Apple asks staff to return to office 3 days a week starting in early September • Hacker News Board

Re: Apple asks staff to return to office 3 days a week starting in early September

#741

Post by shlant » Thu, Jun 03, 2021, 11:02 AM UTC

amyjess wrote: post #198

Nbox9 wrote: post #51

I work for another company that is going to do a partial return to office. I will be looking at options for companies that offer full in person office (or 90% in person office) after things settle down. I have worked full remote for a total of 5 years of my career, and I believe working in the office is a competitive advantage. * Overhearing hallway conversations (and joining them) helps spawn invocation. * I often d…

I do not care about being competitve. I work so I can draw a salary to fund my life. That's it. I don't care about constantly climbing a ladder. I don't care about advancing my career for the sake of advancing my career. I just want to enjoy my life, and working for a living is just my means to that end. If I'm making enough to be comfortable, I don't care about chasing a promotion or getting ahead of people. I can't…

aside from the autism reasons (although I definitely empathize as my wife is on the spectrum) you took the words right out of my mouth. I don't care about anything other than funding my lifestyle. Been remote for 5+ years and will never go back. I enjoy my job and I like to socialize with people I work with in person occasionally and play some ping pong, but nothing about working in an office is worth the trade-off.

Re: Apple asks staff to return to office 3 days a week starting in early September

#742

Post by mytailorisrich » Thu, Jun 03, 2021, 11:03 AM UTC

Nbox9 wrote: post #51

I work for another company that is going to do a partial return to office. I will be looking at options for companies that offer full in person office (or 90% in person office) after things settle down. I have worked full remote for a total of 5 years of my career, and I believe working in the office is a competitive advantage. * Overhearing hallway conversations (and joining them) helps spawn invocation. * I often d…

Interestingly a lot of what you list is the reason while Agile advocates having the team all sit together in office. It makes communication much quicker and easier, and just simply overhearing others helps spread information very efficiently.

Re: Apple asks staff to return to office 3 days a week starting in early September

#743

Post by shlant » Thu, Jun 03, 2021, 11:07 AM UTC

matt-attack wrote: post #511

amyjess wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not care about being competitve. I work so I can draw a salary to fund my life. That's it. I don't care about constantly climbing a ladder. I don't care about advancing my career for the sake of advancing my career. I just want to enjoy my life, and working for a living is just my means to that end. If I'm making enough to be comfortable, I don't care about chasing a promotion or getting ahead of people. I can't…

That’s because diversity and inclusion pretty much means “blacks” and “women” fullstop. I was recently hiring a developer and my massive media company insisted I ensure my recruiter is giving me diverse candidates. I selected an individual who is apparently Spanish Jewish. Some very rare tribe of Jews from Spain. Was that considered diverse? Nope. Needs to be black.

most actions the majority of corps take when it comes to "diversity" are purely performative. Diversity is important and more people should care about it, but what constitutes as "diverse" in the corporate environment is only what looks good on the outside and has a minimal (perceived) impact on the bottom line.

A good example is exactly what is going on now: multinationals all temporarily slapping a rainbow on products to take advantage of a movement (like Raytheon. wtf... https://twitter.com/RaytheonTech)

Re: Apple asks staff to return to office 3 days a week starting in early September

#744

Post by timdaub » Thu, Jun 03, 2021, 11:09 AM UTC

papito wrote: post #736

Commute is not that bad - in moderation. For me, commute is about getting out of the house, moving around, waking up, and getting in the zone. But it gets old after 30 minutes. My previous job was door to door for me in 20-25 minutes. I could hop on the Q train on the Upper East Side in NYC and be at Union Square that quickly. Did I do it? Almost never. I took a walk through Central Park before hopping on a train in…

Agreed. I have a little office nearby. I drive my bike daily. It has become part of my shutdown procedure after work.

Re: Apple asks staff to return to office 3 days a week starting in early September

#745

Post by dboreham » Thu, Jun 03, 2021, 11:10 AM UTC

Nbox9 wrote: post #51

I work for another company that is going to do a partial return to office. I will be looking at options for companies that offer full in person office (or 90% in person office) after things settle down. I have worked full remote for a total of 5 years of my career, and I believe working in the office is a competitive advantage. * Overhearing hallway conversations (and joining them) helps spawn invocation. * I often d…

Pair programming and code reviews are actually easier remote.

Re: Apple asks staff to return to office 3 days a week starting in early September

#746

Post by timdaub » Thu, Jun 03, 2021, 11:15 AM UTC

Let's see how it goes for them. I'd bet it's going to be a disaster. That time I was asked to appear in the office of my employer after years of home office, that catapulted me into a burnout after just a few weeks.

See, working from home allows you to be comfortable with yourself and your body. You organize yourself to do as much work as you deem useful to meet your goals. It allows you to take a ten minute nap or just to let yourself go for a few minutes. I had months filled with focused work. Something I'm only able to achieve in solitude.

Going back to the office after having adjusted your work to excel from home, is a nightmare.

Suddenly you're subjected to the office's furniture, its space, foreign people, the (shitty) food, noise, a commute. You don't have privacy. You'll have to use your will muscle to stay focused and to appear working. Working from an office is putting in effort to be present. WFH is not.

I work freelance and my results are better in a space where I'm in control of. To me WFH is more economically sound.

Re: Apple asks staff to return to office 3 days a week starting in early September

#747

Post by refactor_master » Thu, Jun 03, 2021, 11:21 AM UTC

giantrobot wrote: post #605

trainsplanes wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reading FAANG employees talk about food prices makes me realize the old "It's one banana. What could it cost, $10?" is something that was written based on reality.

At Apple Park lunch at Cafe Macs could easily run $10-15 (without a drink) depending on what station you ordered from. The food there was good but not exactly cheap. The campus was really too big to leave for lunch unless you arrived at some stupid early hour to park underground below your office. It's a 10-15 minute walk to the south parking garage and then at least a 10 minute drive to the closest places to eat and…

Heck, I remember a salad at Harvard being $12.

Re: Apple asks staff to return to office 3 days a week starting in early September

#748

Post by ghaff » Thu, Jun 03, 2021, 11:21 AM UTC

Mauricebranagh wrote: post #738

belatw wrote: post #655

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consider a significant number of Googlers are upper middle class kids, possibly on the spectrum, who go straight from the ivy league to google’s cafeteria. These made up numbers seem reasonable and accurate to them because they never had to take care of themselves in the real word.

Don't ivy league students have to cook for themselves?

Many people at college generally do not have access to a kitchen.

Re: Apple asks staff to return to office 3 days a week starting in early September

#749

Post by swiley » Thu, Jun 03, 2021, 11:21 AM UTC

bpodgursky wrote: post #464

dcolkitt wrote: post #384

What I find really disconcerting is that the senior leaders in the tech industry have been talking for years about increasing gender inclusivity. Yet very few major tech companies seem to be wholeheartedly embracing full remote, despite it being by far the most effective way to encourage more women to join the industry. Research shows that women are 50% more likely to prefer full remote than men[1]. For better or wor…

"Gender inclusivity" at tech companies is really a completely different axis than "motherhood or fatherhood friendly". "Parent" is not a protected class (at least, not on Twitter), and it's really not the goal of any FAANG company to encourage their workers to have families. It requires much harder tradeoffs than being "gender diverse".

> it's really not the goal of any FAANG company to encourage their workers to have families.

Something that for one reason or another is more popular among younger women than men. This excludes women whether they want to admit it or not.

Re: Apple asks staff to return to office 3 days a week starting in early September

#750

Post by Symbiote » Thu, Jun 03, 2021, 11:26 AM UTC

rblatz wrote: post #408

dcolkitt wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$150 extra from 40 hours of AC is insanely high. That's about what I pay total in the middle of summer in Florida for a decent-size SFH. Check the insulation on your house for a leak. Also maybe consider upgrading to a ductless heat pump mini split. That would almost certainly cut your marginal cost to near $30/month.

My electric hits $400+ a month in the summer and it’s just going to get worse when our pool is completed. I live in a new 2500 square foot house in Arizona, our insulation is fine. And we have two pretty nice heat pump/ac units.

A friend's pool in England is almost entirely sustained with solar panels: radiant ones to heat the water (as required), and PV to run the pumps.

It seems like a no-brainer to do this in Arizona, but I don't know the economics.