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The return-to-the-office trend backfires

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Re: The return-to-the-office trend backfires

#32
post #13

RTO is about controlling labor, nothing else. Everything else is a smoke screen. Ask yourself the following questions and you'll understand what happened: - why did RTO happen seemingly right after salaries jumped and labor became scarce? - why did RTO happen virtually in lockstep across all of white collar employment? - why did RTO happen despite no evidence that productivity had anything to do with it? (and in fact…

I can't speak to your sector, but from the perspective in my management role (in law) the explanation is quite simple: managing remote workers is more difficult and less pleasant than managing workers in the office. I actually hate it. And even granting that remote and in-office workers are "productive" in the sense that they bill hours (though not even this seems true in my anecdotal experience), we find that people…

> qualitatively worse performance

How does their quantative performance compare? Is there an opportunity in the differential?

Re: The return-to-the-office trend backfires

#33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't speak to your sector, but from the perspective in my management role (in law) the explanation is quite simple: managing remote workers is more difficult and less pleasant than managing workers in the office. I actually hate it. And even granting that remote and in-office workers are "productive" in the sense that they bill hours (though not even this seems true in my anecdotal experience), we find that people…

> qualitatively worse performance How does their quantative performance compare? Is there an opportunity in the differential?

It's worse in the sense that a more senior person has to spend more time fixing it. I guess that's an opportunity in the sense that it allows a firm to bill more hours, but there is generally a reason we wanted that more junior person to do the work originally. (Client cost sensitivity, teal workloads, training, etc.)

Re: The return-to-the-office trend backfires

#34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> qualitatively worse performance How does their quantative performance compare? Is there an opportunity in the differential?

It's worse in the sense that a more senior person has to spend more time fixing it. I guess that's an opportunity in the sense that it allows a firm to bill more hours, but there is generally a reason we wanted that more junior person to do the work originally. (Client cost sensitivity, teal workloads, training, etc.)

Interesting thanks!

Re: The return-to-the-office trend backfires

#35
post #13

RTO is about controlling labor, nothing else. Everything else is a smoke screen. Ask yourself the following questions and you'll understand what happened: - why did RTO happen seemingly right after salaries jumped and labor became scarce? - why did RTO happen virtually in lockstep across all of white collar employment? - why did RTO happen despite no evidence that productivity had anything to do with it? (and in fact…

I think these conspiracy theories about RTO are really unhelpful and actually harmful to the viability of hybrid work arrangements.

Please work in a day as a oil rig technician or a nurse. "I should be able to work anywhere and my employer must accommodate me" is an extremely privileged and elitist view of thinking.

A few of your notes are actually just wrong as well. Salaries jumped during covid due to over-hiring and software booming. "Productivity" is not a number, but a business-by-business decision. The vast, vast majority of people don't want politics at work, and it's exclusively the viewpoint of the laptop class who demand that stuff. (Again, people who work toiling jobs for 10 hours a day don't create petitions and demands like that)

At the end of the day, if you don't want to work in an office, you don't have to. But, believe it or not, many many people, including young people, like the office environment.

Re: The return-to-the-office trend backfires

#36
post #13

RTO is about controlling labor, nothing else. Everything else is a smoke screen. Ask yourself the following questions and you'll understand what happened: - why did RTO happen seemingly right after salaries jumped and labor became scarce? - why did RTO happen virtually in lockstep across all of white collar employment? - why did RTO happen despite no evidence that productivity had anything to do with it? (and in fact…

I can't speak to your sector, but from the perspective in my management role (in law) the explanation is quite simple: managing remote workers is more difficult and less pleasant than managing workers in the office. I actually hate it. And even granting that remote and in-office workers are "productive" in the sense that they bill hours (though not even this seems true in my anecdotal experience), we find that people…

I have the opposite experience (in tech at small or medium companies). Managing remote workers is much easier since outcomes (and outputs) are necessarily more visible.

Before working remotely (pre-2019) when managing teams in person, I found myself necessarily having discussions to get synced with folks. At my most recent role (and previous remote first roles), team members were excellent at providing updates on Github issues (the sources of truth for work items). Of course, this required buy in at all levels and trickling company objectives down through the program(s) and linking work items to OKRs etc. It was very obvious when folks weren't hitting objectives and easy to gather detailed written evidence of this.

And regarding getting to know folks. Most recent offsite was at a villa in Croatia where I got to both meet my team members and ended up getting to know them like friends. Now that I think about it this has happened at previous companies as well during remote offsites.

I wonder if it's field-specific. Sounds like there are multiple anecdotes across a wide distribution of outcomes.

Re: The return-to-the-office trend backfires

#37
post #13

RTO is about controlling labor, nothing else. Everything else is a smoke screen. Ask yourself the following questions and you'll understand what happened: - why did RTO happen seemingly right after salaries jumped and labor became scarce? - why did RTO happen virtually in lockstep across all of white collar employment? - why did RTO happen despite no evidence that productivity had anything to do with it? (and in fact…

I can't speak to your sector, but from the perspective in my management role (in law) the explanation is quite simple: managing remote workers is more difficult and less pleasant than managing workers in the office. I actually hate it. And even granting that remote and in-office workers are "productive" in the sense that they bill hours (though not even this seems true in my anecdotal experience), we find that people…

Get better or quit then, I don't give a shit about managers, do your job and let the dozens of people you manage live their fucking lives, we're not here to please you or make your job easier

Re: The return-to-the-office trend backfires

#39
post #13

RTO is about controlling labor, nothing else. Everything else is a smoke screen. Ask yourself the following questions and you'll understand what happened: - why did RTO happen seemingly right after salaries jumped and labor became scarce? - why did RTO happen virtually in lockstep across all of white collar employment? - why did RTO happen despite no evidence that productivity had anything to do with it? (and in fact…

Correct. Workers were starting to get power, people had seen through the fog at what was actually happening and were acting out against it. Agency is a direct threat to the owner class.

It is amazing how much the constraints of working in the office shackle people to positions or locations. So many people working below their worth due to spouses ability to get a job in some location for example. Maybe you do land a job in your line of work in this little corner of the earth where your spouses jobs are more a plenty. Now you have to hold on for dear life to this company, do whatever the hell they ask of you and take whatever offer they give you because you have no leverage at all.

The fact that people completely miss this fact and just go "well I like talking to people in person" I mean at a certain point belies ignorance that borders on stupidity with how hard people cling to the "ability to talk to people in the hallway" against even just the obvious negative externalities like the commute and limited home choices. No one ever talks about this career side and juggling a two body problem.

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