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Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

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Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#511

Post by 52-6F-62 »

dogman144 wrote: post #498
papito wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"We are a family" is bullshit. You need to be a pretty egregious repeat offender to be ostracized from a real family. A company can fire you on a whim, simply because someone with a business degree sorted a spreadsheet with salaries in descending order, and you were in the top 20. The more correct analogy is a sports team. Everyone works well together to win the medal, but it's much more pragmatic in that sense. Perh…

I recently read Netflix's culture doc, and they outright said they treat employees like a sports team - welcome to the team, perform at your best, you may get benched, you may get cut. There's no shame in getting cut, and you should be proud that you had the talent to perform at our level for the time you did. My main takeaway was: fair enough, and when can I get into that interview pipeline. I want to be on a meat-e…

That is actually a pretty reasonable take in my opinion. And refreshing.

Having been on [edit: sports] teams before, it can be a toxic situation or it can be absolutely amazing and life-affirming. It might sound cold in the language, but it can be so rewarding, so bonding. It's definitely a better analogy than family. Family is family. You can define it as you like, but nothing equates.

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#512

Post by tinyhouse »

anticensor wrote: post #502
tinyhouse wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Real-estate cost is not an issue for most companies. Also, all fully remote companies that I know have company "retreats" twice a year for all employees, which is expensive. It's not mandatory of course but very important. The bigger issue for me is what will happen to the US tech market. Why would Twitter hire people in the US if they can hire much cheaper people from Europa and other locations. The US government re…

> They might need to intervene with remote work as well. Do you mean all boundary gateways should censor all information and knowledge, that are past without prior authorisation or a heavy tax, by default? Because that is how customs IRL work.

I mean something like tax incentives to companies that hire most of their employees in the US.

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#514

Post by satysin »

wtetzner wrote: post #373
paulie_a wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The office distractions and chitchat are never going to go away regardless of format

They're easier to ignore in async forms of digital communication.

Exactly this. It is much easier to mute a thread when some colleagues are having a slow day than it is to move desk in an office when those same people are having an all day conversation as you're trying to work.

Of course you could tell them to STFU (perhaps in a more professional vernacular) but that can be difficult to do if you're not an assertive or confident person.

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#515

Post by gruez »

mertd wrote: post #444
_the_inflator wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wholeheartedly agree. > If you could eliminate the 1 hour of wasted time daily This is it. Without self-driving cars this is the most important present you can give to a worker. What would you pay for an additional hour a day?

$56 per minute saved https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/new-yorkers-will-pay-56...

more like $56 per 20 minutes

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#517

Post by throwaway287391 »

_bxg1 wrote: post #379
gregkerzhner wrote: post #356

I think if you work with a brilliant group of coworkers that you love to hangout out with, then you are lucky and I can see how you miss being in the office. But, thats not the case for many of us. The crux of work relationships is that they are not voluntary. You might get lucky and have ones you love, or you might get some that are distracting, or at worse, you dislike. Either way though you are stuck with them. I…

The flipside is that it takes a lot more intentional effort, which many of us may struggle to put forth. The vast majority of friendships are made in incidental contexts: people you just happen to be around and interact with through the normal course of life. Many adults struggle to make and maintain friendships when they no longer have school forcing them to be around peers, and become very isolated. I think your in…

Yeah. I'm pretty introverted but the number of good friends I've made in my life that I didn't meet through either school or work is exactly 0. I've never quite understood the anti-coworker-socialization sentiment here. For some people it seems to go beyond that they've given their coworkers a chance and they just don't like them; rather they seem determined not to socialize with coworkers as a matter of principle. Why would it be more likely that you're going to enjoy socializing with your neighbors or your disc golf teammates than your coworkers?

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#518

Post by netcan »

chrismarlow9 wrote: post #412

For me too many companies use the "family" aspect of things too much. No, we're not a family. My family would let me sleep on their couch if I got fired or lost my home. Does the company plan to let me live in the office if they let me go? Are we still doing Thanksgiving? What about a family tree, whos going to keep that up after I die? But seriously, after seeing some nasty employee outcomes over a few jobs it kind…

>"For me too many companies use the "family" aspect of things too much."

I'm not sure if I'm in total agreement or in total opposition.

Family is an analogy... At the scale of many of our workplaces "tribe" might be more fitting. I'm also note convinced people quite believe it... It's more that they're learning the language of their new social structure, whether that's "team," or "family" or whatnot.

In any case, it's suspicious that we're using analogies here at all. Workplaces, usually a company, are the main social institutions of our society. Only the family rivals it. Why do we need analogies to describe workplace the relationship?

I agree that it's not a family. What is it though? A purely transactional definition doesn't work in this context. Your workplace is not your bank. You don't have to be emotionally vested in your bank. You can't avoid being emotionally vested in your workplace in a psychologically sound way.

So... going to the OP's point somewhat... Something is very broken, socially, in the thing we call companies. It's often unpleasant and for many people this lockdown is a reprieve.

I think work from home, as a norm, is a move towards a more transactional relationship with work. This may be better than whatever sucks about your workplace, but it's also got problems. We spend so much of our lives working. A minimalist relationship may not be enough.

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#520

Post by ashtonkem »

wan23 wrote: post #332
ashtonkem wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The utility of partial WFH is much, much lower than full WFH. With partial WFH I still have to live within reasonable commuting distance from the office, while if I’m full WFH I can leverage the difference in cost of living away from the office.

I would consider a much longer commute to be acceptable once or twice a week compared to having to do it every day. You could still have the benefit of having a lower cost of living without increasing the number of hours you spend commuting per week.

I wouldn’t say that partial WFH is of no benefit, but it’s of significantly lower benefit. If I’m coming to the office once a week, I still have to live in a ~1 hr ring around my office. If I’m full WFH I can live anywhere.

The former opens up more options, but it only opens up a tiny percentage of the options that the latter creates.

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