Why Working from Home Will Stick [pdf]

Yes. Key positives for a company are reduced cost of office space and ability to draw upon a wider, cheaper pool of potential workers and increased employee satisfaction (for some, not everyone prefers working from home). Key negatives are reduced productivity due to lack of supervision, difficulty of face-to-face meetings with clients, difficulty of training younger staff.

Its a tradeoff and I think different businesses will fall into different buckets and there will also always be some inertia to change. I do think that the 'new normal' is neither 5 days 9-5 in the office OR complete remote work but something more like a couple of days in the office and a couple at home every week for most staff. But this wil probably be a plurality of the workforce only, with substantial numbers completely remote or close to, and substantial numbers also still in 5 days a week.

Although I spend maybe half of the time working at home, at workplace I can enjoy my lunch with colleagues without cooking (possibly free if it was a company), work in an environment that is less distracted and avoid being with my family 24/7.

> 1. Socializing is the primary activity that happens at work for the vast majority of workers. The gal or guy coming by your desk to "check in" or "see how your weekend was" etc... is literally where they find their social outlets and personal connections.

Not for me, or most of my cowoerks at Google. We absolutely would be doing more work by WFH. When we indeed going to hang out in the office with coworker, that's because we are bored by the work at hands, and need some outlet or simply resting. Not that we desire hanging out with coworkers.

> 2. Managers like to be able to watch their direct reports because it makes them feel more in control than they are

I never was in a team that managers need to see their reports. Most of the time, I often want to see my manager(s) in the office, but they were enjoying their meetings all day every day through the week.

> 3. The commuting routine, even if it's a nightmare, offers a sense of normalcy that most people have gotten used to and in a weird way rely on for grounding.

This sounds weird. I absolutely hate the commute. I am pretty sure that without the commute, my work output would double. Just by having those commute time being actual working hours.

I dont feel commuting is normal. Commuting isn't ideal for anyone. That's an unreasonable idea to me.

> 4. For a huge swath of Americans at least, work is an escape from the drudgery of the home.

That's somewhat true.

I indeed felt relaxed in office without being bothered by my children.

But now after all of us get used to the mode where my closed door means I am not to be disturbed, I absolutely love working from home. For example, if I need a rest, I can grab my younger son, and play with my older daughter. Fantastic experience! I think WFH have reshaped my relationship with my daughter because of more time together.

Any job that can be WFH will be easy to outsource. You aren't need in office so why do we even need you in this time zone? Outsource it cheap. If it really is manageable from a 30 min standup and Jira then why even bother with expensive devs?

Before you had a small competitive market in a central location. Now you're opening it up.

On top of that, remote work I find is starting to bleed over. I have meetings well past 5 now, quite often. I get messaged late and early. Whereas with the office it was different. People respected boundaries much more. Fully remote workforces lead to a lot more timezone issues as well.

I like flex time. I want to be able to work from home when I want to, but also want to go into the office for many things that are easier to do as a group.