What is your federal agency telling you re: RTO? (No other rants/comments!)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:At my sub agency- the only non bargaining unit people are supervisors. So basically only supervisors are returning to work and everyone else will just continue teleworking.

This sounds like me...how long before they break this though?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Managers at the SEC must be really pissed tonight.

SEC manager here. Mainly just delighted for my staff attorneys that they are likely ok until '26; we very likely would have lost at least two high-performers in my branch more or less immediately if this went the other way.

Troll post? It goes against human nature to be cool with the idea of waking up and commuting to an empty building so that your subordinates can chill at home. Nice try.

Not a troll post at all. This is going to be a huge challenge for me and my family and I will absolutely have to manage my resentment over the needless commuting time & etc. But I won't spend a moment resenting colleagues who benefit from CBA protections, and I honestly don't think this will create a manager/non-manager rift (at least within my Division and certainly not in my Office). As I said in the original post, my main reaction was relief that valued colleagues won't have to face this challenge just yet.

Love this post and 100% agree - this is good leadership. We don’t have a specific mandate yet but I will gladly take a bullet for my team to avoid BU professionals being displaced who live far from a building, and were hired for remote positions

How about the localish ones who were hired for in office but applied for and got local remote, but still get the full local pay? I'm talking about people who live in Fredericksburg or Frederick, though some much closer? This accounts for a lot of people in my agency. We have enough space for the local teleworkers to go in full time, but not enough if you add in the local remotes. Fairness would dictate we all go in three days a week instead of some five and some zero.

[Anonymous]

Leaders are expected back. Rest is yet to be determined because of the CBA. They all have to come in at least once a week anyway, so I’m going to cancel our team day, and make at least one of my reports come in each day. I’ll have one to ones with each of them on different days instead of stacking them all in one team day, which I actually would prefer. I’d like them all back at least 2-3 times a week. I think 5 days a week with no less than. 40 hours in the office, is not sustainable for a lot of people and performance will suffer. I’m fine with letting people split time between home and office as long as they work core hours in the office. Will see what happens.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Managers at the SEC must be really pissed tonight.

SEC manager here. Mainly just delighted for my staff attorneys that they are likely ok until '26; we very likely would have lost at least two high-performers in my branch more or less immediately if this went the other way.

Troll post? It goes against human nature to be cool with the idea of waking up and commuting to an empty building so that your subordinates can chill at home. Nice try.

Not a troll post at all. This is going to be a huge challenge for me and my family and I will absolutely have to manage my resentment over the needless commuting time & etc. But I won't spend a moment resenting colleagues who benefit from CBA protections, and I honestly don't think this will create a manager/non-manager rift (at least within my Division and certainly not in my Office). As I said in the original post, my main reaction was relief that valued colleagues won't have to face this challenge just yet.

Love this post and 100% agree - this is good leadership. We don’t have a specific mandate yet but I will gladly take a bullet for my team to avoid BU professionals being displaced who live far from a building, and were hired for remote positions

How about the localish ones who were hired for in office but applied for and got local remote, but still get the full local pay? I'm talking about people who live in Fredericksburg or Frederick, though some much closer? This accounts for a lot of people in my agency. We have enough space for the local teleworkers to go in full time, but not enough if you add in the local remotes. Fairness would dictate we all go in three days a week instead of some five and some zero.

PP - I have mixed feelings on that, and also have employees in that circumstance. I think what you proposed in your last sentence (even 2 days a week in office) is a reasonable compromise. Sadly reason will not factor into implementation plans.

[Anonymous]

RTO announced via email after 5pm on Friday.

There isn't enough room even for local feds to come in 5 days a week, which is why we started doing telecommute days back in the 2010s.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Managers at the SEC must be really pissed tonight.

SEC manager here. Mainly just delighted for my staff attorneys that they are likely ok until '26; we very likely would have lost at least two high-performers in my branch more or less immediately if this went the other way.

Troll post? It goes against human nature to be cool with the idea of waking up and commuting to an empty building so that your subordinates can chill at home. Nice try.

Not a troll post at all. This is going to be a huge challenge for me and my family and I will absolutely have to manage my resentment over the needless commuting time & etc. But I won't spend a moment resenting colleagues who benefit from CBA protections, and I honestly don't think this will create a manager/non-manager rift (at least within my Division and certainly not in my Office). As I said in the original post, my main reaction was relief that valued colleagues won't have to face this challenge just yet.

Love this post and 100% agree - this is good leadership. We don’t have a specific mandate yet but I will gladly take a bullet for my team to avoid BU professionals being displaced who live far from a building, and were hired for remote positions

How about the localish ones who were hired for in office but applied for and got local remote, but still get the full local pay? I'm talking about people who live in Fredericksburg or Frederick, though some much closer? This accounts for a lot of people in my agency. We have enough space for the local teleworkers to go in full time, but not enough if you add in the local remotes. Fairness would dictate we all go in three days a week instead of some five and some zero.

PP - I have mixed feelings on that, and also have employees in that circumstance. I think what you proposed in your last sentence (even 2 days a week in office) is a reasonable compromise. Sadly reason will not factor into implementation plans.

I’m a manager and I think local remote needs to be back in. Especially for agencies who only offered the option to go remote to employees living 50 miles or more from the office. Many of those had chosen those commutes and jobs for a variety of reasons and it’s going to create a lot of strife between those who chose to live closer in for a more manageable commute.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Patent and Trademark Office (non-bargaining unit employees) have had telework agreements cancelled immediately. Not sure why they bothered with the "exemption" from the overall Commerce policy. They are working on plans to bring remote workers to the office. In most cases, I think, that's not going to happen. People will quit. Which may be the point

Big Tech doesn’t care about patents. They are bitter over years of patent trolls, and are now so rich that they can just buy and scale problems away.

Not in the area, but aren’t patents the reason the US is so successful in tech in the first place? I thought our patent laws and process are envied.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Managers at the SEC must be really pissed tonight.

SEC manager here. Mainly just delighted for my staff attorneys that they are likely ok until '26; we very likely would have lost at least two high-performers in my branch more or less immediately if this went the other way.

Troll post? It goes against human nature to be cool with the idea of waking up and commuting to an empty building so that your subordinates can chill at home. Nice try.

Not a troll post at all. This is going to be a huge challenge for me and my family and I will absolutely have to manage my resentment over the needless commuting time & etc. But I won't spend a moment resenting colleagues who benefit from CBA protections, and I honestly don't think this will create a manager/non-manager rift (at least within my Division and certainly not in my Office). As I said in the original post, my main reaction was relief that valued colleagues won't have to face this challenge just yet.

I believe my supervisors feel this way (maybe you are mine!) and I'm so grateful they are good people and good leaders. RTO will hurt them and I'm sorry they're dealing with it. I hope they don't quit.

I also think another shoe will drop and BU will go back before the end of the CBA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Right now, you are only teleworking two times a week. Most people will feel differently when their body is exhausted and they still have to wake up and work for 5 days a week. 5 days is very, very different from 2 days in off, 3 days at home. I appreciate your sentiment, but note that opinions may change once we actually have to endure the true RTO as supervisors.

Oh I expect to feel every bit of it. We’re talking, cumulatively, about thousands of hours taken away from me and my kids pre-9am and post 6pm over the next 10-15 years. But I am certain that I won’t blame or resent BU staff - to do so would be incoherent and childish IMO.

I post here very rarely, but I was motivated to do so by the (reasonable but unhelpful) prediction that SEC managers will grow to resent staff over this. I won’t, and I honestly don’t think the managers I work closely with will.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Managers at the SEC must be really pissed tonight.

SEC manager here. Mainly just delighted for my staff attorneys that they are likely ok until '26; we very likely would have lost at least two high-performers in my branch more or less immediately if this went the other way.

Troll post? It goes against human nature to be cool with the idea of waking up and commuting to an empty building so that your subordinates can chill at home. Nice try.

Not a troll post at all. This is going to be a huge challenge for me and my family and I will absolutely have to manage my resentment over the needless commuting time & etc. But I won't spend a moment resenting colleagues who benefit from CBA protections, and I honestly don't think this will create a manager/non-manager rift (at least within my Division and certainly not in my Office). As I said in the original post, my main reaction was relief that valued colleagues won't have to face this challenge just yet.

Thank you. I just fear we will lose excellent managers. It’s already hard to get people to want to be Branch Chiefs. My supervisor is beyond amazing and this is going to be hard on him and his family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Managers at the SEC must be really pissed tonight.

SEC manager here. Mainly just delighted for my staff attorneys that they are likely ok until '26; we very likely would have lost at least two high-performers in my branch more or less immediately if this went the other way.

Troll post? It goes against human nature to be cool with the idea of waking up and commuting to an empty building so that your subordinates can chill at home. Nice try.

Not a troll post at all. This is going to be a huge challenge for me and my family and I will absolutely have to manage my resentment over the needless commuting time & etc. But I won't spend a moment resenting colleagues who benefit from CBA protections, and I honestly don't think this will create a manager/non-manager rift (at least within my Division and certainly not in my Office). As I said in the original post, my main reaction was relief that valued colleagues won't have to face this challenge just yet.

Thank you. I just fear we will lose excellent managers. It’s already hard to get people to want to be Branch Chiefs. My supervisor is beyond amazing and this is going to be hard on him and his family.

This. The supervisor position was already hard to fill, now no one's going to want it.

[Anonymous]

Where I work about 90% are civil service under who are BU and 10% are active-duty service members. We were all allowed to telework 4 days/week and then everyone came into the office 1 day/week on the same day. It was worked well. Now 90% can continue to telework while 10% have to come into the office and work on ZOOM and TEAMS. In addition, we don't have comp time so many of us work more than 40 hours/week, regardless of whether it's telework and/or in-person. If there's extra work that needs to be done, it is usually assigned to the active-duty service members which we accept is part of the job. We also get deployed when needed which is also part of the job and the reason most of us signed up in the first place. I'm 16 months away from being retirement eligible so I'm hanging in there. The more junior officers are looking to move to other duty stations where commutes are more bearable and housing more affordable.

[Anonymous]

I don’t begrudge anyone who is bargaining unit. Truly. I am not BU but not a supervisor so I don’t make that $. It stings to have all these extra expenses with commuting (parking being one of them).

I think people in the rest of the country don’t get how hard it is to commute here. No one I know outside the DMV commutes an hour and pay $25 a day to park their car.

I don’t live near a metro. Far from it. I’ve always had jobs near my house except current position which I was told I only had to be in once a week until now. I am very sad. It is going to cost $$$$ to be in. I have made those arrangements in December anticipating this but still I might get fired. I tried to appease them and still get fired. Ugh!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Managers at the SEC must be really pissed tonight.

SEC manager here. Mainly just delighted for my staff attorneys that they are likely ok until '26; we very likely would have lost at least two high-performers in my branch more or less immediately if this went the other way.

Troll post? It goes against human nature to be cool with the idea of waking up and commuting to an empty building so that your subordinates can chill at home. Nice try.

Not a troll post at all. This is going to be a huge challenge for me and my family and I will absolutely have to manage my resentment over the needless commuting time & etc. But I won't spend a moment resenting colleagues who benefit from CBA protections, and I honestly don't think this will create a manager/non-manager rift (at least within my Division and certainly not in my Office). As I said in the original post, my main reaction was relief that valued colleagues won't have to face this challenge just yet.

Right now, you are only teleworking two times a week. Most people will feel differently when their body is exhausted and they still have to wake up and work for 5 days a week. 5 days is very, very different from 2 days in off, 3 days at home. I appreciate your sentiment, but note that opinions may change once we actually have to endure the true RTO as supervisors.

Oh I hear you and I expect to feel every bit of it - I mean, for starters we are talking about potentially thousands of hours taken away from me and my kids pre-9am and post-6pm. I just can't imagine directing any negativity toward BU staff over this (that would be incoherent and childish IMO). It's a big building and experiences vary, but I wouldn't expect any of the managers in my group to feel differently.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:RTO announced via email after 5pm on Friday.

There isn't enough room even for local feds to come in 5 days a week, which is why we started doing telecommute days back in the 2010s.

I looked up the stats and we were over 80% telework/remote in 2019 and back then they were running out of space, we were being pressured to go remote. Since then they've hired and given up the lease on multiple buildings. It just doesn't add up.