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Remote Culture War Has Begun, Executives Pumping Out "Back to Work" Propaganda

209 points by davidgerard 5y ago

ganSo 5y ago
I'm finishing my degree at the start of next year. I can only imagine to what world I will get into, after the pandemic, quarantines, and remote jobs. It's going to be such a different world compared to a few years ago. Damn.
- swader999 5y ago
  Lot of people retiring in the next decade. You'll do fine.
- dotcommand 5y ago
  After 9/11 there was talk about nobody wanting to work or live in skyscrapers. That the world was forever changed. Nothing really changed except the state gained more power and people lost some power. Last I checked, there were cranes all over manhattan throwing up skyscrapers left and right. After the 2008 financial crisis, there was talk about breaking apart "too big to fail" banks and reigning in their financial shenanigans and the world was forever changed. Nothing really changed except the banks got bigger and now housing market is the hottest it has ever been. After the Trump election, there was talk about end of democracy, financial collapse, end of globalization, etc and the world was forever changed. Nothing really changed except the state gained more power, the wealthy got wealthier. Every few years there is a crisis that is going to change the world forever. After a few months/years, people forget and move on, til the next crisis that is going to end/change the world. You'll realize this eventually. It's why news really should be taken with moderation. Too much news and it become poisonous and unhealthy for your well being. Everyone eventually learns that "life goes on". In a few years, covid will seem like ancient history and most people will have moved on to other things. Life went on after the far deadlier 1918 pandemic. Life went on after ww2. Life went on after 9/11. You'll be alright.
  - thrashtitan 5y ago
    I am unsure why you are being downvoted, but I whole heartedly agree with this sentiment. You are not attempting to downplay any of those tragedies or the current pandemic, but I do believe it will eventually end. Or it will end us. Theres only two ways forward.
    - geomark 5y ago
      Seems like there might be another way forward, one in which we all muddle along with an ongoing pandemic that doesn't wipe us out but keeps evolving and infecting and killing significant numbers of people. We continue opening and closing economies, rushing out experimental vaccines, and begin seeing larger numbers of long term effects of the disease and attempts to mitigate it.
  - perl4ever 5y ago
    Life went on after the Great Depression, but it left its mark on the people who lived through it. Isn't that kind of a cliche? The US has mostly escaped things that affected people more in other countries, like, say, WWI and WWII. So to some extent, I think saying "you'll get over it" is assuming the US will continue to be fortunate. If you don't believe in divine providence looking over "fools, drunks, and the USA", it's not logical to count on it in the future.
  - redis_mlc 5y ago
    > After the Trump election, there was talk about end of democracy, financial collapse, end of globalization It's important that people understand the following before the 2022 and 2024 elections, where Trump and R will gain several seats. Trump is a patriot - he represents America first, which is good for the US economy and citizens, and thus anti-globalization. That's what MAGA means. Ironically, it's Democrat leaders that are pro-globalization and anti-American, proven by the current porous border and relaxation of sanctions against China. (The border is open to increase people who are predicted to vote D, and to lower wages for company backers of the party.) We will have a financial collapse if Biden's Marxist policies make people wonder if the US dollar should continue to be the global currency - the US has a 1% economic advantage by being that currency. Why do Democrat leaders behave that way? Because when you live in a gated community and have your own security, the rest of America can go screw themselves. (20/25 Democratic city mayors have their own security, yet want to "defund the police" for others.) And wtf is this? Incoherent Biden Town Hall Excerpt (with Don Lemon of CNN enabling it) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LB9MOJUS6L8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LB9MOJUS6L8
- rdaystrom 5y ago
  You'll own nothing and you'll be happy.
colinmhayes 5y ago
The point of Op-Eds is to be hot takes. They're supposed to be opinions that the editorial board disagrees with. They've got columnists on staff to write the respectable opinions. Is "only publish non controversial opinions" really what we want from our news sources?
- jjk166 5y ago
  Op-eds are supposed to be interesting opinions the editorial board feels are worth sharing. While they may go against the leanings of the editorial board, they should be of the same caliber as what they would write themselves. Publishing an op-ed is an endorsement not necessarily of the article's thesis, but of the quality of the argument in favor of the thesis. Publishing hot takes devoid of substance and lacking intellectual merit reflects poorly on the institution and the editors who made the call to do so, regardless of what position they advocate.
  - Gimpei 5y ago
    I disagree. Intellectual merit is in the eyes of the beholder. Sometimes it is valuable to hear a view for the simple fact that it is held by a lot of people or it's influential. If a bunch of people hold a view that I despise, at the very least I'd like to have a sense of why. I have no desire to have my own opinion regurgitated back at me. And no, I'm not afraid of readers of the NY Times being swayed by "propaganda." NY Times readers as a whole have a pretty firmly set worldview. One Op-Ed won't make a damn bit of difference.
    - tehjoker 5y ago
      “It requires a macro, alongside a micro- (story-by-story), view of media operations, to see the pattern of manipulation and systematic bias.” (p. 2) -- Manufacturing Consent
    - jjk166 5y ago
      Which is more valuable for real discussion: hearing an opinion you disagree with argued well and thus coming to see why it is widely held, or hearing a view you disagree with argued poorly, further convincing you that its adherents are simply morons? If you're not getting the opinions you want to read, it's easy enough to pick up a different paper. The danger of a bad op-ed is tricking people into thinking they are getting both sides of the story when they aren't.
MattGaiser 5y ago
> The screed is exactly the thing you don’t give space to if you’re looking to give a balanced view on a subject I never thought that was what the op-ed section was for though. Isn't it so you can see more aggressive arguments for or against something? Op-ed has published the Taliban.
- tehjoker 5y ago
  An Op-Ed is definitely going well when people bring up that the NYT has also published the Taliban unbidden to contextualize it.
dade_ 5y ago
I believe this narrative is being funded by the commercial real spectate industry. They are absolutely fucked. Like Wile E Coyote running over a cliff, they are desperate to not look down. In December 2019, I asked some guys in wealth management, what’s a hot tip, and they were all about Commercial Real Estate, it never goes down! I laughed, but then wondered, what would make it go down? Anyway, that question is now answered. I’ve been working with a company that have done studies on remote work, at the beginning 4% of employees wanted to work from the office 100% of the time. 6 months later it was 2%. Problem #1, Most managers don’t know how to manage a remote team and their employer still hasn’t trained them. Problem #2, people new to the workforce are most likely to want to come into the office some of the time as they are struggling to figure out the culture and finding help and mentoring. This is actually another failing of employers.
- ffggvv 5y ago
  yeah google and apple also spent massive budgets on commercial real estate holdings. billions. that’s why they’re trying to prevent wfh
  - colinmhayes 5y ago
    I think Google and Apple are smart enough to see past sunk cost fallacies.
    - black_13 5y ago
      Really?
    - 1270018080 5y ago
      I wonder how long Stadia will be around
  - jjtheblunt 5y ago
    Well Apple engineering involves (for some divisions) access to exorbitantly expensive capitalized equipment. WFH for folks in engineering labs with millions of dollars of shared instruments doesn't make sense. That was the fundamental reality inside Apple engineering that I lived, anyway: the millions of dollars of instruments for digital design and test can't be repurchased per engineer.
ausbah 5y ago
there is a good amount of research I've heard about that describes workers working more during the pandemic but having less productivity and more stress overall hence why I think management want ppl back to the office, to get productivity back up - as unintuitive as that sounds
- bigmattystyles 5y ago
  I'm only speaking for myself but I need to go back to the office. I have hobbies and friends, but most of my friends are busy with their kids as I am with mine, my hobbies are solitary and to be blunt, I miss the social aspect of the office and co-workers that frankly are also my friends with whom I can have fun conversations at lunch, coffee breaks with and such. I've actually entered a bit of a depression and I think that it's from working from home. I know my sentiments are not those of the majority, or at least if we are, we're not vocal about it. Also my cat stares at me all day.
  - andreilys 5y ago
    Have you thought about finding more social hobbies like swing dancing, yoga or joining a sports rec league that will allow you to make friends outside of the workplace?
    - novok 5y ago
      It's the classic covid remote != normal remote comparison. COVID isn't completely gone so many are not comfortable going into the office.
  - Tehnix 5y ago
    HN makes it seem like the majority is die hard work from home, but I guarantee you that you are by far the minority. Remote work is not for everyone, it has its pros and cons. One of the biggest cons is isolation. For a lot of people, the work place is an incredibly social place, and when you rely on that for your socializing (which is 100% okay!) then the impact of forced WFH very often leads to isolation and slight depression. I personally prefer a mix, and believe you should use each for the strengths they have. Without a shadow of a doubt, casual collaboration is easier in person. Similarly, I’m far less disturbed at home. At my current work, we’ve built up a work style where you decide yourself when you’re in and when you’re not. Notably though, this does mean that everything needs to assume everyone is fully remote for it to work well though.
DaniloDias 5y ago
Been back in the office more this last month. It is so superior that being at home.
dasil003 5y ago
So many absolutist opinions on remote work, but as someone who spent years doing both before the pandemic, I can say with some authority that there are pros and cons—it's not a one-size-fits-all thing. The biggest barrier was companies willing to go all in, as mixed on-site/remote meetings are terrible. So now that the we've broken the ice on this, the market will sort it out. Basically we're going to see a bunch of remote first companies dominate the war for talent, and we'll see some companies leveraging the strength of still being in-person. But individuals will have much more freedom to find a working arrangement that suits them. The landscape will shift in aggregate as a result of where this balances out, not as a result of arrogant op-ed writers who think they know what's right for everyone.
- zmmmmm 5y ago
  > mixed on-site/remote meetings are terrible for me this is the trickiest part. A lot of people and companies are looking at hybrid as a sort of compromise but the brutal reality is that hybrid may be hellishly bad and lead to far worse outcomes than all on-premise or all-remote. I feel like there is a high risk of a lot of dumpster fire disasters and not sure which way it'll go in the end.
  - Freak_NL 5y ago
    Make it standard practice to do meetings virtual whenever there is someone remote joining in. Most meetings will be virtual (and that's fine), and whenever a certain problem benefits from people meeting physically, just plan it.
- randomsearch 5y ago
  > But individuals will have much more freedom to find a working arrangement that suits them. Agree with your comment in general. On this point, I wonder if this is only true whilst power remains in the supply side of the labour market. When the next recession hits, maybe we'll see a migration of workers to where the main employers are. I do wonder if remote working suits the workers a lot more than the employers.
- cm277 5y ago
hunter-2 5y ago
Every company with even an ounce of asset has at least some part of it lying in real estate. Corporate real estate is going to be the biggest loser if WFH becomes the norm post-covid. In other words, it's in almost every corporate's best interest to push people towards offices. Add to this the fact that they get to lobby politicians many of whom invest heavily in real estate. Do not be surprised if governments create tax hurdles for companies operating remotely.
seriousquestion 5y ago
Is this a generational thing or an introvert vs extravert thing?
- ajtjp 5y ago
  Introvert vs extrovert. I couldn't disagree more strongly with the author of the linked article. I'd almost call it pro-remote-work propaganda. But, I say that as a software developer who is extroverted (at least relative to the profession as a whole), and is in my early 30s. Working from home can be super isolating and depressing, and I would rather leave a lucrative career than start another remote job (I already quit my previous remote job, currently living off savings rather than work remotely). I know some people who like working remotely. But I also have friends who hate it as I do, and are super eager to return to the office (some already have, at least on a part-time/hybrid basis. The two biggest factors are see are introversion vs extroversion, and whether they live with other people. My extroverted friend whose wife works at an in person job, and is thus alone all day, hates it. Another friend who lives by herself hates it. A third whose social life centered on work hated it, and wound up moving in with her parents despite being in her 30s just to have some other people around. Productivity-wise, I agree with the studies I've seen showing more time, but no more results. I think of my friend who is not confident in his job security and is working at least 50% more hours than in his pre-pandemic in-person job; I've told him several times his colleagues probably don't realize how many hours he is putting in or how effective he is, because he only interacts with about three people and it's all remote. In the first couple months of his job, before his workload went sky-high, he complained that some of his colleagues were completely burnt out and unproductive; now it's no mystery why some of his colleagues are like that. Another reason I think it's introvert vs extrovert is my conversations with recruiters. I'm that odd software developers who enjoys talking with recruiters, at least the ones who take the time to get to know you. Almost if not 100% of the recruiters I talk with miss being in person. Most of them are young. And guess what, recruiting is a highly extroverted profession. My prediction for the software industry is there are going to be a lot of people switching jobs over the next year or two, as the people who want to be in the office but are stuck at remote gigs leave, and similarly the people who want to be remote but are stuck at in office gigs leave. Some people will probably prefer hybrid too, but most of the people I know have strong opinions on the topic, and I wouldn't be surprised if hybrid mostly falls by the wayside once uncertainty around covid protocols subsides.
steve_taylor 5y ago
As much as I've enjoyed remote work, I can't help but wonder if it makes offshoring more attractive to companies based in western countries. If hiring locally is more expensive and offers no real benefit over offshoring, why keep doing it?
- novok 5y ago
  I agree, I think it will very much be a "be careful what you wish for" type of situation in the end. Time zones I think will be the biggest advantage to hire within the western hemisphere, nobody likes the PST <-> IST timezone meeting gap, there aren't many to hire in latin america and they speak English well and communicate well. If latin america had a large base of engineers to hire in the first place, I think many places would choose there just on a timezone and english communication skills basis. But you see big compensation gaps even between NYC / SFO / SEA and the rest of the USA, so you could very well see a drop from that.
- bottled_poe 5y ago
  Exactly right. If your role can be done remotely, you will soon find yourself competing against the international market. It’s shortsighted to think that your value to the company is just completing development tasks which are easily completed by cheap offshore labour.
  - Overton-Window 5y ago
    Wouldn't you think there'd be numerous examples of such arbitrage in the wild if so?
    - bottled_poe 5y ago
      You mean like outsourcing? Or do you mean situations where individuals are violating their employment terms (if not their contracts)?
- dcolkitt 5y ago
  The cost of office space in Bangalore is not high. Offshore developers are not some secret mystery that corporate managers have never heard from. If the benefits outweighed the cost, companies would have already offshored well before the pandemic. It’s not like WFH changes that calculus. If a BigCo would rather pay a programmer in Bangalore over one in Boise, than they almost certainly would also prefer him to one in Mountain View too.
rajamaka 5y ago
Remote work enabled me to live outside of a busy city I only lived in for employment opportunities, afford property as a result, gain back 10 hours of commuting time a week, spend less money on commuting and eating out. If the price of that is missing out on HR organised 'fun' that's fine - I can be at the bar with friends at 5:05pm anyway. No chance I'm going back.
- bottled_poe 5y ago
  Be careful what you wish for. If your role can be done fully remotely, you will soon find yourself competing against the international market instead of just the local one.
  - godelski 5y ago
    I hear this a lot and I don't buy it. There's still a big advantage to being in the same (or +/-a few hrs). I work in a remote team right now with people across the world. It is hard to make meeting times where everyone can join. There's also laws that make it easier to hire nationally vs internationally. This claim is more a scare tactic than a real warning.
    - bottled_poe 5y ago
      Sure, the market will decide.
      - foepys 5y ago
        In Germany the market decided already. After years of propaganda by consulting firms how India will develop all software for pennies soon, companies in Germany are abandoning near and farshoring to eastern EU countries and India en masse because it caused more problems than it solved. VW for example ended all software contracting and now does software development themselves. So I'm not worried.
        thecleaner 5y ago
vncecartersknee 5y ago
Why do they so badly want us back in the offices? I really don't understand what they stand to lose by SWEs working remotely. I don't know anyone that actually want to be back in the office full time, some are ok with part-time work. Most people seem to be (anecdotally at least) reporting that they and their teams are more productive at home and their quality of life is improved because they aren't wasting time commuting. Businesses could save money by renting smaller offices or doing away with offices completely. Good engineers are just going to jump ship to wherever they can work fully remotely.
- dimator 5y ago
  Just as a counter point, I can't wait to be back in the office. Remote work, while granted is hyper productive, I've never felt so disconnected from my teammates. There are people I used to have contact with daily that I haven't even slacked with in months. A chat/Zoom window is a much higher barrier to conversation than meeting for lunch, coffee, hallway paths crossing, waiting for the bus etc. I'm completely out of touch with what they're working on, aside from little blurbs in stand-ups. We have all become little siloes. I miss whiteboard conversations. And that's to say nothing about the personal connections that have suffered. As adults, the place where you spend the most time with non-friends is the workplace, so that's the best bet at making new friends (in the same way school is for adolescence). The funny thing is, when I was in the office, I felt most productive when I was given long stretches of time to just do focused work. But productivity is not the end goal of a career. It's collaboration and team achievement. I have a feeling that the powers that be that are beating the back to work drum recognize some of these aspects. Obviously they see the productivity metrics, but they see the amount disconnect as well.
  - soapboxrocket 5y ago
    > I've never felt so disconnected from my teammates. That's a valid point, but having everyone back in the office isn't the only solution to that problem. It may be the best solution, but seems like the easiest rather than the best.
- srswtf123 5y ago
roamerz 5y ago
Love working remotely. Day to day comradery and communication is hard to replicate in the digital world though at least for me. Example: I walked by my reports office grumbling about a new network rebuild and the current state of our docs and he mentioned as I was passing how about Netbox. Well guess what I’d probably still be grumbling today except I’m knee deep in getting Netbox implemented. Going to make life a lot simpler for the next Sysadmin. That likely would not have happened if we were a remote team.
- dcolkitt 5y ago
  The problem is it’s not sustainable to build an org around grumbling. If problems are only getting discovered in serendipitous hallway encounters, then that means a lot of problems aren’t getting discovered at all. Remote first may be painful in the short term. But in the long term it’s much healthier as it forces the org to rationalize structured lines of communication.
  - roamerz 5y ago
    That is just one form of communication that you cannot easily replicate in a remote work force and another is social interaction. I have found that it is the glue that holds organizations together and helps keep teams producing quality work. With remote first I can see teams becoming individuals and thought processes becoming siloed. Through the pandemic I’ve seen our department pre covid, then during the pandemic we went mostly remote first then now as we are all back in the office with remote allowed on a less frequent basis. Both moral and productivity have improved since our return. It fun to work again and that also means it will be more than “just a job” as remote work can become.
galaxyLogic 5y ago
I live in New York City where apartments are small and rents are high. I don't live alone. What remote work essentially does it makes the shared space in our apartment smaller since there are more people in it more often. In effect it shrinks your apartment. If I am working for someone else I think they should bear the cost of renting the room where I am working in. If I'm not in the office they can use my share of the office-space to something else. They won't need so much space and thus will pay less rent. So I think remote work is in many cases in the interest of the employers, at least financially. I do believe that in-person contacts are valuable. But I haven't seen it discussed much that remote work in effect shrinks the place where you live.
minusf 5y ago
wfh is not all roses either. sometimes i have difficulties "leaving work" when I'm in the flow. so i started wearing "work clothes" to remind myself "i need to go home" and change into home clothes. meetings are more time consuming and annoying in general. "can you hear me? can you see my shared screen?" i'd prefer a 2/3 or 3/2 days wfh/office arrangement. sometimes the office environment actually helps me to focus better. and i miss the ping pong table..
- reificator 5y ago
  > i miss the ping pong table.. You had me until the end. Nicely done. We all know the ping-pong table is there for the same reason as the couch in front of the break room TV, or the cheese on the mousetrap.
kfk 5y ago
I am running job interviews and candidates ask to work remotely often, even from junior candidates that need at least 6-12 months of development to be truly useful to us. We teach valuable stuff, data engineering, we offer good salaries, they know they will get into a lucrative carrier with us, yet they think they can do all of this remotely. I have to tell them - it’s not realistic. It’s not realistic to learn complex concepts without meeting your more experienced colleagues at least 2-3 times per week. Online courses can only go so far, same with zoom calls and slack. Some candidates understand my point, some don’t, I am sorry for those who don’t. Of course there are people that are self-driven and can do all remotely, but in my experience if you need to develop you are much better off being in an office with people that can mentor you daily.
- maybelsyrup 5y ago
  > It’s not realistic to learn complex concepts without meeting your more experienced colleagues [...] Eh, dunno. A) It's not the complex concepts that benefit from physical proximity to other members of our species, in my experience; it's the subtleties, the little tricks, hacks, and bits of hidden knowledge that are really amenable to someone shuffling over to your desk, grabbing your keyboard, and going "here look at this weird way of doing it" in 20 seconds of physical interaction. Junior people can learn complex things remotely, but maybe physical proximity can give them those little details better. Which leads me to > [...] at least 2-3 times per week. B) So let'em come in twice a week and work from home the other 3. What's the problem? One of my siblings hires junior people at their firm and this is the way they've been operating since before the pandemic. The kids get trained up real nice and are happier in their work not having to commute 3x/wk.
  - kfk 5y ago
    We already have a 2-3 days work from office policy but for some that is not good enough, they want full remote. Many other IT companies are now offering full remote... but I think it’s not in the interest of the employees that need to develop and learn. Again it’s my own experience, I might be wrong, I am just suggesting to approach this topic with care.
- 5y ago
brainless 5y ago
When then debates and fights settle, I want to see remote as a genuine option given to employees. I have worked in "offshore" model most of my life, staying in India and being an early engineer to many startups around the world. I used to be very extroverted by nature. In the last few years I have become more introverted. The transition started when I was living in Germany. Now I have fewer friends, but higher quality. No parties at all and I miss none of it. I live in a small village in the Himalayas, feel super connected to nature, feel happier on average. I just started a contract with a US East based early stage startup. I will travel and surely spend time in in-person huddles, but I want to be a remote worker for as long as my nature fits this mode. I frequent online programming communities a lot more these days and I feel some of the best creators out there (not just in software) hone their skills by themselves, in themselves. I really do not get the point of "managing" people anyway. 1 or 2 short calls a day are enough even for fast paced work. If teams can not understand subject matter through documentation and asynchronous communication, then something is off. Also, a remote company leans more toward documentation and online co-ordination. I see this as an asset to any company.
mihaic 5y ago
I found that most people have a very narrow and different view of "what needs to be done", and that's why there's so much tension on WFH. Most engineers today seem to like just being assigned tasks, and don't consider the huge effort required to create, prioritize and properly articulate those tasks (some of which required engineering input). A good presenter probably know he need to rethink something if he has an audience with a "I don't get it" face. On the other hand, managers can't empathize with how some people concentrate better in their home than in a noisy open office. When my company was forced by covid to move to WFH, individual productivity increased while overall company productivity decreased. Both sides were right, just in different ways.
throwremotely 5y ago
I find it hilarious each time this subject comes up on HN (seems weekly now), everyone saying it's the greatest thing since sliced bread. I know several(!) people, who while 'working remotely', are two timing it, having two jobs simultaneously, obviously unbeknown to the employer. And even then, they 'find' time during their working hours, to go to the gym, do the laundry, do some groceries. They are not some productivity geniuses, no, they are just regular lazy people, like most people are. I get why those people LOVE remote working, because they get paid and not so much work done. Win-Win?
- Bayart 5y ago
  Is it that they don't get work done, or that they can purge all the down time from office work and use it efficiently (doing laundry vs doing HN) ?
ahaferburg 5y ago
The job posting is actually real. Web: https://nytimes.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/NYT/job/New-York-NY/Newsletter-Writer--Back-to-Work_REQ-010284 https://nytimes.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/NYT/job/New-York... Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20210728020438/https://nytimes.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/NYT/job/New-York-NY/Newsletter-Writer--Back-to-Work_REQ-010284 https://web.archive.org/web/20210728020438/https://nytimes.w...
cannabis_sam 5y ago
It really is just so incredibly simple, the people who want an office the whole week or just for a few days, or part of the weekdays, should be able to do it, and stay home when they need/want it. (As long as the work gets done obviously) The primary obstacle is the large contingent of authoritarian managers who are fundamentally and completely unable to either trust or delegate, so they crave control over every detail to compensate for being placed in a position they can’t handle. The saddest part that these completely useless, drains on human productivity, fascist individuals are rewarded greatly by the incentives of our paltry economic system..

209 points by davidgerard 5y ago

I'm finishing my degree at the start of next year. I can only imagine to what world I will get into, after the pandemic, quarantines, and remote jobs. It's going to be such a different world compared to a few years ago. Damn.

swader999 5y ago
Lot of people retiring in the next decade. You'll do fine.
dotcommand 5y ago
After 9/11 there was talk about nobody wanting to work or live in skyscrapers. That the world was forever changed. Nothing really changed except the state gained more power and people lost some power. Last I checked, there were cranes all over manhattan throwing up skyscrapers left and right. After the 2008 financial crisis, there was talk about breaking apart "too big to fail" banks and reigning in their financial shenanigans and the world was forever changed. Nothing really changed except the banks got bigger and now housing market is the hottest it has ever been. After the Trump election, there was talk about end of democracy, financial collapse, end of globalization, etc and the world was forever changed. Nothing really changed except the state gained more power, the wealthy got wealthier. Every few years there is a crisis that is going to change the world forever. After a few months/years, people forget and move on, til the next crisis that is going to end/change the world. You'll realize this eventually. It's why news really should be taken with moderation. Too much news and it become poisonous and unhealthy for your well being. Everyone eventually learns that "life goes on". In a few years, covid will seem like ancient history and most people will have moved on to other things. Life went on after the far deadlier 1918 pandemic. Life went on after ww2. Life went on after 9/11. You'll be alright.
- thrashtitan 5y ago
  I am unsure why you are being downvoted, but I whole heartedly agree with this sentiment. You are not attempting to downplay any of those tragedies or the current pandemic, but I do believe it will eventually end. Or it will end us. Theres only two ways forward.
  - geomark 5y ago
    Seems like there might be another way forward, one in which we all muddle along with an ongoing pandemic that doesn't wipe us out but keeps evolving and infecting and killing significant numbers of people. We continue opening and closing economies, rushing out experimental vaccines, and begin seeing larger numbers of long term effects of the disease and attempts to mitigate it.
- perl4ever 5y ago
  Life went on after the Great Depression, but it left its mark on the people who lived through it. Isn't that kind of a cliche? The US has mostly escaped things that affected people more in other countries, like, say, WWI and WWII. So to some extent, I think saying "you'll get over it" is assuming the US will continue to be fortunate. If you don't believe in divine providence looking over "fools, drunks, and the USA", it's not logical to count on it in the future.
- redis_mlc 5y ago
  > After the Trump election, there was talk about end of democracy, financial collapse, end of globalization It's important that people understand the following before the 2022 and 2024 elections, where Trump and R will gain several seats. Trump is a patriot - he represents America first, which is good for the US economy and citizens, and thus anti-globalization. That's what MAGA means. Ironically, it's Democrat leaders that are pro-globalization and anti-American, proven by the current porous border and relaxation of sanctions against China. (The border is open to increase people who are predicted to vote D, and to lower wages for company backers of the party.) We will have a financial collapse if Biden's Marxist policies make people wonder if the US dollar should continue to be the global currency - the US has a 1% economic advantage by being that currency. Why do Democrat leaders behave that way? Because when you live in a gated community and have your own security, the rest of America can go screw themselves. (20/25 Democratic city mayors have their own security, yet want to "defund the police" for others.) And wtf is this? Incoherent Biden Town Hall Excerpt (with Don Lemon of CNN enabling it) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LB9MOJUS6L8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LB9MOJUS6L8
rdaystrom 5y ago
You'll own nothing and you'll be happy.

colinmhayes 5y ago

The point of Op-Eds is to be hot takes. They're supposed to be opinions that the editorial board disagrees with. They've got columnists on staff to write the respectable opinions. Is "only publish non controversial opinions" really what we want from our news sources?

jjk166 5y ago
Op-eds are supposed to be interesting opinions the editorial board feels are worth sharing. While they may go against the leanings of the editorial board, they should be of the same caliber as what they would write themselves. Publishing an op-ed is an endorsement not necessarily of the article's thesis, but of the quality of the argument in favor of the thesis. Publishing hot takes devoid of substance and lacking intellectual merit reflects poorly on the institution and the editors who made the call to do so, regardless of what position they advocate.
- Gimpei 5y ago
  I disagree. Intellectual merit is in the eyes of the beholder. Sometimes it is valuable to hear a view for the simple fact that it is held by a lot of people or it's influential. If a bunch of people hold a view that I despise, at the very least I'd like to have a sense of why. I have no desire to have my own opinion regurgitated back at me. And no, I'm not afraid of readers of the NY Times being swayed by "propaganda." NY Times readers as a whole have a pretty firmly set worldview. One Op-Ed won't make a damn bit of difference.
  - tehjoker 5y ago
    “It requires a macro, alongside a micro- (story-by-story), view of media operations, to see the pattern of manipulation and systematic bias.” (p. 2) -- Manufacturing Consent
  - jjk166 5y ago
    Which is more valuable for real discussion: hearing an opinion you disagree with argued well and thus coming to see why it is widely held, or hearing a view you disagree with argued poorly, further convincing you that its adherents are simply morons? If you're not getting the opinions you want to read, it's easy enough to pick up a different paper. The danger of a bad op-ed is tricking people into thinking they are getting both sides of the story when they aren't.

MattGaiser 5y ago

> The screed is exactly the thing you don’t give space to if you’re looking to give a balanced view on a subject I never thought that was what the op-ed section was for though. Isn't it so you can see more aggressive arguments for or against something? Op-ed has published the Taliban.

tehjoker 5y ago
An Op-Ed is definitely going well when people bring up that the NYT has also published the Taliban unbidden to contextualize it.

dade_ 5y ago

I believe this narrative is being funded by the commercial real spectate industry. They are absolutely fucked. Like Wile E Coyote running over a cliff, they are desperate to not look down. In December 2019, I asked some guys in wealth management, what’s a hot tip, and they were all about Commercial Real Estate, it never goes down! I laughed, but then wondered, what would make it go down? Anyway, that question is now answered. I’ve been working with a company that have done studies on remote work, at the beginning 4% of employees wanted to work from the office 100% of the time. 6 months later it was 2%. Problem #1, Most managers don’t know how to manage a remote team and their employer still hasn’t trained them. Problem #2, people new to the workforce are most likely to want to come into the office some of the time as they are struggling to figure out the culture and finding help and mentoring. This is actually another failing of employers.

ffggvv 5y ago
yeah google and apple also spent massive budgets on commercial real estate holdings. billions. that’s why they’re trying to prevent wfh
- colinmhayes 5y ago
  I think Google and Apple are smart enough to see past sunk cost fallacies.
  - black_13 5y ago
    Really?
  - 1270018080 5y ago
    I wonder how long Stadia will be around
- jjtheblunt 5y ago
  Well Apple engineering involves (for some divisions) access to exorbitantly expensive capitalized equipment. WFH for folks in engineering labs with millions of dollars of shared instruments doesn't make sense. That was the fundamental reality inside Apple engineering that I lived, anyway: the millions of dollars of instruments for digital design and test can't be repurchased per engineer.

ausbah 5y ago

there is a good amount of research I've heard about that describes workers working more during the pandemic but having less productivity and more stress overall hence why I think management want ppl back to the office, to get productivity back up - as unintuitive as that sounds

bigmattystyles 5y ago
I'm only speaking for myself but I need to go back to the office. I have hobbies and friends, but most of my friends are busy with their kids as I am with mine, my hobbies are solitary and to be blunt, I miss the social aspect of the office and co-workers that frankly are also my friends with whom I can have fun conversations at lunch, coffee breaks with and such. I've actually entered a bit of a depression and I think that it's from working from home. I know my sentiments are not those of the majority, or at least if we are, we're not vocal about it. Also my cat stares at me all day.
- andreilys 5y ago
  Have you thought about finding more social hobbies like swing dancing, yoga or joining a sports rec league that will allow you to make friends outside of the workplace?
  - novok 5y ago
    It's the classic covid remote != normal remote comparison. COVID isn't completely gone so many are not comfortable going into the office.
- Tehnix 5y ago
  HN makes it seem like the majority is die hard work from home, but I guarantee you that you are by far the minority. Remote work is not for everyone, it has its pros and cons. One of the biggest cons is isolation. For a lot of people, the work place is an incredibly social place, and when you rely on that for your socializing (which is 100% okay!) then the impact of forced WFH very often leads to isolation and slight depression. I personally prefer a mix, and believe you should use each for the strengths they have. Without a shadow of a doubt, casual collaboration is easier in person. Similarly, I’m far less disturbed at home. At my current work, we’ve built up a work style where you decide yourself when you’re in and when you’re not. Notably though, this does mean that everything needs to assume everyone is fully remote for it to work well though.

DaniloDias 5y ago

Been back in the office more this last month. It is so superior that being at home.

dasil003 5y ago

So many absolutist opinions on remote work, but as someone who spent years doing both before the pandemic, I can say with some authority that there are pros and cons—it's not a one-size-fits-all thing. The biggest barrier was companies willing to go all in, as mixed on-site/remote meetings are terrible. So now that the we've broken the ice on this, the market will sort it out. Basically we're going to see a bunch of remote first companies dominate the war for talent, and we'll see some companies leveraging the strength of still being in-person. But individuals will have much more freedom to find a working arrangement that suits them. The landscape will shift in aggregate as a result of where this balances out, not as a result of arrogant op-ed writers who think they know what's right for everyone.

zmmmmm 5y ago
> mixed on-site/remote meetings are terrible for me this is the trickiest part. A lot of people and companies are looking at hybrid as a sort of compromise but the brutal reality is that hybrid may be hellishly bad and lead to far worse outcomes than all on-premise or all-remote. I feel like there is a high risk of a lot of dumpster fire disasters and not sure which way it'll go in the end.
- Freak_NL 5y ago
  Make it standard practice to do meetings virtual whenever there is someone remote joining in. Most meetings will be virtual (and that's fine), and whenever a certain problem benefits from people meeting physically, just plan it.
randomsearch 5y ago
> But individuals will have much more freedom to find a working arrangement that suits them. Agree with your comment in general. On this point, I wonder if this is only true whilst power remains in the supply side of the labour market. When the next recession hits, maybe we'll see a migration of workers to where the main employers are. I do wonder if remote working suits the workers a lot more than the employers.
cm277 5y ago

hunter-2 5y ago

Every company with even an ounce of asset has at least some part of it lying in real estate. Corporate real estate is going to be the biggest loser if WFH becomes the norm post-covid. In other words, it's in almost every corporate's best interest to push people towards offices. Add to this the fact that they get to lobby politicians many of whom invest heavily in real estate. Do not be surprised if governments create tax hurdles for companies operating remotely.

seriousquestion 5y ago

Is this a generational thing or an introvert vs extravert thing?

ajtjp 5y ago
Introvert vs extrovert. I couldn't disagree more strongly with the author of the linked article. I'd almost call it pro-remote-work propaganda. But, I say that as a software developer who is extroverted (at least relative to the profession as a whole), and is in my early 30s. Working from home can be super isolating and depressing, and I would rather leave a lucrative career than start another remote job (I already quit my previous remote job, currently living off savings rather than work remotely). I know some people who like working remotely. But I also have friends who hate it as I do, and are super eager to return to the office (some already have, at least on a part-time/hybrid basis. The two biggest factors are see are introversion vs extroversion, and whether they live with other people. My extroverted friend whose wife works at an in person job, and is thus alone all day, hates it. Another friend who lives by herself hates it. A third whose social life centered on work hated it, and wound up moving in with her parents despite being in her 30s just to have some other people around. Productivity-wise, I agree with the studies I've seen showing more time, but no more results. I think of my friend who is not confident in his job security and is working at least 50% more hours than in his pre-pandemic in-person job; I've told him several times his colleagues probably don't realize how many hours he is putting in or how effective he is, because he only interacts with about three people and it's all remote. In the first couple months of his job, before his workload went sky-high, he complained that some of his colleagues were completely burnt out and unproductive; now it's no mystery why some of his colleagues are like that. Another reason I think it's introvert vs extrovert is my conversations with recruiters. I'm that odd software developers who enjoys talking with recruiters, at least the ones who take the time to get to know you. Almost if not 100% of the recruiters I talk with miss being in person. Most of them are young. And guess what, recruiting is a highly extroverted profession. My prediction for the software industry is there are going to be a lot of people switching jobs over the next year or two, as the people who want to be in the office but are stuck at remote gigs leave, and similarly the people who want to be remote but are stuck at in office gigs leave. Some people will probably prefer hybrid too, but most of the people I know have strong opinions on the topic, and I wouldn't be surprised if hybrid mostly falls by the wayside once uncertainty around covid protocols subsides.

steve_taylor 5y ago

As much as I've enjoyed remote work, I can't help but wonder if it makes offshoring more attractive to companies based in western countries. If hiring locally is more expensive and offers no real benefit over offshoring, why keep doing it?

novok 5y ago
I agree, I think it will very much be a "be careful what you wish for" type of situation in the end. Time zones I think will be the biggest advantage to hire within the western hemisphere, nobody likes the PST <-> IST timezone meeting gap, there aren't many to hire in latin america and they speak English well and communicate well. If latin america had a large base of engineers to hire in the first place, I think many places would choose there just on a timezone and english communication skills basis. But you see big compensation gaps even between NYC / SFO / SEA and the rest of the USA, so you could very well see a drop from that.
bottled_poe 5y ago
Exactly right. If your role can be done remotely, you will soon find yourself competing against the international market. It’s shortsighted to think that your value to the company is just completing development tasks which are easily completed by cheap offshore labour.
- Overton-Window 5y ago
  Wouldn't you think there'd be numerous examples of such arbitrage in the wild if so?
  - bottled_poe 5y ago
    You mean like outsourcing? Or do you mean situations where individuals are violating their employment terms (if not their contracts)?
dcolkitt 5y ago
The cost of office space in Bangalore is not high. Offshore developers are not some secret mystery that corporate managers have never heard from. If the benefits outweighed the cost, companies would have already offshored well before the pandemic. It’s not like WFH changes that calculus. If a BigCo would rather pay a programmer in Bangalore over one in Boise, than they almost certainly would also prefer him to one in Mountain View too.

rajamaka 5y ago

Remote work enabled me to live outside of a busy city I only lived in for employment opportunities, afford property as a result, gain back 10 hours of commuting time a week, spend less money on commuting and eating out. If the price of that is missing out on HR organised 'fun' that's fine - I can be at the bar with friends at 5:05pm anyway. No chance I'm going back.

bottled_poe 5y ago
Be careful what you wish for. If your role can be done fully remotely, you will soon find yourself competing against the international market instead of just the local one.
- godelski 5y ago
  I hear this a lot and I don't buy it. There's still a big advantage to being in the same (or +/-a few hrs). I work in a remote team right now with people across the world. It is hard to make meeting times where everyone can join. There's also laws that make it easier to hire nationally vs internationally. This claim is more a scare tactic than a real warning.
  - bottled_poe 5y ago
    Sure, the market will decide.
    - foepys 5y ago
      In Germany the market decided already. After years of propaganda by consulting firms how India will develop all software for pennies soon, companies in Germany are abandoning near and farshoring to eastern EU countries and India en masse because it caused more problems than it solved. VW for example ended all software contracting and now does software development themselves. So I'm not worried.
      - thecleaner 5y ago

vncecartersknee 5y ago

Why do they so badly want us back in the offices? I really don't understand what they stand to lose by SWEs working remotely. I don't know anyone that actually want to be back in the office full time, some are ok with part-time work. Most people seem to be (anecdotally at least) reporting that they and their teams are more productive at home and their quality of life is improved because they aren't wasting time commuting. Businesses could save money by renting smaller offices or doing away with offices completely. Good engineers are just going to jump ship to wherever they can work fully remotely.

dimator 5y ago
Just as a counter point, I can't wait to be back in the office. Remote work, while granted is hyper productive, I've never felt so disconnected from my teammates. There are people I used to have contact with daily that I haven't even slacked with in months. A chat/Zoom window is a much higher barrier to conversation than meeting for lunch, coffee, hallway paths crossing, waiting for the bus etc. I'm completely out of touch with what they're working on, aside from little blurbs in stand-ups. We have all become little siloes. I miss whiteboard conversations. And that's to say nothing about the personal connections that have suffered. As adults, the place where you spend the most time with non-friends is the workplace, so that's the best bet at making new friends (in the same way school is for adolescence). The funny thing is, when I was in the office, I felt most productive when I was given long stretches of time to just do focused work. But productivity is not the end goal of a career. It's collaboration and team achievement. I have a feeling that the powers that be that are beating the back to work drum recognize some of these aspects. Obviously they see the productivity metrics, but they see the amount disconnect as well.
- soapboxrocket 5y ago
  > I've never felt so disconnected from my teammates. That's a valid point, but having everyone back in the office isn't the only solution to that problem. It may be the best solution, but seems like the easiest rather than the best.
srswtf123 5y ago

roamerz 5y ago

Love working remotely. Day to day comradery and communication is hard to replicate in the digital world though at least for me. Example: I walked by my reports office grumbling about a new network rebuild and the current state of our docs and he mentioned as I was passing how about Netbox. Well guess what I’d probably still be grumbling today except I’m knee deep in getting Netbox implemented. Going to make life a lot simpler for the next Sysadmin. That likely would not have happened if we were a remote team.

dcolkitt 5y ago
The problem is it’s not sustainable to build an org around grumbling. If problems are only getting discovered in serendipitous hallway encounters, then that means a lot of problems aren’t getting discovered at all. Remote first may be painful in the short term. But in the long term it’s much healthier as it forces the org to rationalize structured lines of communication.
- roamerz 5y ago
  That is just one form of communication that you cannot easily replicate in a remote work force and another is social interaction. I have found that it is the glue that holds organizations together and helps keep teams producing quality work. With remote first I can see teams becoming individuals and thought processes becoming siloed. Through the pandemic I’ve seen our department pre covid, then during the pandemic we went mostly remote first then now as we are all back in the office with remote allowed on a less frequent basis. Both moral and productivity have improved since our return. It fun to work again and that also means it will be more than “just a job” as remote work can become.

galaxyLogic 5y ago

I live in New York City where apartments are small and rents are high. I don't live alone. What remote work essentially does it makes the shared space in our apartment smaller since there are more people in it more often. In effect it shrinks your apartment. If I am working for someone else I think they should bear the cost of renting the room where I am working in. If I'm not in the office they can use my share of the office-space to something else. They won't need so much space and thus will pay less rent. So I think remote work is in many cases in the interest of the employers, at least financially. I do believe that in-person contacts are valuable. But I haven't seen it discussed much that remote work in effect shrinks the place where you live.

minusf 5y ago

wfh is not all roses either. sometimes i have difficulties "leaving work" when I'm in the flow. so i started wearing "work clothes" to remind myself "i need to go home" and change into home clothes. meetings are more time consuming and annoying in general. "can you hear me? can you see my shared screen?" i'd prefer a 2/3 or 3/2 days wfh/office arrangement. sometimes the office environment actually helps me to focus better. and i miss the ping pong table..

reificator 5y ago
> i miss the ping pong table.. You had me until the end. Nicely done. We all know the ping-pong table is there for the same reason as the couch in front of the break room TV, or the cheese on the mousetrap.

kfk 5y ago

I am running job interviews and candidates ask to work remotely often, even from junior candidates that need at least 6-12 months of development to be truly useful to us. We teach valuable stuff, data engineering, we offer good salaries, they know they will get into a lucrative carrier with us, yet they think they can do all of this remotely. I have to tell them - it’s not realistic. It’s not realistic to learn complex concepts without meeting your more experienced colleagues at least 2-3 times per week. Online courses can only go so far, same with zoom calls and slack. Some candidates understand my point, some don’t, I am sorry for those who don’t. Of course there are people that are self-driven and can do all remotely, but in my experience if you need to develop you are much better off being in an office with people that can mentor you daily.

maybelsyrup 5y ago
> It’s not realistic to learn complex concepts without meeting your more experienced colleagues [...] Eh, dunno. A) It's not the complex concepts that benefit from physical proximity to other members of our species, in my experience; it's the subtleties, the little tricks, hacks, and bits of hidden knowledge that are really amenable to someone shuffling over to your desk, grabbing your keyboard, and going "here look at this weird way of doing it" in 20 seconds of physical interaction. Junior people can learn complex things remotely, but maybe physical proximity can give them those little details better. Which leads me to > [...] at least 2-3 times per week. B) So let'em come in twice a week and work from home the other 3. What's the problem? One of my siblings hires junior people at their firm and this is the way they've been operating since before the pandemic. The kids get trained up real nice and are happier in their work not having to commute 3x/wk.
- kfk 5y ago
  We already have a 2-3 days work from office policy but for some that is not good enough, they want full remote. Many other IT companies are now offering full remote... but I think it’s not in the interest of the employees that need to develop and learn. Again it’s my own experience, I might be wrong, I am just suggesting to approach this topic with care.
5y ago

brainless 5y ago

When then debates and fights settle, I want to see remote as a genuine option given to employees. I have worked in "offshore" model most of my life, staying in India and being an early engineer to many startups around the world. I used to be very extroverted by nature. In the last few years I have become more introverted. The transition started when I was living in Germany. Now I have fewer friends, but higher quality. No parties at all and I miss none of it. I live in a small village in the Himalayas, feel super connected to nature, feel happier on average. I just started a contract with a US East based early stage startup. I will travel and surely spend time in in-person huddles, but I want to be a remote worker for as long as my nature fits this mode. I frequent online programming communities a lot more these days and I feel some of the best creators out there (not just in software) hone their skills by themselves, in themselves. I really do not get the point of "managing" people anyway. 1 or 2 short calls a day are enough even for fast paced work. If teams can not understand subject matter through documentation and asynchronous communication, then something is off. Also, a remote company leans more toward documentation and online co-ordination. I see this as an asset to any company.

mihaic 5y ago

I found that most people have a very narrow and different view of "what needs to be done", and that's why there's so much tension on WFH. Most engineers today seem to like just being assigned tasks, and don't consider the huge effort required to create, prioritize and properly articulate those tasks (some of which required engineering input). A good presenter probably know he need to rethink something if he has an audience with a "I don't get it" face. On the other hand, managers can't empathize with how some people concentrate better in their home than in a noisy open office. When my company was forced by covid to move to WFH, individual productivity increased while overall company productivity decreased. Both sides were right, just in different ways.

throwremotely 5y ago

I find it hilarious each time this subject comes up on HN (seems weekly now), everyone saying it's the greatest thing since sliced bread. I know several(!) people, who while 'working remotely', are two timing it, having two jobs simultaneously, obviously unbeknown to the employer. And even then, they 'find' time during their working hours, to go to the gym, do the laundry, do some groceries. They are not some productivity geniuses, no, they are just regular lazy people, like most people are. I get why those people LOVE remote working, because they get paid and not so much work done. Win-Win?

Bayart 5y ago
Is it that they don't get work done, or that they can purge all the down time from office work and use it efficiently (doing laundry vs doing HN) ?

ahaferburg 5y ago

The job posting is actually real. Web: https://nytimes.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/NYT/job/New-York-NY/Newsletter-Writer--Back-to-Work_REQ-010284 https://nytimes.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/NYT/job/New-York... Archive: https://web.archive.org/web/20210728020438/https://nytimes.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/en-US/NYT/job/New-York-NY/Newsletter-Writer--Back-to-Work_REQ-010284 https://web.archive.org/web/20210728020438/https://nytimes.w...

cannabis_sam 5y ago

It really is just so incredibly simple, the people who want an office the whole week or just for a few days, or part of the weekdays, should be able to do it, and stay home when they need/want it. (As long as the work gets done obviously) The primary obstacle is the large contingent of authoritarian managers who are fundamentally and completely unable to either trust or delegate, so they crave control over every detail to compensate for being placed in a position they can’t handle. The saddest part that these completely useless, drains on human productivity, fascist individuals are rewarded greatly by the incentives of our paltry economic system..