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Apple closing down internal Slack channels where employees debate remote work
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 5y agoThese companies all claim to hire the best and brightest and be trailblazing engines of innovation but they're scared of remote work. How about solving an actual difficult societal problem with your big brain innovators then? It's not just Apple here, it seems like every large player is fighting this shift rather than embracing and leaning into it.
- teslafire124 5y agoPeople are legitimately quitting over this. If they don't want to have employee shortages, they will need to adapt and allow it.
- ghaff 5y agoI've been effectively remote for years. But do you honestly believe that the highest-paying SV tech employers will have a problem hiring people because they're less remote-friendly than some other companies are?
- teslafire124 5y agoI think the pandemic changed things a lot more than we give it credit. A lot of jobs were all of a sudden remote and could be done well remotely. I think we are seeing employee preferences shift to remote work if it's possible. If there are remote-friendly opportunities, employees will definitely be leaning towards that in the future.
- ghaff 5y agoI'm not supporting Apple's position. But I don't think they'll have any trouble finding people so long as they pay premium salaries.
- bcrosby95 5y agoAlong with premium salaries comes high standards for being hired. Pretty much all large tech companies are constantly hiring employees as long as they meet their high standards. If there is a general shift to remote work and Apple refuses to budge then they will have to make do with less people, raise compensation beyond what it already is, or lower their standards.
- edoceo 5y agoThe salary may not be premium when comp-vs-cost is factored in. eg: a 10h weekly commute better be worth at least $75k USD
- ghaff 5y agoI'm willing to bet that the majority of people with one hour each-way commutes don't earn $75K total.
- LadyCailin 5y agoSure, but will they be able to find people worth those salaries?
- TranquilMarmot 5y agoTo lean into the idea of "the pandemic changed things a lot more than we give it credit" I have seen a lot of folks realized (very suddenly!) that they needed to re-prioritize things in their lives and that work/money isn't the most important thing to them. I don't think Apple et al. will have trouble finding talent, but they may have trouble attracting "the best and brightest" if they require that you go into an office. Then again, maybe they don't want to hire people who will prioritize mental health and family over work. "Best and brightest" is often a thinly veiled way of saying "willing to over-work and sacrifice personal life for the bottom line".
- ghaff 5y agoI think that's totally correct. Anecdotally, I absolutely see people saying that maybe the $300K SV salary isn't worth it.
- hadlock 5y agoAgree, I've only seen a handful of recruiter spam that don't explicitly call out 100% remote work. Smaller companies are definitely using this as a lever to siphon off talent from larger, more traditional workplaces.
- goalieca 5y agoSort of.. remote anywhere positions have opened up candidates that don’t live in one of the select few hub cities.
- andrewjf 5y agoI doubt Apple is forcing people back to the office without regard for what remote work proponents are saying. At the end of the day, once debate has ended, which is clearly has (at Apple, anyway), isn't it the company's decision and you can leave or deal with it?
- teslafire124 5y agoWe will see. If bigger companies like Apple do allow it, smaller ones will be incentivized to also adopt broader remote work policies or risk losing employees to the former.
- andrewjf 5y agoRight, if it makes Apple less competitive then Apple leadership has to deal with that. They're betting on that not being the case (at least not enough to change one of their defining work-culture tenants -- face to face, in-person work is more productive and innovative). Only time will tell. But work is not typically a democracy and there's time for consensus and if it doesn't go your way, you can leave or stay and commit.
- teslafire124 5y agoI think employee demand is going to make a difference. If enough people demand it, these companies will need to bend.
- ineedasername 5y agoEmployee demand will matter to the extent that there's some level of employer supply in the market. If most employers hold the line, there isn't much for employees to choose from, unless they're one of the very fortunate few who have the luxury of deciding not to work until the appropriate opportunity comes along. If large numbers of employees can't afford to hold out for better WFH policies, then plenty of companies won't need to offer them.
- mustacheemperor 5y agoI like this take. Companies like Apple and Google with trillions of dollars and the brightest engineers in the world are facing the theoretical problem that teams will be less productive if they are allowed to remain at home with their families instead of undertaking commutes to the office. Why does this particular problem fall in the bucket of "throw up our hands and continue doing things the old (old, old, old) fashioned way," unlike all the other problems big tech feels qualified to attempt to innovate a resolution to? Companies that at least initially thrived on rejecting the status quo and doing what was better, even if it was challenging, suddenly abdicating to a status quo that is centuries old and costs everyone huge amounts of our least renewable resource: our time.
- hogFeast 5y agoManagement's sensitivity to risk varies. Staff doing their work from another location: Nope. Centralising their supply chain in a volatile, genocidal dictatorship: Yep. Big play.
- dboreham 5y agoHerd mentality. Where the herd animal is a Lemming.
- ineedasername 5y agoIn defense of those in senior management, they really like the huge bonuses & exercised stock options they get for themselves when cutting labor costs & boosting stock prices. But WFH? Less control! No easily tangible up-side! Workers might be happier? So what, how do you quantify that and what will it do to their bonuses, and OMG how can you trust the unwashed masses of anyone below C-levels & their direct reports? /s
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- Lammy 5y agoI agree with you, but these companies all own a lot of real estate they need to be able to justify on their balance sheets. Apple just built a giant new campus before The Event so of course they want to justify it by seeing butts in chairs.
- haliskerbas 5y agoI’m sure the (widely considered, not universally) most innovative and maybe most profitable company in the world could figure out something to do with that office space. Perhaps make it a hub for more teams, and close down rental spaces all over the bay. Make the gym and cafeteria way bigger. Obviously this is arm chair thinking on my part, but I find it hard to believe that given enough thought they couldn’t make the numbers work out.
- Aeolun 5y agoOr just accept that the numbers don’t work out. The numbers cannot possibly have worked out for the past year, but it hasn’t hurt them any.
- wmf 5y agoBefore the pandemic, Apple's problem was having far too many employees to fit in the spaceship. They can probably fill that campus just with people voluntarily returning.
- MarcScott 5y agoI'm guessing you're referencing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnd1jKcfBRE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnd1jKcfBRE
- joegahona 5y ago> Apple just built a giant new campus before The Event so of course they want to justify it by seeing butts in chairs. Same with Asana, whose founder recently announced[1] "Asana will have an office-centric synchronized hybrid environment," which is another way of saying "employees may work from home on Wednesdays only." [1] https://twitter.com/moskov/status/1384556019636862982 https://twitter.com/moskov/status/1384556019636862982
- Threeve303 5y agoMany of these companies invested tons of money in commercial real estate and can’t afford for that to have been a bad investment. Apple is a great example. They built a spaceship.
- fullshark 5y agoApple could light 10 billion dollars on fire and I'm not sure it would affect their stock price.
- tomc1985 5y agoThe Tyranny of the Extroverted
- dboreham 5y ago...of the NPD.
- tick_tock_tick 5y ago> trailblazing engines of innovation There is a very real possibility that allowing 100% remote work could very well prevent them from being "trailblazing engines of innovation". So many things start as adhoc idea's from a random discussion that would never have happened without being in the same location.
- treeman79 5y agoBest troubleshooting and discussions I’ve had was getting several people to a white board and going over things. Never been able to replicate remote
- teslafire124 5y agoI've been able to do that on group calls with a shared screen. MS Teams has been excellent for that.
- edoceo 5y agoRandom discussion can happen anywhere, anytime. That's the neat thing about random.
- tick_tock_tick 5y agoNo they really can't. The number of random discussion that lead into whiteboard interesting solution to problems we run into infrequent or about the overall direction of our product have dropped to near 0 since I've been working remote. Work has gotten easier in this remote world as it turned my whole team into input / output engines with very little thought along the way but god it's sucked all the creativity out of our work and removed most of the critical review of any product decision.
- andrewjf 5y agoI've experienced this too; sure, work is getting done, but it's so difficult to be creative in a way that gets people excited and thinking about problems and their solutions to make our (and our user's) lives better. Coming up with projects that are impactful and novel is a large part of our jobs, and creative velocity has nose-dived since everyone went remote. There's just (to me) no substitute for hallway chat, overhearing people arguing and getting involved, or coming across an interesting white boarding conversation. One person at a time talking on a scheduled webex is just not at all the same.
- pengaru 5y agoI've long speculated tech companies and their backers use area real estate holdings to hedge their investments. If people stop living and/or working local to their investments, the value plummets and the hedge no longer works.
- kps 5y agoManagement at all levels across all SV tech companies personally own homes whose value depends on centralization.
- ineedasername 5y agoAre real estate holdings that much of a factor? Office leases seem more common than a purchase that generates equity, at least at medium/small companies, and some larger ones too that may have a headquarters but also lease in peripheral sites. In that sense, I'm wondering if the push to get back in the office is more about "Damnit we're locked into a 10 year lease on this space, we're sure as hell not going to let it go empty, get those workers back in these seats!"
- pengaru 5y agoI don't know, it's a vague speculation that sometimes feels like a conspiracy theory when I dwell on it. But I've worked at a couple VC funded SV startups and it wasn't exactly unusual for our investors to show up in the office and see how things are going, get a tour, have meetings. I doubt it's a contractual obligation of any sort, but there's clearly pressure to have a staffed office both local and impressive to the investors. This left me assuming the VCs on Sand Hill Road would hold substantial real estate in the area, both commercial and residential. You're far more willing to throw hundreds of millions of dollars at high-risk investments if you can be confident they'll be throwing most of that money at office leases in the area, and salaries spent on rents and/or inflated bubble mortgages in the area. Especially if you can be confident all your investing peers on Sand Hill are doing the same, further inflating the bubble. The businesses will probably flop, but most that money just comes back through the real estate side provided you keep it all concentrated locally.
- Rapzid 5y agoI believe this is rhetorical but a lot of these companies, while they make many quality products, are coasting off one or two key innovative products. For Apple the Macintosh and the iPhone were prob their revolutionary products. Everything else is small potatoes.
- ineedasername 5y agoHybrid, like Apple is allowing, seems a decent compromise, though I think the balance could reasonably be at 3 or 4 days WFH instead of 2. And if someone has a good track record why not let it be all WFH? I do see some value in having a presence in the office, at least for myself in my own position: My boss & I have to work extremely close together, and that goes more smoothly in person. But it doesn't need to be everyday, and it still works out okay with phone calls & texts & adhoc Zoom meetings.
- teslafire124 5y agoI think employers should be open to what works best for each employee. I am currently WFH but I do server work so I do occasionally need to go to the office for configuring or picking up equipment. I would be okay with doing a hybrid option because of that. If I had to go back to the office full time, I would definitely start looking elsewhere.
- ineedasername 5y agoPretty much agreed-- I can understand wanting new/junior employees to develop a good track record before complete WFH. But it also seems reasonable to let a new hire that might otherwise have to relocate across the country that level of freedom and simply deal with the issue if they don't produce: not much different than how you'd deal with a new in-person employee. I will say that, for myself, I understand my work behavior very well. If I could choose any style, it wouldn't be complete WFH. It would be 3 days WFH, 2 days in office. Just a quirk of my personality that I tend to be more focused in the office, and the time I spend there gives me a fairly regimented view of what I need to accomplish during WFH time. Which is completely what you said: do what worked best for each employee.
- duxup 5y ago>recently began cracking down on Slack channels that aren’t directly related to work I get it even just as a general response to things that have happened other places. The meta conversation is endless and stuff gets out of hand. If I were an employer I'd be tempted to "You know what, I'm not gonna moderate or facilitate this stuff getting out of hand. We're here to work right?"
- ghaff 5y agoConversations in this vein get out of hand, people start getting seriously argumentative and insulting, and people get upset. It's not that discussions of this sort shouldn't happen but company mailing lists maybe aren't the best place to have them if civil debate is the goal.
- teslafire124 5y agoThat's true, but the conversations are still going to happen elsewhere. Any work-related conversation can get derailed. It sounds like they are using it as a blanket excuse for suppressing discussions they don't want employees to have. It may be to just reduce noise, but I feel like a corporation like Apple would want to keep things under tight control.
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago> the conversations are still going to happen elsewhere That's fine. This is the equivalent of water-cooler conversations.
- teslafire124 5y agoYet another reason why it's perplexing they use Slack. It's so easy for Slack channels to devolve into those kinds of chats.
- duxup 5y agoYeah and if I made the rule, I'd be okay with that. Talking about work, that's fine. It's just the nature of providing a forum/ medium so prone to problems that I would not want to do.
- teslafire124 5y agoNow they are just going to talk about it externally. Apple is fighting a losing battle. Pandora's Box has been opened by the pandemic. Now employees know that they can get the same amount of work done remotely and not be as stressed at work. Meanwhile, companies are desperate to pretend that remote work didn't happen because they need bodies to fill up their offices which they are paying for. But work culture is shifting for jobs that can be done remotely despite these attempts to shutter the discussion.
- laurent92 5y agoSome people believe tasks can be broken down and given to independent units of HR resources, executed remotely and concentrated back. Some others don’t. Some others believe it is possible but need to socialize, to belong, to talk. Respect all of them.
- teslafire124 5y agoIf someone would rather work in the office, more power to them. But you can definitely see the hesitancy of employers to allow remote work over in-office work.
- laurent92 5y agoBecause most work cannot be broken down into ideally independent tasks.
- teslafire124 5y agoHere's the thing, if you are in a big company and you work with people all over the country, you can still collaborate with them via video and text chat. It would be the same experience whether you are in the office or at home. In those circumstances, those tasks can be done due to the means of collaboration still being equally effective.
- OldTimeCoffee 5y agoThis is just absurd, JIRA wouldn't exist if you couldn't break down work into independent tasks. You're effectively saying assembly lines can't exist. Tasks can be completed by individuals regardless of where they are.
- p49k 5y agoI'm really surprised that the most secretive tech company in the world uses a third party, non-encrypted, non-self-hosted app for internal communication.
- wavesounds 5y ago"By default, Slack encrypts data at rest and data in transit for all of our customers." https://slack.com/trust/security https://slack.com/trust/security
- jMyles 5y agoIt was clear to me on first read that the comment was referring to end-to-end encryption. It's 2021 - encryption schemes wherein somebody else has the keys are decreasingly relevant. edit: Apparently Slack does indeed facilitate end-to-end encryption using a key management service, as described by the reply to my comment below.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- js212 5y agoAgreed. I worked at one of the major US banks and they would never allow the use of slack.
- paxys 5y agoWhy is the assumption that Apple will be able to secure an online messaging service better than a company whose entire purpose it is to do so?
- deegles 5y agoI'm not currently looking for another job (or plan to), but I respond to every recruiter email I receive telling them I'm only considering 100% remote options. I'm doing my part!
- azth 5y agoHow have the responses been?
- notquitehuman 5y agoI’ve turned down 2 offers that were advertised as remote but the but the managers gave off “management by walking around” vibes, and turned down another that paid 10k less for remote. (I’m more than full time employed and I’m being picky)
- deegles 5y agoGlaring silence for the most part
- toomuchtodo 5y agoThank you!
- mickotron 5y agoMe too. I am voting with my feet and taking my labour somewhere else.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- jachee 5y agoI agree with the Mods’ assessment when this was posted to /r/Apple that “This appears to be unsubstantiated rumor.”
- austincheney 5y agoThis sounds bizarre to me. If Apple feels so strongly about this position then why is there any position for discussion on this matter at all? For example, my employer is strictly a work from office company. I disagree with that position but they were always clear about this at all times: safety permitting employees will return to the office. Never was there any confusion. You can talk about this all you want and disagree about it but the employers position is still clear and everybody knew this at all times.
- pedrogpimenta 5y agoBecause things can change. If it weren't for these talks and changes, we would still be working in horrible conditions because "that's what it was when I was hired and it was very clear this is the way to do it and I have agreed to this".
- austincheney 5y agoI don’t think anybody is claiming horrible work conditions at Apple.
- nextaccountic 5y agoThe company doesn't have total control here. If all workers organized themselves and decided to demand WFH all at once, Apple would be forced to capitulate. The company can't do shit without its workers.
- dboreham 5y agonetscape.really-bad-attitude recycled.
- xwdv 5y agoPersonally, I think the golden age of sprawling luxurious company campuses are over. Imagine you're Apple, you just spent billions building a next generation spaceship campus, and now no one wants to work there. What a waste of money. There's no point in building a custom campus anymore if remote work is now the default preference for so many employees. If you need some office space, rent it out from some generic building downtown for the few laggards.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- yakkityyak 5y agoThis rumor isn't true. I can see pro-wfh channels as well as random channels about video games and stuff.
- ineedasername 5y agoPeople are quitting where I work over this. (Not at Apple) Lots of people have a commute of 1+ hour, then time to walk to the office get settled etc. Same on the way home. For the last ~16 months people everywhere have clawed back 5 or 10 or 15 hours a week. That's a huge increase in leisure time: Enough for a another hobby, additional professional development, time with family, or just relax & help avoid burn out. A huge increase in quality of life. Where I work the message is now "Everyone is back, in the office, full-time, every day, no exceptions, full stop." No WFH was allowed pre-pandemic. So, people quitting. Most places are at least offering some form of hybrid. But then our President/CEO just retired, and a new one starts next week. I suspect that faced with an IT department gutting itself day by day, there may be a reconsideration. I hope there is.
- zeku 5y agoAt my job they're leaning into WFH. We are full WFH since March 2020 with no end in sight, with higher ups reported to be satisfied with our performance and the new job listings all listed as *remote available*. Some people really dislike it at work and appear to come into zoom calls from the office. Most of that group really appreciates how empty the office is though. I also work for an employer that isn't a "tech player" and you wouldn't think we are more forward than Apple on this, but here we are.
- irrational 5y agoYour employer probably didn’t just finish building a multi billion dollar spaceship/office building.
- TomSwirly 5y agoI will never work in an office again, myself.
- masterof0 5y agoDoes anyone knows any company that will hire US devs but will allow at the same time remote work from anywhere(in the world)?
- zeku 5y agoGitlab I think.
- mickotron 5y agoYes they are a 100% remote company, even pre-covid
- sativallday 5y agoI love Gitlab but they pay like shit
- ineedasername 5y agoI wonder how much the Delta variant is going to influence these things... we're a short ways into a spike-- if it continues on current trends w/ break-through infections of those already vaccinates, it's going to be hard to push people back to the office.
- mensetmanusman 5y agoWouldn’t it be amazing if companies responded by building places to live on campus? They could actually be supporting housing development just to get people there. This is what universities do with professors at places like Columbia. We told leadership at our inclusion meetings to transform vast areas of offices into daycares to be more inclusive, I wonder where that will go…