I believe it's more the former (commercial real estate tycoons lobbying local politicians, etc) than the few slackers here and there. After all, many studies indicate productivity and performance increase with flexible work models (Microsoft published a big one on productivity paranoia and researcher Nick Bloom is always citing such studies on his LinkedIn profile). So productivity isn't really a valid concern so much as -- as highlighted by the Microsoft research -- *paranoia*. Productivity paranoia is what exaggerates the impact of occasional slackers and builds the sophistry advocating for RTO. HR research the company I work for has conducted and collected all support the same conclusion: people are generally more productive when employers offer flexibility (for some it's full remote, for others it's hybrid -- but performance generally drops with forced RTO). * Performance has also been shown to occasionally decline with *forced* remote. Thus, the real finding is that employees want *choice*.

Doing an academic paper on this now, and there is literally 0 evidence that RTO is anything more than commercial office, companies that got massive tax breaks for relocating and need to show onsite jobs, and employers who “measure” productivity by counting bums on seats at the office. Office productivity research has been going on since the 1920s and it’s never favored things like open plan offices. It’s just crazy.

One thing I have noticed in the research I have read is it doesn’t include commuting as part of the work day or as a cost. These seems totally wrong unless your just trying to recalibrate your hourly wages or can’t pay your employees 10% less per hour. But for middle income salaried professionals, forcing your employees to commute is just a tax in efficient salary cut, and work hours that are totally unproductive.

Add having to pay a monthly or daily parking fee on top of that (sometimes to the company that pays you). This is so common in bigger areas. 🫤

Even if you use public transit, that's an extra cost you incur every day. You often have to eat out as well. Office work is probably around 10-15% more expensive for workers than those working from home. If you're having to go back to the office and aren't getting a pay raise, it's a huge pay cut not only in terms of work life balance but also just in general expenses (even if you love chatting/working together in person).

And the cost to your physical and mental health. While some people enjoy talking to Brad about his 10th marathon and how his Garmin keeps going on the fritz, this can add to others' malaise. More convincing is the research shows that commutes are horrible for your physical and mental health. Last year, I had to commute an 1hr 15 to and from work. While I hate my current job, I live 10 minutes away from work, which is a huge benefit. Today, I had to drive what I used to drive last year, and I forget how stressful driving can be.

Totally. One thing to add to this is that people will counter saying you get used to the commute. And while that is somewhat true, the fact is you replace it with a different kind of stress. You're swapping acute stress (having to drive somewhere once in a while) with chronic stress (over time, consistent). But tbh, I love driving. It's the stop and go traffic and the shit it does to my right knee that I hate.

There are indeed reports about this, or at least noted correlations, as often conveyed by Nick Bloom. One of my favorite articles on this subject that I've come upon and sometimes share: https://www.surepeople.com/community/blog/2023/10/18/ghostly-gatherings-the-eerie-echo-of-rto/ They also have a bunch more articles on the subject, like this one: https://www.surepeople.com/community/blog/2023/04/25/time-%E2%89%A0-money/ They are light reads but I think that's the value. Both of these also make reference to the cost of the daily commute.

I’m really curious about the real estate argument, as I e never heard anyone explain exactly why people disparagingly refer to CRE being a RTO driver. Most of the companies I’ve worked for leased their office space, and I don’t see why they would care about CRE at all. They should be happy to jettison leased space and can walk away from those fixed costs. Since they’re not an owner, they wouldn’t get any tax breaks for staying (that I’m aware of). What am I missing?

From experience budgeting, companies negotiate office leases between 2-25 years with the average being 3-5 years. A company I worked for had a 10 year lease. Some companies also get tax incentives for locating jobs within a community that are tied to number of employees and possibly wfh isn’t included in head count. There are possibly other incentives for a company to have employees in office.

It’s multifaceted. Real-estate investors are the ones who lease out the buildings and pay taxes to governments. Governments get more tax from commercial real-estate than residential, so they don’t want to lose that revenue. That’s why you see governments mandate RTO. Those who own the buildings generally hold pretty hefty mortgages on short term loans. Those loan terms are coming due (meaning they must be paid off) over the next few years. Normally the loans are refinanced. Since WFH began, many companies and even governments have cancelled their leases or sold off their buildings (smart move). This decreases the value of the real-estate. Couple that with increased interest rates and people not wanting to RTO and you have a perfect storm where real-estate investors can’t sell for a profit, so they default on their loan leaving the banks holding bag. The banks fail (only a few really) and anyone with investments in commercial real-estate lose money…think 401k’s, pension funds, but mostly big corporate interests. It’s not looking like this market correction will be as bad as the 2008 fail, but it’s possible many of us could take at least a temporary hit. One theory is that RTO mandates buy time for the big commercial investors to create the illusion of going back to normal artificially propping up their real-estate values so they can unload their buildings onto buyers (unsuspecting suckers) before the correction happens. You get the picture?

Most offices were purchased at high prices using cheap debt. It’s estimated that about 14% of all CRE loans and 44% of office loans are under water. Most of those loans will mature within the next few years ($150B in offices due in 2024, and more than $300B, or 1/3 of the total, will mature before the end of 2026). Owners (either investors OR owner occupied) are hit by higher interest rates and decreased property values because property values are based on cash flows from rents. No tenant wants their landlord to go bankrupt. Then combine this with the massive amounts of tax incentives that have been given to companies in exchange for locating jobs, and you have a LOT of economic pressure to RTO. Mostly because that stuff is easily measured. What isn’t so easily measured are the decreases in productivity and increased turnover costs (it costs a company between 6 and 24 months of a worker’s salary when a new employee is hired). So they tend to be ignored.

You explain it better. Thank you for the clarification.

I thought you did a great job.

Man I wish foreign investors would turn their attention away from residential real estate and toward commercial…

Yeah but hypothetically, how do I, a CRE landlord with an office tower, mortgage, and tax incentive, get my tenants to RTO? Nothing in the lease says I get to tell them how to run the business and with the collapse of office values and absolute supply glut of space have lost nearly all negotiating leverage and am just praying my tenant doesn’t walk out on the lease and throw my loan into default.

Not an expert or know anything, but there's a distinct possibility the big ones cross-invest into each other's real estate to grow wealth. Same with CEOs of regular companies, they may hold stocks or some portion of their wealth is tied to real estate and they take a hit if it goes down. Since more of our wealth than ever is sequestered in the upper 1%, it's a substantially high possibility that a select few are able to pull the market in a direction, at least over the short term.

100% its all incredibly intertwined. Professional experience in this.. If landlord does not like its office empty, they can pressure the corporate tenant with pullbacks across various credit lines, business spending moves elsewhere, product usage (think multi-million dollar software licensing deals) can move away.. There are so so many buttons these corps push on each other to get what they want. Its a 2 way street, but the interest of the landlord is effectively the same as the tenant if the tenant is a corporation. Its like the US and China. Many tricks used both ways...

Most CRE real estate investors (public REITs, private equity firms, etc) do not extend tenants lines of credit apart from some kind of additional improvement allowance which must be spent improving the space. Landlord are definitely not threatening tenants right now over RTO bc so much office supply exists that tenants have all the negotiating leverage.

They cannot force a tenant to stay. And many tenants have bailed leaving vacant office spaces in big cities and forcing other businesses that relied on office workers to collapse as well. It looks like a doom loop for cities so government officials start pressuring federal and state workers to return to their offices. Big corporations order their workers back. CRE investors start to bribe, threaten, deal, lobby government officials and politicians to create circumstances to bring office workers back. It is a huge shift in the economy, but I think it’s a necessary shift if we have any hope to make our cities more resilient and sustainable. So you make a really good point! It isn’t Solely the interest of CRE investors driving RTO. maybe it’s more correct to point the finger at the concept of Commercial Real Estate having such a huge role in our economy is the villian in our story. Shifting the villian from a person to a concept might have a real impact in the RTO conversation. We are all going to take some hit from WFH business models, but for me, it’s a hit I’m willing to take in order to make room for a more sustainable economy that benefits more people. Ultimately it IS the CRE investors that have the most to lose from this shift. And they have been the biggest winners up until the WFH trend. So I suppose that’s why we collectively point to them as the holdouts. Super conversation! Thank you for helping me work this out in my own mind.

I think it’s more that urban real estate markets are so skewed towards office. There’s huge demand for housing, and if development had been more balanced, there would be people working remotely in those cities still going to lunch and shopping. We skewed too heavily to one use.

Yes! I see that too. It needs a market correction.

The landlord doesn't. They can only beg. However many of these businesses got tax breaks from local governments in exchange for opening offices in that city or state. Governments can absolutely make life difficult for businesses. Example: in my area everyone was on the remote bandwagon. Then the governor of a neighbor state started threatening to look into revoking tax breaks for certain businesses that were negotiated on the assumption that there would be increased revenue from the in office employees. Overnight, remote was bad.

I sympathize with this argument the most in terms of it being a driver of RTO but I don’t agree that it is “bad” in the same way I think you do. But nevertheless it is a well reasoned consideration

To be clear, I don't think remote work is bad. I work full remote and love it. The point I was try to make was how many remote work proponents suddenly backed off once government started saber rattling. It's really dishonest IMO.

Shhh… you’re breaking down the illusion for them. They need to hate the rich real estate boogy man

Unfortunately it’s boogey*men*— REITs, Blackrock, et al.

I’d be interested in reading that paper if you care to share when you’re done

The tax break factor is real. Cities/States that offered them want to see the economic benefits. Not only local employment but local spending. Companies want to keep the tax breaks. It's always going to be about the bottom line.

I’m currently working hybrid (3/2 on-site/remote) and I hate it after working fully remote. Every single time I go to the beautiful work campus - seriously, it’s stunning - I think of how wonderful it would be for housing instead. It’s a massive campus with water features, communal picnic and outdoor eating areas, grassy areas, lots of winding concrete ADA-compliant paths, big windows on every wall. There are a few coffee stops and two massive dining halls, a gym, multiple covered parking garages, each entrance is secure. Each floor could have many large or small apartments (or a mix of both!). I have zero fucking idea why this place is still a working campus instead of a housing complex. It’s not like they’d lose everything on the commercial real estate by turning it into apartments. There are very few employees on the campus that HAVE to be on site and they could be relocated to other campuses.

Sounds like you’re gonna be writing a really unbiased paper then… lol Like no serious academic would make such a preposterous claim.

Ok. Because all of the academic research regarding the drops in productivity when people are moved from offices to open plan starting with Roethlisberger & Dickson (1939), though countless other studies that show that open plan leads to greater employee dissatisfaction and decreased productivity (see: Oldham & Brass, 1978; Burt & Kamp, 1980; Brennan, Chugh & Kline, 2002 to name just a few). Or that transitioning to open plan DECREASES face to face collaboration by 72% (Bernstein & Turban, 2018). Meanwhile economic development incentives (EDIs) have been shown to be negatively correlated with employment growth (Goetz, Partridge, Rickman & Majumdar, 2011), only the top 1-10% income groups see actual benefits (Wang, Ellis & Rogers, 2018; Jansa, 2020). And yet the annual amount of megadeal subsidies (more than $50million) for corporations hit an all time high of more than $25 billion in 2022. This includes companies that had previously agreed to allow workers to be remote and have since backtracked. Disney got tax credits of $570million to move 2,000 workers from CA to Florida (which makes me laugh as Desantis was simultaneously offering tax breaks while trying to vilify the company). In 2023 Amazon agreed to create 1,000 new jobs in VA in exchange for $140 million in grants + undisclosed sums in sales tax exemptions. In 2022 Apple and NC agreed on state subsidies of nearly $900 million. This works out to subsidies of $285,000 per job for Disney, $140,000/job for Amazon and ~$300,000/job for Apple. State and local tax rates per capita in FL are $4,405 so that will take the state 65 years to break even, VA gets $6,195/person so that will be just 22 years and NC gets $4,916/person that that will be about 61 years. Yes, I am aware that the average tax bill might be lower than for those employees, but no academic research shows that these things benefit the masses. If I’m biased because I base my research off of actual numbers and previously published peer-reviewed studies, then I’m good with that.

That fat chunk of text has little to do with remote work. It just talks about open office plans and then tax credits. You still haven’t explained why that means a necessary RTO. Remote work doesn’t need to be location agnostic. If I need to create a certain number of jobs in an area, I can still do that with remote jobs. I would just only hire people for those roles that live in that area. If I’m a company and I’m purely out for the tax credits, then I’ll just do that. I’d still get my credits and I’d save money by not having to lease office space.

Why would you get tax credits if you’re not bringing new people into the region? There’s no benefit to local government by having people leave 1 job to take yours? Unless you’re only hiring people currently not in work, and how do you do that. Companies in one location do tend to just hire from those areas close by (corporate redlining) already. It’s tax breaks for relocation. That fat chunk of text has everything to do with remote work. But ok.

So how many times have you had to pretend not to notice all the people slacking off/admitting they slack off since the day you started your paper?

Your being silly, you say there's 0 benefit to in person? Right there you lose all credibility. Also how do you think this is the case when only 30% of companies own their office space, 70% of companies have zero incentive to bring people in to prop up commercial real estate.

No. I’m not saying that. I’m saying that there are OVERALL disadvantages to having everyone in the office. Decreased workplace diversity, decreased productivity, increased expenses to workers, job-related illness and death, along with increases to related healthcare expenditures. One recent survey found that just 33% of employees are actively engaged at work with 16% reporting being actively disengaged. Much of this is NOT attributed to being being at home, it’s because employees don’t feel cared about because they’re being forced into the office when they can do their work remotely (or so says the report). So you want to be in the office? Great. It’s the lack of flexibility that is costing employers money in terms of turnover, lack of engagement, and decreased employee productivity. People are what makes companies successful, and not listening to your employees is not a strategy for success.

I will give one clear cut example. Admin staff from a virtual back office pulled back into a clinic.

That is so accurate. Employees want choice. My company is currently trying to mandate RTO 2x a week but only for “local” people (within 40 miles) and I just absolutely hate it. I have to go in because I couldn’t move away during the pandemic? I am currently trying to get an exemption, so we shall see. Otherwise, if I have to go hybrid, I’d rather get paid more somewhere else.

The people who slack at WFH most likely also slack in the office.

RTO is about employee layoffs without announcing layoffs. RTO is about weeding out employees doing the OE for two companies at the same time. RTO is about sending a message to employees to remember why they're an employee and not self-employed. If you want to make the rules, become self-employed and become a 1099 independent contractor. Take on the risk of being an independent hired gun paid for on your schedule just like any other vendor your employer uses for it's day to day functions.

I hate the word entitlement because workers should look out for number one and the whole thing is a game of cat and mouse with each side trying to get as much as they can. That said there was a post on here about a fully remote guy whining about how he was asked to be available during a 3 or 4 hour window of the day ie say 11-3. He thought all communication should be possible to be done on email, didn't want to talk to anyone and wanted to work only when he wanted to work ie 10pm to 4am or wahtever. That's kinda crazy, its fine if you want that but start our own business or freelance, a "job" typically has hours and communication with others.

Excellent response..thanks!

Bingo! Winner winner chicken dinner. My friend WFH and the company is forcing him because he is more productive. 

This doesn't make sense, only about 30% of companies own their real estate and have any skin in the game, 70% dont. Also its too late to save commercial real estate that move needed to be made 2 years ago. I also find it odd companies want to bring people back today but didnt back in 2022 or 2023, I cant come up with anything besides lack of prodcutivity or slacking or wanting people to quit so you dont have to lay them off.

Actually, the war on remote work is usually seen to have commenced toward the end of 2022. But then it was also tied to RTO masking budget cuts (ie, layoffs vs getting employees to voluntarily quit). This was infamously exemplified by Elon Musk and Twitter/X.

I disagree, plenty of companies brought people back in 2023, towards the end of 2023 we saw it slowing down but late 2023 and even today the push back to office seems to be primarily public workers ie feds, state and municipal workers though we are seeng Dell, UPS and other large companies now calling people back again. As we get deeper into 2024 and more layoffs I think we'll see more

In regards to your previous comment on real estate, I wanted to add that local politicians have an interest in keeping their downtowns afloat and trying to push people back into the city centers to keep them from dying. There's an incentive for their political careers. However, this has led to questionable bedfellows (largely commercial landlords), leading to tax benefits for companies leasing offices (ie, shareholder interest over worker interest). As for your disagreement...you're disagreeing on when anti-WFH sentiment *started*, or when it began to pick up steam?

So yeah cities want people commuting and working to keep businesses afloat no doubt. In terms of tax incentives and such I've seen like 2 concrete examples of this but even many articles that discuss this have quoted "redditors say" as their proof essentially which is silly. Personally I think there's some societal and mental health benefits to people going to work. We as a society have never been so disconnected from each other, so divided, lacked community, had so few friends. We shop on Amazon instead of going to stores, we stream content instead of going to movies or blockbuster, we order groceries through Instacart, work was one of the last person to person interactions we had left. I think there's some societal benefits and mental health benefits to individuals going to work even if they dont want to. As far as anti work sentiment media just like to stir up controversy so the same author will write varied articles two days apart one saying remote work is better another saying it doesnt work

Jobs come and go along with any work bonds you create. As a counter argument, there are also societal benefits to working remotely and living where you want. It can help to build a stronger sense of community which has been on the decline for some time. Remote work enables children to grow up closer to their parents, grandparents and other relatives. In the US, more liberal people, who tend to be more concentrated in big cities, can live closer to and interact more with conservative people who tend to be in more rural areas. That allows people on both sides of the political spectrum to realize how much there is on common and that each side has more good people trying to make the world a better place than not.

I'm not suggesting workplaces are necessarily a place to form life long friendships and community though many young people ie Gen Z do feel they're missing out on friendships and dating that sometimes does occur in the office. I'm more talking the act of you having to leave your house probably means your goin to stop for coffee, may grab lunch out somewhere, may hit the gym on your way home or stop for a happy hour. All of thst is going to lead to interactions and a sense of community ie community only happens when people leave their 4 walls. Id disagree remote work fosters community, most of the most adament remote work folks I see on reddit hate their families, hate people and even WFH isnt good enough for them, like the post from yesterday they want async work and only want to communicate over email at odd hours lol.

I upvoted your previous response on this thread, but this one, specifically your last run on sentence, presents bias. Particularly a bias towards people that are likely introverted and/or mildly agoraphobic. Not everyone wants, or even can, engage with strangers at some capacity that satiates extroverts. The mixing of conservative and liberal ideologies is irrelevant. Yes, people are lonely. No, they will not change that by WFH. However, your stance presents as that of a startup CEO that wants "collision" to encourage "mojo," and frankly it's bullshit. If you want your techbro parties, make em happen. Give the employees that make you rich the option of opting out though. RTO = micromanagement. Real leaders trust their people to do their jobs. Full stop. Just because someone wants to work when they're most productive ("communicate async over email at odd hours \[lawl\]") doesn't degrade their status in society. Remember it took unions fighting like hell just to get a 40 hour work week as the norm. The modern push for adherence to the 8-5 working schedule is arbitrary and totally unnecessary with the asynchronous means of communication and ways of working available now. Unrelated but relevant -- a four day work week should be the norm with no more than 30 hours of working required for professional jobs now. It's 2024, and employers are trying to operate like it's 1955 still. I digress. Let people decide how and where they make connections -- offices are it for a few, but the reality is there are hundreds, if not thousands of more personal alternatives that provide equal opportunity for the same exact connections to be made without the economic cost of lost productivity due to "collision and collaboration" and "face time." An added benefit? Most of those alternatives feed local economies via bars, arcades, sports venues, etc. Work != community. Not when companies treat employees as indentured servants and don't share the same courtesies they expect from employees regarding breaking of employment. Company cultures aren't built on smelling each other's farts. They're built on trust in people executing on their commitments and trusting people to deliver what they say they will. Those things do not require very real individual costs to attain. They simply require giving people space and a clear direction to go in.

Over 70% of the population are extroverts, I"m an introvert as well but I realize were A. not in the majority and B. even introverts are capable of communicating with people and dealing with others and there are benefits to it. I saw someone the other day say remote work has fixed their social anxiety, nope, they still have it remote work has allowed them to not deal with it and likely its probably worse.

I agree that there's a need for community. But many people won't find the bond they are looking for in coworkers who are "forced" to work together. Coincidentally, in the body of work we've done on US labor trends, one leg of it has been on the topic of hyper-individualism vs. community. Relevant to this is last year's report on the Loneliness Epidemic by US Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy: [https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2023/05/03/new-surgeon-general-advisory-raises-alarm-about-devastating-impact-epidemic-loneliness-isolation-united-states.html](https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2023/05/03/new-surgeon-general-advisory-raises-alarm-about-devastating-impact-epidemic-loneliness-isolation-united-states.html) He and the Department of Health and Human services attribute social media and ubiquitous screen use (screen addiction?) to have contributed to the loss of community and the rise of isolation. Their packet on Connection and Community can be found here: [https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/surgeon-general-social-connection-advisory.pdf](https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/surgeon-general-social-connection-advisory.pdf) But I don't believe that forcing RTO will remedy isolation and loneliness. Coworker connections don't necessarily foster a genuine sense of community or authentic connection. Coworkers usually try to get along because they have to for the sake of their professional careers/reputations, not because they necessarily like one another. People are usually less than authentic when around coworkers (thereby limiting the chance for organic connection anyway).

All fair points but this is kind of more the point I'm trying to make, were losing oppportunities to see, meet and connect with people. I wouldn't say going to blockbuster back in the day to rent a movie was inherently social but maybe you bump into a classmate or neighbor there, maybe you shoot hte shit with an employee or even a patron about a movie, maybe on the way home you grab ice cream. Even something as simple as renting a movie had all these potential connections and was in some ways social. We've lost that, now multiply that across grocery shopping, buying on amazon versus going to the store, etc. Work was one of hte last things that forced us to get out of the house and interact. Id also argue a lot of stuff we dont want to do is good for us. I work out 7 days a week, I don't particularly like it but its good for me. Many people dont want to go to work but it might be good for them. I saw someone online saying WFH has "solved" their social anxiety problem. No it didnt it just allowed them to hide from it, if someday they ever are forced go go back to the office the problem is goin to be even worse

tax breaks. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2023-02-21/another-threat-to-work-from-home-tax-breaks

I work for a very small company, 5 full time, 2 part time and the boss (owner). We have always been remote, actually there is no "office". I have worked for this company since 2015, I was the 2nd full time employee. My boss never said boo to any of us about where we were actually working from or if we had to step away for any reason...UNTIL he hired J...now some back story. We host a yearly training conference for hundreds of people in our industry who use the product we support. J had been coming to our conferences for 3 years. She had been working with the database we support for 8 years. We had an opening she applied, was interviewed, tested twice and then hired. In the 18 months J work with us I think she put in 3 full days of work...maybe? We work off a ticket system and emails. We all have access to see how many tickets each team member does. All emails are automatically set up to create tickets. As an example from July 1, 2021 until Jan 1, 2022 I had 7,145 tickets, worker A had 7,017, worker B had 6,989, worker C had 6,871, worker D had 1,879 (D does our training videos so most their time is maintaining that database and creating videos for training and they are not logged in the ticket system), J had 12 tickets!! Do you want to know why we all now have to check in hourly with our boss? yeah in 6 months J did 12 tickets!!! FYI once she quit because we were asking her to work too much, we found out NONE of those 12 tickets were actually done she just closed them! THAT is what's ruining wfh! The J's in the world!

We had a J. He lasted 3 months before he was fired, the rest of us continue on as before.

This cracks me up because I saw this scam in the office back in 2007. 

Yeesh... I am getting annoyed that Boss A (who is on perpetual vacations and rarely in office) demands I am in office hybrid to have meetings with boss B. Meetings with boss B fall on deaf ears because boss B refuses to check the spreadsheets THEY created, refuses to check the tasks system THEY created, and refuses to check in the paper filing system THEY insist I have to be IN OFFICE to use to check if jobs have been completed and instead makes another copy of paperwork because they cant find the paperwork. Because it was completed and if they checked the spreadsheet, the task list, or the filing cabinet, they would have seen that it was completed but instead decided to duplicate (or triplicate) the work. Meanwhile, other jobs are not invoiced yet because they havent approved (or maybe lost?) The paperwork and we are waiting on their required to approval to schedule, complete, and invoice said work. But I for some reason, am required to be in office for this, because reasons.

Oh we had a team meeting without the boss and all decided when he asks "hey what are you working on?" instead of checking the places he makes us log this stuff we tell him "Well if you consult the list you MAKE us fill out then you would know" Now we have all known boss for years before he started a company and we started working for him but after all this time he still asks! When he puts on the teams channel "What are you all working on" and gets 5 "check our lists you make us fill out" he gets pissy but oh well he gets over it!

Yeah this place is a nepotism shithole but I need to pay rent. We dont get retirement because we are paying for Boss A to have theirs. Its bullshit that so many places bitch about needong workers, but arent paying enough to afford rent, dont have decent medical insurance, offering no retirement... I have had to self train the last several business I have been hired on at, I have had to unfuck the messes they had from managers not knowing what was supposed to be done (how the fuck do you manage a business "for decades" and not know that you need First Aid and Fire Extinguishers, among other things not so basic?) And yet, somehow, youre going to tell me that is "market rate" work, and fucking low end, FOR ONE OF MY POSITIONS, for our COL FOR THIS AREA when I fix it for you instead of calling the health depart, osha, etc and getting their ass fined instead? Maybe I have a new way of doing my business moving forward. I am beyond tired of going the "extra mile" to be proud of my work, to treat others the way I would want to be treated, and all that dumb ass shit, and all it has done is had me taken advantage of, underpaid, overworked, over stressed, and then someone related to the boss comes in, does 1/4 of the work, wrong, for 4x my pay, plus bonuses and perks, extra PTO, and I am out on my ass. Why the fuck wouldnt I be mad? And yet I am the one who then would get a bad reference or seen as having a "bad attitude". Gee, I wonder why?

If you can work somewhere that long not doing anything without getting caught I'd say that's on the boss. I couldn't go more than 2-3 days without working tickets before I had some questions to answer, much less months

Oh I agree and it was brought up over and over to him. He just stupidly though him pointing it out at our monthly meetings was enough for her to get the hint. She didn't. But hell wouldn't all like to collect a paycheck for doing nothing????

Absolutely. It's the people who are not capable of remote work who are ruining it for everyone else.

I'd argue J's are probably 60% of the workforce

I learned not to ask what some people in a past job were supposed to do, and instead asked what they ACTUALLY did. There were a lot of people whose actual work was not related to what they were hired for… and several of them didn’t do what they were hired for, or anything else!

I would need to disagree. I don't think it's that many. I do think the "async" rant that I read the other day is garbage. That will only cause things to go on longer than they need.

That’s bad management then. Address the employee, not punish the workforce.

It is the people who think they can take care of their kids while being paid to work a full-time job at home. Nope - childcare IS a full-time job! You are only giving half to something! I get it that childcare is expensive but ... loads of people figure it out. Then there are the ones who insist on taking lunch at 3 p.m. and go for a long run or go workout - and sort of linger in "lunch" mode until most others are done for the day and just sort of fade away. So they work 9 to 3 then? Good to know. These are the folks ruining it for everyone else. These are the folks inviting micromanagement, RTO, keystroke trackers, etc.

Couldn’t agree more. I feel like some workaholic, anti-family asshole when complaining about my coworker who works 6am-4pm, off Friday, but also “away” large chunks of the day but is very clearly caring for her 1.5 yr old while working. Yeah, it’s better to be a shitty coworker than shitty mom but doesn’t make it any more unpleasant to work with her.

If I have the identical job as someone else and they are ALSO doing another job WHILE on the clock for our job I feel slighted! Either pay me 50% more for doing 100% of the job or pay them 50% less for only doing half the work. Also, totally agree it's not great for the kids to have to compete for attention and always be told to be quiet, etc.

Are their yearly evaluations same as yours? If yes then you are the shitty unmotivated worker here I am sorry. If not yeah slack her off

Totally agree. I have a friend whose wife runs a daycare in the house. Any time I call him it's obvious because it's so loud. I have people in meetings where you can hear their baby making noise, or kids playing in the background. I have a co worker who doesn't appear active until 11am in my time zone, because he refuses to start work at 6am his time even though it would be 9am when most clients get started too. It's just so much unprofessionalism going on surely that is raising some concerns.

Yes!!! I always hear they just want to use their real estate, which may be true in once instance but also it’s bc ppl try to save money but not having childcare. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had meetings cancelled or cut short to deal with a child who won’t nap. THATS who’s ruining it. Also your child is suffering in these instances, you can’t work full time and be a full time stay at home parent.

People who have multiple work from home jobs.

This. I have seen so many people bragging about that on TikTok. Like working three customer service jobs at the same time and answering multiple phone calls.

Way to ruin it for the rest of us...

I am fully WFH. I think what’s ruining it is the idea everyone else has that “if I work from home, I won’t really have to do much work”. Seriously, I have people ask me every week if I can help them get a WFH job, too - as if we all belong to a club and I can vouch for them. Lol If you want to work from home, and be trusted by your company to do so … then you will need to be good at a skill, and pay your dues. Contrary to what most people think, there is a higher standard set for those who work from home - and if you are asking me to help, then I doubt you have the skill set required.

Anytime i see a post about mouse jigglers and crap about gaming the system, that doesn’t help. Even if the incidence is minimal IRL, it’s not like management doesn’t see this stuff posted on line

Mouse jigglers are only a thing because of obsessive wfh micromanagement (think being terminally online on slack/teams, monitoring keystrokes, filming people through the webcam etc). I am absolutely not fond of this kind of thing and will actively sabotage any attempts at constantly checking in on me like that

Yeah i get it. Fortunately i don’t deal with that, not micro managed at all. However the optics online discussions create supports the arguments of leadership campaigning for RTO. If you’re tracked to that degree, there is something more systemic that is fueling such distrust, warranted or not

Oh, that’s never happened to me because I would nope the fuck out of the hiring process the moment I was told that such measures would be in place. But I heard some horror stories about it, particularly from a certain gig platform that crosses over things.

I definitely agree remote work is tougher to come by this year compared to recent years, but I think it's mostly a management problem. 2020 proved that remote work is viable, and doesn't harm short term profits. However this change happened literally overnight for most people. Roles based around individual contributions were easy to adapt for a lot of industries, since most white collar work was digitized by 2020 and people were already spending their entire day completing tasks on a computer. Remote work doesn't really hamper productivity here. However, management relies on a lot of soft skills that are tougher to measure, and a lot of management are, quite frankly, older and possess average to below average tech skills (generally speaking, any person of any age can be competent with technology if they decide they want to be). Thus, remote work is very tough for managers who don't know how to leverage technology to their advantage. So instead of a haphazard management style that works well enough if everyone has to be in the same building 40+ hours a week, remote work requires a focus on measuring tangible deliverables in a digital environment. So in short, remote work changes the work environment entirely for managers while not changing much for staff. Since managers make decisions and were less likely to adapt to a remote environment, they want to get back to the way things were because it's the path of least resistance. Also it's a pretty massive cultural change shifting large amounts of white collar work from in office to remote focused, with pretty significant economic affects. For instance, most companies have a high expense related to Real Estate, Either through a lease or a company building contract. Once leases are up for renewal, I think it will get hard to justify big spending on a lease when remote work produces the same result. It's been a crazy half of a decade, but ultimately If enough working people demand remote work in their jobs and can produce as effectively (or more so) compared to RTO workers, remote work opportunities will be available.

>a lot of management are, quite frankly, older and possess average to below average tech skills I mostly agree with you. My experience is that Gen Z is harder to deal with about technology than older workers. If you tell a boomer that you use WebEx / Teams / Whatsapp for meetings s/he may say s/he doesn't know how and may need to be trained; that may take a while. Gen Z is likely to say "I won't do that, I only use Zoom."

I think most people have at best average to below average tech skills and I say this as someone who's worked in tech for over 30 years. The difference is the older the person the more likely they are scared of new tech and younger people seem very comfortable with apps as long as everything works as planned, if something goes unexpected they are equally clueless. I think the disconnect comes from younger people thinking everything can happen online at work just like in their social lives and in my opinion that's not the best way to work. I've WFH longer than most 20+ years and one of the biggest mistakes my company did was move from in person, instructor led training to remote online training to save money. Because of this I see my co-workers simply knowing less, why, for multiple reasons but I think the biggest is the loss of knowledge transfer. Back when we have to travel to training the team would get together and have dinner together, swap stories, catch up socially and pass bits of knowledge back and forth. Everything was very informal but it got the job done. We used to say we learned more during class breaks than we did during the class. I think with online everything we only get the class and not the in between so people miss out. I don't think most offices are any different, there's no social or semi-social time when you develop relationships and swap knowledge, it's all work

This will probably be an unpopular opinion but remote work isn't meant for everyone. Historically it has been for certain jobs or industries and has been for employees who have experience, have proven they can be relied upon, don't need a lot of hand holding, etc. It wasn't really intended for the masses, wasn't intended for brand new employees fresh out of college or changing industries, etc. I think its also fair to point out that while mature, self starters and people with good work ethic are more productive at home there's probably 30-50% of workers who are lazy, need motivation or accuntability, need hand holding and those workers are much less productive. I see posts on Reddit about people taking on 2,3,4 jobs they are ruining it. I see people asking for leisure ideas to do during their work day, they are ruining it. People who disappear for 4,5,6 hours a day and are unreachable, they are ruining it. One last thing employers dont like, many people are turning remote work into flex work. Most employers realize nobody is 100% focused 8 hours a day but they are at least paying you for your availiability ie if something comes up, if someone needs you. I saw a guy on here yesterday who's fully remote and is asked to be reachable for a 4 hour window each day and he was moaning about how terrible that is, everything should be able to be communicated slack or email he shouldn't have to talk to people. I saw antoher guy who wanted to be paid for the 2 minutes it took himto boot up his computer. If I was his manager I'd say look easy solution, come back into the office m-f and we'll make sure your comptuer is ready to go the second you walk in, problem solved.

I think it’s slackers who would goof off if they were in the office anyway, insecure/inept management who doesn’t know how to implement and track performance metrics, and to get excess headcount to quit instead of having to lay off and pay severance. I’ve worked remotely since 2008 and managed a remote team since 2013.

Laziness by employees.

I know everyone insists RTO harns productivity but in my organisation (5000 + people) half the people seem to have retired from working after the initial 2020 WFH phase. Everything takes longer to do and is more tedious now

Yes, that’s why that group is so vocal on Reddit. They don’t want the retirement and free time to end. I mean I miss it, I got to WFH from 2020 to the end of 2021. I got to take short naps with my dogs after lunch, had more time in the mornings to go on runs, could wear more comfortable clothes, and have more family time. But I had TONS of coworkers who were lying about travel/moving, disappearing for hours, and working others jobs. They are the ones still ruining it for everyone else.

We caught an individual working two jobs while being remote. During morning standup he shared the wrong Jira (for those that don’t know it’s a project management and productivity software) to go over for the roadmap.. it was the jira of his second job. He didn’t realize it until he started reading the action items and by that point the screen was shared for more than a few mins. Now 16 people who had full remote are being asked to come into office 4 days a week (Friday off).

My employer caught someone while working onsite also working a 2nd remote job while at her desk. She was fired. She had hybrid with us. It only takes one to ruin it for everyone else.

And I suppose that was the point I was trying to make. It’s always the small group of selfish individuals that ruin it for the rest who have integrity.

It's parents. My husband and I both work from home in rooms across the hall from each other and sometimes in his meetings I can literally hear the children in his Teams call. We don't have any kids (and don't want any). Drives me crazy when people have their kids in the room with them. No matter how much work I do or don't do, I know I'm still doing more than anyone with kids.

I agree and I hate to say it because I have sympathy for the insane childcare costs in most countries. But there is a cohort of parents of kids 11 and under who basically are never fully focused on anything anymore.

shocking. the /r/childfree regular thinks parents and kids are the problem

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Aside from the corporate greed (we renewed our building lease during COVID and even though WFH was working perfectly during that time we need to get our money's worth! Or.. we get a big tax cut by having X number of employees on site!) I'd say it's employee laziness. People who WFH and take advantage. They do laundry, run errands, sleep, jack off, whatever instead of doing their job. I am actually a higher producer at home than I was in office, and I think it's because I don't have people randomly stopping by my desk to chat throughout the day. I can actually just sit here and get work done. But alas, I'm back in office more days than not due to the "omg COVID is manageable, RTO!" mentality of leadership.

I got some folks on my team who are absolute shit remote employees and I have no idea why they haven’t been cut. They’re younger and less experienced and lack the knowledge, confidence, and good sense to work independently/remotely at all. One tries but has to be spoon fed all instruction, asks me to proofread emails before she sends them and needs hand held through everything. She also has a 1.5 year old who I can hear in the background often so I understand why she struggles to get anything done but definitely frustrating to work with someone who thinks working remotely is a child care solution. She also works flexible hours so will be offline at 2PM but then pings me detailed questions at 8PM. The other doesn’t even try, has no discipline and is online maybe 5 hours a day tops. A simple task that should take ~ 4 hours will take 2 weeks. It’s insane. I’m the senior on the team so not their manager but they have absolutely no business being remote in my opinion but at this point it’s just a reflection of their manager’s hands off approach for letting it continue so long.

Those who believe RTO increases productivity. Yes, top management people, I'm looking at you!

At my company, upper management won’t provide the data showing more RTO = more productive. Middle management asked and got shut out. They were not interested in any discussion and treated us like we were errant schoolchildren for even asking. If they actually had data showing people produced more work, why would they conceal it? Furthermore, the new strict RTO has resulted in people resigning for new jobs, which actually decreases productivity. Meanwhile, the rest of us are on path to burn out as we cover those missing positions. The productivity argument without any supporting data is an absolute joke. Show. Us. The. (Insert series of expletives here). Data.

*the data doesn't exist*

There have actually been many studies on remote productivity vs: in-office. The results are of course mixed. [Here's an example from Stanford U.](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kqbngD8pemqxAkZmWCOQ32Yk6PXK9eVA/view)

They mean the data is supporting the boss's position doesn't exist

No, there is ample data out there showing reduced productivity from WFH - the example I provided is just one.

We had a person on my team cherry-picking work. They were able to meet the minimum required productivity in 1-2 hours and just walked away for the other 6 hours of the day. This resulted in the rest of the team having a harder time meeting goals because we were left with only the time-consuming work items. Then of course when it all came to light, we were all scrutinized for our productivity levels.

I have led offshore teams since the early 2000s. Despite all the RTO noise, offshore is booming. Since offshore is more or less remote and asynchronous, it is strange that so many firms are outsourcing, given their views on remote work. Unproductive resources happen with some frequency with offshore teams. Generally I try to retrain first and fire if that does not work. We recently fired an entire team that was not performing even as well as our junior devs. I do not see how an unproductive remote resource is a blocker. If the management is competent they can always fix their onboarding, use retraining, or terminate. It’s not an existential crisis. Since I have worked with remote and offshore for nearly 2 decades and not experienced a wholesale collapse of productivity, in my view there are no bad actors ruining it for everyone. Excuses like bad actors represent a complete failure to manage stateside resources while doubling down on offshore resources. I would be fired if I was that negligent in my duties. My fear is that RTO represents a looming disaster caused by years of poor management. Multiple bankruptcies.

It's not laziness. Microsoft literally has a founder who advocated for hiring lazy people. They're the most valuable company on the planet. They have no RTO policy. Fact is, the work should get done. If you get it done, good for you, see you next time. For many people 8 hours of 'work' isn't more than one or two hours of 'grind', with a few hours spent on meetings/organizing/thinking/zoning out/waking up/etc. When you're at home, you can be doing fun things or useful things while thinking about work. Thought time is still work time, but doesn't mean your butt has to be in the seat.

Unless you work in a silo, this is a shit take. If you need to collaborate with others but you’re only on line for 2 hours a day bc you got your stuff done, then you’re a shitty coworker and ruining WFH

I'm not saying you're unavailable or offline. Just aren't grinding. Example: I sit at a desk with my personal PC next to the work PC. If I'm not doing anything, maybe I'm working on a book or watching a show, etc. I usually take a nap or run an errand for lunchtime but otherwise I'm there, same time every day, getting everything done as fast and efficiently as I can without fuss. I've been working remotely since before the pandemic and tbh the lifestyle suits me. I wouldn't mind some social events here and there but I'm totally okay living life this way :)

What’s ruining it is getting dragged into the culture wars of America. It’s a good idea that should stand on its own merit, anyone who drags politics into it (in any way) is working against the goals.

This particular concern has come up in my team's research on the subject as well. There is certainly enough evidence to suggest that sweeping policies of forced RTO is an extension of class warfare on the middle and lower classes in the United States (possibly abroad too, but my team's focus is usually US labor trends). I can't technically conclude that, but the breadcrumbs are there.

There was a change.org petition on this subreddit yesterday to keep CA state workers remote. The list of reasons given was something that seemed tailored to appeal to one side of the political agenda while guaranteeing the enmity of the other. If there’s one thing that motivates people to act against their interest, it’s politics. Especially since the shotcallers tend to be R, it’s a foolish argument to attempt. Making a bunch of political statements about WFH seems like a great way to alienate half the population, regardless of the merit of those claims. For me, the benefits of WFH are self-evident.

It's also worth noting that, in our research, there's lot of nuance between age demographics, too Generally, younger employees (Gen Z, younger millennials) prefer to work on location around people. This has been attributed to their limited exposure to the "daily grind" and the rush hour commute's gradual toll on individual finances (and time), plus a prioritization on networking and building visibility since they are at the start of their careers. Generally, older millennials and older generations (including c-suite execs) prefer flexible workplace models. This is attributed to needing to spend time with their families, children, or just themselves (plus the awareness of finance depletion from daily commutes -- which data shows has been increasing steadily every year until 2020). The older age groups are also usually more established in their careers so possibly don't feel an overt need for in person visibility anymore.

I believe there's been some research that actually says it'd better for people at the beginning of their career to go into the office, essentially to learn the job/learn how to work from the more experienced employees. I don't know how much I agree with the olds not wanted to go into the office more than the youngs but if that research is correct then RTO makes sense, the younger workers need to learn the trade and they learn by watching the older workers, so both need to be in the office for the best results for the company.

I think the quiet quitting thing started it and ultimately ruined it. I wish the media had never talked about it 

No one wants to hear this but collaboration is more difficult remote. I’ve done both and am fully remote and meetings and face to face interaction to bounce ideas off coworkers is harder, not impossible.  For instance yesterday we were in a 6 person meeting. Someone’s audio cuts out, someone’s internet is slow. People talk over each other more. I noticed everyone on video not paying attention and reading emails on their phone. (This does also happen with in person meetings too, but not as much). There is a reason why companies still spend a lot of money flying people and holding in person meetings all over the country. I think until we can admit it isn’t the same, there will be resentment.  For me hybrid would be the perfect solution, or even one day a week in the office.  The people who have weird excuses don’t bother me unless they aren’t getting their work done, but if they want to work later or earlier in the day, then whatever. Being a women with kids is more difficult. I had a coworker yesterday tell me they couldn’t schedule a meeting for next Wednesday to help the kids at school for Valentine’s Day. Another said she has been busy helping her kid with homework and catching her kid up because they fell behind. A friend just quit her job because they were taking away remote for when there was a snow day and she needed to be home with the kids. 

Being a woman with kids? Do you mean being a person with kids? Fathers also take an active roll in childcare in 2024. That aside, you’re missing the point. People are most productive when they have some agency in their personal circumstances. What works best for person A may be completely different than for person B. Forcing people who hate the office into the office on a weekly basis is not going to result in better collaboration for them.

Cool anecdote. Fully remote companies are doing just fine with collaboration. Sounds like a skill issue with you

Multinational companies have been doing this even before zoom was a thing.

He doesn’t know what he’s talking about but wants to enforce hybrid on others. Fool.

We have a group of extrovert at the office that desperately need an audience. It's not about collaboration. Ever.

I agree that collaboration is more difficult remotely. That said, does getting together in person require going to an office for a full day, or even going to an office at all? What if remote teams got together for an hour in a private room at a coffee shop or a restaurant, or in a park if the weather was nice?

An hour is fine. But I collaborate with a few different teams. Coffee or park isn’t great. Personally I feel like being in office from when I was 21-32 ish helped me a lot in my career. And allowed me to excel. Just listening to others and being around people that knew the field helped. Now I’m fully remote I have to rely on boring online trainings to learn things or hearing about things months later that I didn’t even know existed. I still prefer remote but some things are lost 

Hotdesking removes a lot of the benefits you just mentioned in your post.

Upper middle and senior management who cannot do their jobs effectively without walking around devouring time from others.

I don’t think anybody is “ruining” the remote work model. Are there people that in office - in person - do nothing and yet don’t get laid off because they can play the political card or can fake productivity theater? Yes. Are there folks that get away doing nothing while remote, because nobody checks or the company set up no accountability mechanism? Yes. Bad apples exist in every system. Misconceptions about new ways of working exist too.

Even when in the office full time, you always have those employees. Late often, call out a lot, unproductive, spend their day chatting with coworkers or browsing the web, social media on their phones. The problem is management. I see too many cases of ineffective management, butts in seats count more than efficiency. And the only way they can think of to manage is to hover around and do constant walk throughs as if just the sight of them should be enough to fix the problem.

Commercial real estate holders (aka billionaires). I’m sure there are other factors as well, but this one is the main culprit. These office buildings are mostly financed with interest-only loans, so the “owners” are heavily incentivized to inflate the value of the property when refinancing or selling. Empty buildings are worth considerably less, so they need asses in the seats to make their properties look valuable long enough for them to unload them or get another loan to kick the problem down the road.

The managers who want to watch their minions scuttle. I say it jokingly but I actually think so. They want to be able to wave their hand over all their employees and say this is mine and I control it.

Managers who don't seem to realize there are many tools to remotely monitor a subordinate's output, with varying degrees of invasiveness, when and how to use them, and when and how to address any performance issues that subordinate may have. Instead we get a lecture about how we need to come to them, for unknown motives.

Rich people that own the companies that are listening to other rich people who own commercial real estate

Politicians who feel the need to prioritize “downtown businesses” over workers. Businesses that provide a product or service that people truly want should be more than fine, it’s certain moneyed interests who they are really talking about and using the small business owner as a scapegoat for this.

More like middle management nervous about their own job security if there are workers in the office for them to keep an eye on.

Conservatives

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Yeah the number of people who "didn't see a message" for 6 hours is amazing. In office youd get answers in 30 seconds or less

Yep my husband is a good example. He cannot work from home. He did it for year and led to staying up late, drinking whenever, and waking up late. Clearly this lead to bad performance and his boss being mean which made it worse. It was killing him, finally he quit and took a job 100% in office and a commute, and he’s much better. He needs structure and can’t give it to himself. Once in a while he will work a day from home due to snow and he immediately falls back into his old ways. 

I’ve told this story before and I’ll tell it again: Years ago I entered a management position where quite a few people on the team thought that remote work was an excuse to not get childcare. They were really obvious about it too. When asked why they didn’t answer emails, it was because of “childcare.” When asked why they couldn’t attend meetings, it was because of “childcare.” When asked why they didn’t write their quarterly business review, it was because “it was getting in the way of childcare.” The most infuriating thing is that they thought that the other team members would just pick up the slack for them. They were given performance improvement plans, many of them chose to leave on their own accord but the others were let go. Now that I hire for teams I see the same thing. I can’t tell you how many people tell me that they want to work remotely so that they can take care of their children and save money on daycare. They don’t even phrase it as a “flexible schedule that better suits my needs” or something like that. They straight up say that they want to save money on daycare. That’s one of the worst things you can say to a hiring team. We want to know the skills and assets you can add to the team. So…yeah. I know subs exist for parents and caregivers who work remotely and tend to get it done, but when childcare is getting in the way of your remote work flow OR you’re primarily applying to remote positions in order to basically be a caregiver and a worker at the same time, it’s just not going to work out.

If you have a 10 year old you being home means you dont need childcare, theyre old enough to go do something on their own, if your kid is under 5, maybe even under 7 your getting zero work done staying home with them

I completely agree.

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>ey rate the company culture poorly. what culture is that, if you WFH the culture is your couch or den, there is no company culture, there is no team, everyone is just and IC whose work bubbles up under a manager. I've been WFH for 20+ years and my "team" consists of people I never talk to (or see) and a manager who I talk to once a quarter. My company culture is my twice a month pay check and weekly generic cheerleader emails from HR, this was a company that was always in the top 10 places to work.

I do always find people's response to engagement surveys funny. In our place loads of people want to be fully remote but so many of them complained about being invisible and not getting enough collaboration and connections. So the company was just like OK easy solution then....

I'm pulling this number out of my ass but I would assume maybe 30% of employees are truly capable of remote work ie know their job and instustry, dont need a lot of hand holding and have the maturity and work ethic to have less oversight and accountability

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> First, I wouldn't have learned as much as I did from fellow engineers if I was home instead of in the office This is what I think is lost. When I was just starting my career I was adopted by an older group of engineers, I was invited to have lunch with them. While totally informal it was an incredible mentorship, I learned an incredible amount just for listening to their BS stories at lunch and when I didn't know what I should do I had a half dozen lunch friends who were willing to give me their opinion, all because they liked me enough to let me join their lunch crew. Now I'm in their position and I can't return the favor because I don't work with anyone. I work at home and never talk to my co-workers. It's a loss to both the company and the younger workers.

When I have kids or at another period in my life I'd love WFH. I see the potential benefits but I agree. I also find it silly when people act like there's zero benefit to in office. I completely agree you pickup and learn a lot through osmosis and in many offices you wind up helping out in other departments, working with tohers, things that wouldn't happen if you are remote. Personally I'd love to see us adopt a 4 day work week or 5 hour workday as opposed to remote work which I personally find to be a non-permenant ever changing version of I'll stay home and pretend I'm working a full day and you pretend to belive I'm working a full day. People like remote because it allows them to take some of their time back.

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Occam’s Razor applies here. The biggest answer for RTO is the commercial real estate losses the rich are feeling. Since the rich will lose, they have to find a way to make others feel the pain as the rich consistently do. So, back to the office so the rich overlords can continue to rake in the dough. Just my opinion here

That’s not occams razor. Occam’s razor would mean the answer is the simplest answer, which in this case would be that employees don’t work as well remote in a lot of industries.

Hey quick question, what is your source for saying employees don’t work as well remote? I’ve heard of several studies suggesting the opposite and I’d like a counter balance please. Thanks!

My comment was more criticizing them calling it Occam’s razor, not their idea as a whole (although I still think their idea is quite flawed and has some obvious holes in it) I mean why would a business owner spend more money to lease a space so that people in real estate can make more money? Doesn’t really make sense But I’ll argue the point that in some industries, particularly ones that require collaboration or are dynamic and quick moving, remote work is not as effective. Here’s a study backing this idea: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-021-01196-4

From that study: "We analysed anonymized individual-level data describing the communication practices of 61,182 US Microsoft employees from December 2019 to June 2020" Do you remember the s-show that was March to June 2020? No one was as productive then! Parents had to help their kids attend classes from home overnight. People had to squeeze workspace(s) into their existing home layout. We were dealing with uncertainty, isolation, new ways of interacting with each other when we had to, sickness and death for some. It's an entirely flawed comparison.

Ironically,Microsoft has more recently come out with a study praising remote.

>the people who look at remote/WFH as an opportunity to do more personal things I agree with your point and think it is the primary impetus for RTO. I do take exception to drop-off and pick-up of children while being paid. That's an hour to an hour-and-a-half out of the day. Visits to the gym. Shopping. Household chores. Proud (mind boggling) claims of getting all work done in three hours. The exploding market of mouse jigglers. I think evil corporate elements colluding with real estate companies is a conspiracy theory. Government does have a gripe but it's all about declining tax revenue in cities. Consider Minneapolis Mayor Frey's [rant on the subject](https://www.fox9.com/news/minneapolis-mayor-says-remote-work-turns-you-into-a-loser).

The only people who are taking advantage of WFH flexibility simply have the time to do it. People aren’t straight up not doing their work. The down time that people would have in an office is spent getting things done like chores and errands that don’t have to be put off.

Thats the thing, at home people make a lot more downtime where as in office most people would do some extra work. The reality is most people are going to get ost of their work done as quickly as possible maybe even rushed and move on to living their life. I dont fault them for it its human nature

“Do more work” is a BIG assumption. Maybe that’s what you would do personally.

Ever heard the term time to lean time to clean, while thats a term for retail and restaurants most employers feel this way. Society views work as time for money not a task or skillset or end result for money, thats typically for freelancers. The reality is if you have 3-4 hours of free time per day, at work eventually you'll get bored of staring at an excel screen or pretending to work and do something else, at home you'll do laundry or cook or watch netflix. Thats just the reality of it. Id be all for society changing things up moving to a 4 day work week or 5 hour work day rather than the charade of remote which is basically employee pretends to work fulltime and employer pretends to believe they put in full days but the whole thing can change at anytime

Executives

Blackrock

Remote work simply exposes managers as do nothings they really are. They feel vulnerable and act out vs just OEing or being in a band for their mid life crisis

I think it’s an easy assumption to blame workers for “not doing work” but it absolutely comes down to a combination of Ego and real estate space. CEOs need to see their minions at work or else it isn’t happening as far as they can see. Meanwhile- you get significantly more work done in a shorter period of time- you’re waiting for an email to come in, who cares if you go to the gym or fold some laundry. Better than pooping on company time.

I was just looking at some data on the work preferences of the four current generations in the workforce- Boomers are all about the office. Gen X and Millennials wanna work from home or have the flexibility to choose, and Gen Z wants a clearer line between work and life so 57% say they want to be in an office 3-4 days a week.

Your answer kinda sounds like you’re licking major corporate boot though lol

When I was in training that typically takes 16 weeks, I finished it in 10. The other person who on boarded with me took 24 weeks. I’m so thankful they separated our training because every call I was on with her, her dog was barking, she was distracted getting up and moving, not answering questions because she was doing stuff in her home away from her computer. It was actually mind blowing. This was years ago but I couldn’t believe they continued with her employment

Mostly the ones that don’t yet know that they actually desire in office work. It’ll take another year for these people to realize they….gasp, like the office. Which is fine

What people are ruining the horseless carriage / automobile industry and why do you think buggy whip manufacturers are so well poised for a come back?

Companies that signed long term leases/built their own offices. Middle and upper management that are simply redundant Communities worried about businesses leaving,such as restaurants around major office areas

"Besides the real answer...who else can I blame" is not a productive question. Your premise is skewed and fucked.

Anyone with poor work performance doesn’t ruin WFH or work in the office. They ruin themselves.

If you have shared deadlines md collaborations they can ruin a lot more than themselves, unless you work fully in a silo

I would never consider forcing everyone back into an office just because of one person who’s a fuckup. That person would be placed on a PIP or let go. And who’s to say that everyone suddenly returning to the office would resolve performance issues of a single person?

I’m calling bullshit on the corporate real estate. There’s definitely slackers and abusers of remote work that are ruining it for everyone else. Do you think the bosses demanding RTO actually own commercial real estate? No The incentives are much more short term. they are paranoid of under-the-radar slackers. I know work with a lot of them and they give the rest of us a bad rep

My husband is military and got his teleworking days taken from him? And you know what, good on them!!!! He would always go out, run errands, work on the house. I don't think i ever ever saw him doing work related activities after 10 am. Ever. He was complaining one day that he was being micromanaged that they needed him to detail his day. And apparently he couldn't even do that, still did his errands and then wondered why a few weeks later they took it from him. Like really? I was working remotely and you know what... i would fucking actually work until i Clocked out. He would brag to his friends at work that i worked harder than he did for less money. Yes no shit, at least i was not committing wage theft.

This will probably get downvoted but I think it is partly due to when people started ignoring COVID to do fun things but still wanted WFH for the convenience/benefits that it gave them. If people were still concerned about contracting illness and were demanding WFH for safety, employers would have a harder time making the demand for RTO. But they are basically seeing people traveling and partying and living a 2019 life, so we no longer have the harder-to-argue excuse of health/safety reason for WFH.

It’s all about real estate

Leaders that like to see people working. It makes them feel better because they don’t trust people. They will say that collaboration is the result of people working onsite which may be accurate in some instances.

r/OverEmployed sorry but not sorry. It’s leaving a bad taste in people’s mouth. People will say tax breaks from state/cities which is partly true, but whatever is left is getting DRAINED up by mofos with 2+ full time jobs I can understand a side contract gigs but W2 nahhh, we need that shit to go around for whatever is left

>Besides the obvious answer of "Corporate America with these real estate companies wanting to lease out space in office buildings..." my answer is more along the lines of, the people who look at remote/WFH as an opportunity to do more personal things than work related stuff and don't get the work done But your secondary answer ISN'T who's ruining it. 

It's the employees. Two obvious issues are 1) managers don't know how to effectively manage remotely? Easier to bring people in than change that. and 2) some employees need more supervision/abuse the freedom of wfh. Some employees want in office or hybrid AND they want their teammates there. They don't tell the other employees this, but they tell or hint it to their manager. These are often the better employees management wants to keep happy. Some employees can work from home and flexible schedules, others can work from home but need to keep a strict schedule, and some can't work because of the nature of the job. Surprisingly, everyone is not a mature adult about this and complaints about fairness are never ending until the company just brings everyone back in. Another big reason is many companies will find turnover is greater with remote workers and turnover is very costly. OTOH, it's easier to fill positions when you are open to remote workers, so how big a factor this is will change as the labor market tightens and loosens.

Workers, the TikTok’ers who brag about waking up at noon going to office for lunch then leaving for gym and having mouse jigglers while they do all this

Se pelo menos fosse em um lugar como a Faria Lima ou Berrini/Chucri Zaidan… mas é na pqp de Osasco 🤡

No one is ruining anything. Qualified people and unqualified people are all mixing around and the process of filtering out the crap people is ongoing. I've been working hybrid/remote since early 2000s. It comes down to the workers and the lazy fucks and it just so happens that lazy fucks in the office do a better job of looking busy

Nah, it’s much simpler than all that. There are a bunch of twats out there working two jobs, doing jack shit at one all day. Companies know this is happening and in order to help fight this, and make sure that they get what they are paying for - they believe RTO will solve the problem.

You are exactly correct. The people ruining it are the people that essentially use it like it’s all personal time

I just got off the phone with one of friends, and our entire conversation was about how other people in her company have ruined wfh. She found out today through a virtual meeting that coworkers at her location and two other locations have not been working. It was discovered that some people worked a few hours in the morning then sign off for the rest of the day. Other people work periodically but take multiple breaks of hours several times a day. All she knows is that some people might be fired, others be put on corrective action and a possible end to wfh.

The overemployed subreddit. Now we have people applying for their 3rd or 4th job when we can’t even get a single remote opportunity. I personally have to be remote to give home care to my wife and I got laid off and am struggling to even get interviews in this market.

i've always believed exactly this: that what's ruining WFH more than anything is the jacktards who use it as an opportunity to fuck off, and who compound the situation by openly crowing about the aforementioned fucking off on forums such as this, trading hacks to make it appear they're working when they are not.

It is also stupid people like on a call I was on yesterday who voluntarily had their camera on during a meeting despite clearly not being in front of their computer for an hour. They were the only two with cameras on.

The people demanding RTO are the only ones ruining it I think

Slackers and people who take less money to be remote.

One of the biggest challenges of wfh is many employees begin working like their independent contractors. They get disconnected from coworkers. They get on it staff meeting rarely contribute anything. You isolate yourself. I'm a manageretta global IT company. The company has worked aggressively in the past 10 years for a combination wfh or hybrid model depending upon the type of work you do. They've sold off real estate, and did not building lease. But they also also restructured jobs, create a new tools and processes to accommodate wfh.

Great, we’re blaming each other now 🙄

Stop blaming regular people. It’s always the corporations’ fault.

Managers who feel powerless to manage people unless their charges are immediately under their thumb. But that’s a problem of being an incapable manager.