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> They don't care about corporate R/E at all. Yeah, the meme about an evil conspiracy of corporate CEOs also owning commercial real estate is really, really du

by mjr00 3y ago

> They don't care about corporate R/E at all. Yeah, the meme about an evil conspiracy of corporate CEOs also owning commercial real estate is really, really dumb. Maybe you could theorize that when Andy Jassy and Tim Cook were the only people pushing for RTO, but now more and more companies are doing it, and I assure you that the CEO of (insert random 100-person tech company here) doesn't have deep investments in commercial real estate. Occam's razor: the simple fact is management thinks that people are more productive when in the office. They may be wrong about that, of course. But if the question is "why is management pushing for RTO," it's simply because they believe their teams will produce more and better output while in the office.

onlyrealcuzzo 3y ago
> But if the question is "why is management pushing for RTO," it's simply because they believe their teams will produce more and better output while in the office. I strongly disagree. Managers don't care how productive their teams are. They care about keeping their jobs. They care about hiring more people and building an empire and climbing the career ladder. If your team is more productive working in Hawaii, but you'll lose your job, you're not going to recommend they work from Hawaii. You're going to recommend they be less productive and you keep your job. The same way if your team doesn't need any more people, you're going to fight to get more people, because you don't care about the company, you care about climbing the ladder. Of course, they don't see it like this. > It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.
- RestlessMind 3y ago
  > Managers don't care how productive their teams are. They care about keeping their jobs. They care about hiring more people and building an empire and climbing the career ladder. All true > If your team is more productive working in Hawaii, but you'll lose your job, you're not going to recommend they work from Hawaii. Huh? I don't see why a team being in Hawaii would lead the manager to lose their job. You still need management in a fully remote setting.
  - onlyrealcuzzo 3y ago
    > I don't see why a team being in Hawaii would lead the manager to lose their job. It's just a hypothetical. In my circle, it seems popular thinking that remote work could lead to less managers. Time will maybe tell if that's true or false.
    - RestlessMind 3y ago
      > it seems popular thinking that remote work could lead to less managers. But.... why? A manager's work still stays the same whether their teams are in office or online. Really curious to understand why one would think otherwise.
- mjr00 3y ago
  This is like saying developers don't care about the software they work on and intentionally introduce tech debt for the sake of job security. True in some cases, not universally applicable.
  - spacemadness 3y ago
    I hate to break it to you but people do exactly this in the form of grossly over-engineered solutions with fancy design docs that impress the right people at the right time.
    - mjr00 3y ago
      That's why I said "true in some cases" Though in my 15+ year career as dev and dev manager I've only ever encountered one person who was intentionally building things poorly for job-related reasons. (Even then, that was for a company doing a federal government contract, so arguably building it in a way that encouraged expensive maintenance contracts was good for the business, in a perverse way.) I've seen a lot of overengineered solutions with fancy design docs but they've always come from a good place, genuinely thinking that the hot new tool X or architecture Y is going to solve all of the problems. I've built some poorly overengineered solutions myself. But even if that road of overengineered solutions leads to hell, it's at least paved with good intentions.
      - JohnFen 3y ago
        > Though in my 15+ year career as dev and dev manager I've only ever encountered one person who was intentionally building things poorly for job-related reasons. I agree, I've very rarely seen this done by individuals. However, I've often seen it done by teams.
      - drewcoo 3y ago
        > thinking that the hot new tool X or architecture Y is going to solve all of the problems Wanting to use X and Y and finding a way to shoehorn them into usefulness is called "motivated reasoning." Does that look any different from "coming from a good place?" Heck, it could be both motivated reasoning and coming from a good place.
- HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
  > Managers don't care how productive their teams are. They care about keeping their jobs Can you see that the second is a likely consequence of the first?
  - flashgordon 3y ago
    Dont you mean the other way around? The primary motivation imo is keeping your job. If the team is productive even better no? I am not sure a manager wakes up in the morning thinking about productivity as much as what's gonna get in between them and their job (source: I've been there).

by mjr00 3y ago

onlyrealcuzzo 3y ago

> But if the question is "why is management pushing for RTO," it's simply because they believe their teams will produce more and better output while in the office. I strongly disagree. Managers don't care how productive their teams are. They care about keeping their jobs. They care about hiring more people and building an empire and climbing the career ladder. If your team is more productive working in Hawaii, but you'll lose your job, you're not going to recommend they work from Hawaii. You're going to recommend they be less productive and you keep your job. The same way if your team doesn't need any more people, you're going to fight to get more people, because you don't care about the company, you care about climbing the ladder. Of course, they don't see it like this. > It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.

RestlessMind 3y ago
> Managers don't care how productive their teams are. They care about keeping their jobs. They care about hiring more people and building an empire and climbing the career ladder. All true > If your team is more productive working in Hawaii, but you'll lose your job, you're not going to recommend they work from Hawaii. Huh? I don't see why a team being in Hawaii would lead the manager to lose their job. You still need management in a fully remote setting.
- onlyrealcuzzo 3y ago
  > I don't see why a team being in Hawaii would lead the manager to lose their job. It's just a hypothetical. In my circle, it seems popular thinking that remote work could lead to less managers. Time will maybe tell if that's true or false.
  - RestlessMind 3y ago
    > it seems popular thinking that remote work could lead to less managers. But.... why? A manager's work still stays the same whether their teams are in office or online. Really curious to understand why one would think otherwise.
mjr00 3y ago
This is like saying developers don't care about the software they work on and intentionally introduce tech debt for the sake of job security. True in some cases, not universally applicable.
- spacemadness 3y ago
  I hate to break it to you but people do exactly this in the form of grossly over-engineered solutions with fancy design docs that impress the right people at the right time.
  - mjr00 3y ago
    That's why I said "true in some cases" Though in my 15+ year career as dev and dev manager I've only ever encountered one person who was intentionally building things poorly for job-related reasons. (Even then, that was for a company doing a federal government contract, so arguably building it in a way that encouraged expensive maintenance contracts was good for the business, in a perverse way.) I've seen a lot of overengineered solutions with fancy design docs but they've always come from a good place, genuinely thinking that the hot new tool X or architecture Y is going to solve all of the problems. I've built some poorly overengineered solutions myself. But even if that road of overengineered solutions leads to hell, it's at least paved with good intentions.
    - JohnFen 3y ago
      > Though in my 15+ year career as dev and dev manager I've only ever encountered one person who was intentionally building things poorly for job-related reasons. I agree, I've very rarely seen this done by individuals. However, I've often seen it done by teams.
    - drewcoo 3y ago
      > thinking that the hot new tool X or architecture Y is going to solve all of the problems Wanting to use X and Y and finding a way to shoehorn them into usefulness is called "motivated reasoning." Does that look any different from "coming from a good place?" Heck, it could be both motivated reasoning and coming from a good place.
HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
> Managers don't care how productive their teams are. They care about keeping their jobs Can you see that the second is a likely consequence of the first?
- flashgordon 3y ago
  Dont you mean the other way around? The primary motivation imo is keeping your job. If the team is productive even better no? I am not sure a manager wakes up in the morning thinking about productivity as much as what's gonna get in between them and their job (source: I've been there).