For those who are anti wfh, curious why you care?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:NP. I’m convinced that a lot of the people pushing RTO have commercial real estate interests and they are freaking out at the losses.

Meanwhile we have a homeless crisis

Imagine if we repurposed these buildings and made them centers to connect people to resources/ house them/ provide food and community/ opportunities etc

But then where’s the money in that?

🙃

+1000

Mayor bowser even said to lease the buildings to nonprofits or other organizations who want them. There are other options. This is about quick profits

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do all of these administrative staff people do their jobs remotely? Seems like BS.

I'm not administrative staff, but that seems like the type of position most conducive to WFH.

+2

An admin is the last person who needs to be on site, unless to prepare for an in person meeting?

My admin works from home 3 days a week and I hate it. When she’s not there I end up doing her job just because it’s faster than trying to get in contact for her so I can tell her what I need her to do. I’m going to either require her to move to at least 4 days/replace her in the near future.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do all of these administrative staff people do their jobs remotely? Seems like BS.

I'm not administrative staff, but that seems like the type of position most conducive to WFH.

+2

An admin is the last person who needs to be on site, unless to prepare for an in person meeting?

My admin works from home 3 days a week and I hate it. When she’s not there I end up doing her job just because it’s faster than trying to get in contact for her so I can tell her what I need her to do. I’m going to either require her to move to at least 4 days/replace her in the near future.

The problem is your management. Why do you let her be out of contact? My admin is always reachable because she knows my expectations

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because we know you aren’t working all of the time and are taking advantage.

what i'm actually doing is taking advantage all the days i'm in the office. apparently it's now part of the agency mission to get face time and socialize. so i do that, hard. mandatory in office day? i'm taking hour coffee "meetings". i will not join multiple meetings simultaneously. you scheduled a meeting right after an in-person meeting? sorry, i'll be having an oh-so-important "hallway meeting" instead, and i might dial in 20 minutes late. maybe. you scheduled a meeting when i am commuting home? sorry, not attending and i'm not going to bother to hit decline because you can see my available hours in the calendar and 5:30 is never it. basically i get about 1/3 of my normal work done if i'm in the office, but that's clearly what the folks in charge want, so thats what they get.

When meetings are the goal, this is the result-- WFH is simply more efficient for back to back meetings. And I would be very inconvenienced is a colleague in the office missed 20 minutes of a meeting (all my meetings are intentional with the right people there) and I had to reschedule 6 or so people with insane schedules (back to back meetings!). Enough that I would float it up to her managers that it's now a risk on my project that I can't get decisions made and maybe a WFH schedule is better to get the meetings done and decisions made.

I think many workers on this board, understandably, don't understand organizations with very active meeting culture. It's not 100 people dialed in and cameras off. We are talking to select people globally, cameras on, showing data live and making decisions. I get that you don't get that, but please understand that this is a very real pattern for some really large companies, and WFH best supports it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do all of these administrative staff people do their jobs remotely? Seems like BS.

I'm not administrative staff, but that seems like the type of position most conducive to WFH.

+2

An admin is the last person who needs to be on site, unless to prepare for an in person meeting?

My admin works from home 3 days a week and I hate it. When she’s not there I end up doing her job just because it’s faster than trying to get in contact for her so I can tell her what I need her to do. I’m going to either require her to move to at least 4 days/replace her in the near future.

Does she not answer the phone?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have four adult kids. Three are now back to work (required) while one is 100 percent work from home. She has two jobs. Her “full time” employer doesn’t know about the second job. She works hard, is efficient, and doesn’t mess around. But she puts in 40 hours a week, tops. She absolutely could not do what she’s doing if she had to report to an office.

So my sample size is one. But I find it really hard to believe that she is the only remote worker in America who is working a second job behind her primary employer’s back. I’m betting it’s a widespread practice.

You’re complaining about someone who works hard 40 hours a week? Wow you RTO people have lost the plot. You can’t come up with a good reason to RTO.

Show me where the PP you are is "complaining", or even why you think PP is an "RTO person." You are just looking to disagree with everyone...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do all of these administrative staff people do their jobs remotely? Seems like BS.

I'm not administrative staff, but that seems like the type of position most conducive to WFH.

+2

An admin is the last person who needs to be on site, unless to prepare for an in person meeting?

My admin works from home 3 days a week and I hate it. When she’s not there I end up doing her job just because it’s faster than trying to get in contact for her so I can tell her what I need her to do. I’m going to either require her to move to at least 4 days/replace her in the near future.

It’s always amazing to me how ineffective managers are just open about how ineffective they are. This admin will be as ineffective in the office because you aren’t a good manager. But sure, you can blame remote work for your failure to performance manage an employee.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Because we know you aren’t working all of the time and are taking advantage.

what i'm actually doing is taking advantage all the days i'm in the office. apparently it's now part of the agency mission to get face time and socialize. so i do that, hard. mandatory in office day? i'm taking hour coffee "meetings". i will not join multiple meetings simultaneously. you scheduled a meeting right after an in-person meeting? sorry, i'll be having an oh-so-important "hallway meeting" instead, and i might dial in 20 minutes late. maybe. you scheduled a meeting when i am commuting home? sorry, not attending and i'm not going to bother to hit decline because you can see my available hours in the calendar and 5:30 is never it. basically i get about 1/3 of my normal work done if i'm in the office, but that's clearly what the folks in charge want, so thats what they get.

When meetings are the goal, this is the result-- WFH is simply more efficient for back to back meetings. And I would be very inconvenienced is a colleague in the office missed 20 minutes of a meeting (all my meetings are intentional with the right people there) and I had to reschedule 6 or so people with insane schedules (back to back meetings!). Enough that I would float it up to her managers that it's now a risk on my project that I can't get decisions made and maybe a WFH schedule is better to get the meetings done and decisions made.

I think many workers on this board, understandably, don't understand organizations with very active meeting culture. It's not 100 people dialed in and cameras off. We are talking to select people globally, cameras on, showing data live and making decisions. I get that you don't get that, but please understand that this is a very real pattern for some really large companies, and WFH best supports it.

This. I have an extremely active meeting schedule, with people in different agencies in the fed govt. There's no way we could meet in person at the pace we currently do if we had to do all of those meetings in person. We just couldn't get from one building to another (and through security) that quickly. Yes, of course there are times when we need to meet in person and do, but that cuts down on what can happen before or after that meeting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Let’s be real here. If you’ve ever been a supervisor you know that dealing with people complaining about unfair treatment between colleagues is tough to manage. Putting the wfh / hybrid management decisions on individual supervisors is a thankless task for them, they will never be able to get it right to everyone’s satisfaction. Higher level consistent rules (not just “guidance”) is needed. Same for any organization, not just the government.

Being a supervisor you have to balance performance with employee satisfaction and retention - including avoiding resentment over perceived or real favoritism. Some on this thread seem to think that’s easy to do.

Yes, supervisors get paid more because their job is hard. Don't take the job if you don't want to do it.

The main thing I take away from the countless complaints about "slacking" in any location is that supervisors are afraid to make direct statements about their expectations, let alone have an uncomfortable conversation with someone about performance. "Managing" is an actual job and skillset that requires thought: it isn't just the thing you automatically do when you've been working for 10 years and the old manager retires.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have four adult kids. Three are now back to work (required) while one is 100 percent work from home. She has two jobs. Her “full time” employer doesn’t know about the second job. She works hard, is efficient, and doesn’t mess around. But she puts in 40 hours a week, tops. She absolutely could not do what she’s doing if she had to report to an office.

So my sample size is one. But I find it really hard to believe that she is the only remote worker in America who is working a second job behind her primary employer’s back. I’m betting it’s a widespread practice.

You’re complaining about someone who works hard 40 hours a week? Wow you RTO people have lost the plot. You can’t come up with a good reason to RTO.

Show me where the PP you are is "complaining", or even why you think PP is an "RTO person." You are just looking to disagree with everyone...

Yes the post is against what this women is doing. Which is working 40 hours and having another job outside of that job. You interpret the post as PP being for what she’s doing and therefore you interpret the post as pro-WFH?

[Anonymous]

I like how everyone writes off the RTO folks as a bunch of old white men who are behind the times.

We know why WFH folks like it better: it’s easier for them. They’ll insist they’re more efficient, more productive, cheaper for the employer, etc - and in some cases they may be right. But that’s not what’s driving them. What’s driving them is that’s it easier. Plain and simple.

You’re gonna have trouble convincing this old white dude that it’s good for business for employees to sit at home on their computers isolated from their colleagues and their employer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I like how everyone writes off the RTO folks as a bunch of old white men who are behind the times.

We know why WFH folks like it better: it’s easier for them. They’ll insist they’re more efficient, more productive, cheaper for the employer, etc - and in some cases they may be right. But that’s not what’s driving them. What’s driving them is that’s it easier. Plain and simple.

You’re gonna have trouble convincing this old white dude that it’s good for business for employees to sit at home on their computers isolated from their colleagues and their employer.

Well, yes. You are out of date and have weak management skills. We know that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I like how everyone writes off the RTO folks as a bunch of old white men who are behind the times.

We know why WFH folks like it better: it’s easier for them. They’ll insist they’re more efficient, more productive, cheaper for the employer, etc - and in some cases they may be right. But that’s not what’s driving them. What’s driving them is that’s it easier. Plain and simple.

You’re gonna have trouble convincing this old white dude that it’s good for business for employees to sit at home on their computers isolated from their colleagues and their employer.

Exactly. You don’t want to work. You want to walk around bugging people. Or stand around a water cooler. Yes, most people just want to do our work on our computers.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I get it, some people want to quiet quit with their lazy girl jobs from home and don’t ever want to see the inside of an office. Others have ambition, want to have real relationships with colleagues and are willing to make some effort to show up in person. We’ll see which group has progressed farther in their careers over the next few years, I know who I’m betting on.

Okay, I confess. I do NOT want to have real relationships with coworkers. I don't. Sorry if that makes me a bad person.

I understand this, I’m a mid 40s mom who doesn’t have any need for new relationships, but I also think of all of the people who trained or mentored me when I was new in my career and I understand it’s my turn to do that for the next generation. It’s much harder to do that from home.

People who don’t “need any new relationships.” So American. No wonder loneliness is an epidemic in this country with people shutting the door on each other.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do all of these administrative staff people do their jobs remotely? Seems like BS.

I'm not administrative staff, but that seems like the type of position most conducive to WFH.

+2

An admin is the last person who needs to be on site, unless to prepare for an in person meeting?

My admin works from home 3 days a week and I hate it. When she’s not there I end up doing her job just because it’s faster than trying to get in contact for her so I can tell her what I need her to do. I’m going to either require her to move to at least 4 days/replace her in the near future.

The problem is your management. Why do you let her be out of contact? My admin is always reachable because she knows my expectations

NP. My admin is "reachable" in the sense that I have reached her: in a session with her trainer, "working" from the beach, on the bus on the way to work (1 hour after her start time). She says as long as she has her phone, she is on the clock. Our policy is I have to let her know if I need her in the office (to do things like a copy job) 2 days ahead of time, when I often only know myself I need something 20 minutes in advance. And she acts so put out if you ask her to shift her WFH days. It is easier to do it myself.

I don't necessarily care she is remote, it's more that RTO is highlighting for me how we don't need as much admin support as we did pre pandemic. And it doesn't make sense for our firm to pay admin for 40 hours of work/week when they are delivering much less than they used to. And I agree management is to blame for this issue, too.