I don't think there is anything else more illogical in modern society than waking up in building A, hopping in a car and fighting traffic for an hour to get to building B just to sit in front of a computer for 8 hours (perhaps with a few minimally productive meetings here and there), then commute back to building A 8 hours later.
Building B sits empty for 16 hours a day while Building A sits empty for 10 with both being heated/cooled for 24 hours. The employee wastes 2 of their 16 available waking hours in the non-productive commute while incurring significant financial costs (lease/insurance/fuel/energy) in order to support this patently absurd activity. Similarly the employer wastes time and energy negotiating leases, re-arranging offices, purchasing AV equipment for meeting rooms in building B, etc.,etc., in addition to paying the likely enormously expensive lease itself.
The impacts on the environment, the number of hours of human life wasted in commute, the pointless buildings and associated costs to employers as well as the public infrastructure to support it (roads, trains, busses, etc.) are all incredibly wasteful. Surely, all of this could only be justified if physical presence had a dramatic impact on productivity. Yet, we cannot tell one way or the other if it actually improves outcomes.
Given that description, it's completely illogical. You've described no differences at all between buildings A and B!
In reality, though, building A might be poorly-suited to work because of children, pets, or other people, or it might be located in an area that's very noisy during the hours in question, or it might be maintained to a different standard of cleanliness, one not conducive to focus, or it might have poor connectivity options available, or...
In reality, building B is the destination for many people working on the same or related projects, so people focused on the same thing can focus and share information easily, and people focused on similar or related things can focus and share information easily. The single-use environment is oriented entirely toward the work expected, without having to support any other uses. Equipment failures can be easily handled because of onsite spares. Connectivity is assured. Comfort is assured. There are likely more meal options in the vicinity, given the nature of office buildings vs residential areas. And so on.
Personally, I prefer to work from home, and I have a dedicated workspace with a 1GB fiber connection and no pets or young kids underfoot, so I don't have a commute, which averages 30 minutes where I live. But it doesn't seem ridiculous or illogical for companies to expect employees to show up at work, and many people seem to prefer separating the two.
>Building B sits empty for 16 hours a day while Building A sits empty for 10 with both being heated/cooled for 24 hours.
Don't know where you live and work, but that's not the case for me. In most buildings I've worked in, aircon/heating switches off around 6pm. And I certainly don't leave my home heated while not in it.
Of everything wrong with modern society, the inefficiency of having separate home and office buildings ranks pretty low imho.
In the short term, kinda curious what would happen to all the people who are sustained by the economic activity of the things you deem superfluous. Someone works those jobs. Provides lunch, cleans the offices, sets up the furniture and AV, maintains the building, etc...
The pure fact that it provides increased economic activity and therefore is able to support different jobs and the second/third order consequences of those makes perfect sense to me.
In your stay at home model, what would all those people do instead?
Probably going to get downvoted by people but… There are a lot of people ITT scornful of Apple’s decision here, and saying that they’re only doing it for dumb reasons, I.e., to justify their office or because managers are old and out of touch.
Please don’t take this as a wholehearted endorsement of Apple’s policy here, but I do sort of get it. In my experience, doing collaborative creative work is dramatically more difficult in a remote environment. In person we can quickly sketch diagrams and wireframes out on a whiteboard or paper and having a six person debate about designs is easy. Remotely, you have to deal with virtual whiteboard software (and as much as I love figjam, it can’t compare to the speed of a physical pen) and video chat (where even a tiny amount of latency results in people talking over each other). I’m sure remote works well for some creative teams… but in my experience, it is much harder (I’ve spoken to peers at other companies who feel the same way). If Apple thinks that collaboration and idea creation are core to innovation, I can see why they want people back in the office.
Not saying I agree with their methods though - personally I would have gone for a softer touch and a more tailored-by-team approach.
Apple can mandate whatever the hell they like, but there will be no putting the toothpaste back into the work from home tube. I won't even consider roles that force me to commute and work in some corporate rat's nest, no matter how nicely it might be decorated.
Are you sure? I’ve been seeing numerous headlines suggesting that you don’t actually feel that way - in fact no one does, and everyone really wants to go back to the office.
Additionally, fabric of society, progress, puppy dogs, and America. Think of the children (during your commute.)
We’re in this cubicle together. (Management thought it would cut costs.)
Does anyone else get major 1929 vibes when they read posts like this?
I suspect there may be a day where people are happy for any job that pays them to stay alive and have food, WPA style. An office might not sound so bad after a few years of laying sidewalks and repairing bridges.
You might as well call me reversible toothpaste then.
People are getting offers, which are so insane, a friend of mine, more like a distant friend of a friend recently got a total comp package of slightly over 250k per year.
He only has to go in 2 days per week, and it's pretty flexible. You can make the days up.
But he's also the type of person who really likes to get out of the house, they own dogs so often he'll just need to get out of there.
I takes me 20 minutes to cycle in to work, pretty much, from home desk to office desk.
I can commute when I want and certainly I don’t ever commute when I have to — we have no mandated office attendance. I do a core set of “days” where I’m guaranteed to come in for lunch, at the very least.
I also come home early — dodging traffic — if the afternoon is looking like I won’t need to talk with anyone. Bunking off for the whole afternoon and doing a night shift of post-dinner to bedtime is also ultra productive, if the family let me, because of the laser focus I seem to get when there are very few people to distract me.
A short amount of light exercise away from the computer is so useful for the thought process that I’ve even commuted twice in the same day, though this is very rare.
Many of my colleagues have the same quality of life but a lot of them have also committed to fully- or mostly-remote, and you feel sorry for them being left behind. Too many decisions happen because they are either discussed in person, or ratified based on the relationships between people who see each other regularly.
Thinking back to my days of spending 2x 90 minutes on the 101 (the main highway in the Bay Area) makes me feel quite unwell.
Being individually very productive is not necessarily good for a company. Just wanted to point that out as a lot of HN (and offline) commenters say - well, I get so much more done when I’m not at work. But that misses the point: what matters is the team’s overall progress, which is (1) certainly not equal to the sum of each individual’s perceived productivity and (2) heavily a function of personal relationships and communication. that is why remote might seem like a great idea for the individual coder yet have managers stressed out of their minds.
I’ve spoken to so many managers about remote. Off the record, all of them have said it is a nightmare for them to coordinate the team.
The last part - missing out on important decisions - is it a geographical one - it's a hierarchy issue. Decisions about you will get made "above you" that you suddenly have no input into.
Until we chnage the decision making process (ie more democracy) in companies we won't have input into the truly important decisions
Exactly this; people who chose to live in a suburban hell with a 2 hour driving commute chose that path for themselves. I have no sympathy if they are reluctant to come back to the office.
I'm so glad to be working at a company (a SaaS startup) that transitioned to a permanent "remote first" policy when Covid hit. That transition was validated by a significant productivity increase - they have good data to say it makes business sense not to go back.
Personally, I'll never go back to working in an office, God willing.
As you traverse the management tree towards the top, both age and ability to influence office policy go up. And as age goes up, remote management experience/comfort goes down.
Conscious or not, the people with the power are making things most comfortable for them. They’re not necessarily acting in the best interest of the company.
I'm very curious if WFH can survive a recession. My gut tells me no, but who knows. Though I enjoy the flexibility of hybrid, I can't help but feel it's the worse of both worlds. Still gotta live close and commute, but don't have the consistency (colleagues will have different schedules) so you often end up in the office and video chatting anyway.
I really like WFH. But I also enjoy working with people F2F.
Discussions around topics happen spontaneously without a meeting and an agenda. Insights created in these type of meetings is very hard to replicate in remote settings.
Also, going for lunch with colleagues is something I don’t want to miss.
That said, I have been most productive working at home.
So for me, the winning model is a mix. 2 days to mingle and have spontaneous encounters, 3 days to work and have scheduled meetings.
The hardesr part of any job for me is the social part. I can get by just fine but meetings after meetings in person, awkward social events and lunches. People forming tribes and playing mind games aginst each other. That's any work place I have seen. Don't care for it one bit. I focus on technical skills since that is what is expected of me and as such a company could best extract value out of me by letting me skip all thay bullshit.
But if your job does indeed require you to form personal relationships and manage office politics I think office works out for you best. What is fulfilling to you might be bursensome and mentally taxing on others.
This is similar to open office work spaces, some people thrive in that environment while others can barely survive. It is impossible to manage time because of constant interruptions and useless time wasting things. Any productivity is a side effect of being lucky enough to squeeze a few hours in between driving, socializing, meetings and peoppe walking up randomly to talk.
I'll be honest 100% here with this regard: covid was the best thing to happen to me for my social, mental and emotional wellbeing.
You all need to stop expecting fishes to climb trees. Try seeing things from others' perspective. I would take a significant pay cut and more responsibility and move to a different location to switch jobs if that meant I would get the most wfh time. Balance is good and happy workers are positivr ROI workers.
I think once a week mandatory and another day in a week whenever there is a good reason to meet and work with in person is best balance.
Speaking of perspective, some people live with families where there is distraction and interruptions there as well so i see their view as well.
I can appreciate 1-2 days a week in the office. There are certainly some benefits to be had there. But if I consistently come into the office 2 days a week, I know for certain that my company is going to push for 3 days, then 4 etc... And I'd much rather be fully remote than have to come in even 3 days a week. That being said, I tend to work a lot more hours when working remotely.
I find discussions and calls happen organically on Slack. I'll often get a message "I'm stuck on this bug, can we huddle?" then we open a voice chat and screen share our way through the problem
Strangely, I have far more unscheduled discussions about real work than I do when I go into the office
When I go into the office we eat lunch together, we chat about non-work related things. It's fun but they are also the days where I get the least done, and where I feel the least bonding with my colleagues
I feel closest with my colleagues and friends when we have a video or voice call and work hard to solve real problems together. There's a shared sense of achievement
I go into the office once a fortnight to pick up shared lunch that we eat together. Sometimes I'll arrange a work-from-Cafe morning where we find a great coffee shop and take our laptops for the morning
> Discussions around topics happen spontaneously without a meeting and an agenda. Insights created in these type of meetings is very hard to replicate in remote settings.
I too find this highly valuable. But there's a solution for that: Regularly catching up with people. It seems silly at first, but works quite well for transferring all those important secondary bits of information.
At my last job, I would go into the office one day per month, for the monthly happy hour. Those mornings were easily my least-productive days all month. Nice to talk to people, but very unproductive.
My new job is 100% remote, no office in my city AFAIK, so I'm more productive... but I still meet up with my old coworkers for monthly happy hour.
The issues I've found with hybrid working are that a) people come in on different days, so it's not really the same as full time, and b) because video conferencing still sucks so much if you have some people in a room and some on Zoom, the ones in the room tend to give up on the zoom people and have side conversations because it's so much easier.
Also I can see it from the company's point of view - it sucks paying for a desk for only 3 days a week and everyone hates hotdesking.
I think office work is mostly superior for most people except for the commute (and also the ability to naughtily do house chores when you technically should be working). Maybe we should concentrate on making commutes nicer.
I think employees should also be given the choice of hot desking vs cold desking for an appropriate pay rise/cut. Nobody likes hot desking but I bet few would be willing to pay the actual cost for a dedicated desk.
I guess hybrid is the one that works for me too. I take some time to get to know people. A fully remote job makes this hard especially if any kind of spontaneous stuff is missing. I've not done any hybrid or fully remote job but have had to take fully remote courses in my college and that semester was pretty depressing. I'm in a new country too so the overall feeling of loneliness can be a real bummer
There is a huge chunk of the economy that is agitating for RTO.
All the big consultancies are pushing it, travel sector (eg airlines, hotels, conference circuit folks) are pushing it, corp real estate and related service sector (think Aramark and other bigCo service companies) are pushing it, etc.
All these folks are on site in your BigCo HQ week in, week out, talking to your senior execs who are predominantly white men 50+ years old, trying to convince them this is like an existential crisis only they can solve and which will supercharge their firm for the next 25 years.
I've seen this shit up close and it's real. Big money and big egos pushing this agenda.
It will happen, just a matter of how long it takes.
I agree on all the benefits of WFH that have already been mentioned, but I do miss the daily casual interactions with colleagues, e.g. in front of coffee. I think, long term, teams will be less cohesive and companies will see less idea exchange (the unstructured or serendipitous kind)
At apple you are not allowed to discuss anything with anyone until you've gone to one of three(!!) internal websites to see if they are "disclosed" on the thing you want to discuss with them. "Spontaneous" conversations cannot happen by definition.
I grew up socializing online so I am the opposite. The office was a barrage of spontaneous interruptions, and made me look for a hole in the back of the office to hide in. It’s easier to take a brainstorming walk and ping a colleague with an idea than give them the 50th shoulder tap of the day. It’s understandable that not everyone is used to communicating in this way.
Just because something has worked one way for ages doesn't mean it can't work another way. It really is a culture thing I think. If you've been working in an office your whole life and you are used to that then I can totally see it being difficult.
If you are a digital native whose social life has taken place largely online it is likely WFH is better.
In some ways the world/technology/culture has changed so much and so frequently over the last 40-50 years that each generation's lived experience growing up is markedly different than the last. In the totality of the human experience this is pretty rare. I think work is only going to become more age segregated over time due to cultural differences.
I’m not planning on ever working for anyone else, ever again; whether in an office, or WFH. That said, I work harder, these days, at my standing desk, in the corner of my living room, than I ever did in an office.
WFH is not a magic panacea. I know a number of folks that WFH, and it’s damn near impossible to get together with them, because their jobs own their asses. They are young, and don’t mind (yet). They seem to be on Zoom calls, all day, every day.
Wait until they have kids, though…
Many folks are not able to maintain discipline, on their own, in their home. I know folks that go to co-working spaces, or even libraries (only if they don’t have a bunch of Zoom meetings).
Others actually get depressed, because of the lack of social interaction. They need to be around others.
For myself, neither of the above apply. I could happily be a hermit, and am seriously self-disciplined. WFH would work great for me.
The problem is that I have gotten used to not having others crap all over my work, and that can happen in a remote environment, every bit as easily as in the office.
It’s not “one size fits all,” which is difficult for companies of a certain size, to handle. Modern HR is built around a model, where no one is an individual, and the same rules and structure apply to everyone. That’s difficult, in distributed workplaces.
I'd love to go back to the office. I like the collaboration and the social side. Too bad all the local employers are cheap feudal lords, and the work they do boring. I could drive further and maybe find something better, but I'm not going back to commuting 2 hours a day and ruining my health. Remote has given me access to a much broader job pool.
I tried to do hybrid a few days a week at Google Waterloo for a few months before just quitting. They axed the parking lot, making me walk 10 minutes to and from my car or fight for an EV charging spot. Before COVID they kept making the entire office environment more and more crowded, loud, and unpleasant. As for hybrid, I'd go in for a day and nobody I worked with would be there, and I'd end up meeting everyone virtually, so it was just like working from home... but with an annoying commute and better air conditioning and Internet.
Remote is the only sane option, and I'll do it until I can't. And once I can't I'll sell my house, downsize and retire or found a startup. I'm not the only one, I'm sure. The BigCos that lose senior employees through being inflexible might find themselves competing with them later as those people go on to found their own startups.
It’s sad to look at my sleep tracker app and see the jump in sleep quantity and quality starting in March 2020 that will soon have to end because some exec has nothing to do if he’s not walking around interrupting peoples’ work.
I had to commute almost 4 hrs every day. Waking up at 5am to be there at 8am. I can play with my son, have quality time with my wife and get up at 7am and finish at 5 and I'm home already. I won't go back, God willing.
I would almost go back to an office, if the company would stop being so lazy and incompetent. Every company is insanely disorganized and inefficient.
You can never find other teams, projects, code, docs, company policies, vendor agreements, onboarding guides, meeting notes. "Agile" became an excuse to not give a shit what anyone did and let everything devolve into the lowest common denominator: tribal silos. Business units are fiefdoms.
Getting access to anything is a scavenger hunt and still takes a week after opening a ticket. There is no useful self-service automation. Desktop support for developers is pathetic while it's top-notch for paper pushers. Nobody has a baseline of training even though we all really need to know certain processes to do our jobs correctly.
Security is a complete joke. They harp on us for falling a phishing test when they have terrible UX to identify real emails, like that's the single thing other than rotating passwords that makes the company secure. Meanwhile the intranet doesn't have an SSL cert.
We can't get 10 grand for some critical SaaS we need for our jobs, but they'll plunk down that much per year on junk food we don't need. But also please work overtime for free because you're salaried and it's expected.
Get your shit together, companies. Do that and maybe I'll drag my ass all the way to your annoying open floor plan I-forgot-my-badge-can-someone-buzz-me-in germ-spreading hot-desking offices and ignore the lies you tell about this being for productivity.
I made my team fully 100% remote in September 2019. Hah! Then covid hit. The entire team was safely at home since then.
BUT.
I have to say while its a nice perk for the job (typing this from South East Asia), productivity is less than what I would like. People take work for granted a bit more and are a little more "entitled" to everything now.
And I get it. It's really nice to be able to work around your job instead of the reverse.
I think some people (like me) are better in-person managers than remote managers. And that's why the quality of remote work is spotty or so many managers want people back in house.
Let's not also forget that all the things that were cherish and use were mostly built by teams of people working together on some site. Whether it's the buildings, the internet infrastructure, the food you eat, the services your subscribe to, the software you're using right now, the computer or phone you're typing from -- all of it is built and delivered by groups of people that see each other every day in offices.
Please, don't get it twisted that just because you can code, provide customer support or write remotely -- that the other 95% of people can.
Remote work is an untested thing and really, only works for a tiny set of knowledge businesses.
So, while I love that our team works remote -- I would say most people will have to get off their a*ses and get back to the office.
Your company may suck at remote, but Apple doesn't. Two years into the pandemic, we see record AAPL profits, no visible downturn in software quality. And yet Apple's CEO, in thrall to the pet social theories of a bunch of ancient billionaires, is willing to throw it all away.
Eh. I don't want to put words in your mouth, but by entitled do you mean less scared of layoff? If so, management does have tools ( or at least should have ) to motivate employees by means other than survival..
I mean it is true. You can tell people are less concerned about their jobs ( anecdotally, my McD messes up my order a lot more often now ), but to me it only proves management had an easy ride the past few decades. Now they actually have to work.
>all of it is built and delivered by groups of people that see each other every day in offices.
Except for those tools that have always been maintained by remote collaborators since it became possible with the internet connecting open source software engineers from around the world. Plus all the businesses that have always been remote.
>I think some people (like me) are better in-person managers than remote managers. And that's why the quality of remote work is spotty or so many managers want people back in house.
Then learn to be a better manager rather than making a whole bunch of people miserable to save yourself the hassle of improving.
This is cringe. As a se ill choose a company that's 100% remote over any other in office position anywhere 100% of the time no matter the salary. Been working remote since 2017 and life is infinitely better.
My company mandated return to office two days a week.
I quit and landed a better job that’s remote and with location-independent pay.
Working from an office is fine for some. Make it optional.
Lots of companies are still hiring. I encourage you to see what’s out there and ask interviewers if roles can be made remote.
Commuting is an expensive, time-consuming, and wasteful activity. Working from an open office was, for me, a source of near constant low level background stress. It felt unnatural, and I couldn’t work as well. Now, remote, I can deliver more quality work with less burnout. I am also feeling healthier.
Never working in a shared office again if I can help it. I’m fortunate enough to have a dedicated room in my house for an office and it’s wonderful. Been fully remote for over six years now.
I have to think they’re going to either give key devs/engineers more flexibility than this or they’re going to lose large groups of staff except for those who are there because they really like working for Apple as a company.
Anyone there who views it as just another job (even if it’s one they enjoy) who is significantly inconvenienced by longer commutes or the high price of living locally and the degraded work/life balance has got to be eyeing their options. Even a pay cut to go elsewhere is moot if it means you can live in better & cheaper accommodations in a location of your choosing.
3 WFH days a week is what my current employer allows for any dev/it/non-customer-facing roll and my workplace absolutely hates hates hates the idea of WFH. Pre Covid it was banned, for everyone for every reason. They even fought it on “undue hardship” grounds when it was requested as an ADA accommodation. Now they’ve changed because they realize that their ideological opposition to it will (and has) hurt them as they forced people going back to the office. We lost roughly 1/3 of tech-oriented staff before operations degraded to such an awful state that they changed. I lost multiple candidates for a position on my team.
I view this purely as a cynical move by Apple to help decrease headcount the way other tech companies are doing and because they’ve clearly not liked WFH in general and know that a cooling job market gives employees fewer options.
These moves may even obtain in the short term, but all job markets are cyclical and employee expectations are not going to return to pre-Covid mentality. In the medium term of 2-3 years they’ll simply gain a reputation of being a bit more worker & WFH hostile in the marketplace at the same time the most people and especially top talent have no end of options that will give them the work environment freedom they desire. And when the job market heats up again they’ll have a harder time recruiting, even if they change their policy. It will be harder to trust the commitment to flexible scheduling & work location.
Or maybe I’m wrong, I’m not high level executive with an eye on long term labor market & “human capital management” (awful term) and I’m I know there’s smarter people than me at Apple, likely some included in making this decision, but my non expert opinion gained through a bit of anecdotal experience and armchair observation of peers and trends indicates it’s a bad decision made with short-term thinking only.
[+] [-] osigurdson|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pwinnski|3 years ago|reply
In reality, though, building A might be poorly-suited to work because of children, pets, or other people, or it might be located in an area that's very noisy during the hours in question, or it might be maintained to a different standard of cleanliness, one not conducive to focus, or it might have poor connectivity options available, or...
In reality, building B is the destination for many people working on the same or related projects, so people focused on the same thing can focus and share information easily, and people focused on similar or related things can focus and share information easily. The single-use environment is oriented entirely toward the work expected, without having to support any other uses. Equipment failures can be easily handled because of onsite spares. Connectivity is assured. Comfort is assured. There are likely more meal options in the vicinity, given the nature of office buildings vs residential areas. And so on.
Personally, I prefer to work from home, and I have a dedicated workspace with a 1GB fiber connection and no pets or young kids underfoot, so I don't have a commute, which averages 30 minutes where I live. But it doesn't seem ridiculous or illogical for companies to expect employees to show up at work, and many people seem to prefer separating the two.
[+] [-] stevage|3 years ago|reply
Don't know where you live and work, but that's not the case for me. In most buildings I've worked in, aircon/heating switches off around 6pm. And I certainly don't leave my home heated while not in it.
Of everything wrong with modern society, the inefficiency of having separate home and office buildings ranks pretty low imho.
[+] [-] aikinai|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mouzogu|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] adiffview99now|3 years ago|reply
The pure fact that it provides increased economic activity and therefore is able to support different jobs and the second/third order consequences of those makes perfect sense to me.
In your stay at home model, what would all those people do instead?
[+] [-] 542458|3 years ago|reply
Please don’t take this as a wholehearted endorsement of Apple’s policy here, but I do sort of get it. In my experience, doing collaborative creative work is dramatically more difficult in a remote environment. In person we can quickly sketch diagrams and wireframes out on a whiteboard or paper and having a six person debate about designs is easy. Remotely, you have to deal with virtual whiteboard software (and as much as I love figjam, it can’t compare to the speed of a physical pen) and video chat (where even a tiny amount of latency results in people talking over each other). I’m sure remote works well for some creative teams… but in my experience, it is much harder (I’ve spoken to peers at other companies who feel the same way). If Apple thinks that collaboration and idea creation are core to innovation, I can see why they want people back in the office.
Not saying I agree with their methods though - personally I would have gone for a softer touch and a more tailored-by-team approach.
[+] [-] wyclif|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] catchnear4321|3 years ago|reply
Additionally, fabric of society, progress, puppy dogs, and America. Think of the children (during your commute.)
We’re in this cubicle together. (Management thought it would cut costs.)
[+] [-] JohnJamesRambo|3 years ago|reply
I suspect there may be a day where people are happy for any job that pays them to stay alive and have food, WPA style. An office might not sound so bad after a few years of laying sidewalks and repairing bridges.
[+] [-] 999900000999|3 years ago|reply
People are getting offers, which are so insane, a friend of mine, more like a distant friend of a friend recently got a total comp package of slightly over 250k per year.
He only has to go in 2 days per week, and it's pretty flexible. You can make the days up.
But he's also the type of person who really likes to get out of the house, they own dogs so often he'll just need to get out of there.
[+] [-] gorgoiler|3 years ago|reply
I can commute when I want and certainly I don’t ever commute when I have to — we have no mandated office attendance. I do a core set of “days” where I’m guaranteed to come in for lunch, at the very least.
I also come home early — dodging traffic — if the afternoon is looking like I won’t need to talk with anyone. Bunking off for the whole afternoon and doing a night shift of post-dinner to bedtime is also ultra productive, if the family let me, because of the laser focus I seem to get when there are very few people to distract me.
A short amount of light exercise away from the computer is so useful for the thought process that I’ve even commuted twice in the same day, though this is very rare.
Many of my colleagues have the same quality of life but a lot of them have also committed to fully- or mostly-remote, and you feel sorry for them being left behind. Too many decisions happen because they are either discussed in person, or ratified based on the relationships between people who see each other regularly.
Thinking back to my days of spending 2x 90 minutes on the 101 (the main highway in the Bay Area) makes me feel quite unwell.
[+] [-] randomsearch|3 years ago|reply
I’ve spoken to so many managers about remote. Off the record, all of them have said it is a nightmare for them to coordinate the team.
[+] [-] lifeisstillgood|3 years ago|reply
Until we chnage the decision making process (ie more democracy) in companies we won't have input into the truly important decisions
[+] [-] warning26|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TimTheTinker|3 years ago|reply
Personally, I'll never go back to working in an office, God willing.
[+] [-] Waterluvian|3 years ago|reply
As you traverse the management tree towards the top, both age and ability to influence office policy go up. And as age goes up, remote management experience/comfort goes down.
Conscious or not, the people with the power are making things most comfortable for them. They’re not necessarily acting in the best interest of the company.
[+] [-] endisneigh|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] baxtr|3 years ago|reply
Discussions around topics happen spontaneously without a meeting and an agenda. Insights created in these type of meetings is very hard to replicate in remote settings.
Also, going for lunch with colleagues is something I don’t want to miss.
That said, I have been most productive working at home.
So for me, the winning model is a mix. 2 days to mingle and have spontaneous encounters, 3 days to work and have scheduled meetings.
[+] [-] badrabbit|3 years ago|reply
The hardesr part of any job for me is the social part. I can get by just fine but meetings after meetings in person, awkward social events and lunches. People forming tribes and playing mind games aginst each other. That's any work place I have seen. Don't care for it one bit. I focus on technical skills since that is what is expected of me and as such a company could best extract value out of me by letting me skip all thay bullshit.
But if your job does indeed require you to form personal relationships and manage office politics I think office works out for you best. What is fulfilling to you might be bursensome and mentally taxing on others.
This is similar to open office work spaces, some people thrive in that environment while others can barely survive. It is impossible to manage time because of constant interruptions and useless time wasting things. Any productivity is a side effect of being lucky enough to squeeze a few hours in between driving, socializing, meetings and peoppe walking up randomly to talk.
I'll be honest 100% here with this regard: covid was the best thing to happen to me for my social, mental and emotional wellbeing.
You all need to stop expecting fishes to climb trees. Try seeing things from others' perspective. I would take a significant pay cut and more responsibility and move to a different location to switch jobs if that meant I would get the most wfh time. Balance is good and happy workers are positivr ROI workers.
I think once a week mandatory and another day in a week whenever there is a good reason to meet and work with in person is best balance.
Speaking of perspective, some people live with families where there is distraction and interruptions there as well so i see their view as well.
[+] [-] babypuncher|3 years ago|reply
I wouldn't want to go back to 5 days a week in the office though.
[+] [-] xedrac|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] interpol_p|3 years ago|reply
Strangely, I have far more unscheduled discussions about real work than I do when I go into the office
When I go into the office we eat lunch together, we chat about non-work related things. It's fun but they are also the days where I get the least done, and where I feel the least bonding with my colleagues
I feel closest with my colleagues and friends when we have a video or voice call and work hard to solve real problems together. There's a shared sense of achievement
I go into the office once a fortnight to pick up shared lunch that we eat together. Sometimes I'll arrange a work-from-Cafe morning where we find a great coffee shop and take our laptops for the morning
[+] [-] solarkraft|3 years ago|reply
I too find this highly valuable. But there's a solution for that: Regularly catching up with people. It seems silly at first, but works quite well for transferring all those important secondary bits of information.
[+] [-] pwinnski|3 years ago|reply
My new job is 100% remote, no office in my city AFAIK, so I'm more productive... but I still meet up with my old coworkers for monthly happy hour.
[+] [-] IshKebab|3 years ago|reply
Also I can see it from the company's point of view - it sucks paying for a desk for only 3 days a week and everyone hates hotdesking.
I think office work is mostly superior for most people except for the commute (and also the ability to naughtily do house chores when you technically should be working). Maybe we should concentrate on making commutes nicer.
I think employees should also be given the choice of hot desking vs cold desking for an appropriate pay rise/cut. Nobody likes hot desking but I bet few would be willing to pay the actual cost for a dedicated desk.
[+] [-] rdedev|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] guessmyname|3 years ago|reply
F2F stands for “Face to Face”, for people in the crowd whose English is not their first language.
[+] [-] chevman|3 years ago|reply
All the big consultancies are pushing it, travel sector (eg airlines, hotels, conference circuit folks) are pushing it, corp real estate and related service sector (think Aramark and other bigCo service companies) are pushing it, etc.
All these folks are on site in your BigCo HQ week in, week out, talking to your senior execs who are predominantly white men 50+ years old, trying to convince them this is like an existential crisis only they can solve and which will supercharge their firm for the next 25 years.
I've seen this shit up close and it's real. Big money and big egos pushing this agenda.
It will happen, just a matter of how long it takes.
[+] [-] nazgul17|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thro_away219239|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ipnon|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cbtacy|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] codereviewed|3 years ago|reply
If you are a digital native whose social life has taken place largely online it is likely WFH is better.
In some ways the world/technology/culture has changed so much and so frequently over the last 40-50 years that each generation's lived experience growing up is markedly different than the last. In the totality of the human experience this is pretty rare. I think work is only going to become more age segregated over time due to cultural differences.
[+] [-] ChrisMarshallNY|3 years ago|reply
WFH is not a magic panacea. I know a number of folks that WFH, and it’s damn near impossible to get together with them, because their jobs own their asses. They are young, and don’t mind (yet). They seem to be on Zoom calls, all day, every day.
Wait until they have kids, though…
Many folks are not able to maintain discipline, on their own, in their home. I know folks that go to co-working spaces, or even libraries (only if they don’t have a bunch of Zoom meetings).
Others actually get depressed, because of the lack of social interaction. They need to be around others.
For myself, neither of the above apply. I could happily be a hermit, and am seriously self-disciplined. WFH would work great for me.
The problem is that I have gotten used to not having others crap all over my work, and that can happen in a remote environment, every bit as easily as in the office.
It’s not “one size fits all,” which is difficult for companies of a certain size, to handle. Modern HR is built around a model, where no one is an individual, and the same rules and structure apply to everyone. That’s difficult, in distributed workplaces.
[+] [-] amatecha|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cmrdporcupine|3 years ago|reply
I tried to do hybrid a few days a week at Google Waterloo for a few months before just quitting. They axed the parking lot, making me walk 10 minutes to and from my car or fight for an EV charging spot. Before COVID they kept making the entire office environment more and more crowded, loud, and unpleasant. As for hybrid, I'd go in for a day and nobody I worked with would be there, and I'd end up meeting everyone virtually, so it was just like working from home... but with an annoying commute and better air conditioning and Internet.
Remote is the only sane option, and I'll do it until I can't. And once I can't I'll sell my house, downsize and retire or found a startup. I'm not the only one, I'm sure. The BigCos that lose senior employees through being inflexible might find themselves competing with them later as those people go on to found their own startups.
[+] [-] dopylitty|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] elforce002|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwaway787544|3 years ago|reply
You can never find other teams, projects, code, docs, company policies, vendor agreements, onboarding guides, meeting notes. "Agile" became an excuse to not give a shit what anyone did and let everything devolve into the lowest common denominator: tribal silos. Business units are fiefdoms.
Getting access to anything is a scavenger hunt and still takes a week after opening a ticket. There is no useful self-service automation. Desktop support for developers is pathetic while it's top-notch for paper pushers. Nobody has a baseline of training even though we all really need to know certain processes to do our jobs correctly.
Security is a complete joke. They harp on us for falling a phishing test when they have terrible UX to identify real emails, like that's the single thing other than rotating passwords that makes the company secure. Meanwhile the intranet doesn't have an SSL cert.
We can't get 10 grand for some critical SaaS we need for our jobs, but they'll plunk down that much per year on junk food we don't need. But also please work overtime for free because you're salaried and it's expected.
Get your shit together, companies. Do that and maybe I'll drag my ass all the way to your annoying open floor plan I-forgot-my-badge-can-someone-buzz-me-in germ-spreading hot-desking offices and ignore the lies you tell about this being for productivity.
[+] [-] eric4smith|3 years ago|reply
BUT.
I have to say while its a nice perk for the job (typing this from South East Asia), productivity is less than what I would like. People take work for granted a bit more and are a little more "entitled" to everything now.
And I get it. It's really nice to be able to work around your job instead of the reverse.
I think some people (like me) are better in-person managers than remote managers. And that's why the quality of remote work is spotty or so many managers want people back in house.
Let's not also forget that all the things that were cherish and use were mostly built by teams of people working together on some site. Whether it's the buildings, the internet infrastructure, the food you eat, the services your subscribe to, the software you're using right now, the computer or phone you're typing from -- all of it is built and delivered by groups of people that see each other every day in offices.
Please, don't get it twisted that just because you can code, provide customer support or write remotely -- that the other 95% of people can.
Remote work is an untested thing and really, only works for a tiny set of knowledge businesses.
So, while I love that our team works remote -- I would say most people will have to get off their a*ses and get back to the office.
[+] [-] KerrAvon|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] A4ET8a8uTh0|3 years ago|reply
I mean it is true. You can tell people are less concerned about their jobs ( anecdotally, my McD messes up my order a lot more often now ), but to me it only proves management had an easy ride the past few decades. Now they actually have to work.
Heavens.
[+] [-] asdff|3 years ago|reply
Except for those tools that have always been maintained by remote collaborators since it became possible with the internet connecting open source software engineers from around the world. Plus all the businesses that have always been remote.
[+] [-] marcinzm|3 years ago|reply
Then learn to be a better manager rather than making a whole bunch of people miserable to save yourself the hassle of improving.
[+] [-] throwawaysleep|3 years ago|reply
Is this because of remote or just the hot job market? I am a quiet quitter because I know I can just leave, so why do more than the minimum?
[+] [-] apecs|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mbil|3 years ago|reply
I quit and landed a better job that’s remote and with location-independent pay.
Working from an office is fine for some. Make it optional.
Lots of companies are still hiring. I encourage you to see what’s out there and ask interviewers if roles can be made remote.
Commuting is an expensive, time-consuming, and wasteful activity. Working from an open office was, for me, a source of near constant low level background stress. It felt unnatural, and I couldn’t work as well. Now, remote, I can deliver more quality work with less burnout. I am also feeling healthier.
[+] [-] cheshire137|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ineedasername|3 years ago|reply
Anyone there who views it as just another job (even if it’s one they enjoy) who is significantly inconvenienced by longer commutes or the high price of living locally and the degraded work/life balance has got to be eyeing their options. Even a pay cut to go elsewhere is moot if it means you can live in better & cheaper accommodations in a location of your choosing.
3 WFH days a week is what my current employer allows for any dev/it/non-customer-facing roll and my workplace absolutely hates hates hates the idea of WFH. Pre Covid it was banned, for everyone for every reason. They even fought it on “undue hardship” grounds when it was requested as an ADA accommodation. Now they’ve changed because they realize that their ideological opposition to it will (and has) hurt them as they forced people going back to the office. We lost roughly 1/3 of tech-oriented staff before operations degraded to such an awful state that they changed. I lost multiple candidates for a position on my team.
I view this purely as a cynical move by Apple to help decrease headcount the way other tech companies are doing and because they’ve clearly not liked WFH in general and know that a cooling job market gives employees fewer options.
These moves may even obtain in the short term, but all job markets are cyclical and employee expectations are not going to return to pre-Covid mentality. In the medium term of 2-3 years they’ll simply gain a reputation of being a bit more worker & WFH hostile in the marketplace at the same time the most people and especially top talent have no end of options that will give them the work environment freedom they desire. And when the job market heats up again they’ll have a harder time recruiting, even if they change their policy. It will be harder to trust the commitment to flexible scheduling & work location.
Or maybe I’m wrong, I’m not high level executive with an eye on long term labor market & “human capital management” (awful term) and I’m I know there’s smarter people than me at Apple, likely some included in making this decision, but my non expert opinion gained through a bit of anecdotal experience and armchair observation of peers and trends indicates it’s a bad decision made with short-term thinking only.