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That's one reason for sure, but even if my house was a 10 minute walk from the office, I'd still rather only go in for meetings. At home I have my own private o

That's one reason for sure, but even if my house was a 10 minute walk from the office, I'd still rather only go in for meetings. At home I have my own private office with a nice view. I have a nice set of speakers and can play any music I like. If I want to go for a walk, I'm in a quiet suburban neighborhood with hiking trails nearby. The kitchen is always stocked with snacks I like plus freshly prepared healthy lunches (prepared either by myself or my wife). My dog spends most of the day in the office with me. At the "new" office, no one has an assigned desk, so I have to take everything I need with me to my desk and pack it up at the end of the day. My company is distributed so I spend half the day on zoom meetings with people in other offices... and even with relatively few people in the office it's already hard to book a room for a meeting. There's enough background noise in the open office that I keep headphones on most of the time while I'm at my desk. We do get free lunches at the office which is a nice perk, but food is prepared off-site, so menus tend to be designed around food that stands up to this model of food that can be prepared hours ahead of time. My commute is less than 30 minutes (one-way) and is a pretty pleasant drive.... it takes an hour out of my day, but it's not the primary reason I don't want to go to the office.

Arcanum-XIII 4y ago
The magic of open space is the same for me... but without the "perks" (food is pretty horrible from the comment I have, and it's 1 hour of traffic jam to get there). All that to do Teams meeting at my desk, with the noise of my other colleagues also in call. That's, to put it simply, hell. And then you have to be under constant surveillance, "why do you leave so early?" (I've been there for 8 hours already, so, fuck you very much)" and the "why do you go to a private cell for your meeting? (to not annoy you)" The worst part? I sometimes do meeting with half of my colleague sitting right next to me in the same call. With my headset. Why?
- wollsmoth 4y ago
  There aren't any meeting rooms at your office? I think every place I've been, even the startups had some kind of conference call mic setup on the table, although I don't think every place had a cam. It's possible for the "room" to join the call and those who must join over video.
  - Johnny555 4y ago
    We have a number of those rooms and a greater number of one or 2 person "phone rooms", even now without everyone back in the office, those are fully booked at some times. It was a big problem before COVID too -- we'd usually do 1:1 meetings outside because it was easier than trying to find a conference room -- you'd have to find an open spot in each person's schedule and an open room at the same time, which was hard to get.
  - loloquwowndueo 4y ago
    A conference room full of people is a nightmare for remote meetings - audio quality is horrendous and it’s very hard to make out what people in the speakerphone setup are saying. Everyone having their own headset makes for a much better experience for everyone. Unless the meeting is primarily in person with a few remote participants - then those get left out and have trouble catching up. Hybrid remote doesn’t work - go either fully on-prem or fully remote.
    - wollsmoth 4y ago
      I haven't had that experience but I'm sure quality setups don't come cheap. Actually... the polycom setups don't seem that expensive. Idk, I guess I haven't experienced major issues with that personally.
      - avisser 4y ago
        I can't tell you how many times I've been on a call w/ a room full of people & a PolyCom system... and then the Zoom meeting is hosted on some asshole's laptop mic. It's hard to do the right thing sometimes.
  - UnpossibleJim 4y ago
    But you're still in a meeting room on a video call, so why not just be on a video call if the rest of your day is spent in isolation with headphones on with all the inconveniences of office travel. What is the upside? Especially when there are open office plans with no assigned desks (as has been mentioned above - luckily, I haven't actually worked at a "non assigned desk role yet), which is f'ing dehumanizing.
timr 4y ago
> My commute is less than 30 minutes (one-way) and is a pretty pleasant drive.... it takes an hour out of my day, but it's not the primary reason I don't want to go to the office. Focusing on "reasons why I don't like the office" is missing the point, IMO. A lot of folks are betting on the long-term results of a short-term dislocation, but ignoring why things were as they were before the dislocation. It's sort of like the commentariat who come up with hot-takes in the aftermath of a natural disaster, and conclude "life will never be the same"...but within a few years life is, almost always, pretty much the same. Yes, there are obvious upsides to working from home, but there are also fundamental reasons that we used to go into the office, and dismissing them all as "the old way of doing it" is facile. I think, in the "long" run (i.e. the next few years), the same forces that led humans to form cities throughout all of human existence will prevail. Said differently: offices sucked before the pandemic too. The technology existed for remote work before the pandemic, too. Yet even in the most remote-friendly work environments, we went out of our way to make time for in-person communication. There was no sudden shift in technology or quality here. We did some short-term things to deal with a short-term circumstance, and now we're seeing the hangover of those choices. But the forces at play are largely unchanged. If I had to wager, I'd bet that being in the office will be how you get noticed and advance in your career. Making on-site visits will be how you get the sale. Having in-person communication will offer productivity gains over video chat. The incentives to in-person communication will therefore accumulate over time, until we're back to where we started.
- troon-lover 4y ago
- MrPatan 4y ago
  "being in the office will be how you get noticed and advance in your career. " In every job I had working from the office I didn't have to get noticed before quitting for a better job and advancing my career.
  - timr 4y ago
    The exception makes the rule. If you're truly working a job where you only advance by leaving, then you likely aren't in a position where you can advance at all. Or you are in such a job, but you've neglected the value of visibility to your career growth (PSA: this is far too common amongst programmers). It certainly happens, but it's not a counterargument to what I'm saying.
BlargMcLarg 4y ago
>There's enough background noise in the open office that I keep headphones on most of the time while I'm at my desk. I still don't get how we as a species went "this is fine". The complete loss of audiovisual privacy is such an immense drain. I'll buy the "being close together works better" argument, but I still can't grasp how that offsets all the distractions in the modern office.
- the_only_law 4y ago
  I used to keep the clip as a joke, because I was constantly going into the office early so I could get some work done before the constant chatter. https://youtube.com/shorts/4whlr2dVDws?feature=share https://youtube.com/shorts/4whlr2dVDws?feature=share
  - colpabar 4y ago
    I really wish stuff like this was illegal. It's so disgusting to wait at someone's house just to harass them every single day, celebrity or not.
  - BlargMcLarg 4y ago
    I did the same and I barely function before the sun is up. Got a solid 1-2 hours in doing way better work than the hours spent not half asleep but with the noise. Was able to do it the other way around a few times and found my late hours were even better, but managers were a little eager to apprehend me for coming in "late".
    - the_only_law 4y ago
      Yes I might think about finding a job on the other end of the country, that would allow me a sleep schedule that feels less forced.
- Ataraxic 4y ago
  I feel like the unicorn where I both enjoyed my colleagues in the office and had a lot of fun. Was it _more_ productive? Hard to say but I could easily put on my headphones and work. The lack of visual privacy I realize but I would never say it hindered my work. Then again nobody was on me if I went on reddit for a bit because the tests are running. I think a bunch of people on hacker news are discounting how much more you can learn in an office with helpful colleagues. When I was a new developer I absorbed so much information in the office just from being able to ask people questions in person. Just from people overhearing a conversation I was having and saying "I think you probably want to do it like X instead" and explaining! In my opinion many people are discounting the development of newer engineers. I'm sure it can happen remotely but remote work requires more intentional coordination and that's one area that I doubt it's happening more effectively than in an office (on the whole). I'm not saying in person meetings are awesome but comparatively, interacting with other people is easier and more enjoyable as opposed to having the same meeting digitally.
apple4ever 4y ago
> At the "new" office, no one has an assigned desk, so I have to take everything I need with me to my desk and pack it up at the end of the day. Which is the opposite direction. I don't mind being in the office, especially on a hybrid scheduled. But I hate not having my own office. I hate having to share a giant room with people.
recursive 4y ago
It's exactly reversed for me. I have a nice private office at work and snacks and it's next to a nice path and all that.
turtlebits 4y ago
Pretty sure most workers don't have ideal working conditions at home. For me, it's the separation of work/home and seeing people in person. That said, there are also nice benefits - view, lunch/snacks, EV charging, better lighting and ventilation.
bshoemaker 4y ago
You are one of the very few people to have no kids and a seemingly utopian home. This does not seem like an experience most would have.
pmontra 4y ago
I had a small house that happened to be in different years: at a 10 minutes walk from my office, at a 1h 15m commute from my next job, the place where I've been working when I became self employed. With hindsight (which I didn't have) I would go to the office close to home for meetings and probably go out to lunch with colleagues (it foster careers.) But nothing beats working from home with one's own customers.
bsder 4y ago
> At the "new" office, no one has an assigned desk Yeah, somehow management has conveniently forgotten that an "office" has a door. If it doesn't have a door, it's not an "office". With open floor plans, it's hardly a surprise that nobody wants to come back to the office.

Arcanum-XIII 4y ago

The magic of open space is the same for me... but without the "perks" (food is pretty horrible from the comment I have, and it's 1 hour of traffic jam to get there). All that to do Teams meeting at my desk, with the noise of my other colleagues also in call. That's, to put it simply, hell. And then you have to be under constant surveillance, "why do you leave so early?" (I've been there for 8 hours already, so, fuck you very much)" and the "why do you go to a private cell for your meeting? (to not annoy you)" The worst part? I sometimes do meeting with half of my colleague sitting right next to me in the same call. With my headset. Why?

wollsmoth 4y ago
There aren't any meeting rooms at your office? I think every place I've been, even the startups had some kind of conference call mic setup on the table, although I don't think every place had a cam. It's possible for the "room" to join the call and those who must join over video.
- Johnny555 4y ago
  We have a number of those rooms and a greater number of one or 2 person "phone rooms", even now without everyone back in the office, those are fully booked at some times. It was a big problem before COVID too -- we'd usually do 1:1 meetings outside because it was easier than trying to find a conference room -- you'd have to find an open spot in each person's schedule and an open room at the same time, which was hard to get.
- loloquwowndueo 4y ago
  A conference room full of people is a nightmare for remote meetings - audio quality is horrendous and it’s very hard to make out what people in the speakerphone setup are saying. Everyone having their own headset makes for a much better experience for everyone. Unless the meeting is primarily in person with a few remote participants - then those get left out and have trouble catching up. Hybrid remote doesn’t work - go either fully on-prem or fully remote.
  - wollsmoth 4y ago
    I haven't had that experience but I'm sure quality setups don't come cheap. Actually... the polycom setups don't seem that expensive. Idk, I guess I haven't experienced major issues with that personally.
    - avisser 4y ago
      I can't tell you how many times I've been on a call w/ a room full of people & a PolyCom system... and then the Zoom meeting is hosted on some asshole's laptop mic. It's hard to do the right thing sometimes.
- UnpossibleJim 4y ago
  But you're still in a meeting room on a video call, so why not just be on a video call if the rest of your day is spent in isolation with headphones on with all the inconveniences of office travel. What is the upside? Especially when there are open office plans with no assigned desks (as has been mentioned above - luckily, I haven't actually worked at a "non assigned desk role yet), which is f'ing dehumanizing.

timr 4y ago

> My commute is less than 30 minutes (one-way) and is a pretty pleasant drive.... it takes an hour out of my day, but it's not the primary reason I don't want to go to the office. Focusing on "reasons why I don't like the office" is missing the point, IMO. A lot of folks are betting on the long-term results of a short-term dislocation, but ignoring why things were as they were before the dislocation. It's sort of like the commentariat who come up with hot-takes in the aftermath of a natural disaster, and conclude "life will never be the same"...but within a few years life is, almost always, pretty much the same. Yes, there are obvious upsides to working from home, but there are also fundamental reasons that we used to go into the office, and dismissing them all as "the old way of doing it" is facile. I think, in the "long" run (i.e. the next few years), the same forces that led humans to form cities throughout all of human existence will prevail. Said differently: offices sucked before the pandemic too. The technology existed for remote work before the pandemic, too. Yet even in the most remote-friendly work environments, we went out of our way to make time for in-person communication. There was no sudden shift in technology or quality here. We did some short-term things to deal with a short-term circumstance, and now we're seeing the hangover of those choices. But the forces at play are largely unchanged. If I had to wager, I'd bet that being in the office will be how you get noticed and advance in your career. Making on-site visits will be how you get the sale. Having in-person communication will offer productivity gains over video chat. The incentives to in-person communication will therefore accumulate over time, until we're back to where we started.

troon-lover 4y ago
MrPatan 4y ago
"being in the office will be how you get noticed and advance in your career. " In every job I had working from the office I didn't have to get noticed before quitting for a better job and advancing my career.
- timr 4y ago
  The exception makes the rule. If you're truly working a job where you only advance by leaving, then you likely aren't in a position where you can advance at all. Or you are in such a job, but you've neglected the value of visibility to your career growth (PSA: this is far too common amongst programmers). It certainly happens, but it's not a counterargument to what I'm saying.

BlargMcLarg 4y ago

>There's enough background noise in the open office that I keep headphones on most of the time while I'm at my desk. I still don't get how we as a species went "this is fine". The complete loss of audiovisual privacy is such an immense drain. I'll buy the "being close together works better" argument, but I still can't grasp how that offsets all the distractions in the modern office.

the_only_law 4y ago
I used to keep the clip as a joke, because I was constantly going into the office early so I could get some work done before the constant chatter. https://youtube.com/shorts/4whlr2dVDws?feature=share https://youtube.com/shorts/4whlr2dVDws?feature=share
- colpabar 4y ago
  I really wish stuff like this was illegal. It's so disgusting to wait at someone's house just to harass them every single day, celebrity or not.
- BlargMcLarg 4y ago
  I did the same and I barely function before the sun is up. Got a solid 1-2 hours in doing way better work than the hours spent not half asleep but with the noise. Was able to do it the other way around a few times and found my late hours were even better, but managers were a little eager to apprehend me for coming in "late".
  - the_only_law 4y ago
    Yes I might think about finding a job on the other end of the country, that would allow me a sleep schedule that feels less forced.
Ataraxic 4y ago
I feel like the unicorn where I both enjoyed my colleagues in the office and had a lot of fun. Was it _more_ productive? Hard to say but I could easily put on my headphones and work. The lack of visual privacy I realize but I would never say it hindered my work. Then again nobody was on me if I went on reddit for a bit because the tests are running. I think a bunch of people on hacker news are discounting how much more you can learn in an office with helpful colleagues. When I was a new developer I absorbed so much information in the office just from being able to ask people questions in person. Just from people overhearing a conversation I was having and saying "I think you probably want to do it like X instead" and explaining! In my opinion many people are discounting the development of newer engineers. I'm sure it can happen remotely but remote work requires more intentional coordination and that's one area that I doubt it's happening more effectively than in an office (on the whole). I'm not saying in person meetings are awesome but comparatively, interacting with other people is easier and more enjoyable as opposed to having the same meeting digitally.

apple4ever 4y ago

> At the "new" office, no one has an assigned desk, so I have to take everything I need with me to my desk and pack it up at the end of the day. Which is the opposite direction. I don't mind being in the office, especially on a hybrid scheduled. But I hate not having my own office. I hate having to share a giant room with people.

recursive 4y ago

It's exactly reversed for me. I have a nice private office at work and snacks and it's next to a nice path and all that.

turtlebits 4y ago

Pretty sure most workers don't have ideal working conditions at home. For me, it's the separation of work/home and seeing people in person. That said, there are also nice benefits - view, lunch/snacks, EV charging, better lighting and ventilation.

bshoemaker 4y ago

You are one of the very few people to have no kids and a seemingly utopian home. This does not seem like an experience most would have.

pmontra 4y ago

I had a small house that happened to be in different years: at a 10 minutes walk from my office, at a 1h 15m commute from my next job, the place where I've been working when I became self employed. With hindsight (which I didn't have) I would go to the office close to home for meetings and probably go out to lunch with colleagues (it foster careers.) But nothing beats working from home with one's own customers.

bsder 4y ago

> At the "new" office, no one has an assigned desk Yeah, somehow management has conveniently forgotten that an "office" has a door. If it doesn't have a door, it's not an "office". With open floor plans, it's hardly a surprise that nobody wants to come back to the office.