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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

#101

Post by al_borland »

akurtzhs wrote: post #85
charlie0 wrote: post #15

Hybrid 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…

YMMV. I prefer hybrid with two days a week in the office. You can dedicate those days to meetings and conversations and keep the remote days for more heads down work. And if you can’t make it to the office due to snow or travel, you’re prepared for remote work.

Doesn’t this only work if everyone you need to have meetings with also has the same plan for 2 meeting days per week?

Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay

#102

Post by nickff »

BobaFloutist wrote: post #79
diggernet wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have heard rumors (yes, completely lacking proof) that some major banks with huge commercial loan portfolios are using those loans as leverage to coerce companies into loudly demanding return to office. That's actually pretty easy to believe, because they'd really be hurting if commercial real estate values were to plummet.

How are they using those loans as leverage? The terms are set, your student loan company couldn't make you, I don't know, tweet something you didn't want to.

It could be a line of credit, which might be modified. There could also be an ongoing relationship, related to the issuance of a series of loans used for financing inventory or something like that.

Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay

#103

Post by away271828 »

izacus wrote: post #30
solarpunk wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

all the small companies my friends work for in my neck of the woods stopped leasing office space

Indeed, which is why this real-estate conspiracy is downright bizarre.

And even a larger company I'm familiar with has been looking very hard at lease renewals and has been walking away from a bunch of them. There's a certain lip service to the energy associated with having people back in the office but, in practice, people are being switched to fully remote if they don't come in and offices are being eliminated or swapped out for smaller spaces.

Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay

#104

Post by llm_trw »

akurtzhs wrote: post #85
charlie0 wrote: post #15

Hybrid 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…

YMMV. I prefer hybrid with two days a week in the office. You can dedicate those days to meetings and conversations and keep the remote days for more heads down work. And if you can’t make it to the office due to snow or travel, you’re prepared for remote work.

I think one and a half days is the best.

One of those days is the Friday so you get the half day automatically while being sociable.

Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay

#105

Post by thunky »

cookie_monsta wrote: post #69

My boss (middle management) is very staunchly opposed to more than 1 day per week of WFH. She spends about 90% of her time on video calls, so I was always confused by that until she was telling me that when she does WFH she's always distracted by other things which doesn't happen in the office. Maybe a lot of the WFH opposition is really just managers projecting their own work ethic onto others?

> she's always distracted by other things which doesn't happen in the office

Ah yes, some people will use any excuse to get away from their family/kids.

Before WFH these people were traveling to any meeting or conference they could find.

Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay

#106

Post by ryandrake »

theandrewbailey wrote: post #39
jonahhorowitz wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've said this in other places, but as a _manager_ it's much nicer to work in the office, in person. That gets more true the higher up the management chain you go. Managers spend most of their time in meetings. Meetings suck over video chat. This is the entire reason CEOs (and pretty much everyone between them and line employees) would rather everyone come back to work. It makes their workday more pleasant.

Meetings tend to be some the least productive activities, especially when everything "discussed" could have been sent out as an email (which can be read remotely).

Meetings can only be replaced with E-mail if people actually read (and respond to) their E-mail, and I've found fellow employees' E-mail hygiene to be pretty spotty.

Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay

#107

Post by georgeecollins »

llm_trw wrote: post #20
theandrewbailey wrote: post #2

A 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 v…

I would love it if this is the end of the barn (aka open) office. It's such a awful place to work. Companies say they do it to foster collaboration but the truth is its very cheap, and easy to deal with a lot of turnover, which every company I every barn company I ever saw had a lot of.

The funny thing always was "everyone has the same space" and the SVP/ CEO reserved this conference room all day, the one with suspiciously nice furniture that is never available.

Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay

#108

Post by wyldfire »

I still opt to go into the office two/three days a week. It's a bummer that nearly none of my old workmates are there anymore.

And yet, I can't help to acknowledge that there's no going back. And of course I can see that some things are remarkably convenient when working from home. So even though I miss the way things were, I understand this is here to stay.

Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay

#109

Post by ghaff »

llm_trw wrote: post #20
theandrewbailey wrote: post #2

A 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 v…

You can make an office as palatial as you like. If it's a 1+ hour commute I still don't really want to come in.

Re: Defeated CEOs are now conceding hybrid working is here to stay

#110

Post by al_borland »

charlie0 wrote: post #60
TexanFeller wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It makes it bearable to live more cheaply in the suburbs and make the long drive to downtown only a couple times a week. Live in MCOL suburb and work a couple days in HCOL city seems like a fair compromise to me.

Really depends on the area though. In LA for example, you'd have to move 1-2 hours away to get into MCOL or LOCOL. 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 awa…

I’m all for periodic retreats. I volunteered to do something like this when I was moving about 6 hours from the office. Then the pandemic happened, and about 6 re-orgs, so it no longer makes sense for me to go there.
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