well made.

There is 1 consideration we have not yet discussed, and that is the challenge which managers, team leaders and employers face with their staff who work remotely. How can they provide the leadership to ensure that their teams still operate to their full capabilities, and function properly?

You may be relieved to know that this blog will not answer that question right now (that shall be saved for another time), but the wider considerations of the team's performance must be considered before any remote model is adapted.

All of the challenges we have discussed are not insurmountable, and our new series of blogs will help you meet them. From how to switch-off, to finding your secure space.

This blog started by asking whether an Englishman's home is still his castle.

Undoubtedly, it still is. Remote working will not infringe upon habeas corpus, and you can still shut out the outside world if you so wish.

But it is threatened, and life is unrecognisable to what it was like a generation ago. For many of us, our (metaphorical!) castles are threatened, and for the sake of our well-being, we must find the balance between working effectively or encouraging our team to do so, whilst protecting our own and our team's wellbeing to secure productivity.

Next week, we will be discussing why our wellbeing is so important. I appreciate that the answer maybe obvious to some, but it is still something which many of us have lost sight of.