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80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

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Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#271

Post by johnnyanmac »

SoftTalker wrote: post #193
jurassic wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The sweet spot in my experience has been for WFH orgs to get together periodically for extended offsites. A one week gathering twice a year has forged some incredible bonds on my distributed team.

Ugh. Multi-day work offsites are the worst. Along with conferences. You have to make arrangements to be away, (try to) sleep in a hotel room, end up eating and drinking too much, getting a workout in is nearly impossible, they just completely disrupt all your routines and responsibilities.

Is 2 weeks of travel a year that unexpected? A job I got hired at said to expect quarterly travel for various conferences. Not week long arrangements, but we're talking about being ready with a few week's notice to fly out for a few days to some different part of the world.

of course I got hired in that place in 1/2020, so we know how that turned out.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#272

Post by johnnyanmac »

ecshafer wrote: post #56
atleastoptimal wrote: post #15

I understand the merits of WFH and in-person work. One thing that is however funny is the guilt tripping used by employers who have this straw-man version of a lazy WFH employee, and more so, employers who have a delusion that their workplace is important enough that people need to sacrifice a large portion of their lives just for the opportunity to be there in person. 90% of jobs aren't people's "passions" and have…

"Hybrid" is just in office work with a fancy name. A company I worked for pushed heavy for RTO and said "Its part time Hybrid". But we already had 1+ days (at managers discretion) WFH a week before covid hit. Hybrid was In office Tuesday through Thursday with remote Monday and Friday. This was actually less flexible than 1 or maybe more as you need it WFH that we had it prior.

YMMV. two of the companies I worked at mid-post pandemic were truly hybrid when they opened back up. Some people never ever came in and a few came in everyday. Others still were very far away so it was never an option.

But I've also heard of old co-workers at later jobs where hybrid was just flowery words and really meant "mandatory remote time and mandatory office".

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#273

Post by globular-toast »

refurb wrote: post #201
ChuckMcM wrote: post #39

I had lunch, not too long ago, with a senior executive of a silicon valley tech company that was moaning about how much of a pain it was to get people to come into the office and how it felt like things would never return to the way they were. And I told them I actually knew of a way to get 100% of their employees to return to the office happily. When they asked what this magic bullet was I said, "Go back to offices,…

I'm not sure that would be the magic bullet, but you're on the right track. If you want people to return to the office, use carrots not sticks . I personally can't stand virtual meetings with more than 2 or 3 people. They are wildly more inefficient then in person. Add on top a meeting focused on brainstorms or discuss and it's a shit show. Give people a reason to return, and have it actually be true, and people won'…

The worst is "hybrid" meetings where some are in the same room and some are remote. It just doesn't work.

Fully remote meetings work for routine stuff like regular team planning etc. Where they fail is what I call the "magic meeting" where management types seem to think if they get the right people in a room together things will just magically happen. But those meetings never achieve much anyway apart from making people feel good for a while. A remote meeting just removes any illusion.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#274

Post by [deleted] »

yieldcrv wrote: post #165
troupe wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it funny that when people were required to be home, employers talked about what great productivity they were getting with people at home. Then when it isn't required anymore, they want everyone back in the office for...productivity. My guess is that most employers really have no way to measure if an employee is being productive or not so managers are just reporting what makes them look good...and now we are ba…

I’ve started talking about crystals to attract hot chicks that are already into crystals. Many are, or want to believe, just like researchers want to believe in a room temperature superconductor. The alpha is that pedantic and over-analytical guys dismiss crystal energy at the expense of their reproductive opportunities, and the way around it is literally just not doing that. One thing I quickly noticed is that the p…

[deleted]

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#275

Post by laserlight »

Alupis wrote: post #146
atleastoptimal wrote: post #15

I understand the merits of WFH and in-person work. One thing that is however funny is the guilt tripping used by employers who have this straw-man version of a lazy WFH employee, and more so, employers who have a delusion that their workplace is important enough that people need to sacrifice a large portion of their lives just for the opportunity to be there in person. 90% of jobs aren't people's "passions" and have…

There's a lot of nuance that isn't discussed in the WFH circles. I don't believe the cynical claims some offer of VC's losing out on real estate deals, or mid-level managers needing to boost their butts-in-seats numbers or whatever. For some, perhaps, but on average? What percentage of long-distance relationships work out long-term? Do you become more or less close with friends after they move out of town? Do you sti…

> Do you become more or less close with friends after they move out of town?

Do you continue doing what it takes to be close with those friends? Do you talk every other day, for instance, like you do with your teammates? Do you share your experiences, think together, have plans and commitments?

Geographical proximity is not the most important contributor to closeness. I feel closer to random strangers on the Internet than how much I feel close to my neighbors.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#276

Post by jayd16 »

MBCook wrote: post #173
jayd16 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would those people be working significantly more without supervision? I find it hard to believe.

I don’t think that’s their point. The kind of person who isn’t going to work when not stared at all day by a manager is also probably the kind of person who is going to try to LOOK busy at the office without actually having to do a lot of REAL work. Surfing the web, playing games, chatting with their friends, whatever they can get away with when someone’s not watching. Or maybe doing their real tasks really slow. The…

I've definitely seen juniors who need attention to succeed.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#277

Post by johnnyanmac »

deprecative wrote: post #95
atleastoptimal wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also naïve to assume that the work people do when supervised is always valuable and not optimizing for the appearance of work, rather than work itself.

It's also naive to assume that optimizing for productivity is some goal we should work toward when zero reward structures are in place for it. The thing to optimize for is just enough productivity.

> when zero reward structures are in place for it.

we used to have them. Pension is long dead, however. Hell, promotions and raises are arguably dead as well in certain industries. It's practically common knowledge that it's easier for tech jobs to change jobs for a 20% raise than to ask the current company for a 5% raise. And then that company you left after 2 years proceeds to pay someone a 20% raise in order to ramp up someone doing your same job.

Companies need to reward tenure and actually budget for employee bonuses if they don't want to keep doing this. But from what I've read, they don't care and HR may even be incentivize to do this song and dance: https://old.reddit.com/r/datascience/comments/uo589a/why_are...

or if you want a TL;DR for the TL;DR:

>HR / recruiting "wins" when hiring, and does not "lose" when employees leave. Their incentives are in most cases at the fastest possible rotation of people.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#278

Post by ulfw »

troupe wrote: post #48
atleastoptimal wrote: post #15

I understand the merits of WFH and in-person work. One thing that is however funny is the guilt tripping used by employers who have this straw-man version of a lazy WFH employee, and more so, employers who have a delusion that their workplace is important enough that people need to sacrifice a large portion of their lives just for the opportunity to be there in person. 90% of jobs aren't people's "passions" and have…

I find it funny that when people were required to be home, employers talked about what great productivity they were getting with people at home. Then when it isn't required anymore, they want everyone back in the office for...productivity. My guess is that most employers really have no way to measure if an employee is being productive or not so managers are just reporting what makes them look good...and now we are ba…

It's all about PR to keep stock prices up.

Which employer would ever say: "ah man it's all fucked up. Our productivity is completely gone. We're not getting anything done"

Imagine what that would do the stock prices

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#279

Post by johnnyanmac »

bluefirebrand wrote: post #238
csomar wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's kinda what an emerging phenomena is.

My point is that it's still the result of human action, it's purposeful and intentional. It's just not conspiracy. It's not emergent out of nowhere. It's emergent out of shitty people being in positions of power and influence.

>it's still the result of human action, it's purposeful and intentional.

Orcheastras imply a conductor, a central figure with the score to direct their symphony to play.

1000 conductors means there is no conductor. Each one may have a purpose and intention, but a conspiracy implies... well, conspiring. That isn't a conspiracy, it's a mob. Even if somehow the symphony manages to make a melody out of the madness, it's not a result of a conspiracy because it never happened.

Re: 80% of bosses say they regret earlier return-to-office plans

#280

Post by laserlight »

dt3ft wrote: post #77
tester756 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, you found simple solution for very complicated dynamic and you actually believe you solved this problem? I don't care about offices with doors. Sure, they're better, but still it doesn't solve my issues - I care about commute - time and money, especially time. I've been commuting like 3h / day before WFH and I don't want to go back unless you pay me at least 2.5x

Only this would make me consider going back to the office: a 5 hour workday, paid as 8. The 3 remaining hours would be compensating for the commute, which includes the time to get dressed. Commuting costs and food should be compensated as well. Nothing else. Even with the above, I would still prefer a hybrid or remote positions as long as I have a choice. Standing on a crowded train is not something I want to do ever…

> which includes the time to get dressed

Thanks for mentioning this. It drives me crazy how people think of commute time as the time their engines are running, whereas the overhead of doing so is relatively significant.

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