5 ms·

Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg might be right: Remote workers are less productive

6 points by uxcolumbo 3y ago

uxcolumbo 3y ago
https://archive.is/3aU4e https://archive.is/3aU4e
- mydriasis 3y ago
  This is blurred
  - LinuxBender 3y ago
    Is this one better? [1] [1] - https://web.archive.org/web/20230803132738/https://fortune.com/2023/08/03/remote-workers-less-productive-research/ https://web.archive.org/web/20230803132738/https://fortune.c...
    - mydriasis 3y ago
      Nope -- still blurred. Strange
      - LinuxBender 3y ago
        Odd. The archive.is version is blurred for me but wayback is not. I have uBlock enabled, maybe something is slipping through that uBlock or one of my other add-ons is catching. Perhaps NoScript or Disable Transitions
        archo 3y ago
        There are maybe at least two reasons that this is happening. Please check this one : https://archive.is/YwIxX https://archive.is/YwIxX BTW, I have uBlock-Origin installed.
        LinuxBender 3y ago
        That one is not blurry for me.
        archo 3y ago
        Thank you for the conformation.
        uxcolumbo 3y ago
        Why is this one not blurred? Both archived pages have the same original Fortune URL? How did you get it to be not blurred?
MBCook 3y ago
Using Musk as an authority to be trusted is a very interesting decision in August of 2023.
- catchnear4321 3y ago
  that’s the angle. if you think musk (or zuck) is dumb, well, this one weird fact they discovered about worker productivity will shock you. it’s clickbait. it held your attention enough to comment on it. but that’s only a partial success. did you click?
  - MBCook 3y ago
    No, because I don’t trust them, and honestly don’t care much if I did as I disagree with the idea that being in an office is necessary (for most jobs). I read the title as something akin to “[people you’re supposed to think are smart] know this so it must be true”. With that reading, Musk seems like a particularly bad choice.
    - catchnear4321 3y ago
      nor should you trust them, but your reading is exactly the intent. rich, successful, powerful people know this thing being stated as fact. musk is a great choice for most readers. (not here, this is a filter.) he’s a billionaire. they aren’t. that’s plenty.
- MBCook 3y ago
  Can’t believe I didn’t think of this earlier? Why not Tim Cook? Runs the biggest and most profitable company in the world and pushes RTO. They make innovative products people love. Wouldn’t that be better? No. Choose the guy who overpaid for a company, trashed the business, can’t pay its bills, and is now getting into battles with the city and his landlord over permitless “improvements” to the HQ.
taraharris 3y ago
This is just desperate propaganda to try to save banks and other entities exposed to dying commercial real estate. It won't work!
DoingIsLearning 3y ago
Reminder that there is a solvency problem in Commercial real estate now that a lot of companies have not renewed their leases post pandemic. Reminder that for the past 2 quarters there has been a steady stream of opinion pieces coming out of Fortune, WSJ, and FT. All with more or less the same message, remote bad, RTO good. They somehow found a study that agrees with their agenda, and disregard all the previous body of evidence that doesn't support their opinion. Take this piece with a giant pinch of salt.
boris_m 3y ago
These kind of articles are sooo dumb. Those tech CEO's are acting like complete idiots. 1. You can measure productivity in a precise way only in some mindless repetitive jobs e.g. are Twitter employees more productive now that they are in the office. How do you measure that (if you measure it in profits, app quality etc. I'd say that they are much less productive) 2. Each person is different. I may be 10% more productive at home than in the office, and my coworker may be 20% less productive. Why do I have to be in the office because of some stupid statistic? 3. Fine, let's say people who work at home have lower productivity. But working from home enables you to hire people from all over the world as well as people who cannot go to the office for various other reasons. I'm not a big tech CEO, but somehow it seems to me that the best candidate in the world, working at 90% of their capacity will still perform better than the best candidate who happens to live in your city and is willing to travel. 4. Working from home is also linked to a better well-being, which means less turnover, better working environment etc. 5. Most importantly: the fucking planet is dying, because of carbon emissions and you want to just dismiss the obvious and already implemented solution for reducing those by letting people not travel to work, just because of some 10% profit increase.
- uxcolumbo 3y ago
  Yep - great points, esp the last point. During COVID air quality went up and probably other damage we cause was reduced as well.
- tamimio 3y ago
  >the fucking planet is dying, because of carbon emissions and you want to just dismiss the obvious They never cared about that, but corps are happy to take government grants and tax cut to “protect” the planet.
- quantified 3y ago
  Disruptive open office plans are just as bad as they ever were. It's part of why we took to WFH so well. And the amount of time we can spend on chit-chat at the office is greater, many more opportunities.
- 3cats-in-a-coat 3y ago
tamimio 3y ago
Another article pushed by banks and commercial landlords. Remote work isn’t going away anytime soon, the pandemic was the reality slap for a lot of employees, they found that the work indeed can be done remotely in efficient and effective ways, without the compromises on all office shenanigans, commute troubles, wasted time, bad launch in a short launch break, and for some even being away from their families and barely seeing their kids on the weekends. Remote work simply shifts the power back to the employees, not entirely but at least it balances thing out, and that’s something corps do not want, they want to treat employees like kindergarten kids and when you achieve something the reward is something cheap and humiliating like this: https://twitter.com/fuckyouiquit/status/1611910606885638144 https://twitter.com/fuckyouiquit/status/1611910606885638144
Zigurd 3y ago
The experiment is well-designed to have statistically sound sample sizes all performing directly comparable and quantifiable work. BUT maybe at the cost of relevance to knowledge work in the US: The researchers observed data entry workers in Chennai, India, who were working either in an office or at home, and found that those randomly assigned to working from home were 18% less productive than office workers. Yes, that's a little unfair to a study in a field where sound experiment design often is hard to have. But only a little.

6 points by uxcolumbo 3y ago

uxcolumbo 3y ago

https://archive.is/3aU4e https://archive.is/3aU4e

mydriasis 3y ago
This is blurred
- LinuxBender 3y ago
  Is this one better? [1] [1] - https://web.archive.org/web/20230803132738/https://fortune.com/2023/08/03/remote-workers-less-productive-research/ https://web.archive.org/web/20230803132738/https://fortune.c...
  - mydriasis 3y ago
    Nope -- still blurred. Strange
    - LinuxBender 3y ago
      Odd. The archive.is version is blurred for me but wayback is not. I have uBlock enabled, maybe something is slipping through that uBlock or one of my other add-ons is catching. Perhaps NoScript or Disable Transitions
      - archo 3y ago
        There are maybe at least two reasons that this is happening. Please check this one : https://archive.is/YwIxX https://archive.is/YwIxX BTW, I have uBlock-Origin installed.
        LinuxBender 3y ago
        That one is not blurry for me.
        archo 3y ago
        Thank you for the conformation.
        uxcolumbo 3y ago
        Why is this one not blurred? Both archived pages have the same original Fortune URL? How did you get it to be not blurred?

MBCook 3y ago

Using Musk as an authority to be trusted is a very interesting decision in August of 2023.

catchnear4321 3y ago
that’s the angle. if you think musk (or zuck) is dumb, well, this one weird fact they discovered about worker productivity will shock you. it’s clickbait. it held your attention enough to comment on it. but that’s only a partial success. did you click?
- MBCook 3y ago
  No, because I don’t trust them, and honestly don’t care much if I did as I disagree with the idea that being in an office is necessary (for most jobs). I read the title as something akin to “[people you’re supposed to think are smart] know this so it must be true”. With that reading, Musk seems like a particularly bad choice.
  - catchnear4321 3y ago
    nor should you trust them, but your reading is exactly the intent. rich, successful, powerful people know this thing being stated as fact. musk is a great choice for most readers. (not here, this is a filter.) he’s a billionaire. they aren’t. that’s plenty.
MBCook 3y ago
Can’t believe I didn’t think of this earlier? Why not Tim Cook? Runs the biggest and most profitable company in the world and pushes RTO. They make innovative products people love. Wouldn’t that be better? No. Choose the guy who overpaid for a company, trashed the business, can’t pay its bills, and is now getting into battles with the city and his landlord over permitless “improvements” to the HQ.

taraharris 3y ago

This is just desperate propaganda to try to save banks and other entities exposed to dying commercial real estate. It won't work!

DoingIsLearning 3y ago

Reminder that there is a solvency problem in Commercial real estate now that a lot of companies have not renewed their leases post pandemic. Reminder that for the past 2 quarters there has been a steady stream of opinion pieces coming out of Fortune, WSJ, and FT. All with more or less the same message, remote bad, RTO good. They somehow found a study that agrees with their agenda, and disregard all the previous body of evidence that doesn't support their opinion. Take this piece with a giant pinch of salt.

boris_m 3y ago

These kind of articles are sooo dumb. Those tech CEO's are acting like complete idiots. 1. You can measure productivity in a precise way only in some mindless repetitive jobs e.g. are Twitter employees more productive now that they are in the office. How do you measure that (if you measure it in profits, app quality etc. I'd say that they are much less productive) 2. Each person is different. I may be 10% more productive at home than in the office, and my coworker may be 20% less productive. Why do I have to be in the office because of some stupid statistic? 3. Fine, let's say people who work at home have lower productivity. But working from home enables you to hire people from all over the world as well as people who cannot go to the office for various other reasons. I'm not a big tech CEO, but somehow it seems to me that the best candidate in the world, working at 90% of their capacity will still perform better than the best candidate who happens to live in your city and is willing to travel. 4. Working from home is also linked to a better well-being, which means less turnover, better working environment etc. 5. Most importantly: the fucking planet is dying, because of carbon emissions and you want to just dismiss the obvious and already implemented solution for reducing those by letting people not travel to work, just because of some 10% profit increase.

uxcolumbo 3y ago
Yep - great points, esp the last point. During COVID air quality went up and probably other damage we cause was reduced as well.
tamimio 3y ago
>the fucking planet is dying, because of carbon emissions and you want to just dismiss the obvious They never cared about that, but corps are happy to take government grants and tax cut to “protect” the planet.
quantified 3y ago
Disruptive open office plans are just as bad as they ever were. It's part of why we took to WFH so well. And the amount of time we can spend on chit-chat at the office is greater, many more opportunities.
3cats-in-a-coat 3y ago

tamimio 3y ago

Another article pushed by banks and commercial landlords. Remote work isn’t going away anytime soon, the pandemic was the reality slap for a lot of employees, they found that the work indeed can be done remotely in efficient and effective ways, without the compromises on all office shenanigans, commute troubles, wasted time, bad launch in a short launch break, and for some even being away from their families and barely seeing their kids on the weekends. Remote work simply shifts the power back to the employees, not entirely but at least it balances thing out, and that’s something corps do not want, they want to treat employees like kindergarten kids and when you achieve something the reward is something cheap and humiliating like this: https://twitter.com/fuckyouiquit/status/1611910606885638144 https://twitter.com/fuckyouiquit/status/1611910606885638144

Zigurd 3y ago

The experiment is well-designed to have statistically sound sample sizes all performing directly comparable and quantifiable work. BUT maybe at the cost of relevance to knowledge work in the US: The researchers observed data entry workers in Chennai, India, who were working either in an office or at home, and found that those randomly assigned to working from home were 18% less productive than office workers. Yes, that's a little unfair to a study in a field where sound experiment design often is hard to have. But only a little.