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Google is saving $1B per year as a result of employees working from home

latimes.com

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Re: Google is saving $1B per year as a result of employees working from home

#301

Post by Guest42 »

SilverRed wrote: post #204
quantumsequoia wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google is one of the most sought after companies, but this is due to them actively advertising Google as a great place to work. Actually talking to someone who works at Google makes it more real and attainable in candidates minds and reinforces Google as a desirable place to work If Google were to stop attending, they risk newer generations of engineers shifting their perspective on Google, especially these days when…

Sounds about right. The OP sounds like "Why does coke advertise their product so much when they are the most well known product in existence" Because that status will decline without advertising.

I think that’s a fair take although my expanded position was more along the lines of whether spending 9 figures on this particular channel was the most effective use of resources given the extent of industry domination, when perhaps other channels could promote the brand for marketing and recruitment purposes.

Re: Google is saving $1B per year as a result of employees working from home

#302

Post by DannyBee »

beambot wrote: post #4

Google may save $1B this year on the P&L, but I can assure you that a large cohort of employees are vastly less effective (especially parents!). Time will tell how wfh pans out in terms of long-term enterprise value creation, after confounding variables (i.e. COVID) are removed. Source: A lot of my Googler friends are itching to get back into the office -- whether parents or people whose social lives centered around…

As someone else says in the thread, all these "assurances" are based on combinations personal preference and anecdote.

I am overall responsible for the team that produces and figures out developer productivity metrics for Google.

I can assure you there is lots and lots of real data on this, so there isn't a lot of need for random supposition based on people's desires (WFH vs not) and biases. There are too many comments in this thread to read every single one, but most suppositions i read seemed just to reflect biases and personal preferences rather than any real data.

It's IMHO a little odd to see people assume that any really successful tech company is not going to be able to figure out and succeed at maintaining whatever overall level of productivity they want (IE pre-covid, pre-covid-50%, pre-covid+50%). The ability to adapt and be productive/effective in changing conditions is often one of the things that makes companies successful in the first place.

The thing that is much harder to fix is stuff like personal well being.

Re: Google is saving $1B per year as a result of employees working from home

#303

Post by underdeserver »

squaredisk wrote: post #212
paxys wrote: post #81

Google is saving $1 billion per year because of COVID-19, not because employees are working from home. This is literally mentioned in the article, but the headline is twisted (for clicks no doubt): > During the first quarter, Google parent Alphabet Inc. saved $268 million in expenses from company promotions, travel and entertainment, compared with the same period a year earlier, “primarily as a result of COVID-19,” a…

If Google saved that much money and the business didn't see a considerable negative impact (34% increase? Quite the opposite in fact.), then that news should be telling not just for Google, but for every company that previously catered to spoiled employees who jump on an airplane just to have lunch with the customer. Two lies COVID has forcibly flushed out and helped dispel: Lie #1: Remote work, cannot work. Lie #2:…

I've been working through VC across the atlantic during the pandemic. It's been horrible. There have been multiple projects that took months - and I know, from past experience, that if I could hop over the atlantic for a week they'd be solved in that timeframe.

Why? Because of face-to-face experience and trust building and the ability to sit beside one another and grab someone quickly. It's 100% worth the ridiculously high costs of air travel and expenses.

Re: Google is saving $1B per year as a result of employees working from home

#304

Post by [deleted] »

BiteCode_dev wrote: post #237
SilverRed wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds about right. The OP sounds like "Why does coke advertise their product so much when they are the most well known product in existence" Because that status will decline without advertising.

I wonder if this is not a good argument to actually make all kind of advertising illegal. There is no way that ensuring huge entities with enormous capital are able sustain their dominant position thanks to flushing cash at ads is healthy. I've yet to see a situation where advertising was better than word of mouth, personal experience or expert feedback. It seems it's all gain for them, no gain for us.

[deleted]

Re: Google is saving $1B per year as a result of employees working from home

#305

Post by oblio »

kalleboo wrote: post #268
bootlooped wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not a universal opinion. All of the people on my team would prefer to be in the office 2 or 3 days a week. Some people find it's positive for their mental health to see and interact with other people, in person, regularly.

With non-pandemic WFH you can see and interact with other people, in person, regularly, outside of work. Hobbies, cafés, bars, etc.

What if you also want to interact with colleagues?

Re: Google is saving $1B per year as a result of employees working from home

#306

Post by oblio »

agent008t wrote: post #262
bootlooped wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not a universal opinion. All of the people on my team would prefer to be in the office 2 or 3 days a week. Some people find it's positive for their mental health to see and interact with other people, in person, regularly.

It is possible they are not telling you the truth.

That's A) super arrogant, B) completely ignoring the fact that we're social animals and introverts are a minority in the overall population.

Re: Google is saving $1B per year as a result of employees working from home

#307

Post by lukeschlather »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #107
lukeschlather wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My company has OKRs directly focused around improving serendipity and cross pollination lost due to Covid WFH.

Your company is making up fairy tales to support a narrative.

I shudder to live in a world where no one tells fairy tales.

Re: Google is saving $1B per year as a result of employees working from home

#308

Post by lukeschlather »

walterbell wrote: post #73
lukeschlather wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My company has OKRs directly focused around improving serendipity and cross pollination lost due to Covid WFH.

What have teams been doing to hit those OKRs? How are they measured?

Our people team is in charge of organizing things. Some of it is intangibles like encouraging more communication on Slack, others are more concrete like setting up time to connect people who might not otherwise connect.

Re: Google is saving $1B per year as a result of employees working from home

#309

Post by varispeed »

EvilEy3 wrote: post #232
varispeed wrote: post #208

I can bet that $1B won't get distributed through salaries, but rather some managers get hefty bonuses and the rest will be reinvested into perfecting manipulation techniques to make us buy products we don't need or want.

Why should it be distributed through salaries? Making an extra is a one time thing.

I think I meant as bonuses for employees. I am sorry for the confusion.

Re: Google is saving $1B per year as a result of employees working from home

#310

Post by jsjohnst »

etripe wrote: post #283
noja wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your "lies" are missing the "outside of a pandemic" qualifier.

What are your reasons for assuming business travel is a necessity outside a pandemic? Why do you think remote work is only feasible during a pandemic?

> Why do you think remote work is only feasible during a pandemic?

Remote work was feasible in part during a pandemic because it had to be. When everyone is 100% remote, things aren’t bad. If companies don’t do anything to preserve that culture from during pandemic times, when folks start returning to the office again, remote work will very likely go back to sucking. Being remote you’ll very likely be the odd person out on meetings desperately trying to hear what was said and/or struggle to get a word in with everyone else jammed in a conference room.

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