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> the executive team made the decision earlier this week > He pointed to the ease of asking ad-hoc questions on the way to lunch or in the elevator. > It’s ea

• JohnFen 4y ago
  My problem with these arguments (the ones you quoted) is simply that I don't think they're true.
  • MuffinFlavored 4y ago
    They must have some data that shows people are more productive (whether it's against their will or not/whether they hate their lives sitting in traffic to and from work or not/whether they thinking being in the office surrounded by a bunch of people who are mostly fake is soul sucking or not) in the office. There's no way Google + Apple + Amazon + Meta are all aligned on "work from home isn't a viable option" without dating backing it. It's just an echo chamber here on HackerNews that we begrudgingly don't want to believe it.
    • JohnFen 4y ago
      Maybe they do. If so, they should share it, then, because it's certainly not readily available. It would go far to increase their credibility.
    • ssully 4y ago
      No, they have data on how much money they paid for office space. Thats all it is.
      • Fargren 4y ago
        I've heard this a million times, but isn't that a sunk cost fallacy? They don't get their money back when people come back, and they can either stop renting or sell. They aren't charging employee's rent for using the offices.
        • xienze 4y ago
          > but isn't that a sunk cost fallacy? Maybe? But it's human nature to feel a little better about shelling out cash on something if it actually gets used. To make an analogy, let's say your kid insisted you buy them a car. Not some lame Toyota, it has to be a Ferrari (read: lavish office in expensive downtown location). They use it, they're happy. Then some event happens that makes them not want to use the car anymore, but for contractual reasons you still have to keep it around for several more years (read: pay insurance and maintenance). It doesn't ever get used, but you're still paying for it (read: paying for maintenance and utilities for a mostly empty office). You'd feel at least a LITTLE better if your kid at least attempted to drive the car a few times per week, but they just want to stay home and call you an asshole. I strongly prefer WFH, but I get the thinking. Also keep in mind that city governments are probably breathing down the necks of these companies telling them to get workers back into the office ASAP because the local economy is going to shit without thousands of office workers buying Starbucks, going to lunch, etc. every single day.
          • Fargren 4y ago
            Yes, what you describe is a sunk cost fallacy. I get it, people do fall for them, we're wired that way. But a public company with stockholders shouldn't make decisions like this. It's either better for the company to make the people come back, or it isn't. "The CEO has buyer's remorse" is not an argument for such a highly impacting decision. You might be onto something with the cities asking for this, but I have not seen any data or anecdotes pointing to that.
            • p_j_w 4y ago
              >But a public company with stockholders shouldn't make decisions like this. Yes and all people should be decent and look out for each other as well.
    • tut-urut-utut 4y ago
      Believe it or not, there are enough people who like to go to the office rather than working from home.
      • MuffinFlavored 4y ago
        I don't think this describes why executive leadership would force people who want to work from home back into the office against their will.
      • misnome 4y ago
        None of whom are affected by any of these.
    • Xcelerate 4y ago
      Worked at one of those four companies you mentioned on one of the teams analyzing employee productivity during the pandemic through EOY 2022. The one liner (that ignores all nuance) is that remote work does not negatively affect productivity, at least for the company I was at. Decisions by leadership are not significantly influenced by what the data shows.
      • MuffinFlavored 4y ago
        > Decisions by leadership are not significantly influenced by what the data shows. If it isn't productivity (or morale) driving their decision on "putting their foot down and demanding no work from home", what is it? I don't believe it's some simple reductionist "they're evil and want employee control" narrative.
        • Xcelerate 4y ago
          > If it isn't productivity (or morale) driving their decision on "putting their foot down and demanding no work from home", what is it? Unfortunately, my background is in data science. I would say the field of psychology is better suited to answering that question.
        • tsgagnon 4y ago
          I don't believe it's some simple reductionist "they're evil and want employee control" narrative. Remove the "they're evil" part and I don't see what's reductionist about it being about "having more control over employees"? That to me sounds like a very likely explanation.
        • JohnFen 4y ago
          I don't think many people are ascribing it to maliciousness. What it looks like to me is a combination of two things: 1) Working in an office full of people is what they personally prefer, and 2) They have large investments in physical infrastructure that they need to use.
          • MuffinFlavored 4y ago
    • xienze 4y ago
      > They must have some data that shows people are more productive I think it comes down to not liking the idea of paying $$$ on lavish offices that are ghost towns. And I also wouldn’t doubt cities are “encouraging” companies to force BTO because local economies have been hit hard by the lack of office workers.
      • vitaflo 4y ago
        The city I live in did this. Gave all sorts of tax breaks to companies downtown to get people back in the office because lack of employees was hurting all the other small businesses that were built up around downtown to service those employees during the day (think restaurants, coffee shops, dry cleaners, day care, etc).
    • NikolaNovak 4y ago
      I keep thinking that; I don't want to believe this is just people who don't know how to use email and slack, enforcing their habits on everybody else. But, why has nobody come out and shared that data? All I keep hearing is these nice anecdotes about meeting random people accidentally, and vague hand-waving about collaboration. (my own team is operations/application maintenance, and we are WAY more effective and efficient now that everybody is remote and on the same level. I understand that may not be the case in all fields/areas/teams).
      • dalyons 4y ago
        if the data existed it would have been shouted from the rooftop, given the anti WFH corporate sentiment. That you havent seen any speaks volumes.
• evilturnip 4y ago
  [flagged]
  • mjhay 4y ago
    What a dumb post. Remote work can be just as productive or more productive. Workers work for a paycheck and want a good quality of life. That's not entitlement, it's called not being a bootlicker.
• zonox 4y ago
  internally they did consult people, 80%+ preferred WFH DaTa DRiVeN cOMpaNY
  • GalenErso 4y ago
    Yes, but the data also shows that 100% of Amazon's CEOs wants RTO. The data is clear. Back to the office it is. /s
    • newaccount2021 4y ago
      [dead]
• NikolaNovak 4y ago
  What I'm struggling with is, even my own leadership and executives, have struggled to meaningfully communicate the WHY; they have not succeeded in selling the back to office, to myself at least. My own mentor, when I pushed in a friendly manner, related an anecdote how last time he was in the office, he met this new person from another team and they had a nice chat. Which is a LOVELY anecdote, and COMPLETELY irrelevant to forcing 300 people on our project back to office. If meeting people from other teams is a priority, there are a myriad ways of doing do (I avail of many of them myself). Neither the business nor personal benefit of this chance random encounter was quantified nor discussed, nor compared to alternatives. But I keep hearing these benefits of "water cooler conversations" and "elevator chats" etc. Is it a generational thing? I'm a 45 year old grouchy geezer, but between slack and sms and teams and webex and email and everything else, I've developed strong and productive relationships with co-workers I've never met and feel I have many methods of engaging depending on my timing and priority needs.
  • Swizec 4y ago
    Here’s an example from personal experience: When working at the office, it felt meh. We mostly talked on slack, worked async, and ignored each other. But the weekly outings for lunch were nice. When working from home, it’s b been great. We talk a lot on many channels, work together, and feel a great sense of camaraderie. But we mostly haven’t met in person. Team morale has more to do with it than physical presence. BUT whenever we do meet in person, you always find out the inside scoop about all sorts of goings on. You hear murmurings of big decisions months before they’re made. I think the grape vine is a crucial information channel for people in leadership and it’s almost impossible to reproduce virtually. But it’s much less, if at all, valuable to us peons.
    • NikolaNovak 4y ago
      In my neck of the woods, the higher up you go, the more "Sales" is part of your job description. And I think a lot of people are finding it hard to do sales (formal or informal) remotely. A lot of sales is about building a relationship and being near the potential customer and informal conversations and to your point grapevine etc. I 101% understand how they are struggling in doing their job effectively, remotely.
• stuckinhell 4y ago
  For most companies there aren't many reasons to force people back. Productivity was higher for my firm, yet some executives want people back. In my opinion this is a flexing of power by the executive class, and I think it will backfire heavily. They think people can't find new jobs, and sure its a tough job market. But employees are creative, and can cause all sorts of damage if they'd like via slowdowns, "accidents", leaking information, etc. I keep warning my firm, but they aren't listening. If just 5% of our employees decide to be a pain in the ass, it'll be a god damn disaster.
  • 13of40 4y ago
    I'm not sure what it's like at Amazon, but I expect they're in a similar situation as the place I currently work, which is that probably a third of the talent has simply moved away and doesn't even have the option of coming to an office anymore. Are they going to tell Jane the Star Dev that she needs to sell her house and move back into the city or else she's fired? If anything they're probably going to have to wait a few years and let natural attrition sort it out.
• notJim 4y ago
  Software engineers want a seat at the table, but refuse to form unions that would actually give them one. I'm curious if that will begin to change during this era of greater pressure from management (but I doubt it).
  • ActorNightly 4y ago
    Unions are not needed because you do want competition for jobs. People who are getting rejected/fired from Amazon aren't exactly hurting for money or job opportunities.
  • rr808 4y ago
    Software engineers want a seat at the table but no one can be bothered to go to the office where the table is. :)
• deleted 4y ago
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