7 ms·

I don't share the pessimism over the office that many commenters here share, despite largely preferring home office work. Many people don't prefer remote work,

I don't share the pessimism over the office that many commenters here share, despite largely preferring home office work. Many people don't prefer remote work, and they have good reasons for it. Even ignoring all people who are impacted by factors they cannot control, some people really just don't so well in a home office environment. The routine and structure of going into the office to do work and coming home to not do work is pleasant for many people. Some folks don't have good control over their work behaviors when they're not in that environment. They thrive more in an in-person environment. I'm willing to bet that's a lot of your coworkers. There's a good chance that you'll need a lot of stuff to support people coming back to the office if it's anything more than a small fraction. If 50% of your workforce actually prefers to come into the office every day, that's a lot of investment! I would naiively expect that to support 50% of your workforce you'd need to invest more than 50% of what you used to invest to support the in-office work environment. I'm thinking bigger firms here, the ones that actually spend a lot of money on this stuff. And lastly I'm just not convinced that businesses actually act based solely on hard figures. The math may point towards it being advantageous to have a more remote or distributed workforce, but the world doesn't run on people following "the math". People are messy and irrational and emotional and, critically, in key leadership roles that drive what the heck their company is actually going to do. Have a handful of executives who can't wait to get back into their comfort zone - the office - and that office spending budget will find a way to get spent.

ryandrake 6y ago
> Many people don't prefer remote work, and they have good reasons for it. It’s almost as if some people prefer one way and others prefer the other way! Which is why WFH advocates just want the option. They aren’t asking for everyone to have to WFH, just for the choice. The back-to-office advocates however want to go back to office and force everyone else to go back to office. This is the difference in approaches. They don’t want people to have a choice—they want it their way for everyone.
- internet2000 6y ago
  WFH advocates will quickly say they're disadvantaged in career development in a hybrid approach, so no, they want everyone to have to WFH.
  - ryandrake 6y ago
    Literally no WFH advocates I know say this, and none of them advocate for forcing others to work from home. Everyone knows the trade offs and are willing to live with them. Hell I’d be willing to forego all promotions forever, in writing, just to be given the option to work remotely.
    - phillipcarter 6y ago
      You and some of your peers may not be that way, but a sizable population of office workers probably don't like the idea of neutering their careers just so that they could be more productive (which that employer gets an outsized amount of value from).
      - InvertedRhodium 6y ago
        No, but perhaps we'd like to "neuter" our careers in order to reduce the time spent in-transit, increase the flexibility with which you can do things around the house during the day, and generally avoiding the "management in passing" that can occur when you're in the office. If it was a one-sided win for the company and no benefit being reaped by the employee then no one would opt for it.
        ryandrake 6y ago
        Exactly. There are plenty of benefits I get from WFH that have nothing to do with productivity. My commute is 2 hours each way. WFH lets me recover 20 hours per week and use it either to catch up on work or (usually) for pleasure. WFH has allowed me to actually see my child during the weekdays and bond. WFH lets me eat a healthy, inexpensive meal at home rather than blow $15/day at the local oil-and-carb lunch shacks near the office. WFH lets me discretely run errands around my home during down time rather than having to just sit in my office chair picking my nose. WFH has saved hundreds of gallons of gasoline and carbon footprint from my commute. This past year has been pretty much all upside, and it’s going to suck to throw it all away because Mr. CTO just can’t bear to not have his minions crawling around the shiny office.
- benttoothpaste 6y ago
  Many back-to-office advocates are “social butterflies”, so they will not enjoy coming back to half-empty offices. They really need everyone to be there in order to thrive.
  - cube00 6y ago
    I can't say I've missed being the social butterflies's nectar while I'm trying to do my own work.
  - pdimitar 6y ago
    Good explanation, but it doesn't make things better. :(
  - surajrmal 6y ago
    I am anything but a social butterfly, but would be upset if I came back to work in a largely empty office. I enjoy being around people even if I don't talk to them much.
monkeydreams 6y ago
The pendulum of remote-to-onsite work is swinging back away from full-remote, yes, but I think this type of report has the air of "buggy-cart vendors in the age of the Model T" about it. Major (or a subset of) employers do not like losing centralised control of their employees, but there are a large cohort of employees who wish to see remote or hybrid models of work and, critically, this trend was growing prior to COVID-19. COVID merely accelerated this trend, as it did with a lot of pre-existing social and industrial changes. > And lastly I'm just not convinced that businesses actually act based solely on hard figures. Correct. Large, Big-5-hiring, corporations are probably going to be the last companies to move to true hybrid models. They are behemoths that cannot be turned quickly. They have slow bones, vast inertia, and long memories, and will have been optimised for reporting chains that require face-to-face interactions and strong visual signaling. All of this takes time to change. But I wouldn't expect that this return to all-onsite work will be completed before the pendulum begins to swing back again the other way.
- phillipcarter 6y ago
  Yeah, I largely agree that all-onsite will be a thing of the past. Eventually enough talented folks will just work elsewhere and businesses will react. I guess the real question in my mind is that if you work for a place doing a hybrid approach, are you at a disadvantage? Unless senior management folks also do the same, that lack of visibility is devastating to a career.
- patrickk 6y ago
  > COVID merely accelerated this trend, as it did with a lot of pre-existing social and industrial changes. My perspective is quite different. Perhaps for more innovative companies this is true that it accelerated the trend, but there are plenty of stuck-in-the-mud companies where COVID-19 forced their hand to move to remote quickly, and they would've never done this without COVID. That's was I saw (outside the FAANG, outside the US) in a traditional industry. There was a telling survey posted some months back (can't find it unfortunately) "What accelerated digital transformation in your company?" and the answers were management or COVID, the response was overwhelmingly COVID.
lumost 6y ago
Anecdotally, I've observed that employers are conservatively opening to full-time remote employees based on needs. If a role can't be filled locally - they'll try in another office or full-time remote. I'd bet that as people move back to the office you'll see a settling towards equilibrium.
ryndbfsrw 6y ago
>> Have a handful of executives who can't wait to get back into their comfort zone - the office - and that office spending budget will find a way to get spent you could have just said this. everything else you wrote is superfluous justification

ryandrake 6y ago

> Many people don't prefer remote work, and they have good reasons for it. It’s almost as if some people prefer one way and others prefer the other way! Which is why WFH advocates just want the option. They aren’t asking for everyone to have to WFH, just for the choice. The back-to-office advocates however want to go back to office and force everyone else to go back to office. This is the difference in approaches. They don’t want people to have a choice—they want it their way for everyone.

internet2000 6y ago
WFH advocates will quickly say they're disadvantaged in career development in a hybrid approach, so no, they want everyone to have to WFH.
- ryandrake 6y ago
  Literally no WFH advocates I know say this, and none of them advocate for forcing others to work from home. Everyone knows the trade offs and are willing to live with them. Hell I’d be willing to forego all promotions forever, in writing, just to be given the option to work remotely.
  - phillipcarter 6y ago
    You and some of your peers may not be that way, but a sizable population of office workers probably don't like the idea of neutering their careers just so that they could be more productive (which that employer gets an outsized amount of value from).
    - InvertedRhodium 6y ago
      No, but perhaps we'd like to "neuter" our careers in order to reduce the time spent in-transit, increase the flexibility with which you can do things around the house during the day, and generally avoiding the "management in passing" that can occur when you're in the office. If it was a one-sided win for the company and no benefit being reaped by the employee then no one would opt for it.
      - ryandrake 6y ago
        Exactly. There are plenty of benefits I get from WFH that have nothing to do with productivity. My commute is 2 hours each way. WFH lets me recover 20 hours per week and use it either to catch up on work or (usually) for pleasure. WFH has allowed me to actually see my child during the weekdays and bond. WFH lets me eat a healthy, inexpensive meal at home rather than blow $15/day at the local oil-and-carb lunch shacks near the office. WFH lets me discretely run errands around my home during down time rather than having to just sit in my office chair picking my nose. WFH has saved hundreds of gallons of gasoline and carbon footprint from my commute. This past year has been pretty much all upside, and it’s going to suck to throw it all away because Mr. CTO just can’t bear to not have his minions crawling around the shiny office.
benttoothpaste 6y ago
Many back-to-office advocates are “social butterflies”, so they will not enjoy coming back to half-empty offices. They really need everyone to be there in order to thrive.
- cube00 6y ago
  I can't say I've missed being the social butterflies's nectar while I'm trying to do my own work.
- pdimitar 6y ago
  Good explanation, but it doesn't make things better. :(
- surajrmal 6y ago
  I am anything but a social butterfly, but would be upset if I came back to work in a largely empty office. I enjoy being around people even if I don't talk to them much.

monkeydreams 6y ago

The pendulum of remote-to-onsite work is swinging back away from full-remote, yes, but I think this type of report has the air of "buggy-cart vendors in the age of the Model T" about it. Major (or a subset of) employers do not like losing centralised control of their employees, but there are a large cohort of employees who wish to see remote or hybrid models of work and, critically, this trend was growing prior to COVID-19. COVID merely accelerated this trend, as it did with a lot of pre-existing social and industrial changes. > And lastly I'm just not convinced that businesses actually act based solely on hard figures. Correct. Large, Big-5-hiring, corporations are probably going to be the last companies to move to true hybrid models. They are behemoths that cannot be turned quickly. They have slow bones, vast inertia, and long memories, and will have been optimised for reporting chains that require face-to-face interactions and strong visual signaling. All of this takes time to change. But I wouldn't expect that this return to all-onsite work will be completed before the pendulum begins to swing back again the other way.

phillipcarter 6y ago
Yeah, I largely agree that all-onsite will be a thing of the past. Eventually enough talented folks will just work elsewhere and businesses will react. I guess the real question in my mind is that if you work for a place doing a hybrid approach, are you at a disadvantage? Unless senior management folks also do the same, that lack of visibility is devastating to a career.
patrickk 6y ago
> COVID merely accelerated this trend, as it did with a lot of pre-existing social and industrial changes. My perspective is quite different. Perhaps for more innovative companies this is true that it accelerated the trend, but there are plenty of stuck-in-the-mud companies where COVID-19 forced their hand to move to remote quickly, and they would've never done this without COVID. That's was I saw (outside the FAANG, outside the US) in a traditional industry. There was a telling survey posted some months back (can't find it unfortunately) "What accelerated digital transformation in your company?" and the answers were management or COVID, the response was overwhelmingly COVID.

lumost 6y ago

Anecdotally, I've observed that employers are conservatively opening to full-time remote employees based on needs. If a role can't be filled locally - they'll try in another office or full-time remote. I'd bet that as people move back to the office you'll see a settling towards equilibrium.

ryndbfsrw 6y ago

>> Have a handful of executives who can't wait to get back into their comfort zone - the office - and that office spending budget will find a way to get spent you could have just said this. everything else you wrote is superfluous justification