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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

#371

Post by globular-toast »

Valkhyr wrote: post #129

After a year working remotely, I don't think I'd be willing to go back to working fully (or even primarily) in the office. I could do a day here or there for team-building activities or major meetings, but that's pretty much the extent I'd be willing to do. Granted, this is based on having a 40-minutes train commute (each way, so 80 minutes/day), but unless I could have a 10 minute walk or bike commute I don't think…

Yep. When I look for my next job, remote working will be at the top of my list of priorities. I am not willing to work primarily at an office. Covid has been great in forcing companies to figure out working for home infrastructure, though, so I don't foresee this being a problem.

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

#372

Post by mingusrude »

DoingIsLearning wrote: post #354
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?

So first of all, there are (or should be) a lot less interruptions when working from home. People tend to disturb folks that they see, it's a lot easier to give address someone at the other end of the room or across the corridor than it is to call, email or chat with someone. With these disturbances gone, you are more likely to be more productive from the start when working from home and so a little slacking off here and there probably does not make you less productive than what you were at work.

That said, self motivation and lack of external pressure can be a problem. When I feel I have a hard time to focus on something my last resort is the pomodoro timer. I sit down, set a timer at 25 minutes and force myself to no break focus during that time. Once the first period is over it's usually no problem to keep going since I've gotten into something by then.

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

#373

Post by ljm »

thomasfromcdnjs wrote: post #206
ohthehugemanate wrote: post #199

Just in case you were operating under the illusion that tech giants are run by forward thinking executives who are immune to the usual politics and problems of corporate life. Nope, most of their exec layer is a bunch of people who cut their teeth the industry in the 90's, and are operating within a thick fog of local workplace politics. I guarantee that behind this move is an executive who believes that developers n…

Anecdotally, I've been a remote engineer on and off for ten years. There have been plenty of companies where I thought we might have achieved more with an office. Yes, I understand you can always improve your processes but there does feel like there are fundamental limitations with remote work.

I'm fully remote and I don't mind it. Compared to being either fully remote or fully office-based, my ideal lies somewhere in between the two. Remote by default with the option to head in for co-working and stuff when I want to.

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

#374

Post by lentil_soup »

dgellow wrote: post #368
lentil_soup wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I cannot recommend a co-working space enough. My life improved so much since working from a co-working. I looked for a place that shared my work/life style and I've made friends, we share lunch, we've gone on trips, we usually share a friday drink, etc. And since everyone works on different things and/or companies it's quite interesting as well to get some other input that's not just work colleagues. I also looked fo…

Reading this thread makes me realize that not everybody is currently in a lockdown. Co-working spaces where I am are closed (due to the virus) since ~October and won't reopen before a while :(

Ah, I started working at a co-working before the pandemic.

Where I am currently (Spain) there's been different levels of lockdown. The co-working is open, but with a lot of the usual activities heavily restricted.

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

#375

Post by austinjp »

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?

I wrote a long edit clarifying a few things, and lost it on submit thanks to timing out. Damn.

I'm morbidly fascinated by the polarisation that drives some online conversations. Admittedly I have probably fuelled some of that with my question, I'll try to do better in future. However, it was intended to point out that there are shades of grey here (as evident in the comments) while the post I replied to seemed very black-and-white to me.

I wonder if a better question might be something like: what does a healthy, productive future of work look like now that covid has demonstrated that some people will very much want to continue working entirely remote, while some people very much do not?

For what it's worth, I completely agree and sympathise with all the issues people raise here. None of remote, in-office, or hybrid are perfect. They all have problems.

It seems that covid has given us the opportunity to at least try to improve things, even though clearly the answers are difficult to find.

Slight tangent: I was saddened to read recently that Basecap has permanently closed their Chicago HQ [0]. I've held up this place as a model for how I'd want to build an office space should my unicorn/cash-cow finally hatch. No, it's not perfect, but I loved the fact they explicitly tried, and they explicitly recognised it might be seen by some as a waste of company funds, particularly when they also did things like deliver fruit & veg to employee's homes rather than workplace as an incentive to go home rather than stay late in that expensive office space [1].

I think there are major underlying structural issues that discourage companies from solving issues relating to worker happiness. Extortionate rent and service charges have produced homogenous high-streets, and they're homogenising the business districts too. The labels over the door of each building might be different, but the attitude inside is the same. Worker happiness is grist to the mill, productivity and the bottom line reign. I think we could do better.

[0] https://basecamp.com/about/office

[1] https://basecamp.com/books/calm

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

#377

Post by izacus »

krageon wrote: post #285
izacus wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's our duty as human beings to resist going back to the office as much as possible. Please don't talk for all of us. If you're miserable in the office that's fine, but it's noones duty to support your preferences. This is why we have this amazing free market - everyone can work at a company that respects their preferences.

> amazing free market > everyone can No. Most people don't have good options. It's a little ironic to say the OP needs more empathy and then go on to make an argument that's almost breathtakingly disconnected from reality.

I've seen many breathtaking articles on this very page which claim that majority of companies are shifting towards permanent WFH. They were followed by predictions that this will increase.

How am I disconnected from reality?

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

#378

Post by oblio »

tremon wrote: post #301
oblio wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When will introverts realise that their working conditions are being dictated to them by extroverts. Majority rule :-)

Hardly. Extroverts just have an easier time getting heard.

In these circles, yeah, maaaaaybe introverts are the majority.

For the general population? No way. Most studies put the number of introverts somewhere between 20-40%.

Extroverts are loud and they are the majority, too.

As someone on this forum put it, the only evolutionary advantage to being an introvert is that you're insurance in case all the bunched up introverts die in a natural disaster, while you're away sitting alone in your far away corner.

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

#379

Post by izacus »

irq wrote: post #304
izacus wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's our duty as human beings to resist going back to the office as much as possible. Please don't talk for all of us. If you're miserable in the office that's fine, but it's noones duty to support your preferences. This is why we have this amazing free market - everyone can work at a company that respects their preferences.

Just in terms of reduced CO2 emissions due to fewer people commuting because they can work from home, and the impact this has on climate change, he is correctly speaking for all of us, if by all of us you mean life on Earth.

If that's the main driver, then instead of forced WFH, let's do a blanket ban of cars. Not just commute to work, but force people to stay at home at all times. After all, we're ignoring all the other effects here right?

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

#380

Post by intricatedetail »

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…

Worst thing is that my partner thinks sitting by a computer is not work and she feels entitled to interrupt any time she pleases. I didn't know that side when I worked in office. The first few months were difficult and she only came to terms with that when I started packing my things and said I will be moving out. I learned that this is probably wrong relationship but it is hard to throw away those years, but I can't live with someone who doesn't respect what I do. I am not sure how I missed this? How do you set those boundaries in a healthy way?
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