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Some execs feel their employees are less productive when remote. There isn't a non-gameable way to measure productivity. I can tell you with certainty who on my

Some execs feel their employees are less productive when remote. There isn't a non-gameable way to measure productivity. I can tell you with certainty who on my team is getting the most stuff done any given week or across a year, but I can't provide data as to why.

groos 3y ago
If you can't actually show it from concrete evidence, then your certainty may actually be an illusion. I have worked with busy-beaver devs who created as many issues as they fixed, in effect making no impact to the quality of the product, and with three-toed sloth types as well, who took a while to get the work done but after it was done, it stayed done.
- hot_gril 3y ago
  I can show you what they got done and walk through my reasoning, but again that isn't data. The busy-beaver's metrics will probably look better despite doing nothing useful.
  - peteradio 3y ago
    I think we should bid hours on tasks. If you want to undercut your teammate because they are a sheister, then you can bid it down and call their bluff. You'd need buy-in to automate the obvious stuff so sheister isn't doing make work. And you'd need buy-in to veto bad projects that shouldn't be done to begin with, aka sheister bait projects.
    - hot_gril 3y ago
      You can't have a team function this way normally, because everything you do relies at least indirectly on your teammates cooperating.
dvfjsdhgfv 3y ago
For me it's very easy to measure. When working remotely, I do all my tasks, and if I finish before the en of sprint, I sometimes add something from the backlog I planned to do anyway. When working from the office, I do zero tasks, because the moment someone mentions RTO I change jobs.
- hot_gril 3y ago
  For you, yes. For most of my team, they're required to RTO, and they do it. Only a few people (myself included) were allowed to stay full remote, and we were told it's because we're the most productive members and also have shown no "decrease in presence" while WFH.
  - dingnuts 3y ago
    lol FOR NOW they RTO and then they polish their resumes, and fill seats while they look for a new job. That's what I'd do. Office Space 'bare minimum' mode.
    - hot_gril 3y ago
      They already have houses with families in the Bay Area sorta near the office. They aren't going to quit just to be remote. I'm in a different situation, looking to start a family elsewhere.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
dingnuts 3y ago
there's a simple solution to this: pay more for in-office. If it is really more productive, you'll get your money's worth. I DO NOT CARE if I am theoretically more productive in the office. My price is my WFH price, and you're paying for the amount of productivity you get when I work from home. If you need more productivity at my depressed WFH wages and nobody will come into the office, enjoy the discount on labor and hire more bodies to make up the difference. I am mortal and my company is not, therefore, -I- get to decide how productive I am, and the market can set an appropriate price. If you don't like the price, don't hire me! I won't be losing sleep.
- hot_gril 3y ago
  Worker productivity isn't simply some fungible resource they can pay per cycle for, and there's no "I" in team. They want FTE teammates working 8/5, that's why they aren't interested in a pay-less-get-less arrangement. I've asked before why I can't take 3mo unpaid leave per year.
- vidarh 3y ago
  Last time I was looking for a job (almost exactly a year ago now) that's pretty much what I told recruiters: "My expected salary is X; add 20% if they expect me in the office". It's purely a question of competition: I knew I could land a remote job paying X, and did, so I had no incentive to incur extra costs and lost time to go into an office unless I was paid extra for it. I ended up turning down several offers where people didn't get the memo and thought they could talk me around. In the end I was right about my market rate WFH.
  - hot_gril 3y ago
    That sounds about right and similar to what I experienced last time I was looking for backup offers. You won't convince an in-office team to take a new remote employee, but you can find partially-remote teams (sometimes even within the same company), only they will offer less money. Also, my pay was automatically reduced 10% when I went remote, not because they expect less work from me but because the market rate is different now. Not bad actually.
api 3y ago
It’s hard to measure productivity in a non-gameable way at scale no matter where people are. Manipulative social climbers excel at faking productivity in person.
- hot_gril 3y ago
  Right, but they can tell how productive their workforce is overall.

groos 3y ago

If you can't actually show it from concrete evidence, then your certainty may actually be an illusion. I have worked with busy-beaver devs who created as many issues as they fixed, in effect making no impact to the quality of the product, and with three-toed sloth types as well, who took a while to get the work done but after it was done, it stayed done.

hot_gril 3y ago
I can show you what they got done and walk through my reasoning, but again that isn't data. The busy-beaver's metrics will probably look better despite doing nothing useful.
- peteradio 3y ago
  I think we should bid hours on tasks. If you want to undercut your teammate because they are a sheister, then you can bid it down and call their bluff. You'd need buy-in to automate the obvious stuff so sheister isn't doing make work. And you'd need buy-in to veto bad projects that shouldn't be done to begin with, aka sheister bait projects.
  - hot_gril 3y ago
    You can't have a team function this way normally, because everything you do relies at least indirectly on your teammates cooperating.

dvfjsdhgfv 3y ago

For me it's very easy to measure. When working remotely, I do all my tasks, and if I finish before the en of sprint, I sometimes add something from the backlog I planned to do anyway. When working from the office, I do zero tasks, because the moment someone mentions RTO I change jobs.

hot_gril 3y ago
For you, yes. For most of my team, they're required to RTO, and they do it. Only a few people (myself included) were allowed to stay full remote, and we were told it's because we're the most productive members and also have shown no "decrease in presence" while WFH.
- dingnuts 3y ago
  lol FOR NOW they RTO and then they polish their resumes, and fill seats while they look for a new job. That's what I'd do. Office Space 'bare minimum' mode.
  - hot_gril 3y ago
    They already have houses with families in the Bay Area sorta near the office. They aren't going to quit just to be remote. I'm in a different situation, looking to start a family elsewhere.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

dingnuts 3y ago

there's a simple solution to this: pay more for in-office. If it is really more productive, you'll get your money's worth. I DO NOT CARE if I am theoretically more productive in the office. My price is my WFH price, and you're paying for the amount of productivity you get when I work from home. If you need more productivity at my depressed WFH wages and nobody will come into the office, enjoy the discount on labor and hire more bodies to make up the difference. I am mortal and my company is not, therefore, -I- get to decide how productive I am, and the market can set an appropriate price. If you don't like the price, don't hire me! I won't be losing sleep.

hot_gril 3y ago
Worker productivity isn't simply some fungible resource they can pay per cycle for, and there's no "I" in team. They want FTE teammates working 8/5, that's why they aren't interested in a pay-less-get-less arrangement. I've asked before why I can't take 3mo unpaid leave per year.
vidarh 3y ago
Last time I was looking for a job (almost exactly a year ago now) that's pretty much what I told recruiters: "My expected salary is X; add 20% if they expect me in the office". It's purely a question of competition: I knew I could land a remote job paying X, and did, so I had no incentive to incur extra costs and lost time to go into an office unless I was paid extra for it. I ended up turning down several offers where people didn't get the memo and thought they could talk me around. In the end I was right about my market rate WFH.
- hot_gril 3y ago
  That sounds about right and similar to what I experienced last time I was looking for backup offers. You won't convince an in-office team to take a new remote employee, but you can find partially-remote teams (sometimes even within the same company), only they will offer less money. Also, my pay was automatically reduced 10% when I went remote, not because they expect less work from me but because the market rate is different now. Not bad actually.

api 3y ago

It’s hard to measure productivity in a non-gameable way at scale no matter where people are. Manipulative social climbers excel at faking productivity in person.

hot_gril 3y ago
Right, but they can tell how productive their workforce is overall.