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> So, when it's useful, genders do exist and one's born into them. Interesting.
At the end of the day we all ultimately know the truth even if we shy away from it to be nice… just how it goes
Apple employees criticize work-from-home policy in open letter
171–180 of 632 posts
Re: Apple employees criticize work-from-home policy in open letter
#172Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because if the CEO of a trillion dollar company wants people in the office, it's very likely that you will convince them otherwise. Tim Cook has tremendous influence over his company, these employees do not. Maybe if they had a union there would be some bargaining power but as it stands they can't do anything outside of leaving. Happy to be proven wrong here, but labor doesn't have much power in the US; especially wh…
I can guarantee you that “Nothing can ever be better, so why try?” will definitely not work to change policies. But it would make one a stereotypical Democratic senator.
...
Voting with your feet is trying. Also keep your snarky (and highly boring) political stance to Reddit, whenever possible (always).
Re: Apple employees criticize work-from-home policy in open letter
#173In other words: We blew five billion dollars on Apple Park. its a monument and a testament to the ineffable power and glory of our babel made manifest. You will attend this church of man in blessed reverence or you will find the cold streets at your feet.
Are people who are convinced by this logic aware that the vast majority of Apple employees don’t work in Apple Park and instead in extremely unremarkable office buildings throughout suburban Bay Area?
And do they ignore the fact that many of apple’s most important employees work in physically secured labs where physical device access is a major part of their job?
Like sure GitHub can be remote top to bottom, but an insane amount of Apples workflow is prototype driven and those prototypes cannot physically leave their secure facilities. Hard to argue (from a retention standpoint) that those people need to come in full time but the Apple Music people can do whatever they want.
Re: Apple employees criticize work-from-home policy in open letter
#174Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It's entirely a byproduct of a lack of trust in management intentions. Absolutely true. Employees do not trust management for good reasons, because they have experience with management not being open and honest with them (speaking generally here, of course there are exceptions). Management's goals are often counter to those of the employees. Whereas workers want good pay, flexibility, work/life balance, and so on.…
Spoken like someone that's never been a manager.
Except that I have. I've been on both sides of this issue and stand by these comments.
Re: Apple employees criticize work-from-home policy in open letter
#175> CEO Tim Cook called in-person collaboration benefits "irreplaceable" and in an email, the executive team talked about the importance of "the serendipity that comes from bumping into colleagues" during in-person work. Another extroverted MBA who doesn't understand why many engineers need big, unbroken chunks of silence & concentration to do great work.
So, I get that. However, that doesn't make those engineers better at communicating, being communicated to, or understanding where they work. They're at risk for being underrepresented due to the siloed and likely insular nature of their work.
Most of my success has been because I'd spoken, independently and unofficially, to people in unrelated divisions who hadn't met who _really needed to talk_. I don't expect others to take this on because they're almost definitely busier than me. And I don't necessarily like taking to people, but I'm really good at this one stupidly simple thing, and I'd rather be the one getting dragged into the meetings instead of everyone else so they can focus.
It's why corporate org charts are so bullshit to me; the real work happens when people can form their best structures, which typically takes knowing who you're working with or being known by someone who can protect that for you. For some, that's churning out work while being with their families way the fuck away from everyone else. For others, it's being wherever they can get some perspective and inspiration digging in and deciding something about the trajectory of the org they're at, usually involving people. If it works, it's valid.
Re: Apple employees criticize work-from-home policy in open letter
#176Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The time theft of traffic, costs of fuel and wear and tear on your car, the cost of lunch if you don't pack a lunch. I'm all for remote work but calling it "time theft" feels a bit weird. You knew these things were a requirement when you signed your contract, right? If you didn't want these things then why didn't you either made a point of them in contract negotiations or simply went to a company that allowed remot…
> You knew these things were a requirement when you signed your contract, right This is not entirely fair. Pre-pandemic, remote work was much more difficult to find.
True, but in this example, the pandemic provided an effective increase in pay to the employee while catering less for the needs of the employer. From an employer's perspective, the fair thing would be to either have the employee end their temporary privileges when the pandemic is over (i.e. return to the office), or "meet in the middle" and propose a salary cut to the employee.
I'm not saying this is how employers should react, but I found the arguments presented here just really one-sided and wanted to show where such a line of arguments lead.
I think reality is a bit more complex; the employer can turn this into an upside as well by saving expenses for office space, and possibly benefitting from the increased productivity of people who are more productive at home. And I think it's reasonable that employees ask their employers to look into these upsides.
Re: Apple employees criticize work-from-home policy in open letter
#177Earlier quoted context omitted.
Are people who are convinced by this logic aware that the vast majority of Apple employees don’t work in Apple Park and instead in extremely unremarkable office buildings throughout suburban Bay Area?
What are the percentages? Apple built Apple Park to not house the majority of employees?
> Still, Apple will continue to be based in Silicon Valley, where it has about 25,000 employees, including 12,000 employees in its loop-shaped headquarters.
[1]: https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/apple-will-sp...
Re: Apple employees criticize work-from-home policy in open letter
#178Earlier quoted context omitted.
Are people who are convinced by this logic aware that the vast majority of Apple employees don’t work in Apple Park and instead in extremely unremarkable office buildings throughout suburban Bay Area?
What are the percentages? Apple built Apple Park to not house the majority of employees?
Would it surprise you to hear that, despite taking the mantle as the new HQ (because it’s the most impressive building) it’s just an incremental office build and people still work at one infinite loop?
Re: Apple employees criticize work-from-home policy in open letter
#179Earlier quoted context omitted.
It’s not a stereotype. It’s statistics. https://developerpitstop.com/how-long-do-software-engineers-... The people who want to work from home and are being forced to work in the office, by definition aren’t “content”. As far as the living arrangements, if the impetus for you leaving is to find remote work, how will changing to another job change your living situation?
>"The people who want to work from home and are being forced to work in the office, by definition aren’t “content”." I feel like being "content" involves a lot of other factors and trying to determine if someone is content means looking at other aspects of the job holistically. I've always detested yearly evaluations and the 'song and dance' one must do to write "corpo-speak" about their achievements and goals. Yet,…
If you work for any company that offers health insurance, there is a pretty high bar set by the ACA for employers that make the difference in health insurance benefits different at most a few thousand dollars. You can usually negotiate the difference by asking for more money.
Even if that’s not the case, being able to work remotely means you can choose to work in a lower cost of living area - ie basically any place away from Apple’s headquarters will be cheaper.
It would also be a very regressive company - one that I have never worked at in 25 years - that would frown on you saying “I’m not available during $x hours when I need to drop my kid off to school. That’s the benefit of working remotely. You have a meeting at 9:00 and can’t get home in time? Pull out your cellular equipped tablet and join the meeting
I once left home at 9:00 AM during a workday to see my parents 4 hours away. But it took a whole day after stopping along the way to attend meetings from my cellular iPad.
I logged in when I got to my parents and finished my workday.
I have meetings scheduled with someone on the opposite coast at 7:00 ET? I log out at 5, walk to the next room to my home gym, exercise and log back in at 7 to have the meeting.
We are very much a calendar culture in my org.
Re: Apple employees criticize work-from-home policy in open letter
#180> CEO Tim Cook called in-person collaboration benefits "irreplaceable" and in an email, the executive team talked about the importance of "the serendipity that comes from bumping into colleagues" during in-person work. Another extroverted MBA who doesn't understand why many engineers need big, unbroken chunks of silence & concentration to do great work.
Cook has an engineering degree and Apple did some pretty good engineering before COVID including the A series of microprocessors, Air Pods, Apple Watch, and most of the M1 development. I understand that people like work from home, but implying engineering can’t be done in an office building is overselling the issue by quite a bit.
It is my understanding that the team behind the hardware and chip developments refused to work at Apple Park and demanded that a more suitable work area was built for them.
https://www.macrumors.com/2017/08/09/apple-park-employees-op...
I think even office areas are not equatable and greatly depends on the team.