Ask HN: How to negotiate continuing to work remotely?

So my "no reason for it" was stated with this in mind.

As an employer, I'd like to know. Other employers seem to be vindictive, which I find bizarre. Worse, enough employers act this way, that they poison the pool.

Then these same employers act surprised, and wonder why they get little warning when an employee leaves.

Silly.

But then I also read a news article about how my company was giving up 3 floors in their Asia HQ, which ended up being close to US$ 1 million a month. So money is definitely involved as well.

You absolutely can infer that if the person has come to you saying they're considering taking the offer. People don't consider offers from other companies unless there's a reason why they might want to leave where they are now.

Some people think an offer is leverage they can use to improve their current role, but really it's a signal that the person is already half out of the door and the company should say goodbye and start recruiting a replacement.

I was lucky to have a bit of negotiating sway due to our company having just been acquired and me reporting to the new CEO who was keen to keep me on board. So I could probably have negotiated remote-only as a permanent thing, but I actually chose to quit the business last year and become a freelance consultant, working for my old employer under a contract instead (which they were happy with as opposed to losing me altogether).

So now I run my own business, choose my own work environment and tools (I have setup an awesome home office during lock down which is a pleasure to spend time in!) and contract for my old employer while building up some other clients too.

For me, I’ve spent over half my career self-employed and I wanted to get back to this anyway, but for what it’s worth, if you want to fully dictate your work environment (location, tools, hours etc) you can’t beat being freelance!

I appreciate this is not the advice you were looking for - just my personal experience in case it prompts any ideas.

To more directly answer your question, just ask! One thing I’ve learnt over the years is that we often want things but are too afraid to ask. Even if you think you know what the answer will be, ask anyway. See what discussion there is to be had.

The other thing I’d say is if you can negotiate 1-2 days remote (if they force you to a compromise) take it, because you can grow those 2 days into more from there if you can prove you’re productive in those days at home.

It’s much easier to go fully remote if you’re already partly remote, so don’t look at it as a binary thing.

BTW I’ve been on the other side of this too, helping one of my direct reports transition to fully remote. I was on board with it already but I had to “sell” the concept to my bosses in turn, but we made it happen.

Good luck!

1. If you negotiate, the questions is what can you give to get something. The only thing you have is your work, so the negotiation can be simplified to "you work there or not" from your side and "all office, part office or all wfh" from their side. If you want "all wfh" then you have little to negotiate, if you want part time office and part time wfh you can negotiate the proportions.

2. What worked for me and a few colleagues: I am officially working partly from the office for almost 15 years. That "partly" is the key word and very subjective: in the winters I used to go to the office a few days per month, in the summer (easier commute, 30 min instead of 1-2 hours each way) a few days per week, the rest of the year was somewhere in between. In the past few years (more than one) I go to the office only when I need to be there, not when HR wants me there. My team is globally distributed, so it makes sense in my case. At the same time, I have a couple of colleagues working remote for many years, one is hundreds of kilometers away and one is one country border away; they are officially working from the office, but they are not physically needed there and nobody is looking for them, their immediate teams are also globally distributed. If this is not applicable for you, you cannot use this method.

Most companies will not allow full wfh for different reasons, some are very valid and reasonable, so the best option may be to work partly from the office and negotiate that part. I think most companies will agree 1-2 days wfh and for some people they will accept more, depending on the specifics of the work these people do and the value for this company these people bring. These are the 2 points you can use in your favor.