‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy • Hacker News Board

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#51

Post by fullshark » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:54 PM UTC

bluefishinit wrote: post #32

fullshark wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one has any master plan here, everyone is winging it and trying not to screw up so much they get fired/replaced by the board, while still achieving their preferred outcome. The end result is this kind of limbo, where no one can trust the current status quo fully.

This is incorrect. CEOs are literally planning these moves together. In a more general sense they're also creating an open culture to promote this type of thing. Take a scroll through some VC/CEO twitter accounts and see how many whine about WFH or people "cheating" at work, working two jobs, not having a work ethic... The capital class is good at working in its own interest and it has a lot of leverage to do so.

They are unhappy for sure, and are all copying each other because they are afraid of making the wrong move. They looked at what Musk did with Twitter with great interest I'm sure, looking for lessons for example to carry over, as one of the few leaders willing to stick his neck out. I don't believe there's major orchestration but it is true when everyone's on each other boards an incestuous common sense/wisdom tends to emerge about what needs to happen and what the justification will be, and I'm sure they all believe it's inevitable all the companies move back towards full time on site.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#52

Post by ajmurmann » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:54 PM UTC

rottingchris wrote: post #10

themaninthedark wrote: post #8

It's kind of funny to me that for a long time the people in cities looked down on rural people and life and touted the benefits of living in close proximity. When COVID hit, we saw a mass exodus from the cities and now people don't want to return.

People who live in cities are not a uniform hive mind. Some people left but the vast majority stayed.

"People who live in cities are not a uniform hive mind"

We need more of this! It seems so much of our public discourse is worsened by putting people and their opinions into firm groups, then assuming that anything anyone in that group ever says is a core believe of that group and then vilifying the group for that believe.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#53

Post by eru » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:54 PM UTC

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #7

whywhywhywhy wrote: post #2

Just genuinely don't see the point in this debate anymore, like some companies will want you to show up, some will be fine with you working from home. If your company is asking you to show up, time to just get another job if that's important to you. Thankfully it's an easy solve because the people who like showing up are tired of video calls anyway.

> because the people who like showing up are tired of video calls anyway. Even if you like showing up, you will likely still have video calls. Most large companies have multiple office sites and you still need to collaborate with teams/employees in different locations.

Yes, but whywhywhywhy is probably happier if there are fewer calls.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#54

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:54 PM UTC

civilitty wrote: post #35

jeffbee wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every clause of your post is false. There was not a mass exodus from cities during COVID. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2021/12/16/in-2020-f... Urban people do not look down on rural people. It’s the opposite. Rural people are the most likely to hold negative opinions about people who live in other situations, and urban dwellers are the least likely. https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2018/05/22/how-…

The contempt rural people have for urban dwellers is palpable if you ever spend any substantial time with them. God forbid if you’re from California cause then you might as well be Satan’s spawn come to harvest their children for adrenochrome.

[deleted]

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#55

Post by lolinder » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:54 PM UTC

spaceman_2020 wrote: post #28

imgabe wrote: post #19

Offices per se aren’t necessarily terrible. Commutes are terrible. Open floor plans are terrible. Companies don’t seem interested in fixing these things, though.

Yep. Ask any remote worker if they’d go back to the office and most would say no. Ask them if the office was within walking distance and most probably wouldn’t mind.

Walking distance with a private office, maybe. I wouldn't even walk to the offices I've actually had to work in, not now that my home office is a viable option.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#56

Post by dnissley » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:55 PM UTC

bluefishinit wrote: post #32

fullshark wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one has any master plan here, everyone is winging it and trying not to screw up so much they get fired/replaced by the board, while still achieving their preferred outcome. The end result is this kind of limbo, where no one can trust the current status quo fully.

This is incorrect. CEOs are literally planning these moves together. In a more general sense they're also creating an open culture to promote this type of thing. Take a scroll through some VC/CEO twitter accounts and see how many whine about WFH or people "cheating" at work, working two jobs, not having a work ethic... The capital class is good at working in its own interest and it has a lot of leverage to do so.

It's too easy for smart CEOs to defect and gain an advantage by allowing WFH. The capital class is not reasonably aligned on the RTO issue. Many CEOs and leadership teams themselves are reluctant to come in to the office, and so end up aligned with their workers on this particular issue.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#57

Post by footy » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:55 PM UTC

themaninthedark wrote: post #8

It's kind of funny to me that for a long time the people in cities looked down on rural people and life and touted the benefits of living in close proximity. When COVID hit, we saw a mass exodus from the cities and now people don't want to return.

I live in a city and I want to work from home. I'd never want to live in a rural area, the benefits or urban life are orthogonal to my career.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#58

Post by voisin » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:55 PM UTC

davewritescode wrote: post #43

I think full time work in the office is 100% dead and buried. It's never coming back for people who have enough skills to leverage that kind of arrangement. I think the first place we need to start is there. Most of us are NEVER going back to 5 days a week in the office. However, most of the folks complaining about return to work I've noticed are senior people who have enough skills to perform their job and don't req…

> What I've noticed is these kinds of workers absolutely thrive remotely

Thriving individually does not equate (necessarily) to thriving as a team, nor thriving as an organization. I see on HN too many people taking about how they personally perform better, which is (a) difficult to objectively self assess given all the biases involved and (b) ignores that the team might perform poorer or the organization might, due to a variety of frictions added by being remote.

It isn’t as black and white as some people like to claim.

Edit: I love how I am being downvoted on something as uncontroversial as stating that there’s more nuance than the current debate seems to devolve into on HN. Shameful.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#59

Post by eru » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:55 PM UTC

themaninthedark wrote: post #8

It's kind of funny to me that for a long time the people in cities looked down on rural people and life and touted the benefits of living in close proximity. When COVID hit, we saw a mass exodus from the cities and now people don't want to return.

Some people like living in cities, some people like rural living.

If we let the people who like to live in cities bunch up closer together (by legalising more density there), the rest of us have more space in the rest of the country. It's a win-win situation.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#60

Post by Nullabillity » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:56 PM UTC

osigurdson wrote: post #9

toomuchtodo wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Workers have leverage and are using it. You don’t have to understand it for workers to work towards having more agency over their working arrangements. The NLRB is likely about to reinstate the Joy Silk doctrine, which will make it even easier to organize. Workers who want flexible work arrangements as a right should lean into that. Public support for unions exceeds 70%, the highest amount in almost 60 years. So stra…

>> “you just have to do what your employer dictates or go elsewhere.” Isn't that pretty much exactly the case? No one in software is going to go to the trouble of unionizing.

Found the VC alt.