Being summoned back to the office four days a week and anxious/sick over it

[Anonymous]

I work in a global organization. I supervise a global team. I have employees in Stockholm, Warsaw, New York, Singapore and London. The boss is based in Ohio and travels constantly.

Please explain why I need to commute to an office to take my calls with these people every day and how that makes me more productive? I don’t actually work with the other people who are physically in the office, except rarely and on those rare occasions we do arrange face-to-face meetings (but we don’t spend daily time together since we all are working on multiple projects).

And if you agree I can do the same job from home as I could managing a global team from an office, do you also agree that I am equally productive in both settings?

Or should I have to be physically present in the office for the 0300 conference calls with Singapore?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm confused. Presumably you went into the office before covid hit and you didn't get sick to your stomach and have panic attacks.

I don't understand why you feel that way now. I mean, sure it sucks to have to RTO, but not understanding why you are getting legit panic attacks over it.

Exactly. You'll adjust.

I think you are feeling this way because you think that the employer is taking away something from you. But in reality, they adjusted for the pandemic and are adjusting things back to normal now.

Employers absolutely are taking something from us with RTO.
They did not want to lose any valuable labor time during covid so they fed everyone lines that if you got sick you could take "covid leave" blah blah but they found ways to get everyone connected and working from home pretty seamlessly.

Then when employees showed that they could do it, excel, be more productive and in some cases work even more hours (even when recovering from illnesses! or quarantining) they are not happy with that proof and want their way again.

Put yourself in the shoes of your evil employer for just a moment, they have decided to bring their staff back to the office more days. Why? Do they think people are excelling and working more hours from home and they are trying to reduce productivity? Unlikely. Are they trying to torture you and cause panic attacks? Also unlikely. I think that most employers are sick of trying to reach their staff while they’re busy making soup or out picking up their kids and they need to bring them to an office to verify they do their jobs, plus the in person camaraderie is good for the team. Why else do you think so many are doing this?

Long-term leases.

Yes, this.

The mindset of “I have to verify you’re doing your job” is such a middle manager desperate to justify his existence.

[Anonymous]

It’s actually better than you think, Op.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I work in a global organization. I supervise a global team. I have employees in Stockholm, Warsaw, New York, Singapore and London. The boss is based in Ohio and travels constantly.

Please explain why I need to commute to an office to take my calls with these people every day and how that makes me more productive? I don’t actually work with the other people who are physically in the office, except rarely and on those rare occasions we do arrange face-to-face meetings (but we don’t spend daily time together since we all are working on multiple projects).

And if you agree I can do the same job from home as I could managing a global team from an office, do you also agree that I am equally productive in both settings?

Or should I have to be physically present in the office for the 0300 conference calls with Singapore?

Same.
Ridiculous. Antiquated. Life ruining spoilt behavior to insist on making employees do this

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Suck it up Buttercup!

Lol. No! We have options cos we’re smart 😉

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went back in work in person 5 days a week in Prior job remote three years.

My new job I started same time as another person who is hybrid. Only 3 days in office. Which means 40 percent of time his chair is empty. His learning curve is so slow. People don’t go to him for much as why bother the chair is empty most days. He also knows less people. He asks me who does what a lot.

Recently he asked about promotion. Was told since all people are not hybrid he will have to come to work five days a week. It was like he was hit with a cold pail of water.

His problem, or my problem or her problem whatever case is. I stopped doing any zoom or on line meetings or even outlook meetings with remote people. I only meet in person. The more people do that the harder it gets to do remote.

He may be hybrid but I bet he can spell ‘online’

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No sympathy. No work from home ever for me.

Welcome back to the real world.

Right but that’s on you for choosing a role or a job that won’t let you. Others should not suffer just because you failed to get a job that lets you work where you want.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No sympathy. No work from home ever for me.

Welcome back to the real world.

Right but that’s on you for choosing a role or a job that won’t let you. Others should not suffer just because you failed to get a job that lets you work where you want.

PP didn’t “fail” to get a job that allows remote. How would anyone have known prior to Covid to only look for jobs that allow remote. Remote is great but if your job doesn’t allow then they don’t allow. End of discussion.

[Anonymous]

I think the market will adjust.
Case in point - I am currently hybrid flex. I have 2 job offers. One requires 3 specific days in office and one is also hybrid flex. I straight up turned down the one with more rigidity (and told them the reason) in favor of the one that is just as flex as my own.
Desirable candidates will always have sway and companies are realizing it’s up there with salary and sometimes in fact you can pay people less to let them choose.
Had a good conversation about it with the co that mandates and they were quite thoughtful about it. Imo it’s a cultural red flag that a. A company needs to oversee in this way and b. That they hire people who need that kind of oversight to be productive.
Your job should be driven by workload not by hours. End of story

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No sympathy. No work from home ever for me.

Welcome back to the real world.

Right but that’s on you for choosing a role or a job that won’t let you. Others should not suffer just because you failed to get a job that lets you work where you want.

PP didn’t “fail” to get a job that allows remote. How would anyone have known prior to Covid to only look for jobs that allow remote. Remote is great but if your job doesn’t allow then they don’t allow. End of discussion.

Dude it’s been 3.5 years since covid started.
That’s 3.5 years that pp has been sore and resentful about having to go into an office but doing nothing to better their situation and preferring to crow when others have to suffer. That’s failure

[Anonymous]

4 days seems extreme. In my circle of friends 2 to 3 days in the office is more than normal.

My spouse’s large company made a big public fuss in February or so that starting in March everyone would be in the office 4 days a week. It’s October and he’s been in once all four days. Most of the time he goes in 3. It’s fine and no one cares. They more just wanted to make the point that the FT WFH is ending but no one is squabbling over exact days.

The other thing that seems permanent since Covid is people on their office days, having more overall flexible schedules… Leaving earlier, coming in later, coming in for meetings, but not arriving at nine and leaving at six like the old days.

Why don’t you go and see how it is and see if you can shift to a more reasonable 2 to 3 days.

[Anonymous]

Remote work will ultimately be for low pay data processors who can be monitored by key strokes.

Remote jobs will be outsourced to low pay international workers or lower pay parts of the US.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the market will adjust.
Case in point - I am currently hybrid flex. I have 2 job offers. One requires 3 specific days in office and one is also hybrid flex. I straight up turned down the one with more rigidity (and told them the reason) in favor of the one that is just as flex as my own.
Desirable candidates will always have sway and companies are realizing it’s up there with salary and sometimes in fact you can pay people less to let them choose.
Had a good conversation about it with the co that mandates and they were quite thoughtful about it. Imo it’s a cultural red flag that a. A company needs to oversee in this way and b. That they hire people who need that kind of oversight to be productive.
Your job should be driven by workload not by hours. End of story

The rigidity of the in-person schedule is so that people are actually together in person on the same days to reap the benefits of being together. To me it’s a red flag that a company offers people a flexible hybrid schedule. That means they just want to say they have ass in chairs some of the time and don’t have any real clear idea why they are doing it. If you’re not there at the same time as others, kind of no point.

This issue and how you feel about it seems very driven by the type of work you do. Comments about workload and productivity speak to individual contributors who don’t need to work much with others and don’t tend to manage people and relationships don’t matter as much. Anyone who is sitting on zoom all day talking to people or in meetings does not want to WFH the rest of their life because it’s hell on earth.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Remote work will ultimately be for low pay data processors who can be monitored by key strokes.

Remote jobs will be outsourced to low pay international workers or lower pay parts of the US.

On the contrary. Remote work will be for the highest performers because they can negotiate for whatever they want.
We just hired someone at $320k to be fully remote who we would prob have had to pay $400 if we’d wanted him in office (and I think he would have declined)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the market will adjust.
Case in point - I am currently hybrid flex. I have 2 job offers. One requires 3 specific days in office and one is also hybrid flex. I straight up turned down the one with more rigidity (and told them the reason) in favor of the one that is just as flex as my own.
Desirable candidates will always have sway and companies are realizing it’s up there with salary and sometimes in fact you can pay people less to let them choose.
Had a good conversation about it with the co that mandates and they were quite thoughtful about it. Imo it’s a cultural red flag that a. A company needs to oversee in this way and b. That they hire people who need that kind of oversight to be productive.
Your job should be driven by workload not by hours. End of story

The rigidity of the in-person schedule is so that people are actually together in person on the same days to reap the benefits of being together. To me it’s a red flag that a company offers people a flexible hybrid schedule. That means they just want to say they have ass in chairs some of the time and don’t have any real clear idea why they are doing it. If you’re not there at the same time as others, kind of no point.

This issue and how you feel about it seems very driven by the type of work you do. Comments about workload and productivity speak to individual contributors who don’t need to work much with others and don’t tend to manage people and relationships don’t matter as much. Anyone who is sitting on zoom all day talking to people or in meetings does not want to WFH the rest of their life because it’s hell on earth.

I zoom all day and hell on earth is doing it from the office.
Rto only works for companies that have one ‘branch’