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> Once more, companies want butts in seats — even though there's no legitimate business reason for many employees to return to the office. If there were no leg

> Once more, companies want butts in seats — even though there's no legitimate business reason for many employees to return to the office. If there were no legitimate business reason they wouldn't do it since it costs them a great deal to do so. And if businesses are acting irrationally? There are plenty of companies who are not returning to office, so we'll certainly see them out compete and displace the office-based businesses.

piva00 2y ago
> And if businesses are acting irrationally? That seems to be the most plausible answer. Businesses are led by people and acting irrationally even when not financially beneficial isn't out of the realm of reality. Businesses in the same industry already suffer from a herd mentality, doing the opposite thing that others are doing is risky, most leaders will choose less risk. It becomes dominoes, one leader from a benchmark company makes a hard to quantify wrong decision, another will follow, the side-effects will take a few years to crop up and by then almost the whole industry will have followed suit.
- pintxo 2y ago
  You mean like open plan offices?
  - atmavatar 2y ago
    Also overtime. We have over a century of evidence that requiring employees work > 40h/week for long periods of time is a net loss in productivity compared to working fewer hours. That's why we have a standard 40 hours per workweek and a concept of overtime in the first place. However, there's always going to be a large cohort of management that thinks their employees are different so they can squeeze out more hours, so we get BS like trying to convince employees they're part of a family they need to sacrifice for and (unfortunately successful) lobbying for legal overtime exemptions across certain jobs.
jedberg 2y ago
I think you're not accounting for momentum. Amazon can act irrationally for decades before they get out-competed.

piva00 2y ago

> And if businesses are acting irrationally? That seems to be the most plausible answer. Businesses are led by people and acting irrationally even when not financially beneficial isn't out of the realm of reality. Businesses in the same industry already suffer from a herd mentality, doing the opposite thing that others are doing is risky, most leaders will choose less risk. It becomes dominoes, one leader from a benchmark company makes a hard to quantify wrong decision, another will follow, the side-effects will take a few years to crop up and by then almost the whole industry will have followed suit.

pintxo 2y ago
You mean like open plan offices?
- atmavatar 2y ago
  Also overtime. We have over a century of evidence that requiring employees work > 40h/week for long periods of time is a net loss in productivity compared to working fewer hours. That's why we have a standard 40 hours per workweek and a concept of overtime in the first place. However, there's always going to be a large cohort of management that thinks their employees are different so they can squeeze out more hours, so we get BS like trying to convince employees they're part of a family they need to sacrifice for and (unfortunately successful) lobbying for legal overtime exemptions across certain jobs.

jedberg 2y ago

I think you're not accounting for momentum. Amazon can act irrationally for decades before they get out-competed.