  During the COVID-19 epidemic in China, millions of workers in tech companies
had to start working from home (WFH). The change was sudden, unexpected and
companies were not ready for it. Additionally, it was also the first time that
WFH was experienced on such a large scale. We used the opportunity to describe
the effect of WFH at scale for a sustained period of time. As the lockdown was
easing, we conducted semi-structured interviews with 12 participants from China
working in tech companies. While at first, WFH was reported as a pleasant
experience with advantages, e.g. flexible schedule, more time with family, over
time, this evolved into a rather negative experience where workers start
working all day, every day and feel a higher workload despite the actual
workload being reduced. We discuss these results and how they could apply for
other extreme circumstances and to help improve WFH in general.
