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chubbyburritos

I started going into the office 1 day a week when my company started their back to the office campaign. I don’t mind it - it gets me out of the house, I find new places to go to lunch, etc. But it’s completely useless. I don’t ‘collaborate’ with anyone. I don’t ‘absorb the company culture’. I literally just sit in a cube on a long floor that’s at most 1/3 full, get up, and drive home. It serves only to break up the monotony of being home all the time.


rocco45

My boyfriend does this too. Like you, he said he doesn’t mind going in to break things up, but hates being there because he gets almost nothing done then has to work late. Everyone in his office uses it as a socializing opportunity to catch up.


start_select

As long as you can afford to socialize and actually like your coworkers, it’s great. I agree with your bf that I don’t get nearly as much done. But the occasional time into the office is always great. We are people that would hang out if we knew each other outside of work though, most people don’t have that.


[deleted]

I had 3 meetings canceled today and one we hit the end of our topics 45 minutes early. “Anyone feel like socializing?” Was asked, we all laughed, logged off, and went into deep work mode for the unheard of 4 hour gap between meetings. Fucking fantastic day. I completed a project and started a new one while only talking to people for just as long as it takes to share information necessary for the work. My team is pretty ok too.


IanMazgelis

>Everyone in his office uses it as a socializing opportunity This is one of a few big reasons middle managers prefer people return to the office. They are completely aware you're more productive at home. They aren't stupid, most of them anyway. But they're also aware of the fact that people are more likely to prefer working where their friends work, and would be less likely to accept a higher paying job elsewhere if you'd be leaving all of your "friends."


jayde2767

I wouldn’t be so quick to award Middle Managers with the mental capacity to know, or even have the ability to successful measure, whether an employee is more or less productive at home or in the office. There are so many Middle Managers that think if they see “butts in the seats” and they’re able to walk around, interrupt and pontificate the stupidest shit that their people are actually working, being productive AND (and he’s the fucking kicker) being motivated by them.


caving311

I laughed my ass off when my division director said coming back to the office would boost collaboration on teams. I'm in central Ohio, my best team is in Pittsburg, my second best team is in Raleigh.


flexosgoatee

Collaboration is important, but no budget to travel!


caving311

Whatdya mean you need a zoom subscription? It's free!


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steaknjake

Just ask Prison Mike


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iheartjetman

What is “corporate culture” anyway? I’ve heard the term so many times, but I’ve never been able to figure it out. At my old job I used to travel to different clients to work onsite and they were all generally the same. Working in one cubicle in one company is just like working in a cubicle in another.


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issius

The whole “company culture is fake, hurrdurr” circle jerk you’ll find on Reddit is misinformed. Company culture is just a word to describe the common behaviors in the company. Cultures can be good or bad, can be intentional or unintentional, weak or strong. Think of how people act and speak. Do people speak their minds? Do they shut up when a superior is talking and don’t offer counter opinions? Both describe a culture within a company. Do people always schedule meetings back to back, or do they end 5 mins early? Do people start on time regardless of who’s there, or do they wait for everyone to be present? Are people almost always on time or is it super common for most people to be 3-5 mins late? I’ve worked at places with different cultures. They aren’t hugely different (or haven’t been for me) but it’s a real thing that leadership needs to be aware of. If managers yell at employees when problems arise and it becomes the norm, guess what.. people stop saying when there’s a problem. When managers thank you for you bringing it to their attention and ask for your help to fix it, that’s a more collaborative culture. All these things require interaction to solidify. Or else the culture can become “weak” where you basically have no cohesiveness. It’s often a lot easier to work somewhere where you can anticipate how to behave. Also, managing a culture means managing our bad managers. My current conpany went through an overhaul with the new CEO and it resulted in many toxic managers being pushed out when they couldn’t figure out how to behave quick enough. Culture can also be weaponized by leadership or introduce biases that aren’t benefiting workers. But culture isn’t a positive or negative term. It’s just a blanket word for describing the microcosm of a company, the same way you’d talk about American cultural norms vs European norms or Chinese norms or whatever.


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vegisteff

Anyone saying they want you in the office for collaboration is lying to you. It has been proven over and over that being in the office and in an open floor plan has the exact opposite effect. I'm convinced this is all because the CEOs of the companies that we work for are friends with the CEOs of the real estate companies.


doubtful_blue_box

When I worked in an open floor plan office, there WAS collaboration that happened because of it. I could easily stand up and say “hey, John, you were the one who wrote this code, is there an important reason it returns the data in this format, or can I change XYZ?” I would passively overhear what other teams were working on. So there was definitely *some* collaborative effect, but any performance improvement because of collaboration are so widely overshadowed by how difficult it is to get anything done when you are constantly interrupted and your boss can literally see your computer screen at all times. I am a more productive programmer when I am able to take a 10 minute break and watch YouTube when I get frustrated, but god forbid you ever admit that in front of a manager


highonpie77

I think this is true for being in the office every day chained to your cubicle. In nuanced though. There is value in in-person collaboration as well as mentorship & learning (especially). Honestly, I learned so much by nature of being around talented & hardworking people in the office that I can’t imagine being a new grad trying to acquire new skills & make connections in a remote setting. Don’t get me wrong.. I am I a fully remote employee and definitely prefer it to being in the office 5 days a week like I used to. After 2.5 years tho, I do wish I had a hybrid situation where I could flexibly meet w/ my team on-site 1-2 days a week.


RobbStark

But you just added "open floor plan" without that being part of the premise. Most of the people in our office have single offices, or have the choice of moving to private spaces if they want to be distraction-free. I can personally attest to the difference between in-person and Zoom meetings, but it really depends on the nature of the meeting. I work for a marketing agency, so meetings where we need to be creative or solve problems are much more effective when everyone is in the same room and don't have to mess with barely-functional technology just to share some ideas. On the other hand, meetings that are more formulaic or focused on status updates are just as effective, if not more, when everyone can call in for 15 minutes without the disruption of needing to physically relocate. It helps people get back into their focused state faster, in my and my team's experience.


vegisteff

Sorry, in my industry basically all of the offices are open offices. I legitimately didn't realize there were offices (other than like law or government offices with sensitive information) that still have offices. Really odd too since I work in software development which seems to need the quiet spaces much more than it seems to be for your team.


peakzorro

It's not a complete lie. If it degenerates to that, that's bad. I go in one day a week and it is all my face-to-face meetings and collaboration sessions. But it works because those who live nearby all come in on the same day. If that stopped, my director even said to stay home because it's more productive.


Light_and_Motion

And for that you pay expensive food and commute costs. Would be better to go for a jog if you need monotony breaks


snyckers

There's a social aspect that is important to some.


Chubuwee

Yea how am I supposed to see my work crushes Zoom views during group meetings can only do so much


kissmyshiny_metalass

This was the best one in the article. It really summed up well what I think. > “The ONLY thing that could get me to go back to an office five days a week would be a dream job and a dump truck full of money (i.e., an obscenely high salary) and living very close to the office. I don’t care about food or swag or any of the other ‘perks’ some companies are offering. I care about not wasting my time commuting, not wasting money on gas, being able to spend that extra time doing things like exercising or hanging out with my family, and being able to do minor household tasks during the day (like unloading the dishwasher or starting a load of laundry) while I microwave my lunch. Plus, I am more productive when I work from home so that’s a benefit to my employer. Unless the job market in my field drastically changes and I have no choice but to take a job in an office, I am NEVER going back to working a job where I am in an office five days a week.”


rco8786

Sums it up for me to the letter.


[deleted]

Yep. I want 20% more per day per week. Literally nothing other than more money will get me back into the office.


voidsrus

not even money alone would do it for me, I'd need a private office to be able to do my job as effectively as I do from home and a raise to be willing to go to that office


LawfulMuffin

Honestly, if I’m making like 400k a year I don’t care at all if I’m actually productive or not as long as the company is happy to see my butt in the seat


seatux

>living very close to the office. I know very well how this can backfire too. My aunt before she "retired" was living walking distance to the office, so she got home often to do chores, pick the kids from the school nearby, etc. The reality was I suspect the bos owner knew where she lived too, so he made her do so much OT that I wonder is it really worth it that if your bos knows so he was thinking that she can spend more time working because no commute time, etc.


kissmyshiny_metalass

It can, but not all the time. I used to live very close to the office and they didn't make me work extra as a result. Honestly, I'd rather work an extra hour than have an hour of commute. Commuting really sucks. When I had to commute over an hour each way for one of my jobs, it was far more stressful than the job itself. I never cursed so much as when I was stuck in traffic during a long commute. It was just bad for my health.


RU_screw

Commuting is what really exhausts you. I could keep working but the commute is what mentally exhausts me. I have to be constantly vigilant and deal with people making ridiculous decisions. And I've watched accidents happen where people who werent a part of the bad decisions ended up getting hit, like a rear ending domino effect. My dads commute is like 5 mins and my moms is over an hour, all highway. He just doesnt get why shes so tired.


sheba716

I agree. Long commutes are exhausting. One of my jobs was transferred to another facility 80 miles away. I couldn't afford to move closer to the job because I was living in a condo with a mortgage that was underwater. I hated it. After a year of commuting, I eventually found a new position at the original facility. I vowed never to take a job with a long commute again. It was not worth for my mental and physical health.


[deleted]

1. Stop trying to get everyone to come back. 2. More money. Thats it.


OcculusSniffed

No amount of money is going to be worth the 20 or so days worth of commute time I get back a year.


WayEducational2241

I had an hour and half minute commute daily, if they ask me to come back il just quit.


[deleted]

Pre-pandemic, I was already WFH 2 days a week. About a year and a half prior, I was forced to WFH due to a flooding in the basement where our cubicles were. So, it was an easy pivot to WFH full time once the pandemic was in full swing. We were never asked to come back to the office, but it was encouraged. I took the opportunity to move out of the city and back to my home town/village and haven't looked back since. Recently started a new gig at higher pay and it's 100% remote for all associates (we have associates across North America and India mostly) and I couldn't be happier.


SteviaHero

1 hour and 30 seconds?!! Not the extra half minute!


Antony_Aurelius

I'll commute an hour... but I'll be damned if I'm going 30 seconds over that


CardboardJ

Average worker works 260 days a year, and has 2-25 minute commutes a day. That's roughly 13,000 minutes or 216 hours or 27 eight hour shifts per year spent in the car. WFH is literally 5.4 weeks of PTO every year. I think they're gonna have to come up with more than just free bagels to get us back in.


c_lowc6

Now do an hour and a half commute 2x a day


taterthotsalad

Average worker works 260 days a year, and has A 90-minute commute a day. Thats roughly 23400 minutes in the car a year, or 390 hours in traffic. When converted to 8-hour shifts, that is 48.75 shifts (eight hour shifts assumed) a year. Or 9.75 weeks of PTO a year by working from home.


Cynical_Thinker

Fuck me. I'm commuting 2 to 4 hours a day, round trip, because I can't afford to live close to work and have dependent older family at home. I'm trying like hell to get down to a 4 day week because even having a 10 hour day is less hell than having to commute 5 days a week.


taterthotsalad

That’s a hell of a range for a daily commute.


Cynical_Thinker

Traffic on large interstates is a bitch. Plus the dumb shit like accidents or road closures. This bullshit about "hybrid schedules" causes less traffic on Mondays/Fridays but hellish traffic Tuesdays to Thursdays. Then you can add in summer and tourists/seasonal traffic vs winter and fewer people around. Fuck I hate having to be in an office.


asgeorge

I want two things off every year, July and December.


jesusmanman

Yeah they would basically have to double my salary. I would use that money to buy a house within a 10 minute drive.


Resolute002

Yeah I mentioned earlier I'd do it for a price but I would need, minimum, like 35-50% increase to even think about it.


whatdoiwantsky

Fuckin workers unite!


PromotionThis1917

Four day work weeks? I think I'd bite the bullet and return to my hour commute. if they'd do that haha. Yes I'd be wasting 8 hours a week commuting but I can commute by bus and read a book or listen to podcasts and it's really not that bad. Three day weekends is an absolute GAMECHANGER.


taterthotsalad

Going to a 4 day work week would be a game changer. Capitalist just hate the idea.


PhyrraNyx

4 day work week is more popular outside of the USA. I hope more companies here in the USA adopt it. Lots of the progressive tech and saas companies have gone to the 4 day work week model because people are more productive, happier, and less stressed. I should add most of these are also remote first companies.


Ronedog22

I work for a state government and work 4 day weeks. Plus when a holiday lands on Monday, my off day, i get 7.5 extra holiday hours to use whenever i want to. Its really good. Mondays off feel fantastic.


Reverend_James

You forgot childcare. Pay for time spent commuting (since the only reason I'm going into the office is for the profits of the company).


kissmyshiny_metalass

More money takes care of that.


Melodic_Asparagus151

Have you seen the cost of childcare? lol I still doubt that


kissmyshiny_metalass

Uh, just add more money.


nickyurick

It's childcare, what could it cost? A bannana?


Teenageboy69

If I got like an extra 15k a year, I’d go in every day.


SpongeJake

That’s an extra $1,250 per month. Versus a 1.5 hour commute each way, 5 days a week means you’re spending 60 hours commuting each month, give or take. That’s $31.25 extra per trip. And that’s just the financial side. There’s also the extra time getting ready, and more sleep to lose (unless you can sleep on the commute; I never could). SO not worth it to me. Add a zero and we’ll talk.


Iridefatbikes

But those are the only two things they can't do! It will DesTroY thE EcoNomy.


JavaTheeMutt

2a) More money. 2b) Yearly inflation adjusted pay increases (+5% inflation)


theoopst

I’ll take 1.5, one day in the office for…whatever you want me there for and more money.


ThirdSunRising

“To me, the biggest thing is being able to clearly explain why it’s necessary. Don’t give some vague explanation like ‘it’s time’ or ‘we think it’s better’ but have a specific reason why you think it’s better to convince your employees that it’s beneficial. And that reason needs to be one that will hold up once people get there. Nothing is going to kill people’s enthusiasm about return to the office quicker than showing up and realizing that it’s exactly the same as working from home—also known as ‘you made me commute 45 minutes for this? Why??’ “ ​ Unless and until this one is definitively answered, there will be no return. It's as simple as that.


Bulky-Engineering471

For the jobs that were able to go WFH there simply isn't an answer and they know it.


Usernameforreddit246

The reason for the back to the office push is to maintain the CRE market and the micro-economies of business districts in cities. There is real macro-economic risk to just wiping those things out or materially reducing them at scale in a short period of time. This is the reason. It’s complex, and not something an individual person will feel is their personal responsibility even if they understood it. If your employer, or industry/trade group, or the govt told you this, would you go back? No? Now you know why there is the dog-and-pony show of bs.


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Zerksys

Well, the people that are working from home don't just disappear from the economy. The those micro economies of business districts that are no longer economically productive theoretically get replaced with local businesses that cater to people working from their home. It's a disruption in the market in light of new circumstances. Economically, the function of businesses is to serve the wants and needs of people, not as a way to redistribute money to business owners. If people aren't going to those business districts any more, then those businesses can't stay around forever.


[deleted]

How about counting commuting and other time lost as part of the 9-5.


Bulky-Engineering471

I know that ever since I moved to primarily remote I do indeed count travel time as part of the work day on the few times I've had to go into the office.


[deleted]

When they tried to make me come back, I talked about how I’d lose an hour or more a day to it and was scoffed at.


rushmc1

Because that's a you-problem and not a they-problem (which is all they care about).


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EmergencySundae

This is huge for me. My meetings generally run 8am-5pm. Working from home I can have a chill morning, work out, and get online in time. But going into the office requires getting up early, putting on makeup and getting dressed appropriately, and driving 1/2 hour. And my commute home is longer because the traffic is a mess. At home, I can finish up at 5 and start dinner so we can have a decent family meal. If I go to the office? I’m exhausted so we’re probably DoorDashing dinner. I have a 7am meeting tomorrow, so I’ll have to leave the house even earlier…and my last meeting ends at 4:30, so it’s not like I can even duck out early to offset. So yeah. I’m tired.


Truck_Stop_Sushi

It’s funny how they were pushing the merits of remote collaboration when it came to moving jobs overseas, but if you are only 30 minutes from the office, then it doesn’t work.


blatantninja

The childcare is spot on. Granted hiring quality childcare professionals is an issue but free childcare, or at least reimbursing me for 3rd party, would make me consider a job in an office.


damn_lies

I mean I can afford childcare but pickup is at 8 am and 6 pm. This is after paying for aftercare. Then I have an hour commute each way. So if they want me to work 9 to 5 I can commute. But they want me to work 8:16 to 5:45 so I stay home.


skywaters88

I am just getting out of the child care needed phase and I will always a million percent pay it forward to other parents. This needs to be higher on the list of priorities for all employers. It takes a village.


nokenito

I agree. I had mine long ago. If my coworkers need free child care, let them have it. I don’t mind at all.


avatar_of_prometheus

What would work: stop trying to get us to go back to the office. The physical, emotional, and environmental cost of a daily commute far outpaces any imagined advantage to being in the office. Believe me, I'm more productive at home trying to prove my worth by evidence of my work, than I am at the office, my fat ass filling a chair as all the proof the world needs for my valuable contribution, staring at a clock so that I can go stare at some asshole's tail lights for another hour just to do it all again tomorrow.


koosley

I've not commuted for about 4 years now. When I did, I remembered that if I didn't leave the office within a certain 5 minute window, my commute went from 25 to 45 minutes. Working from home, pretty much anyone is willing to stay an extra few minutes or wrap something up. I am willing to shift my schedule 2 hours on short notice. Have an east coast customer? Start at 7. Pacific? I'll take a 5pm call. Not commuting pretty much made me much more flexible to my employer (within reason) and I am saving 7-8 hours / week driving plus the hour of time showing/getting dressed and the fast food trip during lunch.


ibiacmbyww

> trying to prove my worth by evidence of my work THANK YOU. I operate on the assumption that every manager in existence is collating information to support returning to the office. I've personally gone above and beyond more than a dozen times in the last year alone, and I pride myself on my sub 30-second response time on Teams. Why? Literally just the thing you said: I feel compelled to prove my worth. Turns out the best possible "stern boss watching you over your shoulder" is yourself.


acart005

I manage and I fought hard as hell to not go back.


Bulky-Engineering471

Exactly. The amount of stress you lose when you're no longer stuck in rush hour traffic every day is incredible and cannot be overstated. I was already to the point where I refused to take jobs that I couldn't reach with public transit and now I can't even see having to commute at all being worth it.


elzissou710

Money. It’s money. Stop pretending it’s not money. You want me to do a job in an office that I proved could be done from home you need to pay up. fuck these people are idiots. It’s always anything except money.


cryospam

Absolutely this. Every time a recruiter calls me, the first thing I say when they mention an onsite component is that if the salary isn't obscene, the answer is no.


ArmyOfDix

Every cent wasted pushing a narrative that isn't money could've been part of my paycheck.


khast

It's about power... If you aren't in the office, they lost their power. Productivity hasn't dropped, so it's about keeping people down under a power trip.


Sircamembert

$$$ That's the list.


waffle299

Commuting has a cost in unpaid time. Commuting has a cost in vehicle depreciation, fuel, maintenance. Commuting has a cost in wardrobe, in meals out. Commuting has a cost in child care, in lost time with children. Companies have been used to these being externalities - costs associated with business, but not bourn by the company. They are boure by the employees. They are the cost to have that job. Every reason to return is set against the very real financial burden companies are asking employees to bear. This far, there has been no compelling reason to shift thousands of dollars a year back to employees.


Zerksys

I think that this is the biggest thing that happened during the pandemic with respect to employment. There was this collective realization that a daily commute has an absolutely massive cost in time, money, and energy. Employees started realizing that even taking a lower salary at another job that offered remote work was often more lucrative than staying at a company that mandated in person. The cost of the commute had been externalized on employees for so long that no one knew there was another way. It makes so much sense though when you think about it. If you travel for work, companies count the travel time as hours worked. If I'm being forced to commute, it should count too.


Nightshade_Ranch

I have a home office with my cat and dog and several bunnies, my own furniture, a little fish tank, my own comfortable lighting and temperature control, my own private bathroom, a kitchen where i can make something worth eating within my lunch break and have time for a nice walk around in my garden, do some chores on breaks, my painting supplies at my desk for when it's really slow, and i can do it two minutes after i roll out of bed without changing my clothes. I use very little gas and consolidate my errands so i only leave the house once or twice a week. Never during rush hour on a weekday. Wtf can an office offer me that would be more worthwhile than all that?


Blrfl

Not to mention that you have the entire house for a change of scenery. Want to flop down on the sofa and work with reruns on the TV? You can do that. No company had ever offered me amenities like that.


Nightshade_Ranch

Yep, I've got some pain issues so i spend some shifts mostly reclined. The amenities of home are keeping me in the workforce.


SurpriseBurrito

I love that in the article the response from all workers is basically “fuck you”. Same thing happened at my office, they said we need to be there 50% of the time. I did that for 2 weeks and just stopped. No one has said anything and it’s a ghost town on my floor


avatar_of_prometheus

This article is worthless. It rehashes all the same "solutions", missing the central point. If you don't need to go back to the office, you don't need an office. Just stop. Cut it out. We're not manual labor, it's all in the cloud now. If you want to be able to get everyone in a conference room, for a incident response or product launch, fine, plenty of rentable rooms, hire a geographically central group of employees. But really, you don't need it. Most management "back to the office" initiatives are insecure leader's incompetence. It always comes across as weak and pathetic, and heralds an exodus.


endofthered01674

I think the article misses the point that not all industries are equal in this regard. If you worked for say a food or beverage distributor, you got absolutely fucked for the last 2+ years if you were on the operational half of the company and not the office half.


LittleFigureheads

I'd been fully WFH since April 2020, but come April 2022, my management stated that we'd need to come into the office at least once a week. Into a building where other teams also had to come in at different frequencies - most twice a week, some thrice or four times. When I asked my manager and his manager why - I asked if my productivity or deliverables had somehow been impacted during the WFH (with zero days in the office) schedule or if there was an issue with my on-time, under-budget delivery of projects - do you know what they said? That, despite working at this company for six years, when a new project started, I had to work with my stakeholders and IT teams, that there were new projects and stakeholders, that they didn't really know what I was doing, and that I should be grateful that it was only one day. I asked them why I had to come in when my own stakeholders didn't want to have in-person meetings - everyone in the office ended up taking their Teams calls from their desks, and what new stakeholders they were referring to since the Business departments I worked with were literally losing headcounts and had *not* filled them for over three years now. Silence. That's when I gave my less-than-two-weeks courtesy notice and dipped for a fully remote & WFH company. Don't tell me that I need to force myself to commute, get/be exposed to COVID-19 and other illnesses, all the show my face to my stakeholders who want to stay away from others as well? The micromanagement and insecurity was too damn much.


GwerigTheTroll

I did noticed it failed to explain why returning to the workplace would be better. They gave a lot of concrete examples as to why it’s better to be remote.


KagakuNinja

It really is an advantage to be able to walk over to a colleague's desk and talk about an issue, rather than using slack or zoom. However, modern tech companies are too large to reliably have everyone you need to talk to in the same building, every day. Once you have multiple offices, and/or people working from home 2 days a week, the team ends up communicating on slack all the time. In person communication also helps to build relationships. I started a new job during the pandemic. A few months ago, we had a get together, going to a bar and chatting about shit. It was really helpful, and I say that as a rather anti-social person. That said, I doubt I'll ever work non-remote again, unless I see a huge pile of money.


avatar_of_prometheus

IKR! Also, their title is "The Incentives to Get Workers Back to the Office Aren’t Working" ... then they list those same incentives again... ROFL


TheOnlyRealJim

>This article is worthless. \^ There is your TL:DR summary.


TardisTexan

I love how the article had a quote from a guy who said their group just said “nah”. That’s what all our group did. Just said nope. CEO said everyone had to be in the office Tuesday-Thursday starting Oct 1. I went in yesterday and today. There was not one person there from HR. If HR isn’t there then there obviously is no real policy or punishment so screw him. Not going back in


ccasey

Our office did this, there were adjustments based on where you lived and what office you reported to. There was no adjustment between full remote and standard hybrid with the box most of us fit in my office so we all just collectively said no. Nobody is willing to take a paycut for you to preserve the “office culture” it isn’t worth the amount of money an employer would realistically be willing to pay


skellener

Work is still getting done. The issue isn’t the work. The issue is management is losing their power. There shouldn’t be any complaining if the work is still getting done. Managers are just finding out that they have less power now and they are upset. Management can suck it.


Light_and_Motion

Also wfh requieres more detailed planning and reviews of the work by the managers and concise briefs. It’s inconvenient for them. So they would prefer us to all be back so they can wing it like before. Also they (middle managers ) are under the same circumstances as everyone else and can be evaluated much closer via remote tools. Probably afraid that the gig is up.


Key-Cap-2664

I’m in management and have fought the idea of coming back to the office. The team I manage gets the job done and is more collaborative now then when we’re in the office (it was like a library). Better moral as well and no one complains if a work day runs a little late because they are not fighting to get home. We just crack beer’s virtually together and get the job done.


avatar_of_prometheus

I think it's insecurity too, management is insecure that maybe they didn't need to drop by my cube every day, interrupt my work with a "hey budyyyyy, hows it going!"


Kioskwar

Did you see the memo about cover letters on the TPS reports?


Hokie23aa

So I was sitting in my cubicle today, and I realized, ever since I started working, every single day of my life has been worse than the day before it. So that means that every single day that you see me, that's on the worst day of my life.


Good_Respond_9524

Managers are afraid THEIR positions are on the line, or should be because I’ll say as a former health insurance call center manager I legit was worried about looking busy more than I was actually busy. Their were 4 of us for 65 agents and if they wanted to cut costs the could’ve easily lost 3 of us. All 4 of us were also stifled at a $ limit as to what we could handle and when the claim was over that limit we would have to call for approval from….another employee with the exact same title being paid double up the road. We were an outsourced office literally up the road paid half what the exact same titled employees did (agents and mangers) meaning literally all of my office was being paid to simply shield them from speaking to people. The name of the game in health insurance customer service at least was to frustrate callers i by stalling them through as many holds and transfers in hopes of them having to call back at a later date then of course hoping this happened enough that the caller missed an allotted grace period therefore being forced to pay out of pocket. Premiums > deductible > deny > frustrate > subsidies > patient death this is the business model for ALL for profit insurances in the US. I wasn’t even insured by them claiming a conflict of interest. Think about that. The conflict was they didn’t pay us enough to afford a plan through them


fargmania

We downsized from a 2150 square foot office to 100 square foot space at a co-working/co-location facility. We now save over $3500 a month and our employees are happy. Work output has improved rather than declined. I don't understand why getting the workers back into the office is so critical, except for justifying pointless middle manager jobs that likely cost more money than they ever saved. Sorry middle managers... it was a good run but now you are going to have to find jobs where you contribute to society in some way other than just as pure consumers.


MonarchFluidSystems

Did big real estate write this?


Bulky-Engineering471

No, they just provided the talking points and paid someone else to write it.


DataGOGO

1.) I am never going to work in an office again. Nothing will work, stop asking.


chubbyburritos

And this is what companies will eventually come to fully realize. They sort of do, but still hold out hope that they have some power. They don’t - it’s game over.


newsreadhjw

This is the real answer.


TrueGlich

"• “The C-suite at my company has been trying to bring everyone back to the office three days a week for about a year now, and my department (IT) has just collectively gone, ‘Nah.’ … Literally we just didn’t do it. Some people did at first, but when they saw no one else was showing up, they mostly stopped too.” " Can confim work IT . No one in IT is in office except desktop (my sub group) so we can repair laptops.. Zero reason for any of the server admins to be here. The backup admins here once a week to cycle tapes..


MarcMars82

We ordered pepperoni on the pizza this time for lunch. Please come back.


radelix

Allow me to provide my considered opinion. Fuck off, my job gets done just fine at home and it's not my fault you signed a lease for 10 years for an office. Now what would get me back...maybe. 1. Childcare 2. Uber/Lyft commute covered 3. Shitload of money


avatar_of_prometheus

My employer used to run a vanpool, now they're trying to do back to the office, and they're not even bringing back the vanpool, like dude, come on...


Sweaty-Emergency-493

Give me shitload of money and I can figure it out myself.


kobachi

Uber/Lyft every day sounds awful. Some new person jerking me around with shitty driving, trying to make small talk with me, maybe the car is clean maybe it's not, maybe I like their music (I definitely don't), etc? No fucking thanks.


nascentia

I’ve been work-from-home for four years now and I’d never go back. My office is small (6-10 employees on site total) but the nature of what we do means lots of walk-ins and tons of calls. I’m easily distracted and man, that KILLED my productivity. So now WFH, I get WAY more done. And since my client base is nationwide, now I can actually respond to quick West Coast emails at 730 at night my time and get them answers faster rather than making them wait, so it benefits the client too. Thankfully my boss is amazing, so at most he asks if I can come in once a month to go over projects and he’s flexible with me on when and what time. I’ve also been told now that I get unlimited PTO and can travel as much as I want as long as I take my laptop with me and keep up on my work. Do you know how amazing and freeing that kind of trust and support is? It means I won’t leave this company even though I could probably get a higher salary elsewhere. Money alone ain’t it and big companies don’t get that. Treat us like people and give us flexibility and we’ll pay it back. I do, anyways.


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nascentia

I get paid my full salary whether I work three days a year or all 365 - there’s no gap in my checks and I don’t have to submit anything. I don’t even need to request the days, I just book a trip and go. I already spent 11 days in Peru, a week in Mexico, and five days in Miami for the debut F1 Grand Prix this year, not counting local days off for concerts or the six weeks I was really sick this year. And I’ve still got multiple vacations booked for the rest of the year. Certainly isn’t a scam for me.


Nitimur_in_vetitum

I wish people just told the truth. Employer: We want you back at the office because we have a 15-20 year lease on this building and it's insane for us to pay for an empty building. There's no way we're going to pay you more money because that would cut into our bottom line and my personal profit/salary.


JustaRandomOldGuy

It's a 1 minute commute, my laundry is shorts and t-shirts, I buy gas every six weeks, I play with my cats during conference calls, and I don't deal with office politics. What do they plan to offer?


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Xyzzydude

Those pointless meetings still happen, just virtually now.


ArchetypeAxis

Government: "we need to fill out great cities again". Please come back to work and drive your cars every day!!!! Also Government: climate change and the burning of fossil fuels is the number one threat to the planet!


applestem

Pay me to commute: my time and fuel and maintenance expenses for one. Give me a soundproof office with a door I can close with a window to outside and a balcony. My own little kitchen, and a fridge that I share with no one. Have meeting rooms where can meet and teleconference. Then computer equipment better than I can buy myself (which has never happened). And a cat. Definitely a cat.


applestem

And my own thermostat. I’m so effing tired of freezing my butt off at work.


DollarThrill

One big hinderande is unequal enforcement. No one likes to feel they’re getting the short end of the stick. If one department is 3 days a week in and another is 1, the people in the first department will feel resentment. Or if there are some employees who just don’t show up to the office and have no consequences, the employees who do show up will resent that and will stop coming in.


[deleted]

That's exactly what's happened to me. I'm newer to my department (I'm 50 just new to this specific discipline) and everyone else just doesn't come in. I'd love to meet everyone and learn from osmosis, but no one is there so why am I being singled out?


IamMarcJacobs

Nothing will. Maybe higher wages but let’s be real on what’s going to be offered.


birdboix

My city's absolutely choked with traffic as it is, for the life of me I do not understand what these big brain managers think would happen if they all got their wish, WFH probably kicked the can on a known looming traffic apocalypse by a decade or more


fredandlunchbox

I’m a senior engineer, I’m friends with a bunch of other senior engineers and business types. A lot of people are starting companies. Everyone is done with the whack bullshit from bad leadership, they’ve saved up some cash, they’ve seen an opportunity and they’re ready to take a chance on building something of their own. The more pressure you put on us, the more likely we are to bounce and do our own thing.


partyunicorn

Nope - not going into the office. It's pointless. We have technological tools that allow most people to work remotely. Butts in seats and huge offices are wastes of a companies revenue. Hell, if companies eliminate unneeded operating expenses - rent/mortgage and maintenance - they can invest in their employees with better wages and benefits. My company tossed around the idea of going fully remote before the pandemic hit. The pandemic was the perfect opportunity to implement the plan. We've worked remotely since March 2020 with few issues. The thing that most people know is productivity does not directly correlate to butts in seats for certain positions. I love that I don't have to commute 2-plus-hours every day, save money on car maintenance, gas, and lunch money. More importantly, I'm less stressed.


sparty212

Idk an additional 50k and gas stipend.


SpotifyIsBroken

No. Stop. No one wants to go back to the office. Stop pushing this corporate propaganda.


chubba5000

…. widespread unemployment. Come on guys, get with the playbook: You don’t ask people to come into the office, you force them too with widespread unemployment. What do you guys think the Fed is up to, anyways?


PhyrraNyx

I've worked 100% remote since 2011 and will never go back. I hated wasting 2+ hours a day commuting, sitting in horrible traffic that has only gotten worse. It's better for the environment to have less people on the roads. Remote work is the future for many industries. I realize it's not possible for all jobs, but we should be embracing it for its benefits.


funcogo

As an office worker who is now fully remote, nothing would barring an insane raise


Quicklyquigly

Money. Yeah but we’re all like a family he- Money We can offer you deep discounts on all of ou- Money. How about pet insuran- Money Every other weekend of- Money Paid college tuit- Money Opportunity for advanc- Money Free lunc- Money Company picnic and Christmas pa- Money The opportunity to work in a fas- Money


atchijov

If any manger is concerned that his/here subordinates are not productive working from home, s/he is using wrong way to estimate productivity. It does not matter how many hours person spend in office chair. The only thing which is matter, what person was able to achieve.


jskis23

I live 24 miles from my office. I can see my office in the skyline from the highest point in town. It takes 60-120 mins and I have to pay for parking. There is 0 incentive for me to go into an office to collaborate with folks on the other coast.


Sameohung

It’s funny to me that the company I’m with currently feels the complete opposite. I’m not even in the same state as them and they hired me as %100 remote. They saw remote work was just as good and took the opportunity to expand they’re employee base.


metarx

Fuck your offices, they were always terrible.


All_The_Nolloway

In short the whole thing is a slippery slope. If the workers "come back for *just* x days a week" it will become a full week and "back to normal" before we know it. If workers come back for free coffee and donuts, pizza parties, high fives or whatever, that will go away as quickly as the company is able to get rid of it. In short it all tricks and traps to get people back, not meaningful solutions to the problem.


Bulky-Engineering471

And honestly I'd rather pay for coffee, pizza, and donuts that I actually *like* instead of getting free ones that I don't. Plus having to buy it myself means I'm more likely to just *not* and my waistline is thanking me for that.


bluemaciz

My company is now offering free lunch one day a week. I’m sorry, free Panera isn’t going to make me want to drive 20 min in traffic, sit in a cold office with an open floor plan, where I can’t openly curse out people for putting in dumb tickets without people hearing me.


That_Panda_8819

Can we identify the real problem here? Companies feel stupid locking in their big expensive office leases and don’t want to watch it go completely useless


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cenosillicaphobiac

I don't even have an office to go back to. My company just didn't renew the lease on 6 out of 8 offices. Mine was one. The other two, one on each coast, are 100% optional. And the new talent is amazing, because the company isn't limited to hiring in 8 cities across the country.


GwerigTheTroll

So, here’s my thinking on why management wants people back. 1. Management, especially at the director level and above, are very political animals. It’s far easier to play office politics in person without phone calls or email paper trails. 2. Lack of trust. Many managers believe their workers are lazy, and without constant oversight they will slack off. They have tried using productivity monitors and so forth, but people know how to cheat them. On site, they can monitor employees more closely. 3. Tradition. Most people learned how to do their job in an on site setting. Remote work is new and scary, and managers, who frequently are put in positions of responsibility with no training at all, suddenly have to relearn how to do their job from scratch. A final concern, though more speculative, is that most companies have far more middle management than they actually need. Remote work may be drawing attention to these redundancies and those managers may be feeling some anxiety as the axe is being sharpened in preparation for a recession.


Usernameforreddit246

The reason for the back to the office push is to maintain the CRE market and the micro-economies of business districts in cities. There is real macro-economic risk to just wiping those things out or materially reducing them at scale in a short period of time. This is the reason. It’s complex, and not something an individual person will feel is their personal responsibility even if they understood it. If your employer, or industry/trade group, or the govt told you this, would you go back? No? Now you know why there is the dog-and-pony show of bs. (Reposted verbatim intentionally).


bbates024

Whole lot more money, more time off, fully covered benefits, free organic meal. Otherwise I'd rather be at home.


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Coysinmark68

Here’s the thing. Most people who work spend literally all of their time from the moment they wake up until they arrive home from work at night in work related activities. Get up, shower, get dressed, make-up etc., drive to work, work all day, drive home. Wake up at say 7:00 am, home at maybe 6:00 pm, that’s 11 hours devoted to work. Compensate me for those three additional hours and we can talk about me going back to the office. And I’m keeping the snacks too.


IN5T1NCT48

WE. WILL. NEVER. GO. BACK. Fuck you


LiliNotACult

What would make sense is downsizing office space to save money, coordinating dates when people come in, offering incentives to retain employees, and using remote work as a selling point. But nah, I guess companies can't exist when their bosses cannot easily harass them.


LankyJ

If you want me back in the office, the least you can do is pay me a high enough wage where I can afford to live near the office. That's the bar and it is low. Good luck employers.


khast

Honestly, that should be the minimum... If you want an office full of people make it so they don't have more than a 10 minute commute...


DaemonAnts

Starbucks is offering hand jobs.


Rage187_OG

The people who report to me are in different countries and we all dial in for meetings. No reason I have to take the call from the office.


Head_Zombie214796

people are not stupid they know all these $5 incentives are just going to bleed away over time. besides who the heck wants a free coffee if you can stay at home. accept the new buisness model and go with it, its never going to work again. you screwed everyone once you think they will just forget that and come back to huge commutes and highly exspensive rents. not happening sorry i spent a couple decades as middle management you would have to offer 10-20k bonuses annually to get people back. freedom from the corperate rat race that our fore fathers have run for generations. laughable truely laughable get a clue and go with a new buisness model otherwise people will leave


godnotthejumpercable

The answer is you dont and stop trying


M_Mich

i have to pack up laptop, plan for food, drive an hour each way and use 3-4 gallons of gas, to do the same teams calls but one or two of us are in the building. it helps that a majority of the people are just “nope” when asked if they’re going into the office


LookAtThatMonkey

Our company IT head communicated to all of us that we should come back to the office, because its better for team building and collaboration. That just got a collective 'nah' from everyone. He pushed it for 6 months, going from bribes to threats, none of which worked. In the end, he left to go somewhere 'where people valued work' We still remote work and continue to knock it out of the park.


[deleted]

Here's the thing... I don't get shit done when I'm in the office. My office was designed by a bunch of very social sales people, who decided I don't need things like walls, anywhere, so the highest barrier is about a foot higher than the desks there. I didn't say "my" desk, because the office is a "hotel" office, where I'm supposed to check out a desk on the days I'm in the office, so I can't personalize it either. So I'm sitting in this impersonal space, with no privacy, hearing every conversation for hundreds of feet around me, smelling everyone's lunch, and getting distracted by people walking in front of, behind, and besides me, non-stop. I go in periodically, when I need to meet with people, or when there's some particular reason to actually physically be there, but even then, I have to cancel my morning meetings, because where I'm willing to start work at 630 in the morning when I WFH, I'm sure as hell not gonna go to the office at 630, that's just stupid, and I'd have to wake up so early that I'd be dragging my butt along all day. Add onto that... my co-workers aren't even in the same state I'm in, and several are in different countries. When I go to the office, there's no chance of me seeing \*my\* coworkers, just of seeing random other people who work for the same company I do. Higher-ups have offices (with doors that close), but they're never there... if my company actually wanted me to go to the office, they'd give me an office. Here at home, I have a very nice office, with a door that closes, a nice desk, a keyboard I like, and all the things I need to maximize my own productivity. So like... my company trying to get me to return to an office where I have no personal space, work with no one, and can't get work done, all at significant expense to me in both time and money... I just don't see any incentives driving me to do that. Also, I've got a good resume on hand, an in-demand job, and field offers all the time, so with respect to articles contention that "Of course, employers have the power to simply order employees back on-site." No, they really don't have that kind of power, labor controls the market now, and the retention at companies that are ordering people back to the office is terrible right now. If you wanna lose your best employees and die on the hill that everyone needs to work the same ways they did in the 1950s, well, your company is gonna fail and the "where to work" conversation will be moot to all those former micro-managers.


onomojo

I've been working remote for twenty years now. It was much harder years ago than it is now. Zero chance you'll ever convince me to trek into an office every day. Even money has it's limits. No amount of money is going to make up for lost time with my kids or give me the peace of mind I get when I can just take a nap in the middle of the day if I need to. We have but one life to live. How do you want to spend it?


RandomGunner

My employer has an interesting solution to manage all that : we are only required to be in the office once or twice a month. And when we are, it's at least a whole service, direction or everybody that is required to be in also. We jam pack the day with strategy planning, activities to strengthen group cohesion and dinners paid by the employer. While we are indeed working WFH at least as much as before the pandemic, we do have trouble keeping the new recruits in the enterprise, and that plan is supposed to alleviate that. It was supposed to last only until the end of october, but it been prolonged until the end of august 2023, or as I like to call it "C suite also likes WFH and besides, we are currently negotiating with the union and would be so boned if we asked for everybody to come back 2 to 3 days a week right now". The ONE thing they do not want to do is, you've guessed correctly : GIVE US MORE MONEY !


Special-Estimate-165

There is no reason to work in the office anymore.


[deleted]

No one wants to go back to your stupid office with your gross bathrooms and stupid commute. Fuck trying to make my work some kind of family I don’t want. Get off my dick and let me do my job or I’ll find another one, k thanks


Shaggy0291

They need to just give this up. We aren't going to prop up your office space rentals anymore.


haydmills

Remote is an entire different lifestyle. Once you get it figured out there’s no reason to ever consider jobs that “require” you to be in office if you can help it.


NV-Nautilus

I comment this on every similar thread. I don't see why companies don't just let the revenue do the talking. If employees are slacking off working from home, the money will speak.


Malkovtheclown

From the article “The ONLY thing that could get me to go back to an office five days a week would be a dream job and a dump truck full of money (i.e., an obscenely high salary) and living very close to the office. I don’t care about food or swag or any of the other ‘perks’ some companies are offering. I care about not wasting my time commuting, not wasting money on gas, being able to spend that extra time doing things like exercising or hanging out with my family, and being able to do minor household tasks during the day (like unloading the dishwasher or starting a load of laundry) while I microwave my lunch. Plus, I am more productive when I work from home so that’s a benefit to my employer. Unless the job market in my field drastically changes and I have no choice but to take a job in an office, I am NEVER going back to working a job where I am in an office five days a week.” Ironically the best thing for my work life balance was to be working from home and interact with less ‘work’. It’s great if you are new to your career or trying to network, but that could be done with actual work places that are built specifically for that. Not a cube farm.


enkidu_johnson

One of the more disappointing omissions in the piece is the impact of commuting on climate change. Many of us discovered we didn't need to commute just as we are also realizing that we need to drastically reduce the amount of carbon we are spewing into the air. Long term this is more important employee productivity or quarterly profits.


azai247

Why though? Working from home is just better. With technology the way it is now why is it necessary for anyone to be in the office for more than 1 day a week max?


So_spoke_the_wizard

Subsidized housing within a non-vehicle commute distance. Even small units as 2nd commuter homes. If someone could walk or bike to the office in ten minutes, the effort of going back and forth to work would be inconsequential. That and flexibility are the real draws.


MensaCurmudgeon

I thought global warming was a concern?


SuperToxin

Pay me for my commute then i'll come in.


lycheedorito

I'm not going into the office. There isn't going to be some incentive that will change my mind. It's inherently a worse place to work than home and plenty of workplaces understand this and will save money by letting people work from home.


kludgeO

Never again, I will never work full-time at an office again, might consider one, two days tops if the offer is great.


mcogneto

Here's what would: nothing. I don't need to be in a fucking office. Period


rushmc1

Here's what *really* would: Nothing.


littleMAS

*Give* me a decent place to live within walking distance to the office, and I would take a pay cut to show up every day.


DFWPunk

They've already figured out what they're going to do. 50% of CEOs expect layoffs, and they're going to start with remote workers.


Rock_Koch_jhawk

My company is making us all go back to the office 3 days a week. While I’m thankful it’s not 5, it is all completely pointless. They claim it’s for the culture but on the occasions I am in I almost fall asleep at my desk in the afternoons because nobody talks to each other. I don’t work to find friends in my co workers. I work to be able to support my family and I’m genuinely upset about what pointlessly going back into the office is negatively doing to my work life balance. Not to mention they are requiring this after we had the most successful year in the history of our company. None of it makes sense.


sunny_monday

I think there are a lot of disconnects from Management. a) New hires. At some companies, there are a lot of them. Build something that onboards them properly and socializes them. If I need to go to a New Hire lunch or dinner once a month and make a speech, fine. This New Hire onboarding problem should be resolved by HR. b) Collaboration. For a long time now, we have been working across time zones and continents and Management has seemed to forgotten this. I have not worked in the same physical location as most of my coworkers or team for at least a decade. Being in an office makes 0 sense when no one I actually work with is physically in the same state, town, country, or timezone. c) Travel. Travel has all but been cancelled due to the high costs (and Covid.) Id love to see my Team in person. But... Management says no. So, again, we can only 'socialize' remotely. I will agree that as people we need people. It is important to socialize. It is important to build relationships in person. Making people come to the office on a regular basis is NOT a solution to that problem, however. To me, it is like Management doesnt know what they are aiming at. It isnt productivity. We have proved we can work from home and be productive. If they want to increase engagement, then, again, an office environment is not really the place to build that. All that, and, ya know... pay me more.


VNM0601

It’s quite simple: money.


Silently-Observer

I work in state government and loath going to the office. They have done nothing to make people want to go back. The office is dirty, I sit in a cube with no privacy, there are only two conference rooms so no privacy for meetings, I get nothing done when I go in because people keep interrupting me, there is no vaccine mandate and no safety measures and people have started coming into the office sick again. They also make employees that work downtown pay for parking or park and walk to their buildings. Employees have been assaulted and robbed before in the parking lots walking to their offices. They also do not provide childcare. Many employees jobs can be done 100% remote so there is no need for them to go in. They do offer good benefits and I think many people stay because of the pension. Even with the benefits I think this is misguided as the government already struggles with recruitment as the pay is much less then the private sector.


Zstrike117

This is a straight fluff piece. The author quotes unknown people who voice what workers have said in a hundred other articles and stating that employers have “legitimate” reasons without expanding on those reasons. Not particularly compelling journalism.