Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#451

Post by kelnos » Sun, Feb 05, 2023, 9:01 PM UTC

necovek wrote: post #415

kelnos wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So we should require that everyone be in an office, so that people like you can get their career-defining opportunities? Maybe many of us would be fine making that trade-off: fewer opportunities for career-defining opportunities in exchange for the elimination of a commute, more-comfortable working arrangements, and a much more flexible work schedule. Not everything in life is about career advancement.

So everyone should work from home? Yes, that's not what you said, just like that's not what the comment you replied to said.

The problem is that for all these alleged career-defining opportunities to happen, you need a bunch of people in an office. That means that people need to be required to go to an office.

I explicitly did not say "everyone should work from home", using words like "many of us", so right, "that's not what [I] said", and you're just making up an argument where none exists.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#452

Post by noam_compsci » Sun, Feb 05, 2023, 9:02 PM UTC

Not an employer but:

- Older execs are too stuck in their ways

- Busy execs __need__ a work family to rationalise their commitment

- Hard to make a culture when remote

- Hiring is one of the hardest task in most companies and it’s made harder by remote. Not being able to nail onboarding and the face to face getting to know someone can be lethal

- In the 1% of times, when shit really hits the fan, remote is best because you can have zero communication delays, command management etc. As an “exec” these are the moments that you optimise for

- Bad eggs leave such a bad taste in the mouth.

I’m not an employer and not even exec level. So I may be totally off base. Just my observations.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#453

Post by camgunz » Sun, Feb 05, 2023, 9:02 PM UTC

asdadsdad wrote: post #434

Volundr wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear you and doubt nothing about your plight, but frankly that feels like a you problem. I can sympathize while also rejecting the idea that I should have to come into the office so your not lonely. Have you considered a co-working space? It seems like that could get you what your looking for. Beyond that I'd look to get creative around finding ways to get social outside work. A martial arts or social dance class f…

This is much more than a one person's problem, but it's a general issue that many older people with well-established lives don't sympathize with unfortunately. As much as others can deny, work is source of most people's friendships, relationships, mentorships, and other social interactions. There's hardly a substitute for that outside.

It's a symptom of societies that require you to work way too much and get everything (status, health care, socialization) from your job.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#454

Post by Gigachad » Sun, Feb 05, 2023, 9:02 PM UTC

Insanity wrote: post #425

Gigachad wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve asked around my friend and coworkers group all 20s and everyone feels this way. Remote work is terrible for young people.

Anecdata, but my friends in the 22 - 26 range don't feel this way. _But_, they have an active social life (football club together) and go out together every weekend or every other weekend. And they don't mind remote work. So I don't think it's an age issue, but more a socializing issue?

It probably would have been better if I hadn’t moved out of my parents house. For a brief moment I was living the dream in the city with a 5 minute walk to work, then I found myself remote working sitting on a Monday thinking about the dinner party with friends I’ve planned for Saturday for the weekly social interaction.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#455

Post by yodsanklai » Sun, Feb 05, 2023, 9:02 PM UTC

65 wrote: post #342

I'm in my 20s. I live alone in a city where I don't know anyone. Remote work destroyed my mental health. All I wanted was to be able to go into an office and talk to a real life person. I would go weeks at a time not talking to a single person in real life. I don't think people understand the plight of the young office worker until they've experienced the torture of solitary confinement. Day in, day out. All alone. I…

> Guess what? My team can't get enough remote work - they're not going to go into the office.

This may sounds crazy but I actually like to go to the office when I'm team isn't there! The place is lively and there are other people who aren't in my team, and I prefer to interact with them (perhaps it's less stressful as we're less likely to talk about ongoing team work, or they won't require my assistance).

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#456

Post by kelnos » Sun, Feb 05, 2023, 9:02 PM UTC

sodapopcan wrote: post #304

hdjjhhvvhga wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Moreover, personally I'd prefer it stays this way. When I take a break and go to the kitchen to get a coffee, it is also a part of mental hygiene - I need to clear my mind as it needs some rest, too. So the last thing I want is someone bothering me about a merge request or some planned feature. A weekend trip, on the other hand, is perfectly fine.

Hear hear. I worked at a place that pair programmed all the time (I liked it that way—it's why I joined the company) but it meant that I always had to eat lunch at my desk. To me it's crazy to be talking all morning then talk all through lunch then talk all afternoon! But to each their own.

Wait what? Why does pair programming mean that you have to eat lunch at your desk?

You are just as capable of taking a bag lunch to a cafeteria, or going out to eat...

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#457

Post by inoop » Sun, Feb 05, 2023, 9:02 PM UTC

65 wrote: post #342

I'm in my 20s. I live alone in a city where I don't know anyone. Remote work destroyed my mental health. All I wanted was to be able to go into an office and talk to a real life person. I would go weeks at a time not talking to a single person in real life. I don't think people understand the plight of the young office worker until they've experienced the torture of solitary confinement. Day in, day out. All alone. I…

If you're in NYC and want to grab lunch let me know

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#458

Post by rumdonut » Sun, Feb 05, 2023, 9:02 PM UTC

treis wrote: post #23

I think a lot of people are abusing WFH. Some make it obvious like doing meal prep during refinement but others are just kind of ghosts during the day. Even as a fellow team member reviewing code it's hard to tell how much my coworkers are working. Assume my EM has less of an idea than I do and anyone above them is totally in the dark.

They are. My former employer briefly had WFH due to COVID. It ended with a small number of people getting fired and the rest coming back 5 days a week. People just weren’t working, and they had some astonishing IT stats that hinted at how bad it was.

Over at Google, there’s an internal study that shows raw code checkins have dropped dramatically since WFH. I’m pretty sure Sundar’s 20% more productivity comment came directly from the numbers in those slides.

It does not surprise me that Zuckerberg and Benioff have gone the length of calling out their employees’ productivity directly. I’m really surprised this comment is this far down, when it’s been painfully obvious at the couple companies I’ve worked at through the pandemic that productivity is the elephant in the room. Some CEOs dress it in corpspeak about collaboration, but if Google, Meta, and Salesforce are all complaining of worker productivity, I think that’s the true reason. I think we’re too afraid to take an honest look at how productive we are, which will ultimately be the demise of WFH we want to defend so badly.

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#459

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Feb 05, 2023, 9:03 PM UTC

phphphphp wrote: post #185

snozolli wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What senior or principal engineers? I graduated college with significant, real-world programming skills. I immediately went to work writing software. The only thing my first manager contributed was showing me where to find documentation, and even then, books that I found on my own were far more valuable overall. It was no different the first year from the tenth: here's what we want made, go make it. No mentorship, no…

I don’t mean this as a slight against you because there’s a place in the world for every type of developer, but your description of work and collaboration is very cynical. You could be the most unlucky person in the world and thus you’ve never met anyone worth collaborating with, or, more likely, you’ve not attracted those people in your workplaces. I’ve worked at great companies and awful companies, and no matter wh…

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Employers, why do you want us back in the office?

#460

Post by roncesvalles » Sun, Feb 05, 2023, 9:03 PM UTC

kelnos wrote: post #404

roncesvalles wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same and same. Also, I hate how these days it's somehow shameful to even think about making friends at the workplace, that somehow work friends are work friends and can never be your "real friends". Looking at my parents' generation, most of their current friendships are people they met at work. In fact my parents met each other at work. We go to school and make friends with other people at school. Why is it wild tha…

I've made plenty of real, meaningful, long-term friendships at work. But I also have solid friend groups of people I've met outside work. I value all of them, but I'm not going to give up the opportunity to have more flexible working arrangements because some people seem to think they can only make friends at work. > We go to school and make friends with other people at school. Why is it wild that you'd want to go to…

This is exactly the attitude that I'm protesting against. I don't agree that you can make even close to the same depth of friendship with someone who you see 2 hours a week, vs someone you see 8 hours a day 5 days a week for months. Work or school are really the only places where you can spend that much time with someone.

Then again, part of the problem is that people have forgotten what real friendships are like. "Friends" these days are just people you go to restaurants/clubs/concerts/vacations/hiking/camping with so that you don't have to go alone. That's not friendship. That's just people you hang out with.

It might cure the itch for a real friendship, but don't confuse it for one.