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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

#871

Post by swlkr »

jjjensen90 wrote: post #781

I always thought I enjoyed remote work as an engineer/architect, I did it for 6 months by my own volition before coming back. I am extremely unhappy. I really miss being in the office with my coworkers and friends. I've struggled deeply with overwhelming sadness at the idea of not going back anytime soon. My work has suffered from a lack of dynamic interactions. I get lots of focus time, just like I did at the office…

Working from home is a challenge, there’s no doubt about that, but assuming some return to normalcy, you don’t have to work from your house or apartment.

Remote work means you can work wherever you want, you can go to a coffee shop for a few hours, you can head to your town’s local library, a coworking space. You can take an extended trip and live out of a van.

Once starlink is up, if you can get away with high latency, you can work from the middle of Greenland if you wanted to.

Working from home, which is really working from wherever you want, is about the flexibility and control to work how, when and where you want.

I do hope that large tech companies like twitter leave their offices open, because that’s also a piece of the remote work puzzle. Just like when we switched from cubicles to open offices, it would be nice to be more thoughtful about remote work AND an in office hybrid situation.

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#872

Post by arebop »

bun_at_work wrote: post #843
acituan wrote: post #664

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you are overestimating the size of the eligible labor supply increase. Just for Google, for 2017-2019 the number of H1B workers sponsored was 22k. For the same period the increase in number of full time employees was 40k (couldn’t find the figure for US only but fair to assume majority is US-based). So more than half of the new employers are supplied internationally. Does the geo-unlocked US supply pose a sub…

I'm curious - you seem to be saying that FAANG companies can't find enough employees, but your support for the point is that Google hired a significant amount of H1B workers. However, I've read/seen that many H1B workers work for significantly less, and under more pressure, because they are trying to become citizens in the US. Is it possible that the reason for FAANG companies hiring so many H1B workers isn't due to…

H1B in tech companies are not paid significantly less, and they can easily find alternative employers willing to help with the transfer in Silicon Valley. It's H1B in non-tech companies that manipulate job postings to massively underpay their workers, and whose geographically-limited set of alternative employers are already small and also generally less willing to offer legal support dealing with the H1B transfer issues.

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#873

Post by gdubs »

I’m very in favor of remote work, but I think it remains unfair to compare this current situation with working in the office. The more extroverted types already prefer the social interactions of the office — but right now, most people can’t get social interaction outside the office even if they wanted to. They can’t go to a cafe a couple of times a week for the atmosphere.

A lot of us have small kids at home, so now we’re (mediocre) teachers on top of our work.

But most importantly, this is a national — no, a global — trauma. People might not realize it, but that trauma is there, and it will have to be addressed at some point. It’s another factor which makes it impossible to fairly evaluate the efficacy or desirability of working remotely.

Climate change is another reason work will likely have to change over the next decade. This pandemic has forced us to confront the types of changes we might need to make to adapt to a world of less flying, commuting, etc. Those changes seemed impossible, but we’ve been forced into a trial run. If we can get through it in these incredibly difficult circumstances, it gives us time to design a future of work that’s a bit more balanced. Perhaps a mix of remote and in-office. Perhaps an office that is less crowded. Perhaps a more distributed, regional world, where we can revitalize the lost cities in America rather than crowd into overpriced hubs.

Is it convenient? No. Will we lose certain bits of magic? Maybe. But we’ve ignored problems for a long time that we now need to confront.

It’s time to put on our design thinking hats. We’re the innovators — so let’s innovate the future. It doesn’t have to suck.

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#874

Post by globular-toast »

jjjensen90 wrote: post #781

I always thought I enjoyed remote work as an engineer/architect, I did it for 6 months by my own volition before coming back. I am extremely unhappy. I really miss being in the office with my coworkers and friends. I've struggled deeply with overwhelming sadness at the idea of not going back anytime soon. My work has suffered from a lack of dynamic interactions. I get lots of focus time, just like I did at the office…

If you were working from home under normal circumstances you could still be a "social butterfly" after work. But anyway, you have the right attitude when you say you'll leave if it goes remote and you don't like that. That's exactly what people should do. Fixing your problems usually starts with yourself.

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#875

Post by dominotw »

jjjensen90 wrote: post #781

I always thought I enjoyed remote work as an engineer/architect, I did it for 6 months by my own volition before coming back. I am extremely unhappy. I really miss being in the office with my coworkers and friends. I've struggled deeply with overwhelming sadness at the idea of not going back anytime soon. My work has suffered from a lack of dynamic interactions. I get lots of focus time, just like I did at the office…

I beg and plead with people who like going into work to not ruin it for the rest of us. please.

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#876

Post by bosie »

UnpossibleJim wrote: post #870
omk wrote: post #784

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are not alone. We often under estimate the value of workplace bonding. Planning a dinner for the team when we have been through a tough development cycle for a couple months for instance is incredibly rewarding. It vastly improves the quality of collaboration and the way people engage with each other. Helping them communicate in an informal settings and find better ways to connect with each other even on an emoti…

Like you, I don't think it can be done away with entirely. But, seemingly, I don't see this quite as binary as many here do. This doesn't have to be an all remote or no remote proposition. This could easily be a three or four day a week, remote position, with one day set aside to come in and have meetings/Agile development, what have you, team spirit a awards, maybe lunch. The days could be scheduled out so the real…

Because that still means you have to live near where you work and that gives you a small home (at least if you live in a large metro area) due to the real estate being scarce and expensive.

But having 2 people work from home increases your required footprint and yet you live in the same area as before. If i need an additional 20sqm in or near London, that is going to be expensive.

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#877

Post by cheshireoctopus »

djjsjdjsjsjs wrote: post #861
jjjensen90 wrote: post #781

I always thought I enjoyed remote work as an engineer/architect, I did it for 6 months by my own volition before coming back. I am extremely unhappy. I really miss being in the office with my coworkers and friends. I've struggled deeply with overwhelming sadness at the idea of not going back anytime soon. My work has suffered from a lack of dynamic interactions. I get lots of focus time, just like I did at the office…

>If this field goes primarily remote, I will leav See you later! I will never miss commuting, uncomfortable chairs, loud offices, the filth of public transport in USA, office politics, and high cost of living areas!

Do office politics go away in a remote setting?

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#878

Post by georgeaway »

wonderwonder wrote: post #854
jjjensen90 wrote: post #781

I always thought I enjoyed remote work as an engineer/architect, I did it for 6 months by my own volition before coming back. I am extremely unhappy. I really miss being in the office with my coworkers and friends. I've struggled deeply with overwhelming sadness at the idea of not going back anytime soon. My work has suffered from a lack of dynamic interactions. I get lots of focus time, just like I did at the office…

I have worked from home for the last couple of years. Prior to the Covid shutdown, I had generally enjoyed it. Once my children's school closed and my wife's work switched to work from home, my productivity has plummeted. I find it impossible to focus as every 10 minutes I have a young child running into my office, or have to listen to them yelling at each other (as all kids do). My wife has had a hard time adjusting…

Exact same boat here, we can't complain because we still have our jobs, we feel terrible because our kids are getting bored out of their minds and all they want is our attention, i don't know how long we can go on like this.

I haven't figured out how to be as productive as night as I would be in the morning, which used to be my best hours.

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#879

Post by whack »

justinpaulson wrote: post #564
whack wrote: post #558

I work at a FANG company. And I would gladly take a significant pay cut and work at a less prestigious company, if they offered permanent WFH. I'm only in my 30s, but the grind of sitting in an office from 9-5 everyday, feels positively revolting. Before the pandemic started, I was counting down the days to my retirement. But now, I'm actually enjoying my work a lot more. And during my 20s, I would have been absolute…

There are lots of places that are full remote that will pay you less. Why not do it? I have been working from home for almost 2 years now and I will never go back (Didn't have to take a pay cut either, actually a raise).

Golden handcuffs. People in their 30s at FANG make 250-500k per year. I'd be willing to take a ~30% pay cut and work remotely. But every remote-working opportunity I came across while job hunting, required a 50-70% pay cut.

Re: Twitter Will Allow Employees to Work at Home Forever

#880

Post by owenwil »

wonderwonder wrote: post #854
jjjensen90 wrote: post #781

I always thought I enjoyed remote work as an engineer/architect, I did it for 6 months by my own volition before coming back. I am extremely unhappy. I really miss being in the office with my coworkers and friends. I've struggled deeply with overwhelming sadness at the idea of not going back anytime soon. My work has suffered from a lack of dynamic interactions. I get lots of focus time, just like I did at the office…

I have worked from home for the last couple of years. Prior to the Covid shutdown, I had generally enjoyed it. Once my children's school closed and my wife's work switched to work from home, my productivity has plummeted. I find it impossible to focus as every 10 minutes I have a young child running into my office, or have to listen to them yelling at each other (as all kids do). My wife has had a hard time adjusting…

Hang in there <3
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