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What one executive wishes they could tell employees about return-to-office plans

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Re: What one executive wishes they could tell employees about return-to-office plans

#41

Post by popularonion »

RestlessMind wrote: post #29
dickersnoodle wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hmm. "A low level of trust between team members" sounds like remote work exposed some big defects in your company culture that should be addressed first. Why did "a lot of the tenured engineers" leave? Why weren't they doing more to mentor the newer ones to facilitate knowledge and "lore" transfer? (And don't tell me it can't be done online, because it absolutely can.)

If it was limited to my own company, I’d definitely blame it on our culture. But so far, based on discussions with a few dozen friends and colleagues, everyone seems to be missing the in-person interaction while not missing the commute. The general consensus wants a hybrid setup with a few days from home and few days from office. As for why tenured engineers left, they all had spent 3-5 years in this company and it w…

>And it is borderline impossible to build camaraderie or a well bonded team purely online without any in person interaction for months or years.

If you want to bond with your employees, find one who’s into MMORPGs or used to be - shouldn’t be too hard in this industry. They have hours and hours of stories to tell you about.

Re: What one executive wishes they could tell employees about return-to-office plans

#42

Post by angmarsbane »

Fixing the commute and/or fixing housing would help get people into office heaps. Fully remote seems to work really well for people who are who’ve been at the company for awhile so offer fully remote once someone has been at the company X amount of years.

Re: What one executive wishes they could tell employees about return-to-office plans

#43

Post by LocalH »

There are two types of people - those who perform better working in person, and those who perform better working remotely. Forcing either to work in the other fashion is harmful. The best solution for productivity will be that which respects both types of people.

Re: What one executive wishes they could tell employees about return-to-office plans

#44

Post by toomuchtodo »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #31
RestlessMind wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think your parent commenter is talking about making “friends” at work. It came across as an environment with “friendly colleagues”, which is amazing to have and so far I haven’t seen those kind of work relations being built purely on Zoom.

Perhaps I’m just not seeing the benefit. You can absolutely have friendly, polite, cordial colleagues remote/over Zoom without being friends, no? In the decade I’ve been remote, across several orgs, this has been my experience. Friendly but not friends. A friend is someone I can expect to be there when I ask for or need personal help (and vice versa), not someone who shares their beer or hobby preferences over a Zoom…

Relevant thread to add to my thesis: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32040213

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2022/jul/09/when-it...

Re: What one executive wishes they could tell employees about return-to-office plans

#45

Post by nullfield »

jen20 wrote: post #26

> There’s a level of distrust that employees have for their organizations, almost like an old dated image of like fat cats sitting around counting their money. Because it is broadly true, as the nonsensical, obfuscated-with-bullshit layoff announcements prove - and there is always someone waiting in the hacker news comments to bleat about how corporations must be this way because of “shareholder value”. Executives ne…

Right-my partner was just laid off without notice, while as usual the company has had record profits and just recently they were talking about opportunities for training.

So no, fuckers. There’s no trust.

Re: What one executive wishes they could tell employees about return-to-office plans

#46

Post by RestlessMind »

jleyank wrote: post #36
RestlessMind wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And given that software development usually profits from peace and quiet It seems you have never built any complex software which needed a lot of whiteboarding, intense design discussions with lots of nuances to hash out, lots of unanticipated tiny cases which were solved by a quick 2-min chat or other aspects which are far better addressed in person vs via Zoom.

I’ve spent decades building such things. But it’s not something that’s done much after things are threshed out and work assigned. Fine, gather the clans to start things up, divvy up work, and get out of their way and let them work. Better?

> gather the clans to start things up, divvy up work, and get out of their way and let them work

That sounds good. But my company has no budget to gather the clans. So what is the alternative?

Re: What one executive wishes they could tell employees about return-to-office plans

#47

Post by jleyank »

RestlessMind wrote: post #46
jleyank wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve spent decades building such things. But it’s not something that’s done much after things are threshed out and work assigned. Fine, gather the clans to start things up, divvy up work, and get out of their way and let them work. Better?

> gather the clans to start things up, divvy up work, and get out of their way and let them work That sounds good. But my company has no budget to gather the clans. So what is the alternative?

Embrace remote work and zoom away. I assume there was never or is no longer an office to collect in?
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