RTO and employees who live outside the DC metro

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everyone on these threads always talks about how much more work they get done. But on my mom’s group- the tone is totally different. They are upset about how they can’t get any work done, they don’t have childcare for their 6m-3 year olds and do a lot of chores during the day. Which also is what I see at my own work. There’s much less productivity from remote workers.

Give supervisors more control over their employees and then remote work might actually work.

Weird how they don’t post stories like that anywhere else. Almost like you’re making it up.

I’m a female and a mom. The poster isn’t making it up. It’s frustrating when I see parents (but particularly moms) on my team and other teams leave or sign off early frequently and don’t meet the same targets as other team members. A colleague in another department signed off every single day at 3:30 when her kids can home from
The bus. Blocked it off, didn’t sign back in, etc. Sign them up for after school, and yes she could afford it!

I have women on my team who have had to leave early to work from home with a sick child. As long as they give me a heads up and do their work I am fine with it. I also give leeway for people who need to care for parents or wait for a plumber but it can’t happen daily and if it is then you use your sick leave or PTO.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everyone on these threads always talks about how much more work they get done. But on my mom’s group- the tone is totally different. They are upset about how they can’t get any work done, they don’t have childcare for their 6m-3 year olds and do a lot of chores during the day. Which also is what I see at my own work. There’s much less productivity from remote workers.

Give supervisors more control over their employees and then remote work might actually work.

Weird how they don’t post stories like that anywhere else. Almost like you’re making it up.

I’m a female and a mom. The poster isn’t making it up. It’s frustrating when I see parents (but particularly moms) on my team and other teams leave or sign off early frequently and don’t meet the same targets as other team members. A colleague in another department signed off every single day at 3:30 when her kids can home from
The bus. Blocked it off, didn’t sign back in, etc. Sign them up for after school, and yes she could afford it!

I have women on my team who have had to leave early to work from home with a sick child. As long as they give me a heads up and do their work I am fine with it. I also give leeway for people who need to care for parents or wait for a plumber but it can’t happen daily and if it is then you use your sick leave or PTO.

Ah yes, a “female.” Very believable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Office-based work is also completely out of sync with the real estate market. Most people change jobs multiple times throughout their careers. It makes no sense to uproot a family and take on the expense of selling a home to work for a job that you have not have (voluntarily or involuntarily) in five years. I even know people in the DC that have sold and bought homes when they changed jobs (e.g., moving between MD and VA or PG and MoCo counties) to be closer to work. Owning a home is a huge deterrent to changing jobs when in office work is required, even within in the same metro area when commutes can be very long.

This is a great example of another tangential argument about RTO. My company has decided that we work best together in our office together in person, period full stop. Your real estate market concerns, child care arrangements, feelings about public transportation, etc are all irrelevant. If those are more of a priority for you please go somewhere else and we will find some other worker who better fits our company.

No one cares about your company with hostile supervisors. There is no way to take public transportation to these buildings. We have teens, no child care issues, but when you are working all day and a few hours at night it’s a driving and safety issue. Do you have to get up at 2am regularly to fix something? Have calls between 7-12 at night? Calls at 6-7 am?

We don’t have hostile supervisors, people who seem to like interacting with other humans in person do well in my company at any level. I do have to get up and fix something or have calls at night, and I’m compensated well for my time. Also my 12 and 14 year old kids take the metro and public busses without incident so I find these sudden misgiving about public transportation from grown adults laughable. I’m sure my job and lifestyle aren’t for everyone but the constant complaining from the insufferable pandemic-life-is-my-forever-lifestyle crowd is exhausting.

I agree with you 1000%. We're somehow supposed to believe that a bunch of adults who have navigated the world up to this point suddenly are incapable of navigating a world where they have to, gasp, arrive at an office in order to work. It's absurd. People are selfish and lazy. That's all it really comes down to. I also think it's really important to model for your children. What actual working looks like. I don't think most adults who are working from home really serve as good role models in that capacity. They're just producing a new generation of even lazier, weird people who are incapable of carrying on a conversation or debating an issue face-to-face.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Office-based work is also completely out of sync with the real estate market. Most people change jobs multiple times throughout their careers. It makes no sense to uproot a family and take on the expense of selling a home to work for a job that you have not have (voluntarily or involuntarily) in five years. I even know people in the DC that have sold and bought homes when they changed jobs (e.g., moving between MD and VA or PG and MoCo counties) to be closer to work. Owning a home is a huge deterrent to changing jobs when in office work is required, even within in the same metro area when commutes can be very long.

This is a great example of another tangential argument about RTO. My company has decided that we work best together in our office together in person, period full stop. Your real estate market concerns, child care arrangements, feelings about public transportation, etc are all irrelevant. If those are more of a priority for you please go somewhere else and we will find some other worker who better fits our company.

No one cares about your company with hostile supervisors. There is no way to take public transportation to these buildings. We have teens, no child care issues, but when you are working all day and a few hours at night it’s a driving and safety issue. Do you have to get up at 2am regularly to fix something? Have calls between 7-12 at night? Calls at 6-7 am?

We don’t have hostile supervisors, people who seem to like interacting with other humans in person do well in my company at any level. I do have to get up and fix something or have calls at night, and I’m compensated well for my time. Also my 12 and 14 year old kids take the metro and public busses without incident so I find these sudden misgiving about public transportation from grown adults laughable. I’m sure my job and lifestyle aren’t for everyone but the constant complaining from the insufferable pandemic-life-is-my-forever-lifestyle crowd is exhausting.

I agree with you 1000%. We're somehow supposed to believe that a bunch of adults who have navigated the world up to this point suddenly are incapable of navigating a world where they have to, gasp, arrive at an office in order to work. It's absurd. People are selfish and lazy. That's all it really comes down to. I also think it's really important to model for your children. What actual working looks like. I don't think most adults who are working from home really serve as good role models in that capacity. They're just producing a new generation of even lazier, weird people who are incapable of carrying on a conversation or debating an issue face-to-face.

It is absurd. Spending 2-3 hours a day in traffic to have Teams calls with people who aren’t physically in my office is absurd.

Why can’t you accept that technology has evolved?!

[Anonymous]

I don't understand why this debate continues to happen again and again and again and again on this site. It comes down to what works for your job and your employer. Or what the leadership or Board determines it needs. If they decide they need people in the office then that's what will happen. And you can do it or vote with your feet. This really isn't rocket science. This RTO v. WFH navel gazing argument ad nauseum is pointless and exhausting. It will continue to be determined employer by employer based on job requirements, the business culture, financial needs (ie paying a premium for an office lease) and myriad other factors. Basically, keep your eyes on your paper unless you want to put down your pencil and leave.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everyone on these threads always talks about how much more work they get done. But on my mom’s group- the tone is totally different. They are upset about how they can’t get any work done, they don’t have childcare for their 6m-3 year olds and do a lot of chores during the day. Which also is what I see at my own work. There’s much less productivity from remote workers.

Give supervisors more control over their employees and then remote work might actually work.

Weird how they don’t post stories like that anywhere else. Almost like you’re making it up.

I’m a female and a mom. The poster isn’t making it up. It’s frustrating when I see parents (but particularly moms) on my team and other teams leave or sign off early frequently and don’t meet the same targets as other team members. A colleague in another department signed off every single day at 3:30 when her kids can home from
The bus. Blocked it off, didn’t sign back in, etc. Sign them up for after school, and yes she could afford it!

I have women on my team who have had to leave early to work from home with a sick child. As long as they give me a heads up and do their work I am fine with it. I also give leeway for people who need to care for parents or wait for a plumber but it can’t happen daily and if it is then you use your sick leave or PTO.

Everyone on my husband's team who has kids flexes but they may log off at 3 or 4 to take the kids to an activity, etc. but they are working when they get to the activity or later at night or they start very early in the morning.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Office-based work is also completely out of sync with the real estate market. Most people change jobs multiple times throughout their careers. It makes no sense to uproot a family and take on the expense of selling a home to work for a job that you have not have (voluntarily or involuntarily) in five years. I even know people in the DC that have sold and bought homes when they changed jobs (e.g., moving between MD and VA or PG and MoCo counties) to be closer to work. Owning a home is a huge deterrent to changing jobs when in office work is required, even within in the same metro area when commutes can be very long.

This is a great example of another tangential argument about RTO. My company has decided that we work best together in our office together in person, period full stop. Your real estate market concerns, child care arrangements, feelings about public transportation, etc are all irrelevant. If those are more of a priority for you please go somewhere else and we will find some other worker who better fits our company.

No one cares about your company with hostile supervisors. There is no way to take public transportation to these buildings. We have teens, no child care issues, but when you are working all day and a few hours at night it’s a driving and safety issue. Do you have to get up at 2am regularly to fix something? Have calls between 7-12 at night? Calls at 6-7 am?

We don’t have hostile supervisors, people who seem to like interacting with other humans in person do well in my company at any level. I do have to get up and fix something or have calls at night, and I’m compensated well for my time. Also my 12 and 14 year old kids take the metro and public busses without incident so I find these sudden misgiving about public transportation from grown adults laughable. I’m sure my job and lifestyle aren’t for everyone but the constant complaining from the insufferable pandemic-life-is-my-forever-lifestyle crowd is exhausting.

I agree with you 1000%. We're somehow supposed to believe that a bunch of adults who have navigated the world up to this point suddenly are incapable of navigating a world where they have to, gasp, arrive at an office in order to work. It's absurd. People are selfish and lazy. That's all it really comes down to. I also think it's really important to model for your children. What actual working looks like. I don't think most adults who are working from home really serve as good role models in that capacity. They're just producing a new generation of even lazier, weird people who are incapable of carrying on a conversation or debating an issue face-to-face.

Kids can observe parents working at home and learn from that. The issue is many are not working 9-5. Tonight my husband had a call with his boss at 7 PM for an hour and another work call after that. So, you expect him to go to work (with an hour+ commute each way), then come home to 2-3 more hours of work/calls and a few nights a week, being on call waking up in the middle of the night to deal with emergencies. If you have a 9-5 job being in the office is no big deal, but when its not 9-5 its a huge deal. He'd gladly go in if it was just 9-5 and no work at home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t understand how much longer this can go on. Commuting to sit on Teams calls all day with people in other cities is ridiculous. If they want us in the office they should take away video conferencing and Teams messaging capabilities.

Ok. Will do. From now on ALL my meetings are in person. Unless you are in leave you better be there. I have a feeling you'll be on a PIP by the end of the week. Lazy

Yea for you. That’s not normal except in your world. My spouse has zero in person meetings. Many customers are not in the us or are in Seattle or other areas. I’ll be good with a focus then pip as then he’ll get a good offer to leave. We’ll be fine. B

More and more companies aren’t giving severances to people on PiPs who are let go for cause FYI especially those who refuse to RTO.

That's fine, there's always unemployment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Expectations changed during the pandemic - a higher level of productivity and more availability outside of normal business hours became the norm. The fact that workers weren't commuting facilitated this.

Now RTO companies are seeking to preserve those gains while ALSO asking workers to add the commute back in. And that's why workers are so hostile - they really are worse off than they were pre-pandemic if they RTO.

I told my boss that the company is completely right that I can only be productive in the office where I can collaborate in person. Therefore I no longer do any calls or work at home on evenings or weekends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Expectations changed during the pandemic - a higher level of productivity and more availability outside of normal business hours became the norm. The fact that workers weren't commuting facilitated this.

Now RTO companies are seeking to preserve those gains while ALSO asking workers to add the commute back in. And that's why workers are so hostile - they really are worse off than they were pre-pandemic if they RTO.

I told my boss that the company is completely right that I can only be productive in the office where I can collaborate in person. Therefore I no longer do any calls or work at home on evenings or weekends.

I think that's the approach many will take and its going to be a logistical nightmare and far less productivity. If you say 8 hours in the office, that's what you will get.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Kids can observe parents working at home and learn from that. The issue is many are not working 9-5. Tonight my husband had a call with his boss at 7 PM for an hour and another work call after that. So, you expect him to go to work (with an hour+ commute each way), then come home to 2-3 more hours of work/calls and a few nights a week, being on call waking up in the middle of the night to deal with emergencies. If you have a 9-5 job being in the office is no big deal, but when its not 9-5 its a huge deal. He'd gladly go in if it was just 9-5 and no work at home.

At some point it also becomes simply impractical....You want someone who has an hour commute each way to be in the office from 9-5:30 pm. But you also want them to regularly give a presentation during a meeting that goes from 6:30 pm to 7:30 pm. If they commute home between 5:30-6:30 they are cutting it close; obviously trying to present while driving a car or sitting on public transportation are both bad ideas for safety and confidentiality reasons; and staying at the office from 9:00 am to 7:30 pm is a 10 hour day, not an 8 hour day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Kids can observe parents working at home and learn from that. The issue is many are not working 9-5. Tonight my husband had a call with his boss at 7 PM for an hour and another work call after that. So, you expect him to go to work (with an hour+ commute each way), then come home to 2-3 more hours of work/calls and a few nights a week, being on call waking up in the middle of the night to deal with emergencies. If you have a 9-5 job being in the office is no big deal, but when its not 9-5 its a huge deal. He'd gladly go in if it was just 9-5 and no work at home.

At some point it also becomes simply impractical....You want someone who has an hour commute each way to be in the office from 9-5:30 pm. But you also want them to regularly give a presentation during a meeting that goes from 6:30 pm to 7:30 pm. If they commute home between 5:30-6:30 they are cutting it close; obviously trying to present while driving a car or sitting on public jtransportation are both bad ideas for safety and confidentiality reasons; and staying at the office from 9:00 am to 7:30 pm is a 10 hour day, not an 8 hour day.

This. I’m not taking calls from the west coast on my way home from work. It’s impractical and also dangerous. I didn’t have these calls pre-Covid. This is after spending all day alone in a conference room on Teams. I’m looking for a new job.

[Anonymous]

When I worked in the office pre-COVID, I did not bring my laptop home unless I had a major pending deadline and generally did not work after hours or on weekends. With WFH I am available for more of the day and routinely put in a few hours on the weekend. So what if I have to step out at 3:30 to pick up a kid?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everyone on these threads always talks about how much more work they get done. But on my mom’s group- the tone is totally different. They are upset about how they can’t get any work done, they don’t have childcare for their 6m-3 year olds and do a lot of chores during the day. Which also is what I see at my own work. There’s much less productivity from remote workers.

Give supervisors more control over their employees and then remote work might actually work.

Weird how they don’t post stories like that anywhere else. Almost like you’re making it up.

I’m a female and a mom. The poster isn’t making it up. It’s frustrating when I see parents (but particularly moms) on my team and other teams leave or sign off early frequently and don’t meet the same targets as other team members. A colleague in another department signed off every single day at 3:30 when her kids can home from
The bus. Blocked it off, didn’t sign back in, etc. Sign them up for after school, and yes she could afford it!

I have women on my team who have had to leave early to work from home with a sick child. As long as they give me a heads up and do their work I am fine with it. I also give leeway for people who need to care for parents or wait for a plumber but it can’t happen daily and if it is then you use your sick leave or PTO.

Ah yes, a “female.” Very believable.

LOL A Female and a Mom. Thanks

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Kids can observe parents working at home and learn from that. The issue is many are not working 9-5. Tonight my husband had a call with his boss at 7 PM for an hour and another work call after that. So, you expect him to go to work (with an hour+ commute each way), then come home to 2-3 more hours of work/calls and a few nights a week, being on call waking up in the middle of the night to deal with emergencies. If you have a 9-5 job being in the office is no big deal, but when its not 9-5 its a huge deal. He'd gladly go in if it was just 9-5 and no work at home.

At some point it also becomes simply impractical....You want someone who has an hour commute each way to be in the office from 9-5:30 pm. But you also want them to regularly give a presentation during a meeting that goes from 6:30 pm to 7:30 pm. If they commute home between 5:30-6:30 they are cutting it close; obviously trying to present while driving a car or sitting on public jtransportation are both bad ideas for safety and confidentiality reasons; and staying at the office from 9:00 am to 7:30 pm is a 10 hour day, not an 8 hour day.

This. I’m not taking calls from the west coast on my way home from work. It’s impractical and also dangerous. I didn’t have these calls pre-Covid. This is after spending all day alone in a conference room on Teams. I’m looking for a new job.

Exactly. Can't have it both ways. You want me on a call with the California team? I'm not staying at the office late. I'm not shifting my day because I already have an 8AM standup. And I'm not taking my laptop home if there's no decency of flexibility on where I work.