5 ms·
I think the crisis here is the crumbling of traditional power structures in corporate life, which many of us are now asserting are as toxic as we knew they were
by deepsquirrelnet 4y ago
I think the crisis here is the crumbling of traditional power structures in corporate life, which many of us are now asserting are as toxic as we knew they were.
Office Space couldn’t be written about remote workers. Power tripping managers have a much more difficult time asserting themselves, and might be finding out that they’re not as important as they thought.
I think the rebellion against totalitarian work life has started, and that’s apparently worrisome enough that the productivity gains from remote work aren’t worth it.
The next step is realizing that the “theory of bullshit jobs” is at least partly true, and that modernization has removed the need for as many people to be working as there are. It’s actually resource limitation that prohibits our collective wealth, and not our labor.
- alaricus 4y agoI think WFH revealed very brutally who in an org is useless. Every large org has a lot of people who don't produce anything but still manage to get by using their good social skills. Those folks got hit hard by WFH.
- b3morales 4y agoPerhaps I'm just too cynical, but I have no trouble thinking that there will be an "Office Space, but for remote work" in due time. Power tripping managers aren't going to just disappear, so they will have to adapt and find new ways to trip. The details will change but the basic character of the relationship will be the same for many people. For example, we're already seeing spyware being a condition for some remote workers. Whether that continues I don't know, but it shows the point I think.
- bsder 4y ago> The next step is realizing that the “theory of bullshit jobs” is at least partly true, and that modernization has removed the need for as many people to be working as there are. The problem is that this cuts both ways. Is society ready for 15% more people being unemployable? It's been many decades, and we never really "solved" the issues caused by the mills/mines/factories all going under. We simply ignored the people hurt. I still see no one proposing a solution, 40 years later.