New OPM memo on RTO
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Anonymous
If Trump wants to treat federal workers like commercial workers then increase our pay like 25%. Feds can’t be underpaid and have no flexibility, unless you want Feds to find other positions, which is why this whole thing is happening. Also the idea that all Feds attended the DEI presentations is ridiculous. Attendance was optional during lunch. I only went to the ones that sounded interesting. It was in a private company that I got a mandatory attendance for The Woke Coach. DEI seemed far more prevalent in commercial, IMO. |
Anonymous
My DH in the private sector was hired 100% remote, as was about 90% of his company. If that changes (there is talk that it might), he will leave the job. It upends our childcare arrangements, our insurance, etc. I don’t think it’s entitled of him to expect the work arrangement he was hired into and negotiated for or to talk to recruiters now that it might change. |
Anonymous
A good chunk of the attorney workforce (especially among DCUM posters) came from biglaw and likely could return. When these new changes take effect biglaw will offer MORE workplace flexibility than government. This will be disastrous for retention and hiring—which seems to be the plan. |
Anonymous
100%. The plan is to get everyone out of the federal government and into the private sector. Get yourself out and find a better job for yourself. |
Anonymous
| The irony is the private sector will now offer better work life balance for more pay. |
Anonymous
But super true. |
Anonymous
+1 DH and I are both feds. We didn’t do any major changes (e.g. moving) and kept paying for aftercare/camps because we knew this was always a possibility under any President but almost certain under Trump. |
Anonymous
This is true. So much entitlement among Feds |
Anonymous
Good for you for planning ahead |
Anonymous
+1. The economy goes up if the federal workforce dumps out into the private sector. It goes down as feds stay in the federal government, passing policies and regulations that hamstring the private sector. The people who write here seem to not understand that this is all by design. They want a smaller federal workforce. They don't want the best and brightest bringing their talents because then there will be stronger regulations, more expansive policies, etc. I know most people here will only listen to mainstream media. But if you do that, you cannot understand the administration's plans. Trump’s people do not give long interviews to the mainstream media, and when they are interviewed, it's hostile and antagonistic so the core ideas never come out. You have to listen to interviews on right wing media to hear the plans. Tucker Carlson has been interviewing administration officials for months and they've spelled out their entire plan, including litigation strategies. I have known all this was coming for months and have been surprised by nothing, and I even understand the time frames and some of the logistics. If you can't stomach listening to opposing views, I am not talking to you. If you're genuinely seeking to be able to know what they are planning to do and when they plan to do it, I am talking to you. |
Anonymous
A few problems with your analysis: 1) most feds are GS, a system that was invented over 100 years ago and is centrally controlled by OPM. By definition, this is not a "market rate" salary. 2) the RTO for big tech hasn't happened the way people say it has. Most tech companies are 3 days per week, and of all the big ones, only Amazon has recently announced (but not implemented) 5 days per week. To make things worse, there is a significant delta between their stated policies and the way that they implement. For example, security engineers broadly work from home, often entirely, both because of the nature of the candidate pool and the nature of the work. So companies are making policies, but they aren't cutting off their noses to spite their faces. They are giving themselves flexibility to hire and retain. 3) the appeal of federal compensation is now changing at the same time as flexibility is changing. I think the government could weather RTO if the pension scheme remained the same. But making the contribution go up to 4.4% makes federal employment significantly less appealing than at the current rate. I don't think we can look at the policies in isolation when, as a practical matter, they are happening as a package. You cannot reduce flexibility, compensation, and benefits and then say this is equivalent to the private sector RTO. The companies that you name provide 2-3 times the amount of total compensation as the federal government. |
Anonymous
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I’m sure the Feds of DCUM are highly qualified and can get themselves a higher-paying private sector job by snapping their fingers.
But this doesn’t tally with most remote Feds I know, many of whom are lazy and entitled, giving their “day job” a few hours of attention a week and spending the bulk of their time on their kids or day trading. That being said, full RTO for knowledge workers is dumb and a huge step in the wrong direction. It’s bad for the environment, it’s bad for working parents, it’s bad for people who *actually* need or want to be there in-person and now have to deal with heavier traffic. The way to deal with lazy Feds is through better performance management practices to weed out the bad ones. |
Anonymous
What about all the people at IBM who were hired remote decades ago had to go back to the office or the people at Starbucks, Amazon, or Meta who have RTO recently? Of course people are looking for new roles if they don’t want to RTO, but no company or organization owes employees indefinite anything. Feds are not the first employees to find themselves in this position. There is nothing exceptional about having to RTO after being remote or hybrid. Some Feds may make less than some private sector peers, but this is untrue of every fed. And feds who may make less than they would in the private sector are not entitled to remote or hybrid conditions just because they are paid slightly less. The market will dictate if feds have better options than staying and I predict for many feds jumping to the private sector will not be better from the standpoint of remuneration, especially if FERS is taken into account. |
Anonymous
No way. They’ve gone soft. They couldn’t handle that lifestyle anymore. Not to mention, some of them may have taken the paycut for flexibility, but I bet the majority were pushed out bc it’s a very “up or out” culture. |
Anonymous
My husband's org is doing RTO. They have months to prepare and will still have situational telework. That's very different from what's happening here. Of course being remote doesn't have to be permanent, but springing it on people like this is something you only do when the point is to make their lives worse, and I don't know why anyone would defend that. |