Fujitsu announces permanent work-from-home plan • Hacker News Board

Re: Fujitsu announces permanent work-from-home plan

#271

Post by josh_carterPDX » Tue, Jul 07, 2020, 9:59 PM UTC

bbojan wrote: post #226

josh_carterPDX wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's even more difficult when you factor in kids at home. We've had to deal with that at our home which means our ability to get work done has been cut in half. It also puts a lot of burden on co-workers. The biggest issue with this has been people without kids wondering why coworkers WITH kids aren't getting as much done.

But once the situation with the coronavirus is over, the kids will be in school/daycare, so this won't be an issue.

Unless you have year round school, this will always be an issue.

Re: Fujitsu announces permanent work-from-home plan

#272

Post by fomine3 » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 12:12 AM UTC

cdavid wrote: post #203

Barrin92 wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>There is a culture of overwork that begets a culture of inefficiency that boggles the mind. Few people know that Japan has a labor productivity lower than Italy, for example. If you spent so much time at the workplace like the Japanese you end up with a low producivity on paper pretty much by definition, because it's simply output divided by amount of time worked. But I wouldn't overestimate the importance of comput…

>If you spent so much time at the workplace like the Japanese you end up with a low producivity on paper pretty much by definition, because it's simply output divided by amount of time worked. It is not as simple as that: in general, more developed countries tend to have higher labor productivity. Japan has been historically low for several decades. I'm no specialist of labor statistics, but note that Japan actaually…

For work hours, maybe because many Japanese women works as "part time job" due to discrimination and some tax/insurance system. Statistics by gender maybe reflects it.

Re: Fujitsu announces permanent work-from-home plan

#273

Post by fomine3 » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 12:15 AM UTC

SenHeng wrote: post #139

benmw333 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What struck me was the seemingly 1995 era laptops people were working on in the trains.

This is what benmw333 is referring to. The Panasonic Let's. Despite how bulky it looks, it weighs about the same as the macbook air. It's basically used by anyone who isn't a manager, designer or software developer. You see them everywhere . https://biz.panasonic.com/jp-ja/products-services/letsnote/l...

IMO Most Japanese tech geeks laughs why MacBook Air is advertised as "light" laptop. There are more lighter and more functional laptops available in Japan.

Re: Fujitsu announces permanent work-from-home plan

#274

Post by fomine3 » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 12:18 AM UTC

kozak wrote: post #185

SenHeng wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what benmw333 is referring to. The Panasonic Let's. Despite how bulky it looks, it weighs about the same as the macbook air. It's basically used by anyone who isn't a manager, designer or software developer. You see them everywhere . https://biz.panasonic.com/jp-ja/products-services/letsnote/l...

Why are they emphasizing the optical disc drive so much?

Some enterprise still likes CD than USB drive because they believe it's less risk for contaminating malware.

Re: Fujitsu announces permanent work-from-home plan

#275

Post by fomine3 » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 12:20 AM UTC

danielscrubs wrote: post #258

cdavid wrote: post #97

I am quite bearish about the impact of WFH, especially for software engineers, but if there is one country where I think the coronavirus can have a huge positive effect for the economy, it is Japan. Japanese companies are generally extremely inefficient. Outside of a few powerhouses, partially thanks to a protected and large domestic market, Japanese labor practices are antiquated. There is a culture of overwork that…

I got it explained quite simply by: digital signatures is by law not valid in court. Which would explain the paper use. Don’t know if it’s still true though. Usually things that seem inefficient boils down to law in the end.

It's valid now.

Re: Fujitsu announces permanent work-from-home plan

#276

Post by fomine3 » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 12:27 AM UTC

y-c-o-m-b wrote: post #124

kubatyszko wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can actually get a house for free in some areas, mostly central Japan. Many cities are becoming deserted and houses are left alone, governments offer incentives to take them over. Might come with a catch such as committing to maintenance of farming.

My wife did a little light reading on this subject and found it's more complicated than that. It turns out that finding the owner of these properties is an enormous challenge because due to the high level of taxes and fees associated with these buildings, the owners are reluctant to claim them (to avoid paying the taxes/fees). I would like to see someone living in Japan confirm this, though.

That's because a land owner isn't able to release(return to gov) their lands in Japan.

Re: Fujitsu announces permanent work-from-home plan

#277

Post by mleonhard » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 5:03 AM UTC

> The company also said the programme would allow staff to choose where they worked, whether that was from home, a major corporate hub or a satellite office.

Culture cannot change quickly. I expect only a few Fujitsu employees will work from home. Most will continue to waste countless hours sitting at a desk to "demonstrate commitment to the company." It won't matter that the desk is in a satellite office. Male managers will require their female subordinates to work from the same satellite office with them. Only determined top leadership can change a Japanese company's time-wasting sexist culture. I doubt Fujitsu will succeed before the pandemic ends.

Re: Fujitsu announces permanent work-from-home plan

#278

Post by webmaven » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 7:34 AM UTC

buboard wrote: post #144

thesumofall wrote: post #129

Not commenting on this specific case here, but I believe we currently see the pendulum swinging from one extreme (WFH only at a very exclusive subset of companies) to the other extreme ("WFH first" policies) I'm convinced the true winners will be those companies that find a smart mix of both worlds. This includes recognizing that both concepts have their strengths (e.g., people are a lot more disciplined about meetin…

There is no middle ground -- WFH is self-reinforcing trend, because offices are much less useful when they are half-empty and all processes have go online. As soon as some coworkers move, others follow. If people start working 2-3 days at home ... they start to think about moving somewhere better. I wonder what is the endgame of this rearrangement? Perhaps nomadism will become common? But in that case, cities will lo…

> Obvious choice #1 is near extended family. What else motivates people to move?

Anecdotally, I am aware of folks who were highly motivated to move away from their extended family.

Re: Fujitsu announces permanent work-from-home plan

#279

Post by JonathanKurumi » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 5:52 PM UTC

alistairSH wrote: post #26

Can Japanese residents comment on how this works WRT office space in the home? Do people typically have space in their homes to have a proper home office setup? My wife and I are both WFH right now, and we had to buy a second desk and chair and repurpose what was previously our 2nd bedroom. The 3rd bedroom has always been a home office. If we lived in a downtown apartment, I'm not sure what we'd do, as we're both in…

Me and my girlfriend are lucky(?) enough to live in Saitama so we have an extra room that we’ve converted into an office. Most of my colleagues/friends don’t have this space and had to slap their computers on top of their Kotatsu’s before summer rolled around, now because this doesn’t look to be ending anytime soon they’re all buying desks or “floor office chairs”

Re: Fujitsu announces permanent work-from-home plan

#280

Post by JonathanKurumi » Wed, Jul 08, 2020, 5:56 PM UTC

laurieg wrote: post #165

derefr wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The culture of the customer is always right also implies making contortions to please them, including many on site meetings where you have to be there just as a sign of respect. I've always wondered if there could be something like a badge you could put on your business, to signal that you're participating in a separate sub-economy where the customer isn't always right. There must be modern companies where both sid…

Perhaps one of the biggest barriers to fast moving SV style startups would be how difficult firing is in Japan. You need around 18 months to fire an ineffective employee. (And in contested cases I've heard of an employee who stayed on payroll for 4 years while the firing was finalised). It's one reason why people often face being harassed to the point of resignation rather than formally fired.

This actually isn’t a requirement unless you’re in the national pension system. When you’re below a certain number of employees you don’t have to join the national pension and many of those worker protections also don’t apply to you.