RTO Mandates are just attempted power moves by greedy CEOs.
We have people living on space stations and promising nuclear fusion, but we still have to be in the office to be productive? Gimmie a break.
Google won't be mandating a strict return-to-office plan
61–70 of 296 posts
Re: Google won't be mandating a strict return-to-office plan
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
There’s a ton of fraud in this space. You need at least hybrid to keep that at bay. At a previous place, we chose hybrid RTO over intrusive surveillance. My opinion shifted from being a full remote advocate after I caught a half dozen folks with various schemes and scams. The straw that broke the camels back was a guy who lied about where he was living. He was going through a divorce and the ex-wife ratted him out to…
Define “fraud”? If you get your work done in two hours and can’t progress until a teammate does their end, is it better or worse if you are scrolling HN in an office or at home? I run my own company, I do not give a single fuck how, where, or when people get their job done. I only care they deliver. Likewise, people who need to be watched over are not the employees I want in the first place. I’m not running a daycare…
And if you find out that your developers were actually in North Korea and you've violated sanctions, would you care then?
https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-disrupts-n...
Re: Google won't be mandating a strict return-to-office plan
#63I go to the office almost everyday by choice. Free food, snacks, and coffee, gym, and medical clinics on campus. And it's just nice to get dressed and leave the house. But it's really nice to have the flexibility to WFH when I need to, especially just mornings to skip traffic.
Same! Tech job, my co-founder and I are only a 5 minute drive or bike ride from the office. It’s nice to get dressed and have that separation from home. I feel like the commute is what people are actually feeling the worst, because it’s unpaid time that they just straight up lose. Being close to the office resolves it for us.
Unfortunately a new job, even 5-8 miles away, may turn a then-5 minute commute into a 45m-1hr commute in many metropolitan areas.
I think more management needs to realize that forcing in-person isn't inherently beneficial. There can be value in meeting up if it's appropriately planned, though.
My current management has been very accommodating with remote/hybrid. If there's a meeting where face-time is beneficial, people voluntarily come in -- but there's no pressure to do so. Generally, we find it easier to pop into the office for a day every few months to whiteboard things instead of dealing with Miro/Zoom. We have a mix of remote folks who live next to the office, some folks within a couple hour drive, and some who need to fly in.
A former job of mine used to fly people to the same location 4x a year for a week to hash out a quarterly plan and grab drinks. The whole agenda was laid out and not a minute felt wasted. While not everyone went 4x a year, everyone was given the opportunity to do so, and this helped alleviate friction.
Another job of mine had remote folks fly in every 3-4 months for a couple of days at a time. Some teams did it more frequently (1x/mo for a couple days) when critical projects were in the pipeline, but they'd return to normal afterwards.
Re: Google won't be mandating a strict return-to-office plan
#64Google will most certainly wind down office time on short-term leased offices or those expiring soon. There are likely many around the country/world they have. These could also be smaller offices or areas where they think they could possibly take a wash with a sublease in the current commercial real-estate environment.
Re: Google won't be mandating a strict return-to-office plan
#65Earlier quoted context omitted.
Define “fraud”? If you get your work done in two hours and can’t progress until a teammate does their end, is it better or worse if you are scrolling HN in an office or at home? I run my own company, I do not give a single fuck how, where, or when people get their job done. I only care they deliver. Likewise, people who need to be watched over are not the employees I want in the first place. I’m not running a daycare…
And if you find out that your developers were actually in North Korea and you've violated sanctions, would you care then? https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-disrupts-n...
They’re literally doing the work. They’re not accused of placing backdoors, they’re not accused of anything aside from the US government running an antiquated sanctions regime, and just doing the work. The US government isnt charging companies with OFAC violations, so there is no reason to care. North Koreans learned how to be a fake Staff Software Engineer and do non-fake things for real RSUs.
Companies shouldnt burden the rest of their employees for social verification, for something that isnt a problem for the company.
Re: Google won't be mandating a strict return-to-office plan
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
Define “fraud”? If you get your work done in two hours and can’t progress until a teammate does their end, is it better or worse if you are scrolling HN in an office or at home? I run my own company, I do not give a single fuck how, where, or when people get their job done. I only care they deliver. Likewise, people who need to be watched over are not the employees I want in the first place. I’m not running a daycare…
And if you find out that your developers were actually in North Korea and you've violated sanctions, would you care then? https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-disrupts-n...
You could have them turn up to an office for a few days when they start work if you wanted
Re: Google won't be mandating a strict return-to-office plan
#67They say this now. But in 12 months (or the next layoff period), they will move from hybrid to full RTO. Still a shitty move to mandate RTO. Most people (IT folks) have spoke with do this routine: 0) daily routine to prepare for day 1) 1 hr commute to shitty office 2) login to computer, do calls with cross regional (and international) teams over Zoom/Teams/Webex or whatever conferencing system 3) teleconferencing wit…
RTO for sales folks doesn't make sense to me either. Typically you want your sales folks on the road not in your office. I think sales is a good candidate for fully remote.
Re: Google won't be mandating a strict return-to-office plan
#68Of course it won't. It doesn't have enough desks to allow everyone to be present simultaneously.
Re: Google won't be mandating a strict return-to-office plan
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
Having been there: it's not that. It's that, unfortunately, they have enough hard numbers to know most people do their best work with a boss physically breathing down their neck. I knew some folks at Google who worked 100% remote and only came into the office for critical meetings about once a month. They had proven they could operate that way with a more-or-less stellar track record.
> It's that, unfortunately, they have enough hard numbers to know most people do their best work with a boss physically breathing down their neck. While the conclusion — that most people do their best work when in the office — may be correct, why do you think that the cause of that is the boss breathing down people's necks rather than, say, more efficient collaboration among team members? My personal observations of…
It may be more efficient collaboration among team members. The end-result is the same: more output for the same cost if people are congregating.
> This is something that many were in agreement on before covid
This is an excellent observation worth highlighting: Google's belief stems not just from pre-COVID / post-COVID observation but from the relative output of teams that were same-office colocated vs. inter-office located, necessitating videoconferencing, chat, and email to get work done. Now that you highlight that, I think my reasoning is in error and it's probably more about collaboration being easier in-person. But inconveniently for those who don't want to work in person, the end-result is the same.
Re: Google won't be mandating a strict return-to-office plan
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
There’s a ton of fraud in this space. You need at least hybrid to keep that at bay. At a previous place, we chose hybrid RTO over intrusive surveillance. My opinion shifted from being a full remote advocate after I caught a half dozen folks with various schemes and scams. The straw that broke the camels back was a guy who lied about where he was living. He was going through a divorce and the ex-wife ratted him out to…
Define “fraud”? If you get your work done in two hours and can’t progress until a teammate does their end, is it better or worse if you are scrolling HN in an office or at home? I run my own company, I do not give a single fuck how, where, or when people get their job done. I only care they deliver. Likewise, people who need to be watched over are not the employees I want in the first place. I’m not running a daycare…
Surely nobody is referring to scrolling HN during work hours as “fraud”