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Big tech companies are at war with employees over remote work

arstechnica.com

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Re: Big tech companies are at war with employees over remote work

#31

Post by nwatson »

treis wrote: post #13
sdevonoes wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't they just sell real estate? I mean, remote working is not a thing for the vast majority of jobs out there, so office space is still a valuable asset. So if you are in IT and have offices that are not going to be used (because your employees want to work from home) then just sell/rent it to other companies in which their employees cannot work from home.

They could but Apple will look pretty dumb spending 5 billion on the spaceship only to sell it a few years later for (presumably) a lot less.

A cult with huge pockets would love the Apple spaceship. Perhaps one could timeshare to multiple cults.

Re: Big tech companies are at war with employees over remote work

#32

Post by Andrew_nenakhov »

todd3834 wrote: post #10

I’ve been part of a lot of these conversations and it is important to note that there is a significant percentage of employees that want to go back to the office. The trick is how to please everyone. It is easy to say, let those who want to come back come and those who don’t stay home. However those that want to go back say it is because they want to be surrounded by their coworkers. Having gone back to the office vo…

If an employer wants their workers to work in the office, they should work in the office.

Workers who want to work remote can find employers who are ok with remote work. It isn't like there is a shortage of companies that allow remote work.

Re: Big tech companies are at war with employees over remote work

#33

Post by notpachet »

sokoloff wrote: post #18
sdevonoes wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't they just sell real estate? I mean, remote working is not a thing for the vast majority of jobs out there, so office space is still a valuable asset. So if you are in IT and have offices that are not going to be used (because your employees want to work from home) then just sell/rent it to other companies in which their employees cannot work from home.

To whom would Apple sell their new spaceship if remote working in tech became pervasive? Who would buy Google’s campus? I’m pro-remote work, but if all of tech does it, that seriously dents tech-style real estate.

Hey, Amazon's always on the lookout for new fulfillment center real estate!

Re: Big tech companies are at war with employees over remote work

#34

Post by MattGaiser »

h4waii wrote: post #28
todd3834 wrote: post #10

I’ve been part of a lot of these conversations and it is important to note that there is a significant percentage of employees that want to go back to the office. The trick is how to please everyone. It is easy to say, let those who want to come back come and those who don’t stay home. However those that want to go back say it is because they want to be surrounded by their coworkers. Having gone back to the office vo…

Well said, I do want to point out that some of those who want to go back "to be surrounded by their coworkers" might be missing the fact that those who don't want to back might be because they don't want to be surrounded by their coworkers; they want to be surrounded by people they choose to have relationships with, not ones foisted upon them.

Yes. I am a young single guy who is not really a fan of the office. A lot of that is simply that have already filled all my available relationship time.

Adding new people requires removing other people or reducing my productivity to make more time available.

Re: Big tech companies are at war with employees over remote work

#35

Post by noir_lord »

Company I work for is remote-only and has been for years.

Since they already had that in place the pandemic didn't really hit them from an organisational point of view.

The reason I was so interested in the job (other than the fact the work is interesting) was because they where remote-only before pandemic - so there was no risk of "right, it's over, everyone back in the building".

I'm not sure what someone would have to offer me at this point to get me back in an office tbh.

Working how you want, with everything setup how you want is just a no-brainer.

Of course there are challenges to working remotely but on balance they are no worse (or somewhat better) than working on site.

Re: Big tech companies are at war with employees over remote work

#36

Post by sugarpile »

todd3834 wrote: post #10

I’ve been part of a lot of these conversations and it is important to note that there is a significant percentage of employees that want to go back to the office. The trick is how to please everyone. It is easy to say, let those who want to come back come and those who don’t stay home. However those that want to go back say it is because they want to be surrounded by their coworkers. Having gone back to the office vo…

While I truly do appreciate the cooperative tone, as someone who never intends to set foot in an office again except by choice (outside of onboarding), I think this is a rare event that has reduced the power asymmetry and should be taken advantage of.

How do we make execs more comfortable? Simple, we make it so they have no choice to be uncomfortable with. Allow full remote or lose a significant portion of your workforce in the middle of a hiring crunch with already existing insane hiring demand. This may not play at Apple, for example, but it’s what I’ve already seen play out at my company (including for me specifically) and I see no reason it wouldn’t work at any non-FANG. It’s not a bluff or bluster, I’d leave if my company doubled down on forcing people back on a hybrid schedule and truthfully I may leave anyway over frustration with their initial attempts to do so despite exempting me and others.

My team and office is in a very precarious position with two of our best engineers having left over the initial attempts to force hybrid. I truly think if it was forced again my the fallout may be fatal for my team.

Re: Big tech companies are at war with employees over remote work

#37

Post by goalieca »

notpachet wrote: post #29
todd3834 wrote: post #10

I’ve been part of a lot of these conversations and it is important to note that there is a significant percentage of employees that want to go back to the office. The trick is how to please everyone. It is easy to say, let those who want to come back come and those who don’t stay home. However those that want to go back say it is because they want to be surrounded by their coworkers. Having gone back to the office vo…

> Many of these problems seem solvable without forcing employees who want to work remote to come in. Agreed. Most of the issues that you highlighted that cause employees to prefer being in-office (loneliness, children and other distractions at home, work/life balance) are not attributable to being remote per se. Exacerbated by it, sure. But we should probably be addressing those problems head-on in a more intentional…

> (It actually runs counter to the work/life balance problem you mentioned

I’m not an old fart but I’m on my way. I find is brilliant to talk about house repairs and kids and vacation tips with my colleagues. It really brings some chill to an otherwise chaotic day in an absolutely volatile industry.

Re: Big tech companies are at war with employees over remote work

#38

Post by TigeriusKirk »

If a company isn't allowing remote work, they're voluntarily cutting themselves off from a large portion of the available labor pool.

That's their choice, but they can never again complain about a shortage of talent. Which should affect their ability to participate in work visa programs, for example.

Re: Big tech companies are at war with employees over remote work

#39

Post by bradleyjg »

todd3834 wrote: post #10

I’ve been part of a lot of these conversations and it is important to note that there is a significant percentage of employees that want to go back to the office. The trick is how to please everyone. It is easy to say, let those who want to come back come and those who don’t stay home. However those that want to go back say it is because they want to be surrounded by their coworkers. Having gone back to the office vo…

I certainly don’t have all the answers, but a few observations:

1) Starting remote seems tougher than going remote. It’s a bit rough on families but maybe an extended in person onboarding trip is a good compromise.

2) Face to face connections have to be renewed every once in a while. Co-location trips are going to become a cost of being remote, I think.

3) Some people come across badly over video. Not sure if there’s some kind a training and/or technological answer but it’s a problem and if it can’t be solved those people are not going to thrive remote even if everything else lines up.

4) All other things being equal the relationship is always going to be more transactional for remote workers. It’s just human nature to feel closer to people you regularly bump into and eat meals with.

That’s not necessarily a horrible thing in an industry that blurs the line between work and life, but it does mean you need to be on the top of your game in terms of being productive and making sure people know it.

Re: Big tech companies are at war with employees over remote work

#40

Post by nonameiguess »

vhold wrote: post #4

I wonder how much of it is driven by the company leadership owning very expensive real estate that would lose a lot of value once tech workers are not forced to spend money into those rental or real estate markets.

As others have said, it is likely the companies themselves owning giant, expensive, heavily-branded campuses that weren't designed with modularity and reselling in mind.

However, making decisions based on this is a pretty classic sunk-cost fallacy. The cost of continuing to use the campus won't be any higher because it's half-empty.

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