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What I find most interesting is how people who love working from home can't seem to understand how their own circumstances don't translate for others. This bia

What I find most interesting is how people who love working from home can't seem to understand how their own circumstances don't translate for others. This bias seems especially present in a subset of the tech population. If you think offices are going away, you're betting against decades of history where people work together in meatspace. If you think they do that because they can't get their work done virtually, you've fundamentally misunderstood both humans and also many of their own life circumstances. Some people _in some industries_ can work from home. For many, that's not feasible. There is no "one way".

joe_the_user 6y ago
I'm not an advocate for work from home. The thing about covid is that it forced employers and employees to discover what was practical for work-from-home. And you may well find for some employers, work-from-home being practical is enough. Work-from-home doesn't have to be great or even good. Offices are incredibly expensive. Between not paying for office space and being able to hire anyone from around the world, the virtual organization gives the employer a lot of pluses that they can use to offset the negatives. And if in a given circumstances, this only works for some people. Well, they can hire replacements for the people it doesn't work for. It seems like this will happen unless something stops it.
- bobthepanda 6y ago
  At least in the US, there has been moaning for a decade going on two about how hard it is to hire qualified people at current salaries in STEM. If you fire all the people who don’t like WFH backfilling them is not going to be easy, and even if you did that’s probably a good chunk of tribal knowledge lost.
  - globular-toast 6y ago
    It will be easy if they hire people for those salaries from anywhere in the world. The only reason it's hard now is because they require them to live in SV which not everyone can do.
    - throwaway53453 6y ago
      Some of the people who like offices undoubtedly live and work outside Silicon Valley...?
      - globular-toast 6y ago
        So? Those people still won't be available, but plenty more will be.
globular-toast 6y ago
People worked together in meatspace because that was the only way. It simply wasn't possible to work from home even 20 years ago for the vast majority of office workers. If you think internal combustion engines are going away, you're betting against decades of history. And if you thought horses were going away you were also betting against decades of history. Things do change. Many people who can work from home now will. And many others will invest in home offices and join them. Some people can't work from home, but amongst office workers that number is very small.
tarsinge 6y ago
It's curious because I find it the other way. Every time I read something on WFH it's critical of it, along the refrain "it's not possible for everyone", case in point. In the real world WFH (for compatible positions) is usually not an option. Please apply the "there is no one way" to the real situation, it's not hard to find employers not considering the option even when it makes sense.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
outsomnia 6y ago
Mmmm.... it's true for small places but for larger places like FAANG? They are spread out geographically in hundreds of buildings, and have to fly to see each other for meetings or anyway videoconference. They do not actually succeed to "work together in meatspace" very well when their teams are already in different timezones, cities and even a drive away in the same city. Some companies will springboard off this, and some will cling to the Old Ways.
- samr71 6y ago
  Even at megacorps, most work for most people is done with their immediate team. Most do work together in meatspace most of the time.
CaptArmchair 6y ago
> If you think offices are going away, you're betting against decades of history where people work together in meatspace Historian here. If you're going to argue the past, then working together in close quarters at scale has only become a societal norm since the Industrial Revolution. Throughout most of (European) history, working from home was the norm. This shifted when in the 19th century when industrialization moved the workplace for millions from small scale, artisanal home labor towards factories, workshops and crowded urban centers. The impact on individuals and society was profound. This was also the time where factory workers found themselves facing extremely long workdays, non-existent worker rights, low wages and so on. That's what sparked social and emancipatory movements, and worker parties in the late 19th and early 20th century. Throughout the 20th century, the workforce in the Northern hemisphere became increasingly more emancipated and educated. Post-war economic boom (1945-1975) and social-economic reforms - especially in Europe - created the momentum that turned a blue collar workforce into a white collar workforce. Even so, in the late 20th century, many of the extant notions of how work ought to be organized were still firmly rooted in frameworks that first emerged during the Industrial Revolution. Ever since the emergence of digital technology in the 1960s, visions of modernity and future living have always included the ability to work remotely or from home, rendering the centralized workplace obsolete. It's only now, 50 years later, that commoditization of digital technology has actually turned this into an option for millions of workers. The problem isn't technology though, it's - still - the tenuous and complex relationship between workers and their employers that harks back towards demanding 40, 60, 80 hours in a centralized workplace where maximization of productivity is put front and center. Now, in all of this, it should be clear that I'm not advocating for people to wholesale move towards working from home. Nor that people should go back to bare level subsistence living through local farming / artisanal production. That's not how this works. In that regard, you're absolutely right to state there's "no one way" to organize work. However, generalizing the notion that "people can't do their work virtually and need to see each other" is false as well as it doesn't take into account the historic backdrop that explains how modern society ended up organizing itself in a way that created centralized workplaces as a necessary requirement. The fact of the matter is that the technology finally gives people a choice over the locality of their work. Artificially restricting that freedom for everyone because "That's how it has gone on for decades" or "some people in some industries can't work from home" are rather poor arguments in that regard.

joe_the_user 6y ago

I'm not an advocate for work from home. The thing about covid is that it forced employers and employees to discover what was practical for work-from-home. And you may well find for some employers, work-from-home being practical is enough. Work-from-home doesn't have to be great or even good. Offices are incredibly expensive. Between not paying for office space and being able to hire anyone from around the world, the virtual organization gives the employer a lot of pluses that they can use to offset the negatives. And if in a given circumstances, this only works for some people. Well, they can hire replacements for the people it doesn't work for. It seems like this will happen unless something stops it.

bobthepanda 6y ago
At least in the US, there has been moaning for a decade going on two about how hard it is to hire qualified people at current salaries in STEM. If you fire all the people who don’t like WFH backfilling them is not going to be easy, and even if you did that’s probably a good chunk of tribal knowledge lost.
- globular-toast 6y ago
  It will be easy if they hire people for those salaries from anywhere in the world. The only reason it's hard now is because they require them to live in SV which not everyone can do.
  - throwaway53453 6y ago
    Some of the people who like offices undoubtedly live and work outside Silicon Valley...?
    - globular-toast 6y ago
      So? Those people still won't be available, but plenty more will be.

globular-toast 6y ago

People worked together in meatspace because that was the only way. It simply wasn't possible to work from home even 20 years ago for the vast majority of office workers. If you think internal combustion engines are going away, you're betting against decades of history. And if you thought horses were going away you were also betting against decades of history. Things do change. Many people who can work from home now will. And many others will invest in home offices and join them. Some people can't work from home, but amongst office workers that number is very small.

tarsinge 6y ago

It's curious because I find it the other way. Every time I read something on WFH it's critical of it, along the refrain "it's not possible for everyone", case in point. In the real world WFH (for compatible positions) is usually not an option. Please apply the "there is no one way" to the real situation, it's not hard to find employers not considering the option even when it makes sense.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

outsomnia 6y ago

Mmmm.... it's true for small places but for larger places like FAANG? They are spread out geographically in hundreds of buildings, and have to fly to see each other for meetings or anyway videoconference. They do not actually succeed to "work together in meatspace" very well when their teams are already in different timezones, cities and even a drive away in the same city. Some companies will springboard off this, and some will cling to the Old Ways.

samr71 6y ago
Even at megacorps, most work for most people is done with their immediate team. Most do work together in meatspace most of the time.

CaptArmchair 6y ago

> If you think offices are going away, you're betting against decades of history where people work together in meatspace Historian here. If you're going to argue the past, then working together in close quarters at scale has only become a societal norm since the Industrial Revolution. Throughout most of (European) history, working from home was the norm. This shifted when in the 19th century when industrialization moved the workplace for millions from small scale, artisanal home labor towards factories, workshops and crowded urban centers. The impact on individuals and society was profound. This was also the time where factory workers found themselves facing extremely long workdays, non-existent worker rights, low wages and so on. That's what sparked social and emancipatory movements, and worker parties in the late 19th and early 20th century. Throughout the 20th century, the workforce in the Northern hemisphere became increasingly more emancipated and educated. Post-war economic boom (1945-1975) and social-economic reforms - especially in Europe - created the momentum that turned a blue collar workforce into a white collar workforce. Even so, in the late 20th century, many of the extant notions of how work ought to be organized were still firmly rooted in frameworks that first emerged during the Industrial Revolution. Ever since the emergence of digital technology in the 1960s, visions of modernity and future living have always included the ability to work remotely or from home, rendering the centralized workplace obsolete. It's only now, 50 years later, that commoditization of digital technology has actually turned this into an option for millions of workers. The problem isn't technology though, it's - still - the tenuous and complex relationship between workers and their employers that harks back towards demanding 40, 60, 80 hours in a centralized workplace where maximization of productivity is put front and center. Now, in all of this, it should be clear that I'm not advocating for people to wholesale move towards working from home. Nor that people should go back to bare level subsistence living through local farming / artisanal production. That's not how this works. In that regard, you're absolutely right to state there's "no one way" to organize work. However, generalizing the notion that "people can't do their work virtually and need to see each other" is false as well as it doesn't take into account the historic backdrop that explains how modern society ended up organizing itself in a way that created centralized workplaces as a necessary requirement. The fact of the matter is that the technology finally gives people a choice over the locality of their work. Artificially restricting that freedom for everyone because "That's how it has gone on for decades" or "some people in some industries can't work from home" are rather poor arguments in that regard.