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Personally, having worked remotely since 2014, I feel quite secure in the fact the remote work is here long term. The economics of it make sense on both sides

Personally, having worked remotely since 2014, I feel quite secure in the fact the remote work is here long term. The economics of it make sense on both sides (Office costs, salary costs, commutes, hiring pool access) And the organization impacts work well (for knowledge based businesses) if Leadership is able to adapt to measuring outputs instead of inputs and fostering clarity of goals.

staplers 3y ago
The economics of it make sense on both sides It's mostly about inflating commercial real estate valuations (many companies heavily invested) and exerting control over the workforce. Smart companies don't care about either but many (usually larger) corps have vested interest in both.
- WheatMillington 3y ago
  Managers don't care about commercial property values, I don't understand why this asinine argument keeps being made.
  - colinmorelli 3y ago
    Beyond the fact that mangers don't care, there are many, many businesses with zero commercial real estate holdings outside of a fairly short term lease (which is a sunk cost regardless) who also promote RTO. The argument that all these businesses care less about their core business than they do about their (often non-existent) commercial real estate holdings seems tenuous at best. Feels like we keep trying to look for a conspiracy when in reality that answer might just be that leaders believe their teams to be more productive in office (Note: I'm not saying I believe this to be true, that there's evidence for this, that it's right, or anything else along those lines. Just that the most plausible explanation is that people asking for RTO believe it's going to make the company more valuable, not their commercial real estate holdings.)
    - staplers 3y ago
      people asking for RTO believe it's going to make the company more valuable Does leadership value investor approval? I wonder if investors could possibly be invested in more than one avenue than just tech companies.
kypro 3y ago
What I think you'll see happen over the next 1-2 years is that as some jobs return to office the WFH roles will attract more talent, but also be lower compensated on average since some people are happy to take say a 10-20% for a fully remote role. Personally I don't understand why there is even a push to return people to office if they are working fine remotely. We're having this argument at my place right now... Most of us have been remote for 3 years and there's no obvious signs that we're delivering lower quality or any slower than we were before. I think everyone is onboard with occasional team meetups, but requiring an arbitrary amount of office per week serves no good purpose. I do get the need for office work in some cases, but outside of that it seems to me a lot of this is simply driven by managers feeling less important when they can't be office busy bodies. At very least it's interesting to note that the desire to return to work appears to be highest among those with more "power".

staplers 3y ago

The economics of it make sense on both sides It's mostly about inflating commercial real estate valuations (many companies heavily invested) and exerting control over the workforce. Smart companies don't care about either but many (usually larger) corps have vested interest in both.

WheatMillington 3y ago
Managers don't care about commercial property values, I don't understand why this asinine argument keeps being made.
- colinmorelli 3y ago
  Beyond the fact that mangers don't care, there are many, many businesses with zero commercial real estate holdings outside of a fairly short term lease (which is a sunk cost regardless) who also promote RTO. The argument that all these businesses care less about their core business than they do about their (often non-existent) commercial real estate holdings seems tenuous at best. Feels like we keep trying to look for a conspiracy when in reality that answer might just be that leaders believe their teams to be more productive in office (Note: I'm not saying I believe this to be true, that there's evidence for this, that it's right, or anything else along those lines. Just that the most plausible explanation is that people asking for RTO believe it's going to make the company more valuable, not their commercial real estate holdings.)
  - staplers 3y ago
    people asking for RTO believe it's going to make the company more valuable Does leadership value investor approval? I wonder if investors could possibly be invested in more than one avenue than just tech companies.

kypro 3y ago

What I think you'll see happen over the next 1-2 years is that as some jobs return to office the WFH roles will attract more talent, but also be lower compensated on average since some people are happy to take say a 10-20% for a fully remote role. Personally I don't understand why there is even a push to return people to office if they are working fine remotely. We're having this argument at my place right now... Most of us have been remote for 3 years and there's no obvious signs that we're delivering lower quality or any slower than we were before. I think everyone is onboard with occasional team meetups, but requiring an arbitrary amount of office per week serves no good purpose. I do get the need for office work in some cases, but outside of that it seems to me a lot of this is simply driven by managers feeling less important when they can't be office busy bodies. At very least it's interesting to note that the desire to return to work appears to be highest among those with more "power".