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Depends what you mean by ending remote. Thoughts below only apply to tech companies: * I think that relatively few companies will return to "back to office = 5

Depends what you mean by ending remote. Thoughts below only apply to tech companies: * I think that relatively few companies will return to "back to office = 5d / week" * I think that many companies will return to "back to office = 1-4 days / week" or "back to office = everyone is in the office for a full work-week every month" But I think that some amount of essentially 100% remote roles will endure, just as they existed pre-pandemic. If I were guessing 5-15% of the workforce will settle into that state. Companies are practical. If 5d / week in office means a lot of employee retention issues, and you aren't ok with that, rational actors aren't going to intentionally floor the car off a bridge.

bretpiatt 4y ago
As a CEO I'll echo this, we're at 2+ days across locations where we have offices, and we try to hire in markets where we have an office or can build to an office of 10+. WFH 100% roles don't do innovation and collaboration the same way that happens in person and even flying folks together for planning sessions is subpar for our goal to impact the communities we operate in positively. With a critical mass volunteering for causes the local team cares about, getting involved with schools, setting up internship programs, etc. are all much easier to achieve. My long-term belief is we'll see a sorting of companies deciding on how they want to operate, then advertising that in recruiting, and finding people who are also passionate about the same. While we go through the changes it will be turbulent for both employee and employer.
- dont__panic 4y ago
  I understand that in person collaboration can be extremely helpful when you're trying to increase the pace of innovation, pivot, respond to market stresses, etc. But why 2+ days per week? It feels like you're really limiting your pool of candidates when you insist that people come into the office multiple days a week. Why not try an "innovation week" once per quarter to get that work done, and ad-hoc team meetups instead? With the expenses you'd save from ditching the office lease, you could run a lot of social events for employees that serve a similar purpose. Not trying to criticize or change your mind -- I'm just curious how you came to the conclusion that hybrid is the answer, since it sort of feels like the worst of both worlds to me.
  - bretpiatt 4y ago
    High level... ...one of the 2 days teams are all in together, they focus on internal team activities. ...the other of the 2 days team members spread out across the week, they focus on collaboration with other teams. It does limit our prospective candidates to being in specific geographies or being willing to move to them, the trade-off is we're seeing many people who voluntarily are in more than 2 days per week, they really missed the separation of home/work, the getting to meet and know new people (WFH video/phone/chat is works for getting work done with each other, it isn't great at really getting to build relationships, it happens much more slowly). This is an area where we're still innovating on overall as a company and we will continue to do so, also what works for us may not work for others, there isn't a global monoculture. One of our [4] core values is, "People First -- We provide an opportunity for people to do meaningful work with people they love to work with", and as we live the value, we find people enjoy being at the office because they enjoy being around their team members.
- arghnoname 4y ago
  My office started going hybrid recently (two days / week right now, three eventually). I'm introverted and used to be bullish on remote work, but I did a mix of remote and in-person collaboration in grad school and observed first-hand that there really is no comparison. Consequently, starting my job during COVID I was skeptical about remote work and was gratified to seemingly find that it at least kind-of worked. Things got done, the ball kept moving... But now that we have in-person days there's no question. The level of engagement, collaboration, ideas, 'hallway conversations' that crop up is massively higher...to the point that it feels like a waste of time. I'm so distracted from my main focus of making widgets to talk about hypothetical futures that it feels like I'm falling behind my main 'assigned' duties, but already the fruits of this are starting to be born out and we're probably avoiding mishaps and more fully sucking talent out of everyone due to lower barrier of participatory entry. I understand not everyone feels this way, but I will note that some of our team is still (and will forever be) remote. In mixed meetings they're the same as they ever were, which is to say, mostly silent. The in-person people are much more engaged. Bottom-line: if your work is well-defined or scoped at the individual or perhaps small-team level, remote might work. If you're pushing boundaries I'm skeptical--not that remote work can't work, but that it works best.
- 999900000999 4y ago
  >With a critical mass volunteering Is it really volunteering then? I'm not programming to 'get involved with the community'.
  - bretpiatt 4y ago
    Our experience is different folks want to get involved with different things and they're much more likely to do so with another coworker or two than they would be to do so alone. We understand this isn't what all folks want and don't mandate involvement.

bretpiatt 4y ago

As a CEO I'll echo this, we're at 2+ days across locations where we have offices, and we try to hire in markets where we have an office or can build to an office of 10+. WFH 100% roles don't do innovation and collaboration the same way that happens in person and even flying folks together for planning sessions is subpar for our goal to impact the communities we operate in positively. With a critical mass volunteering for causes the local team cares about, getting involved with schools, setting up internship programs, etc. are all much easier to achieve. My long-term belief is we'll see a sorting of companies deciding on how they want to operate, then advertising that in recruiting, and finding people who are also passionate about the same. While we go through the changes it will be turbulent for both employee and employer.

dont__panic 4y ago
I understand that in person collaboration can be extremely helpful when you're trying to increase the pace of innovation, pivot, respond to market stresses, etc. But why 2+ days per week? It feels like you're really limiting your pool of candidates when you insist that people come into the office multiple days a week. Why not try an "innovation week" once per quarter to get that work done, and ad-hoc team meetups instead? With the expenses you'd save from ditching the office lease, you could run a lot of social events for employees that serve a similar purpose. Not trying to criticize or change your mind -- I'm just curious how you came to the conclusion that hybrid is the answer, since it sort of feels like the worst of both worlds to me.
- bretpiatt 4y ago
  High level... ...one of the 2 days teams are all in together, they focus on internal team activities. ...the other of the 2 days team members spread out across the week, they focus on collaboration with other teams. It does limit our prospective candidates to being in specific geographies or being willing to move to them, the trade-off is we're seeing many people who voluntarily are in more than 2 days per week, they really missed the separation of home/work, the getting to meet and know new people (WFH video/phone/chat is works for getting work done with each other, it isn't great at really getting to build relationships, it happens much more slowly). This is an area where we're still innovating on overall as a company and we will continue to do so, also what works for us may not work for others, there isn't a global monoculture. One of our [4] core values is, "People First -- We provide an opportunity for people to do meaningful work with people they love to work with", and as we live the value, we find people enjoy being at the office because they enjoy being around their team members.
arghnoname 4y ago
My office started going hybrid recently (two days / week right now, three eventually). I'm introverted and used to be bullish on remote work, but I did a mix of remote and in-person collaboration in grad school and observed first-hand that there really is no comparison. Consequently, starting my job during COVID I was skeptical about remote work and was gratified to seemingly find that it at least kind-of worked. Things got done, the ball kept moving... But now that we have in-person days there's no question. The level of engagement, collaboration, ideas, 'hallway conversations' that crop up is massively higher...to the point that it feels like a waste of time. I'm so distracted from my main focus of making widgets to talk about hypothetical futures that it feels like I'm falling behind my main 'assigned' duties, but already the fruits of this are starting to be born out and we're probably avoiding mishaps and more fully sucking talent out of everyone due to lower barrier of participatory entry. I understand not everyone feels this way, but I will note that some of our team is still (and will forever be) remote. In mixed meetings they're the same as they ever were, which is to say, mostly silent. The in-person people are much more engaged. Bottom-line: if your work is well-defined or scoped at the individual or perhaps small-team level, remote might work. If you're pushing boundaries I'm skeptical--not that remote work can't work, but that it works best.
999900000999 4y ago
>With a critical mass volunteering Is it really volunteering then? I'm not programming to 'get involved with the community'.
- bretpiatt 4y ago
  Our experience is different folks want to get involved with different things and they're much more likely to do so with another coworker or two than they would be to do so alone. We understand this isn't what all folks want and don't mandate involvement.