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The war on remote work has nothing to do with productivity

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Re: The war on remote work has nothing to do with productivity

#161

Post by benterix »

bjornsing wrote: post #89
klodolph wrote: post #10

I’ve heard this argument before and I don’t buy it. By that, I mean it may be true (that people want to prop up real estate prices), but I don’t think that this is enough of an explanation. If it were just about real estate, then Amazon would not be calling for 5 days a week return-to-office. I don’t think real estate interests are powerful enough to push Amazon around and I don’t think they’re entrenched enough in A…

I talked to an acquaintance who ran a startup that went remote during the pandemic. His view was that the self-motivated conscientious employees were just as productive remote as they were in the office, if not more. The problem was that when they left the office the people in the office became less productive. To me that makes a lot of sense and aligns well with my experience of office life. Some people depend on se…

> Don’t think he could fully grasp the question, didn’t see a problem with that at all.

Ask him if he ever considered actually asking the self-motivated conscientious employees their opinion and preferences - and watch his mind boggle.

Re: The war on remote work has nothing to do with productivity

#162

Post by benterix »

mgh95 wrote: post #99
bjornsing wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I talked to an acquaintance who ran a startup that went remote during the pandemic. His view was that the self-motivated conscientious employees were just as productive remote as they were in the office, if not more. The problem was that when they left the office the people in the office became less productive. To me that makes a lot of sense and aligns well with my experience of office life. Some people depend on se…

I think a lot of this comes down to perception of ROI for management. If the employment market is giving you qualified candidates at the price you seek in-office, why would you expose yourself to risk? I'm in this situation now where I'm hiring early employees and looking to grow, and about 90% of the decisions is how well can I derisk this hire . I don't need elite developers; I need competent, conscientious "75%" d…

That's kind of normal so I only pick up companies that offer remote only positions with no strings attached.

Re: The war on remote work has nothing to do with productivity

#163

Post by mgh95 »

benterix wrote: post #162
mgh95 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a lot of this comes down to perception of ROI for management. If the employment market is giving you qualified candidates at the price you seek in-office, why would you expose yourself to risk? I'm in this situation now where I'm hiring early employees and looking to grow, and about 90% of the decisions is how well can I derisk this hire . I don't need elite developers; I need competent, conscientious "75%" d…

That's kind of normal so I only pick up companies that offer remote only positions with no strings attached.

That's fine? It's a market. Work for whoever is offering mutually agreeable terms for as long as that remains the case.

Re: The war on remote work has nothing to do with productivity

#164

Post by Propelloni »

kitsune_ wrote: post #49
klodolph wrote: post #10

I’ve heard this argument before and I don’t buy it. By that, I mean it may be true (that people want to prop up real estate prices), but I don’t think that this is enough of an explanation. If it were just about real estate, then Amazon would not be calling for 5 days a week return-to-office. I don’t think real estate interests are powerful enough to push Amazon around and I don’t think they’re entrenched enough in A…

My theory, which is kind of informed by what I saw it play out in my company: The reason is a psychological one. Most leaders derive their power from in-person interactions. Remote and video calls severely impact that. Those leaders also love having an audience that needs to listen to them whenever they are in the room and the lack of that kind of feedback and adulation shellshocked a lot of them.

Obviously this is a multi-causal issue. RTO policies spring up for a variety of reasons, often a mix. All those negative narratives sure have some founding in reality, but maybe you can think of benevolent reasons why companies call for RTO?

Here is an example. Ms. Follett [1] made a good case a century ago that value is not created by people but between people. So you need interaction to add value -- something companies are imminently interested in, even if some employees are not. Some interactions, actually anything with more than 3-4 participants, break down over Teams and require face-to-face contact to be effective. Cutting everything down to 4 participants is to put the tool above the people and, to add insult to injury, will create a new pyramid of management levels, which we chucked for good reasons in the last century. So just get together in the office, which you have anyway to set up your football table. Does this mandate a 5-day RTO policy? No, but it shows that there is at least one good reason to get into the office once or twice a week.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Parker_Follett

Re: The war on remote work has nothing to do with productivity

#165

Post by slippy »

slg wrote: post #74
kitsune_ wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My theory, which is kind of informed by what I saw it play out in my company: The reason is a psychological one. Most leaders derive their power from in-person interactions. Remote and video calls severely impact that. Those leaders also love having an audience that needs to listen to them whenever they are in the room and the lack of that kind of feedback and adulation shellshocked a lot of them.

It feels a lot worse to deliver a lame joke at the start of an all hands meeting to a bunch of muted zoom windows with their cameras off. How much of the return to office is leaders wanting that polite chuckle from that captured audience back? I'm barely being facetious. "That polite chuckle" is really a stand in for all the soft power they wield in person that evaporates with WFH. They have lost a degree of control…

Alas, it's a nuclear option.

People are going to stay or leave based on random criteria. Your company is going to be left with various deficits and it will take a long while to sort out the hiring mess.

This feels more like it's about power. Those with the power leave, likely to competitors.

Re: The war on remote work has nothing to do with productivity

#166

Post by anotherhue »

-mlv wrote: post #145
jbverschoor wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? A workplace with no proper desk, chair, lighting, multi screen setup, isolation from domestic distractions, crappy phone lines due to bad internet, the hurdle of contacting someone who used to sit next to you, and the impossibility of scribbling something on a whiteboard etc? Sure, remote work can be productive for certain work, and for certain people. But people underestimate the value of an office. Working…

I doubt there are many people in tech with bad Internet. Worst case, there's Starlink. All other issues are easily solvable too, either with the right tools, or the right processes. (nb. I also think working at a coffee shop isn't for most people)

Easily solvable? Tell that to the screaming toddlers.

Re: The war on remote work has nothing to do with productivity

#167

Post by csomar »

slg wrote: post #74
kitsune_ wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My theory, which is kind of informed by what I saw it play out in my company: The reason is a psychological one. Most leaders derive their power from in-person interactions. Remote and video calls severely impact that. Those leaders also love having an audience that needs to listen to them whenever they are in the room and the lack of that kind of feedback and adulation shellshocked a lot of them.

It feels a lot worse to deliver a lame joke at the start of an all hands meeting to a bunch of muted zoom windows with their cameras off. How much of the return to office is leaders wanting that polite chuckle from that captured audience back? I'm barely being facetious. "That polite chuckle" is really a stand in for all the soft power they wield in person that evaporates with WFH. They have lost a degree of control…

I am not sure why not more people are not considering that to be the reason. In my last job, it actually made sense to have an in-office audience and yet management was opposed to it due to costs. When we had a round meeting, it kinda transpired to me that upper-management didn't really like to interact with the tech team much. They had a liaison person and that was as much as they wanted to interact with tech people.

Re: The war on remote work has nothing to do with productivity

#168

Post by csomar »

This conspiracy theory needs to be substantiated either by 1. Showing that the "elites" are conspiring together or 2. That the same people who own the companies also do own the commercial real-estate.

The problem with the first point is that why would a certain elite support their commercial real estate elites. This would suggest a certain transaction that the real-estate elite are not able to uphold since all of their income is coming from the companies.

For the second point, it'll be much easier to point at the conflict of interest in corporations.

Re: The war on remote work has nothing to do with productivity

#169

Post by acchow »

Malcolmlisk wrote: post #121
klodolph wrote: post #10

I’ve heard this argument before and I don’t buy it. By that, I mean it may be true (that people want to prop up real estate prices), but I don’t think that this is enough of an explanation. If it were just about real estate, then Amazon would not be calling for 5 days a week return-to-office. I don’t think real estate interests are powerful enough to push Amazon around and I don’t think they’re entrenched enough in A…

If we oversimplify everything, yes... it's all about prop up real estate prices. But if we want to talk about this, we need to have in mind the capital amortization. The value of every business goes up or down if their fixed capital gets old or unused. For example, if you have 100 computers and every computer costs 1000, your company has that value as capital. But if they lose value in the next years and those same c…

Aren’t most companies leasing their office space?

Re: The war on remote work has nothing to do with productivity

#170

Post by Malcolmlisk »

acchow wrote: post #169
Malcolmlisk wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we oversimplify everything, yes... it's all about prop up real estate prices. But if we want to talk about this, we need to have in mind the capital amortization. The value of every business goes up or down if their fixed capital gets old or unused. For example, if you have 100 computers and every computer costs 1000, your company has that value as capital. But if they lose value in the next years and those same c…

Aren’t most companies leasing their office space?

Not all, and even that, leasing is a cost in their accounts, which is good. Those companies that have huge ammounts of benefits need huge costs to maintain a propper balance.
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