Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay
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Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay
#12A lot of business executives fall into the demographic that heavily invests into commercial real estate, which is facing some substantial depreciation. Telling everyone they need to get back to the office would help to keep those prices up. To everyone else, they have no incentive to keep fighting traffic every day (and paying for it) to go to an uncomfortable place full of maybe awful people.
Is that true everywhere or just the USA? As far as I know remote work really only stuck around in the USA.
I've never been in USA and I wfh.
Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay
#13A lot of business executives fall into the demographic that heavily invests into commercial real estate, which is facing some substantial depreciation. Telling everyone they need to get back to the office would help to keep those prices up. To everyone else, they have no incentive to keep fighting traffic every day (and paying for it) to go to an uncomfortable place full of maybe awful people.
The drive to get people back into the office isn't due to any sunk cost on commercial real estate — it's a strategy to prevent workers from working multiple jobs simultaneously.
When did all the CEOs meet to decide this? I missed that one.
Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay
#14Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is that true everywhere or just the USA? As far as I know remote work really only stuck around in the USA.
TBH this sounds like a massive conspiracy theory that somehow gets continiously propagated. Your average small software company CEO doesn't give a crap while still forcing people to RTO.
all the small companies my friends work for in my neck of the woods stopped leasing office space
Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay
#15Hybrid work is the worst of both worlds. Can't move out of a HCOL and now you have to co-ordinate with your co-workers to reap any "benefits" of being in-office.
What would be really cool is reconceptualizing hybrid work as quarterly retreats, where the company provides housing and other amenities for 1 to 2 weeks every quarter. This gives everyone time to bond and work on harder problems.
I get this wouldn't work as well for those with families because being away for that long is tough, but this would be great for say juniors and seniors with greater flexibility. It also solves some of the other issues, ie I could move to an MCOL and just fly in once a quarter to work together with everyone. The "retreat" aspect of it would also incentivize more people to be there.
On the company side of things, instead of leasing out a building for a long time, they can just rent short term and use the money they are saving to make the retreat more fun and productive.
Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay
#16I have ADHD and am autistic so loud open floor plan offices are a challenge. I'm in the category of people most likely to benefit from remote. Honestly it's been a much bigger challenge trying to collaborate and connect with coworkers in the new world than trying to cope with an office. People often don't perceive you as an actual human if you've only ever been a video square to them. And quick collaboration just doesn't happen anymore, or happens in a much slower and more frustrating way on Slack. Juniors especially struggle and I watch them take many times longer to ramp up than pre-pandemic. I honestly desperately wish my team worked in a room together 2-3 days a week.
Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay
#17A lot of business executives fall into the demographic that heavily invests into commercial real estate, which is facing some substantial depreciation. Telling everyone they need to get back to the office would help to keep those prices up. To everyone else, they have no incentive to keep fighting traffic every day (and paying for it) to go to an uncomfortable place full of maybe awful people.
The drive to get people back into the office isn't due to any sunk cost on commercial real estate — it's a strategy to prevent workers from working multiple jobs simultaneously.
Is there any evidence that this is actually happening and going undetected in large enough numbers for it to be rational to allow the possibility to dictate the official remote/not-remote policy of large companies? This feels more like a meme that circulates among management/executive types than it does an actual problem in the real world.
Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay
#18I agree that there is a real difference between being at work vs working from home. You build a connection to the workplace. Your brain shifts into "work mode" by default. People talk to each other, culture develops, etc. These are obviously all good things.
The problem is, most jobs people do have an element of mindlessness and aren't cutting edge, innovating spaces. Most white-collar jobs people work in are satellite offices of large companies where the day-in day-out is simply maintaining and attending to larger systems, applying general verbal reasoning, keeping up appearances, etc. A lot of it is bullshit work, as has been articulated before. This work, stripped to its productive essence, can be done faster, more efficiently and in a fraction of the 9-5 work day at home, but part of the charade is for employers and managers to not admit this truth.
Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay
#19A lot of business executives fall into the demographic that heavily invests into commercial real estate, which is facing some substantial depreciation. Telling everyone they need to get back to the office would help to keep those prices up. To everyone else, they have no incentive to keep fighting traffic every day (and paying for it) to go to an uncomfortable place full of maybe awful people.
Do you have a source for the view that executives invest in commercial real estate, or is the view based on anecdotes? I have not observed any such trend/relationship, and am under the impression that most MBA-types are generally averse to CRE and similar markets, but this is anecdotal, and I have no data to support it.
Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay
#20A lot of business executives fall into the demographic that heavily invests into commercial real estate, which is facing some substantial depreciation. Telling everyone they need to get back to the office would help to keep those prices up. To everyone else, they have no incentive to keep fighting traffic every day (and paying for it) to go to an uncomfortable place full of maybe awful people.
The funny thing is that if they invested more and made offices into, you know, offices people would want to work there.
Instead we have these open floor plan monstrosities for the hoi polloi and private offices for the masters of the universe.
I have no idea what brain damage causes this but if you can't work efficiently in the space you give to your workers to work in how do you expect them to work?
A more or less verbatim conversation between the CEO and myself as CTO shortly before I quite:
>The new office is so stuffy. I'm going to work from home.
>>We need to get a new office.
>No we paid too much to break the lease.
>>But you can't work there.
>I can work from home most of the time. I'll only come in for the big company meetings.