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I once worked for a company that adamantly forbid telecommuting. Our city's transit system shut down due to a strike, in the middle of the cold and dark Canadi

by lee 16y ago

I once worked for a company that adamantly forbid telecommuting. Our city's transit system shut down due to a strike, in the middle of the cold and dark Canadian Winter. The snow and the flood of cars on the roads, ground the city to a halt. My 1 hour daily commute took 3-4 hours total,... the entire team was tired and demoralized from sitting in traffic for so long. Yet our CEO completely forbid telecommuting. He wanted to see asses in chairs, even if it meant wasting our energy in traffic. We were forced to work in the office, and everyone directed their grumpiness and anger to their job. It made the cultural environment toxic, and people left as soon as they could. It demoralized me, and I had animosity towards the company. My performance suffered and I cared less about my work. Eventually the CEO almost drove the company into the ground, until he quit before he could get sued for not completing his fiduciary duties. He eventually fired me, and it was probably one of the best things to happen to my career. TL;DR: anectdotally I can agree that companies that can't trust their employees to telecommute are toxic places to be avoided.

strlen 16y ago
Sorry if this sounds blunt, but a) Why did you join in the first place? b) Why didn't you find another job before getting fired?
- lee 16y ago
  a) When I joined it seemed like a genuinely interesting and good place to work. I joined leaving somewhere worse; and at first it was a great place to work. I did not even think of asking "does this job offer telecommuting?", as I never telecommuted in the past. I had only been out of school for a year, and the company had a lot of cool things going for it, like beer Friday meetings and an office in the "hip" part of town. b) I was trying to find another job. It just happened that I got fired before I could find one, this was also happening at the height of the recession and in my neck of the woods the opportunities were slim. It worked out really well in the end. We had our first child that year, and I got to spend 3 months with my family before finding a much better paying job that had a healthier environment. Sometimes leaving one job is the only way to get a raise.

by lee 16y ago

strlen 16y ago

Sorry if this sounds blunt, but a) Why did you join in the first place? b) Why didn't you find another job before getting fired?

lee 16y ago
a) When I joined it seemed like a genuinely interesting and good place to work. I joined leaving somewhere worse; and at first it was a great place to work. I did not even think of asking "does this job offer telecommuting?", as I never telecommuted in the past. I had only been out of school for a year, and the company had a lot of cool things going for it, like beer Friday meetings and an office in the "hip" part of town. b) I was trying to find another job. It just happened that I got fired before I could find one, this was also happening at the height of the recession and in my neck of the woods the opportunities were slim. It worked out really well in the end. We had our first child that year, and I got to spend 3 months with my family before finding a much better paying job that had a healthier environment. Sometimes leaving one job is the only way to get a raise.