Not enough office space: safe from RTO?

[Anonymous]

Spouse has been RTO for about a year. There is no office space. He drives an hour, scans his badge for attendance, and works from his car in the parking lot or a table in the cafeteria. He’ll go in the building for meetings, but then back to his car for phone calls. Then 1.5 hours home.

So. So. Dumb.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We got rid of some office space during pandemic, remote employees have changed office location, although most remote employees are remote locally. Basically, some employees change teleworking status (before Covid) to remote status, with SF 50 duty station changed too.

There is no funding to get more office space (flat funding, majority of funding goes to employees' salary; while salary/other costs increase annually, there is not even enough money to fill every vacancy).

I think less safe, not more. Overcrowding offices and creating untenable working conditions - or even just the constant threat of them - will work perfectly toward their goal of reducing the federal workforce. Many people will simply quit.

Yeah, how are all these people frantically looking for outlets so they can sit indian-style with their laptop not literally tripping all over each other?

You people are so dramatic trying desperately to paint RTO like some sort of Dante's hellscape, that it really undermines what a reliable advocate you are for WFH. You all come off as elitist brats who have zero grit or problem solving skills. You do realize that you're griping about the lifestyle of college educated workers. Most of America who do shift work and get paid hourly don't give a rip about how you want to maintain the convenience of being able to take suzie to soccer practice at 5, right? Read the f-ing room.

This particular thread is literally about whether RTO will be forced on federal workers whose agencies don't have space. People are proposing how it works in the private sector and people are responding to those posts. Federal workers don't have to stay late to make up the work missed when they can't find a desk, and union boomers are much quicker on the draw with reasonable accommodation requests and workplace safety complaints. So yes, it would be prohibitive to establish something like these stories for agencies who gave up their buildings. It would take years to secure appropriate space, by which time Trump's term would nearly be over.

What do the offices at Tesla and SpaceX look like?

Here ya go:
https://images.app.goo.gl/wewktBsVzsoDYTXE7

https://images.app.goo.gl/Foii9DYLDEZVqpmv9

https://images.app.goo.gl/DU4k2KoZ1xkLXZGf7

You do learn to work in an open environment. There are even arguments that you're more productive because you're more likely to speak with colleagues to problem solve and ideate vs sit alone in your office stumped.

Most feds are not developing new ideas. They are, if anything, trying to avoid chatty coworkers so they can finish running TPS reports.

[Anonymous]

Looks like the cube farm in my fed office space (even worse if you're a contractor -you're in spindle pod desks). Lovely for acquisitions and personnel work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Spouse has been RTO for about a year. There is no office space. He drives an hour, scans his badge for attendance, and works from his car in the parking lot or a table in the cafeteria. He’ll go in the building for meetings, but then back to his car for phone calls. Then 1.5 hours home.

So. So. Dumb.

I actually can believe this is not a troll post. I had a job with a state govt agency once where they lost some buildings due to damage and never could afford to repair them. They took the departments they didn't like and the people they wanted to quit and made them share tiny offices in a leaky basement. People literally worked out of what had been closets or sections of the boiler room. We had to share desks (like 3 people, one desk), and when that wasn't enough for people to quit, they put locks on all the bathroom doors and gave keys to the other floors, but we had to go to the top floor and check out a key from a department head there (if she was in that day) every time we needed it. It still took several years for the bulk of the department to quit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Stop freaking out people. You will adjust. Going into work is fine. Y’all are so whiny which means you probably don’t get much work done at home. Checking your email while at yoga class doesn’t count

Going into work is fine. But there is still a big problem with space. My agency can only accommodate about 30 percent of the employees because they gave up their office space. Saying we can all go to work is like saying you can have 20 people live in a one bedroom apartment. It is neither possible nor safe.

People cannot sit on the floor or in the toilet. Also, fire codes prevent hundreds of people from just stacking up on chairs in the hallways.

They will figure it out. I promise you the sky isn’t falling. Will there be some bumps in the road? Yes. But give it some time, and it will all get worked out. And you might even like it

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Stop freaking out people. You will adjust. Going into work is fine. Y’all are so whiny which means you probably don’t get much work done at home. Checking your email while at yoga class doesn’t count

Going into work is fine. But there is still a big problem with space. My agency can only accommodate about 30 percent of the employees because they gave up their office space. Saying we can all go to work is like saying you can have 20 people live in a one bedroom apartment. It is neither possible nor safe.

People cannot sit on the floor or in the toilet. Also, fire codes prevent hundreds of people from just stacking up on chairs in the hallways.

They will figure it out. I promise you the sky isn’t falling. Will there be some bumps in the road? Yes. But give it some time, and it will all get worked out. And you might even like it

Again we're telling you this will costs billions of dollars to implement government wide (so much for efficiency) and then hobble work.

For instance, my agency didn't just give us two monitors because they thought it was fun to spend money, they determined it was crucial to the job.

Yelling "it will be fine" won't make it so. If you care about efficiency, you'll realize this will be a disaster.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Spouse has been RTO for about a year. There is no office space. He drives an hour, scans his badge for attendance, and works from his car in the parking lot or a table in the cafeteria. He’ll go in the building for meetings, but then back to his car for phone calls. Then 1.5 hours home.

So. So. Dumb.

This is absurd. This will be my souse too. Find a random place to sit, even if he goes in really early.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Stop freaking out people. You will adjust. Going into work is fine. Y’all are so whiny which means you probably don’t get much work done at home. Checking your email while at yoga class doesn’t count

Going into work is fine. But there is still a big problem with space. My agency can only accommodate about 30 percent of the employees because they gave up their office space. Saying we can all go to work is like saying you can have 20 people live in a one bedroom apartment. It is neither possible nor safe.

People cannot sit on the floor or in the toilet. Also, fire codes prevent hundreds of people from just stacking up on chairs in the hallways.

They will figure it out. I promise you the sky isn’t falling. Will there be some bumps in the road? Yes. But give it some time, and it will all get worked out. And you might even like it

Again we're telling you this will costs billions of dollars to implement government wide (so much for efficiency) and then hobble work.

For instance, my agency didn't just give us two monitors because they thought it was fun to spend money, they determined it was crucial to the job.

Yelling "it will be fine" won't make it so. If you care about efficiency, you'll realize this will be a disaster.

Sounds like the government is treating you better. At my spouses job, they get a monitor if they can get a hot desk. Otherwise its a laptop. Yes, people are on the floor, bringing their own chairs to share desks and even bringing tray tables for their laptops. They've had months to plan for this and choose not to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We got rid of some office space during pandemic, remote employees have changed office location, although most remote employees are remote locally. Basically, some employees change teleworking status (before Covid) to remote status, with SF 50 duty station changed too.

There is no funding to get more office space (flat funding, majority of funding goes to employees' salary; while salary/other costs increase annually, there is not even enough money to fill every vacancy).

I think less safe, not more. Overcrowding offices and creating untenable working conditions - or even just the constant threat of them - will work perfectly toward their goal of reducing the federal workforce. Many people will simply quit.

Yeah, how are all these people frantically looking for outlets so they can sit indian-style with their laptop not literally tripping all over each other?

You people are so dramatic trying desperately to paint RTO like some sort of Dante's hellscape, that it really undermines what a reliable advocate you are for WFH. You all come off as elitist brats who have zero grit or problem solving skills. You do realize that you're griping about the lifestyle of college educated workers. Most of America who do shift work and get paid hourly don't give a rip about how you want to maintain the convenience of being able to take suzie to soccer practice at 5, right? Read the f-ing room.

This particular thread is literally about whether RTO will be forced on federal workers whose agencies don't have space. People are proposing how it works in the private sector and people are responding to those posts. Federal workers don't have to stay late to make up the work missed when they can't find a desk, and union boomers are much quicker on the draw with reasonable accommodation requests and workplace safety complaints. So yes, it would be prohibitive to establish something like these stories for agencies who gave up their buildings. It would take years to secure appropriate space, by which time Trump's term would nearly be over.

This is a good point. Where it gets ugly is the Feds really digging in and attacking how it works in the private sector, rather than your sensible rebuttal, which is - things may get that way (who knows with Elon and those workspace pictures) but perhaps not since there are protections (so far-- we'll see).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Stop freaking out people. You will adjust. Going into work is fine. Y’all are so whiny which means you probably don’t get much work done at home. Checking your email while at yoga class doesn’t count

Going into work is fine. But there is still a big problem with space. My agency can only accommodate about 30 percent of the employees because they gave up their office space. Saying we can all go to work is like saying you can have 20 people live in a one bedroom apartment. It is neither possible nor safe.

People cannot sit on the floor or in the toilet. Also, fire codes prevent hundreds of people from just stacking up on chairs in the hallways.

They will figure it out. I promise you the sky isn’t falling. Will there be some bumps in the road? Yes. But give it some time, and it will all get worked out. And you might even like it

Again we're telling you this will costs billions of dollars to implement government wide (so much for efficiency) and then hobble work.

For instance, my agency didn't just give us two monitors because they thought it was fun to spend money, they determined it was crucial to the job.

Yelling "it will be fine" won't make it so. If you care about efficiency, you'll realize this will be a disaster.

Sounds like the government is treating you better. At my spouses job, they get a monitor if they can get a hot desk. Otherwise its a laptop. Yes, people are on the floor, bringing their own chairs to share desks and even bringing tray tables for their laptops. They've had months to plan for this and choose not to.

Which call center does your spouse work for? I haven't heard of legitimate companies putting employees on the actual floor, that would be embarrassing and get you sued if there's a fire or other panic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Spouse has been RTO for about a year. There is no office space. He drives an hour, scans his badge for attendance, and works from his car in the parking lot or a table in the cafeteria. He’ll go in the building for meetings, but then back to his car for phone calls. Then 1.5 hours home.

So. So. Dumb.

This is absurd. This will be my souse too. Find a random place to sit, even if he goes in really early.

If you can work from your car then you can work from anywhere. No way would I stick around to work in my car.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Spouse has been RTO for about a year. There is no office space. He drives an hour, scans his badge for attendance, and works from his car in the parking lot or a table in the cafeteria. He’ll go in the building for meetings, but then back to his car for phone calls. Then 1.5 hours home.

So. So. Dumb.

This is absurd. This will be my souse too. Find a random place to sit, even if he goes in really early.

If you can work from your car then you can work from anywhere. No way would I stick around to work in my car.

No one is. Fake news.

[Anonymous]

Why do people think not enough space? I worked on Park Ave in Midtown years ago and rent is extremely expensive. We had a beautiful building right by St. Pats. There was zero WFH.

To fit us in the rules were if you had and office or a cube you had to check in at the Kiosk in lobby by 10am or your workstation would be listed as available for others.

Only very senior people had private office and even they had to give them up if our on vacation etc.

Mangers/Sr. Manager we had two per office.

Staff we removed cubes and put long work stations, each staff had maybe 48 inch of space. In Hallway we had lockers like a HS and we had file drawers. The staff sitting in those long workstations if they had coats, briefcase, umbrella etc they could lock them in there.

We easily fitted 2 to 3 times the amount of people per square foot than our Long Island and New Jersey location. Those two locations first was lower rent, second we had 30 year leases. Park Ave was expensive.

The junior staff sat in something called a Bullpen. We had like 20-30 in a room, And we would rent an auditorium for meetings nearby, had very few conference rooms no cafe, gym or big lobby. It was dedicated to seats. Even got rid of mail room and print shop as used Kinkos on a contract. And we outsourced tech support. Basically got rid of things that if in house needed seats that were low value.

We had around 900 people per floor on Park Ave and out on Long Island or New Jersey was around 300 people per floor.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Stop freaking out people. You will adjust. Going into work is fine. Y’all are so whiny which means you probably don’t get much work done at home. Checking your email while at yoga class doesn’t count

Going into work is fine. But there is still a big problem with space. My agency can only accommodate about 30 percent of the employees because they gave up their office space. Saying we can all go to work is like saying you can have 20 people live in a one bedroom apartment. It is neither possible nor safe.

People cannot sit on the floor or in the toilet. Also, fire codes prevent hundreds of people from just stacking up on chairs in the hallways.

They will figure it out. I promise you the sky isn’t falling. Will there be some bumps in the road? Yes. But give it some time, and it will all get worked out. And you might even like it

They've had 6+ months to figure it out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why do people think not enough space? I worked on Park Ave in Midtown years ago and rent is extremely expensive. We had a beautiful building right by St. Pats. There was zero WFH.

To fit us in the rules were if you had and office or a cube you had to check in at the Kiosk in lobby by 10am or your workstation would be listed as available for others.

Only very senior people had private office and even they had to give them up if our on vacation etc.

Mangers/Sr. Manager we had two per office.

Staff we removed cubes and put long work stations, each staff had maybe 48 inch of space. In Hallway we had lockers like a HS and we had file drawers. The staff sitting in those long workstations if they had coats, briefcase, umbrella etc they could lock them in there.

We easily fitted 2 to 3 times the amount of people per square foot than our Long Island and New Jersey location. Those two locations first was lower rent, second we had 30 year leases. Park Ave was expensive.

The junior staff sat in something called a Bullpen. We had like 20-30 in a room, And we would rent an auditorium for meetings nearby, had very few conference rooms no cafe, gym or big lobby. It was dedicated to seats. Even got rid of mail room and print shop as used Kinkos on a contract. And we outsourced tech support. Basically got rid of things that if in house needed seats that were low value.

We had around 900 people per floor on Park Ave and out on Long Island or New Jersey was around 300 people per floor.

Your point is it was planned and organized, but that's not the case with many companies and today.