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Google is accelerating reopening of offices and putting limits on remote work

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Re: Google is accelerating reopening of offices and putting limits on remote work

#351

Post by austinjp »

varispeed wrote: post #342
austinjp wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about those who _do_ want a friendly workplace with some element of social interaction?

You can be friendly without having to socialise. Not sure why those things would have to go together? Doing socials after work is such a waste of time - sure it may be fun, but this way you are using up time that otherwise you could use to maintain friendships outside of work. Socialising at work is when you develop unconscious and conscious biases and it is a breeding ground for a toxic atmosphere and disruption of…

Sure, a 100% remote company might be friendly, for example. I mentioned "friendly" since the previous comment mentioned "friends". Not my intention to suggest inclusivity/exclusivity.

Re: Google is accelerating reopening of offices and putting limits on remote work

#352

Post by varispeed »

beforeolives wrote: post #347
varispeed wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Longing for a career at a one company it seems like a concept from the 80s-90s or movies, where you start as a janitor and finish as a director. However, this indeed can impact your day to day life at a company, as managers will develop biases towards people who they socialise with. That's why I think any kind of socials are a bad idea as they may be potentially discarding people who are bad are socialising but are g…

It's not just about socializing or climbing the ladder - you need to communicate with other people to get stuff done. Even if you only care about technical contribution and getting work done, if you aren't in the office and everyone else is, you'll have a difficult time.

Could you explain why? Everyone is on Slack or Teams or even Discord and always available to talk during "office" hours.

Re: Google is accelerating reopening of offices and putting limits on remote work

#353

Post by rightbyte »

Gustomaximus wrote: post #299
alexgmcm wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they do then why don't they share it? I mean they must realise this is a pretty unpopular decision so why not share their justification. Otherwise it's just an appeal to authority - "Ours not to reason why.."

> If they do then why don't they share it? Sometimes its easier not to share. In a perfect world we'd be more transparent. If its an popular decision, discussion potentially fans the flames of disagreement and ill will. E.g. People take some small point of the rationale and blow it out of proportion for why this is bad etc, why it isn't relevant to them without seeing a bigger picture etc. I think we've all seen this…

Having an open minded discussion sparks debates, yes.

Re: Google is accelerating reopening of offices and putting limits on remote work

#354

Post by DoingIsLearning »

bumbada wrote: post #334

I have been working remotely for decades. Most people can't work remotely and productively because they are not trained to do so. E.g. You are in your office (inside your home) and your wife, your dog or child enters it demanding you do some kind of non important issue right now, distracting you from your work.You need to be trained to not them let them distract you. The people living in your house need to be trained…

> or just lack the initiative, knowledge and internal motivation to work without external pressure and supervision

I will humbly raise my hand and admit to this.

As someone who has so far really enjoyed the lifestyle benefits of WFH but has struggled with this, what advice/tips/strategies/recommendations can you or other senior remote engineers provide on how to improve this specific aspect?

Re: Google is accelerating reopening of offices and putting limits on remote work

#355

Post by globular-toast »

mellosouls wrote: post #313
wg0 wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely - in knowledge economy, insisting on physical presence is darn damn stupid. And I don't want to hang "with friends at work" I go to "work" that has to be specified clearly and that I expect to deliver with purely professional merit driven collaboration and not friendships and gangs. I have friends or would love to have friends out of the place where I work. I want strict compartmentalisation between work a…

You sound like a right bundle of fun to work with. You should consider that among the things less conducive to team productivity and mental health are "the guy in the room" types who exhibit the same lack of interest in normal social interaction with their colleagues you are claiming here under the incorrect label "professionalism".

> You sound like a right bundle of fun to work with.

Good thing he's probably employed as an engineer rather than a clown then.

Re: Google is accelerating reopening of offices and putting limits on remote work

#356

Post by whywhywhywhy »

alexgmcm wrote: post #239
anoncake wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's our duty as human beings to resist any normalization of remote working. Loneliness is a far worse problem in our society than commuting. We need to make sure everyone has a baseline level of social contact.

You can have social contact outside of work though. WFH gives people back time to explore hobbies, join clubs, meet people etc. The social contact you have at work often feels forced and artificial - you can choose your friends, your colleagues not so much.

> you can choose your friends, your colleagues not so much

I did choose them, luckily I got to audition them from around 300 people I've been forced to interact with through over my career during the past 10 years. Not only do I get to know their characters well because I can decide if I like them or not and find out if they're trustworthy through working together I also get the extra benefit of being recommended for jobs through them.

How on earth am I supposed to do that though clubs? Presumably you mean sports clubs because no sure much else than that exists for adults, what if I want to make friends with people who are not interested in sports?

Re: Google is accelerating reopening of offices and putting limits on remote work

#357

Post by me_me_me »

beforeolives wrote: post #347
varispeed wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Longing for a career at a one company it seems like a concept from the 80s-90s or movies, where you start as a janitor and finish as a director. However, this indeed can impact your day to day life at a company, as managers will develop biases towards people who they socialise with. That's why I think any kind of socials are a bad idea as they may be potentially discarding people who are bad are socialising but are g…

It's not just about socializing or climbing the ladder - you need to communicate with other people to get stuff done. Even if you only care about technical contribution and getting work done, if you aren't in the office and everyone else is, you'll have a difficult time.

Except all of those people who worked from home fully before pandemic and somehow managed to do thei work just fine.

Re: Google is accelerating reopening of offices and putting limits on remote work

#358

Post by thrwaeasddsaf »

azurezyq wrote: post #32
tyingq wrote: post #4

That's interesting, since my assumption is that Google would be fairly data driven. I'd be curious if Googlers feel like this is because they are really seeing reduced productivity, or if there's a different motivation.

Disclaimer: Googler managing a small product engineering team. I have to say WFH has a considerable impact on productivity. Coding is actually fine, but the problems are: 1. Designing over VC is very difficult, especially for something entirely new. 3~4 people working on a single whiteboard is far more efficient. 2. Personal relationships are difficult to grow, especially for newbies. Usually those things got grown v…

> 3. Really bad work-life balance in general. When busy and everyone's WFH, boundary between work and life really got blurred. There's nothing like "gotta go, chat tomorrow" stuff.

You can only blame yourself for that. When I'm done working for the day, I log out, lock my screen and walk out of the room. And if the time to go happens in the middle of a chat, then so be it. My boss can tell me he's gotta go, and I can tell him I've gotta go, and that's exactly what we do. There is no blurring of work and life because I don't blur them.

Re: Google is accelerating reopening of offices and putting limits on remote work

#359

Post by ilikedthatone »

austinjp wrote: post #288
wg0 wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely - in knowledge economy, insisting on physical presence is darn damn stupid. And I don't want to hang "with friends at work" I go to "work" that has to be specified clearly and that I expect to deliver with purely professional merit driven collaboration and not friendships and gangs. I have friends or would love to have friends out of the place where I work. I want strict compartmentalisation between work a…

What about those who _do_ want a friendly workplace with some element of social interaction?

world has already been designed for __them__ for almost forever?

Re: Google is accelerating reopening of offices and putting limits on remote work

#360

Post by mekkkkkk »

keinten wrote: post #320

As what would be described as an aspergers person, I find offices full of people playing bizarre political and social games with each other that I don't have any particular interest in and the workplaces themselves to be extremely unproductive. I hate working in offices with people often appointed due to nepotism or just because they are like the person hiring, that I would rather be poor then work in them. The entir…

"What produces the best outcome" is doing a lot of work in that last paragraph. Having a nice culture and enjoying the work is a pretty essential part for most people. This may or may not disturb the raw productivity, but still leads to a better outcome in the form of teamwork, resilience and retention.
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