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JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

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Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#151

Post by gruez »

lenerdenator wrote: post #143
gruez wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If you're a CEO that signed a lease or construction contract on any piece of property since, idk, 2015, you have, in some way, burned a lot of money on a piece of ground that could have, in many cases, been replaced with a far cheaper internet connection and suite of remote work applications. >1) explain this bonfire of cash to the board and possibly to shareholders, which is a pretty good way to see yourself shown…

They're not expected to have predicted the next pandemic; rather, they're expected to come up with novel ideas of how to do business. That's the point, or, rather, the justification for why just one year of one job can have them set for life. You get paid an insane amount of money - many multiples of the median lifetime income of Americans - because you make the right bets that either save the company massive sums of…

>They're not expected to have predicted the next pandemic; rather, they're expected to come up with novel ideas of how to do business. That's the point, or, rather, the justification for why just one year of one job can have them set for life. You get paid an insane amount of money - many multiples of the median lifetime income of Americans - because you make the right bets that either save the company massive sums of money, create new revenue streams, or both.

Taking this at face value, what does that have to do with getting an office in 2015? It seems like the same "hindsight is 20/20" problem as before. Maybe the CEO was busy transforming the company to use blockchain or something. You can't expect a CEO to nail every bet. Microstrategy is (was?) doing great because of their bitcoin treasury strategy, but I doubt many boards are getting upset that their CEOs didn't buy bitcoin, even though that would arguably be a better return than not leasing an office.

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#152

Post by phil21 »

brookst wrote: post #142
gruez wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>If you're a CEO that signed a lease or construction contract on any piece of property since, idk, 2015, you have, in some way, burned a lot of money on a piece of ground that could have, in many cases, been replaced with a far cheaper internet connection and suite of remote work applications. >1) explain this bonfire of cash to the board and possibly to shareholders, which is a pretty good way to see yourself shown…

Especially since board members are typically execs at other companies. Anyone remotely competent knows that the macro changes leading to remote work surprised everyone. I just don't find it credible that RTO is about CEO's wanting to keep office leases looking like smart decisions. If anything, it's exactly the opposite. If remote work is genuinely good for the company, a good CEO will acknowledge that and work to mi…

> I just don't find it credible that RTO is about CEO's wanting to keep office leases looking like smart decisions.

It's not credible. It's stuff folks make up from a myopic view of the situation. I have had more than a few intimate very open conversations with executives on the topic and not a single one has stated this as a reason. In fact, many are happy to be able to cancel expensive office leases when able.

The executives may be wrong, but as a group they certainly understand sunk cost theory. Most of them are even smart enough to not to fall for the fallacy by the time they reach that point in their careers. Of course lots of self-serving myopic behavior in that group as well.

It's difficult for some to empathize that there is genuine disagreement on what makes for a more productive workforce. That an individual's performance is irrelevant - group and team performance is the metric that actually matters. One does not necessarily correlate with the other.

It's very interesting to me that folks can hold the opinion remote learning is far deficient to on-campus classrooms, but simultaneously state that WFH is good for everyone. I think it's far more nuanced - and certain types of personalities and life stages will do better in one or the other.

I've worked remote most of my career since the late 90's - I have hired dozens if not hundreds of remote employees over this time. There is absolutely a group of workers who do quite well under such conditions, and some who do horribly. And it doesn't mean the latter can't be productive anywhere - or that these groups are static over an individual's entire career. This was not a controversial opinion prior to the pandemic.

You can go further into company/team structure and communication methods as well. Some have the culture to do remote well, some do not.

In the end I'm confident the market will figure out the right mix. Companies will be punished for making the wrong choices for themselves here.

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#153

Post by 999900000999 »

spokaneplumb wrote: post #139
SirMaster wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then maybe you aren't a culture fit for that employer / office? My experience is just so different. I love the vibe and the camaraderie of my office. It makes it fun to work there. Just sitting at home working, never interacting with people in person sounds really dull and boring and cold to me. I had to do that in 2020 and I hated it. Productivity is nice, but IMO it's not all about productivity. As a worker I value…

> My experience is just so different. I love the vibe and the camaraderie of my office. It makes it fun to work there. Me too! If we had free teleporters I'd probably go into the office for at least half my work day, just about every day, voluntarily. ... I don't like it enough to pay about 15 days per year, every year (5 hours commuting per week, times 50 weeks, divided by 16 waking hours per day[1]), hundreds of do…

My points exactly.

For example, if you want a good amount of space in NYC you're in Brooklyn or Queens.

Your spending 45 minutes to an hour each way just getting to your Manhattan office.

Or you live in Manhattan and spend 6k a month.

Just from a raw math perspective, assuming I make 100$ an hour in NYC, and my Brooklyn apartment is 3k.

That's 1000$ a week for the 2 hour commute if I value my time and apply the same rate.

Let's just say a Manhattan apartment is 6k, but it's right across the street from the office.

To make the math easy, let's estimate your BK to Manhattan commute time to be worth 3k a month.

Vs 2K for an apartment in Philly or Chicago with a remote job.

4k extra a month to work in Manhattan, meaning 48k per year. Once you factor in taxes, you have to make about 70k more to make the in person NYC make sense.

If the option is 150k remote or 200k in NYC you *lose* money going to NYC. Plus, you don't need to live in a city at all .

If I want to I can move out to some small town in Ohio and buy myself a ranch. As long as I have stable internet I'm fine .

Of course this is a moot point if RTO becomes industry standard which it quickly is. With my luck the options are probably going to be have no job or go to New York or San Francisco and make 170 meaning I get the worst of both worlds.

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#154

Post by com2kid »

surgical_fire wrote: post #148
com2kid wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't overcomplicate things. Whiteboards are way better than even the best of online tools and drawing with a mouse. For that matter, post-it notes on a wall are better than JIRA. At one workplace everyone had glass table so they could draw on with markers. People could literally come up to your desk and you could work through problems together on one end of the table. The best online tools are garbage compared to ph…

> Don't overcomplicate things. Whiteboards are way better than even the best of online tools and drawing with a mouse. I'll never understand this. All my whiteboard diagrams look like shit. My drawing skills suck, my writing is nearly illegible. Most online tools have excellent diagram shapes, nice and customizable arrows, good templates, etc. I can make nice diagrams much faster on any of those than in a real whiteb…

My whiteboard diagrams are also ugly, but I can draw ugly diagrams on a real whiteboard without cognitive overhead. Meanwhile diagraming tools have friction that a pen doesn't.

Also I've been to plenty of meetings where engineers split off into multiple sub groups and diagramed different ideas on parts of the board and then everyone joined back up to discuss. Can zoom technically do that? Sure but it sucks.

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#155

Post by com2kid »

intended wrote: post #135
com2kid wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't overcomplicate things. Whiteboards are way better than even the best of online tools and drawing with a mouse. For that matter, post-it notes on a wall are better than JIRA. At one workplace everyone had glass table so they could draw on with markers. People could literally come up to your desk and you could work through problems together on one end of the table. The best online tools are garbage compared to ph…

These are your > spontaneous social chats often lead to work-related brainstorming. Being in the office next to co-workers leads to more spontaneous discussions. I submit that this isn’t my reality.I never spontaneously break out a whiteboard., the same way I dont spontaneously break out into a dance routine. I do hope I’m in the majority, otherwise I’m really unsure of what to make of all the work places I’ve been a…

> I submit that this isn’t my reality.I never spontaneously break out a whiteboard., the same way I dont spontaneously break out into a dance routine.

Countless times I've walked up to someone and asked "hey can I work through this problem on a whiteboard with you."

And while I haven't done so myself, I have had coworkers spontaneously break into dance routines before. (Ok that has only happened once...)

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#156

Post by lenerdenator »

gruez wrote: post #151
lenerdenator wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're not expected to have predicted the next pandemic; rather, they're expected to come up with novel ideas of how to do business. That's the point, or, rather, the justification for why just one year of one job can have them set for life. You get paid an insane amount of money - many multiples of the median lifetime income of Americans - because you make the right bets that either save the company massive sums of…

>They're not expected to have predicted the next pandemic; rather, they're expected to come up with novel ideas of how to do business. That's the point, or, rather, the justification for why just one year of one job can have them set for life. You get paid an insane amount of money - many multiples of the median lifetime income of Americans - because you make the right bets that either save the company massive sums o…

> Taking this at face value, what does that have to do with getting an office in 2015? It seems like the same "hindsight is 20/20" problem as before. Maybe the CEO was busy transforming the company to use blockchain or something. You can't expect a CEO to nail every bet.

Odds are, if they were "busy transforming the company to use blockchain" they blew absolutely massive amounts of money.

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#157

Post by lenerdenator »

phil21 wrote: post #152
brookst wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Especially since board members are typically execs at other companies. Anyone remotely competent knows that the macro changes leading to remote work surprised everyone. I just don't find it credible that RTO is about CEO's wanting to keep office leases looking like smart decisions. If anything, it's exactly the opposite. If remote work is genuinely good for the company, a good CEO will acknowledge that and work to mi…

> I just don't find it credible that RTO is about CEO's wanting to keep office leases looking like smart decisions. It's not credible. It's stuff folks make up from a myopic view of the situation. I have had more than a few intimate very open conversations with executives on the topic and not a single one has stated this as a reason. In fact, many are happy to be able to cancel expensive office leases when able. The…

> I have had more than a few intimate very open conversations with executives on the topic and not a single one has stated this as a reason. In fact, many are happy to be able to cancel expensive office leases when able.

And that's just it: a lot of them aren't able.

Especially if they own the facility.

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#158

Post by nunez »

intended wrote: post #101
nielsbot wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It pains me to say this, but I find in-person discussions more productive than online ones. It's not just shooting the shit--for me, spontaneous social chats often lead to work-related brainstorming. Being in the office next to co-workers leads to more spontaneous discussions.

Have you ever thought of why? Just ‘magic’, is an open doorway for bias and unreliable memory to enter and influence the conversation. Is it perhaps that there are specific people, who are doing the ideation, or are particularly good at helping you think? Or is it anyone and everyone? If it’s anyone, then is it a social / biological quirk? Is it something else? For everyone reading, this is worth reflecting upon, if…

I'm a sales engineer. Given that a big chunk of our job is face-to-face, I can answer this.

We are a social species. Body language, eye contact and facial expressions are more important than the spoken word during a conversation. They're also extremely subtle. You don't think about someone leaning in or mimicking your position (that's a thing!) when you're saying something interesting, but we instinctively pick up on these cues and use them to steer conversations (or, in this case, know to double-down on whatever we're talking about).

None of these transmit well over VC.

Consider eye contact, for example. Maintaining eye contact with someone means that you're staring almost directly at your webcam's lens, which is at best unideal (if you're use to being on camera) and, at worst, impossible (since you're, naturally, staring at the facsimile of a person in the box on the lower-left-hand corner of your Zoom window). Webcams are AWKWARD.

Furthermore, a Zoom meeting has to compete with the billions of other things that you're doing on your computer. A face-to-face meeting competes with your calendar and your inner thoughts. This matters a lot for key conversations.

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#159

Post by nunez »

com2kid wrote: post #114
intended wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you ever thought of why? Just ‘magic’, is an open doorway for bias and unreliable memory to enter and influence the conversation. Is it perhaps that there are specific people, who are doing the ideation, or are particularly good at helping you think? Or is it anyone and everyone? If it’s anyone, then is it a social / biological quirk? Is it something else? For everyone reading, this is worth reflecting upon, if…

Don't overcomplicate things. Whiteboards are way better than even the best of online tools and drawing with a mouse. For that matter, post-it notes on a wall are better than JIRA. At one workplace everyone had glass table so they could draw on with markers. People could literally come up to your desk and you could work through problems together on one end of the table. The best online tools are garbage compared to ph…

It's much more difficult to save and revisit state with whiteboards and post-its, but when an entire team is colo'ed and able to work together on something, I agree; nothing comes close.
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