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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

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.
  - vidarh 3y ago
    I'm my case I found a company where almost everyone in including the C-suite is almost entirely remote and is spread everywhere. I'd be very cautious about taking a job where being remote isn't the norm because it makes it a lot of extra effort to avoid being sidelined. In that case I might prefer going in.
    - hot_gril 3y ago
      Yeah, if most are in an office then you can't even trust them saying your job will remain remote. It's mixed where I am. C-suite is partially remote. Some higher-ups aren't remote, but they're in a separate city from my team. Managers on my team used to never come to the office, but lately they have been. And even in-office people are only there 2-3 days a week. I think the biggest thing reducing my risk is the mix of office locations at this point.
api 3y ago
WFH lets you escape crazy high real estate markets. Asking people to RTO in the Bay Area or Seattle should come with a much higher salary to make up for the gigantic housing cost difference. Even further-out suburbs and small towns near those places can be half the cost or less, not to mention going to the Midwest or the inland West like loads of people have done.
- hot_gril 3y ago
  Looking at what pay cut you get moving to each place, it mostly correlates with cost of living like you said, but not exactly.

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.
- vidarh 3y ago
  I'm my case I found a company where almost everyone in including the C-suite is almost entirely remote and is spread everywhere. I'd be very cautious about taking a job where being remote isn't the norm because it makes it a lot of extra effort to avoid being sidelined. In that case I might prefer going in.
  - hot_gril 3y ago
    Yeah, if most are in an office then you can't even trust them saying your job will remain remote. It's mixed where I am. C-suite is partially remote. Some higher-ups aren't remote, but they're in a separate city from my team. Managers on my team used to never come to the office, but lately they have been. And even in-office people are only there 2-3 days a week. I think the biggest thing reducing my risk is the mix of office locations at this point.

api 3y ago

WFH lets you escape crazy high real estate markets. Asking people to RTO in the Bay Area or Seattle should come with a much higher salary to make up for the gigantic housing cost difference. Even further-out suburbs and small towns near those places can be half the cost or less, not to mention going to the Midwest or the inland West like loads of people have done.

hot_gril 3y ago
Looking at what pay cut you get moving to each place, it mostly correlates with cost of living like you said, but not exactly.