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80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

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Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#411

Post by i_am_jl »

whywhywhywhy wrote: post #407
atleastoptimal wrote: post #15

I understand the merits of WFH and in-person work. One thing that is however funny is the guilt tripping used by employers who have this straw-man version of a lazy WFH employee, and more so, employers who have a delusion that their workplace is important enough that people need to sacrifice a large portion of their lives just for the opportunity to be there in person. 90% of jobs aren't people's "passions" and have…

> this straw-man version of a lazy WFH employee It's not a straw-man, I've seen behavior in the past year that I've never seen in my entire career things as absurd as someone working 7 other jobs while pretending to work for us. Frankly it isn't worth the risk or waste of time or money anymore. Thankfully just by saying you need to be in the office a few days a week will weed out 90% of timewasters. >employers who ha…

>I've never seen in my entire career things as absurd as someone working 7 other jobs while pretending to work for us.

I'm sure I don't understand. You were paying someone for 40 hours a week and getting ~5. Why was this not apparent to their management? Or, if it was, why was nothing done about it?

The problem that your organization pays someone for 8x the output they're getting is definitely a problem, but if your management's only solution to this problem is to force the entire workforce to commute to an office, I think the bigger problem that should be addressed is that your management sucks.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#412

Post by sdiupIGPWEfh »

jayd16 wrote: post #143
atleastoptimal wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also naïve to assume that the work people do when supervised is always valuable and not optimizing for the appearance of work, rather than work itself.

Would those people be working significantly more without supervision? I find it hard to believe.

The question for management is, are you hiring, cultivating, and retaining the best people? And are you defining "best" appropriately? If management's concerns around remote employees slacking off are at all valid, it's management's own fault in the first place.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#413

Post by ghaff »

prasoonds wrote: post #402
Tomte wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if you don't use the room for anything except work. You've got a computer in there that you're also using for private stuff? Not tax-deductible anymore. Private books on the bookshelf? Not tax-deductible anymore. You've got a wardrobe with some clothes you're only accessing once per season (to store off-season clothes)? Not tax-deductible anymore.

This is correct and I'm not sure why it's been downvoted. In Germany, you'd better only every use the work-room for work only. As people have pointed out, you're not likely to get audited for this but often, with apartments, it can be quite obvious that you're using the space for non-work stuff too (for eg, if you're living in a 50 sqm apartment, it's pretty easy to say that you can't possibly have a dedicated work o…

In the US, my accountant always (and as I understand it, the rules have gotten stricter) recommended against taking a home office deduction unless you really had dedicated space for equipment etc. and didn't have an office you could reasonably commute to. The way more typical "office space you often use for doing work" was long seen as a red flag for a deduction and, in the typical case, as you say, truly dedicated space is rare absent a large place and/or specialized needs.

I could make a room a dedicated day-job office but it would cost me way more to do so than I would ever get as a deduction and it would almost certainly be inferior to the mixed-use setup I use.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#414

Post by sdiupIGPWEfh »

itishappy wrote: post #106
water9 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Acting like all humans will work equally as hard when they are supervised vs unsupervised is completely naïve

Completely agree! I work way harder unsupervised. It's probably also naïve to believe all humans respond to supervision the same way...

Unsupervised and left to my own devices, I tend to spend my time on what I actually think is the most valuable contribution I can make. Selfishly, perhaps, because that tends to lead me toward what I find to be the most fulfilling and enjoyable work. This tends to upset some people, because my maximum effort is not funneled toward advancing their immediate metrics. But others get it.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#415

Post by [deleted] »

quickthrower2 wrote: post #325
deaddodo wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Open offices are the literal reason (after commuting/traffic) that I no longer want to go into the office. My work doesn't require a ton of person:person engagement and it's much easier for me to just zone out in my own headspace to do it. When I was required in the office, I would just wear headphones to avoid distractions, but I would have to deal with 2-3hrs of driving/day on top of it. This meant that my employer…

I think specific problem is high density open plan offices. At about 20sqm per person, and keeping quiet and noisy professionals in separate rooms, it is not too bad.

[deleted]

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#416

Post by ghaff »

also23throwaway wrote: post #221
mkl95 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My guess is that most employers really have no way to measure if an employee is being productive or not so managers are just reporting what makes them look good...and now we are back to where managers will look better with lots of people running around the office. My guess is that CEOs and VCs have some obscure reason to force people back into the office. Perhaps related to real estate, especially considering how h…

In my company’s case, RTO is because of tax cut deals with the city/state. They need butts in seats to maximize profit after taxes, so they are passing the cost onto their employees.

That's one of the few non-productivity/collaboration/etc. rationales that may actually make some sense. States (e.g. NH and MA) have had tiffs because workers living out of state are no longer commuting into an office and are no longer paying income tax to the state they used to commute to as a result. I'm sure there are many local cases where there was some agreement about creating jobs in some town which have been essentially thrown out the window now that very few people are actually working in that town except maybe on paper.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#417

Post by rs999gti »

ornornor wrote: post #245
MBCook wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don’t forget that a lot of offices are leased for many years or even purchased/built. Do you know what looks REALLY bad? A giant fancy office with five people in it. Better force people to fill it up. We are stuck, we spent the money, can’t have it look bad.

Maybe they could hire all these movie extras who will soon be replaced by AI generated alter egos and be out of work? Everybody wins: extras get to not be homeless and pay their bills, companies look busier than ever, extras can act whatever fantasy management wants to show off, offices have some kind of purpose again, we get to work wherever we like and do actual work… What’s not to like?

Bernie Madoff staged busy trading floors to fool auditors and investors, so this is not far off the mark

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#418

Post by dboreham »

arkey wrote: post #334
HellDunkel wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100%. And don‘t forget about the useless standup meetings which are nothing more than a complete waste of time.

Why do you think standup meetings are useless? Maybe they are not run properly? I find them to be a pillar of our workday, within our team.

Discussions that should be 1:1 become 1:N, wasting the time of (N-1) people.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#419

Post by ghaff »

ascotan wrote: post #378
wonderwonder wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Open offices are terrible. Management knows they are as well because Sr. leadership almost always have their own offices. The peons sit in the pit. Until the CEO is sitting next to everyone else they are all speaking lies when preaching the benefits of an open office. The only benefit is that its cheaper and they can keep an eye on you.

it's a millennial thing. they grew up working on laptops and their dream office is to make the workplace look like starbucks. Open seating, no cubicles, a barista. It's a knee-jerk reaction to the old office place standard of 'cubes'. Managers hire out to consultants that hype this type of office layout because it will supposedly attract a talent. To be fair, cubes weren't any better. I remember having a guy slerping…

I don't know. I'm certainly not a millennial and I've never had any real issue with ambient coffee shop or equivalent background when reading/working/etc. and I'm rarely putting earphones/headphones on or playing music in general. People probably just have different tolerances and types of tolerances for distraction--not sure how generational it is.

As I've said before, people here pine for private offices a lot but, in my experience, typical workplace private offices have tended to be door open by default absent private meetings/phone calls/some urgent deadline thing.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#420

Post by ghaff »

Tempest1981 wrote: post #222
eulgro wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this satire? If not I don't think that's a sustainable lifestyle.

You've never met a workaholic... it's sustainable for quite a while, for some.

Much as many people here have a deep abiding dislike for executives, that's probably a pretty typical lifestyle for successful executives at a large company (or a startup) to which you can probably add months of every year on the road.
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