Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If FDA gets telework, the SEC should also have that same right - 2x a week sounds reasonable. Union should bring comparable to management.

It isn't across the board at FDA - like some groups have it officially and can put it into their schedule; others are being told it's ok to ad hoc. Whatever it is, it is def an improvement. Hopefully the union brings it to Sir Paul but Sir Paul isn't even here yet and seems like a jerk off so who knows.

Regarding telework at the FDA, it’s only for reviewers who handle vaccines, biotech drugs, medical devices and tobacco products.

Anonymous wrote:Without opening the whole debate of lunch time or not, how much do we think they're simply going to be checking badge swipes for 8.5 hours per day versus matching up badge swipes to whatever your stated entrance and exit time is supposed to be per your schedule?

I've never gotten to work on time ever in my life unless it's something important like court or registrant meeting. So it's not about to happen in middle age. But I'm not a cheater either - if I'm 20 min late, I stay 20 minutes later. This was never ever a problem for anyone in before times. I wonder if it's a problem now.

You can still do this. Most supervisors won’t make you use and earn credit hours in the same day for something like this. But it is technically required and some (probably newer) supervisors might require that.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For us it's very strictly applied. You have to have an appointment in the middle of the day such that you couldn't commit either earlier or later in the day and there has to be a pressing need for you to work that day vs just taking leave for the whole day. It is a very high bar to meet so we won't be doing it more than once every few months, if that.

Are you hearing this at SEC or someplace else?

So it's NEED to do work not just want to do work so as not to burn leave/not fall behind etc. I can see my group at SEC doing this. Like you need to take a mid day appt, fine use your leave. Oh there's a 1 hour outside call that day we want you on - fine you telework just that 1 hour and take leave for the other 7. I just don't see anyone senior going to that rigmarole as people get plenty of vacation time and many/most people are cutting all their travel anyway so it's not like they're saving up time for their 12 days in Europe this summer.

I am at the SEC and that is my groups policy. Right, it's not even worth it for me to beg to telework, I'll just take the whole day off. There is some support for this in KJs RTO FAQ where it talks about balancing the need for TW vs the person just taking leave although I don't think they had to be this strict about it. The managers are irritated about it too because the same policy applies to them.

FWIW your group sounds way more strict than mine

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not being difficult, but isn’t this what “boomers” did ? If you had an appointment, you took leave? And didn’t expect telework? Like when did teleworking become this right? Yes, Covid. But that’s over. And previous generations dealt with having appointments. That’s what leave is for. Not trying to be difficult just pointing this out.

Telework has been around for 20 years, it's not a covid invention. But I am quite old and I remember the pre-telework days. People took a whole day for appointments if they couldn't make it into the office for a half day.

The big difference is that things moved A LOT slower then. You worked your schedule and unfinished work had to wait for tomorrow. If something came up after quitting time, it had to wait. Also, I spent most days in meetings so my manager's questions would have to wait for me to come back to my desk. Managers are going to have to get used to all that again.

Exactly. Not sure why everyone is comparing this to dinosaur times (not being rude - I'm of that gen too). Back then there was no way to telework. We didn't have connectivity at home. We didn't have iphones. So yeah whole days got lost because someone had a mid day appointment with an endocrine specialist and that guy at Hopkins is so hard to book you take what you can get. Do we really want to go back to that pace when people can just work all morning, leave for an appointment, pop back in a few hours and keep working?? Like I thought y'all wanted efficiency.

Anonymous wrote:If FDA gets telework, the SEC should also have that same right - 2x a week sounds reasonable. Union should bring comparable to management.

It isn't across the board at FDA - like some groups have it officially and can put it into their schedule; others are being told it's ok to ad hoc. Whatever it is, it is def an improvement. Hopefully the union brings it to Sir Paul but Sir Paul isn't even here yet and seems like a jerk off so who knows.

Anonymous wrote:Not being difficult, but isn’t this what “boomers” did ? If you had an appointment, you took leave? And didn’t expect telework? Like when did teleworking become this right? Yes, Covid. But that’s over. And previous generations dealt with having appointments. That’s what leave is for. Not trying to be difficult just pointing this out.

Telework has been around for 20 years, it's not a covid invention. But I am quite old and I remember the pre-telework days. People took a whole day for appointments if they couldn't make it into the office for a half day.

The big difference is that things moved A LOT slower then. You worked your schedule and unfinished work had to wait for tomorrow. If something came up after quitting time, it had to wait. Also, I spent most days in meetings so my manager's questions would have to wait for me to come back to my desk. Managers are going to have to get used to all that again.

If FDA gets telework, the SEC should also have that same right - 2x a week sounds reasonable. Union should bring comparable to management.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think it’s accurate to call it a “right” (or else they wouldn’t have been able to get rid of it. Probably a privilege. I agree it sucks thag management did this.

Management is too busy sucking up to Doge. I mean we need to wear our badges at all times. We're still doing the 5 bullet points? Even FDA which has had massive RIFs is bringing back 2 day/wk telework and has told everyone that they're done with the bullets. Us nope - keep sucking up to OPM/DOGE/WH like the spineless leaders you are.

Paul has been confirmed. Where the hell is he? I realize a town hall doesn't come together the next day but not even an email to staff?

Moron. He has been confirmed but not sworn in as Chairman yet.

Why so defensive and protective of leadership? Are you one of them and thus defending each others' lack of leadership?

Anonymous wrote:Without opening the whole debate of lunch time or not, how much do we think they're simply going to be checking badge swipes for 8.5 hours per day versus matching up badge swipes to whatever your stated entrance and exit time is supposed to be per your schedule?

I've never gotten to work on time ever in my life unless it's something important like court or registrant meeting. So it's not about to happen in middle age. But I'm not a cheater either - if I'm 20 min late, I stay 20 minutes later. This was never ever a problem for anyone in before times. I wonder if it's a problem now.

Unless they've developed an entire AI system - and maybe they have - it's not going to be as easy as you'd think to use badge swipe data. While the standard day is 8.5, there's plenty of people in my group that are planning to do more than 8.5 on certain days so that they can make Thursday and Friday or whatever days they wish shorter and can be out in 6-7 hours. So when they pull data for Thursday and see people left in 6.75, are they then pulling up Work Smart for each person to verify that indeed that was supposed to be a 6.75 hour day for them? How much man power do they have in HR to do this? Again absent AI which maybe is linking badging with Work Smart for all we know. But assuming their systems aren't so sophisticated yet I feel like badging is used to detect really obvious issues - people not coming in at all. People coming in for 2 hours per day. People badging in and then leaving for hours and hours, only to badge back in in the afternoon before quitting time; sounds crazed but I know a guy who was doing that early on in RTO - he'd badge in and then go play tennis for 2-3 hours. They started doing that last August/Sept and if you got on HR's radar you were warned and they then watched you closely. Like you got flagged as not being trustworthy. From what I heard it was people whose time entries chronically showed they weren't coming in as required or were coming in, swiping a card and leaving in an hour.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think it’s accurate to call it a “right” (or else they wouldn’t have been able to get rid of it. Probably a privilege. I agree it sucks thag management did this.

Management is too busy sucking up to Doge. I mean we need to wear our badges at all times. We're still doing the 5 bullet points? Even FDA which has had massive RIFs is bringing back 2 day/wk telework and has told everyone that they're done with the bullets. Us nope - keep sucking up to OPM/DOGE/WH like the spineless leaders you are.

Paul has been confirmed. Where the hell is he? I realize a town hall doesn't come together the next day but not even an email to staff?

Moron. He has been confirmed but not sworn in as Chairman yet.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think it’s accurate to call it a “right” (or else they wouldn’t have been able to get rid of it. Probably a privilege. I agree it sucks thag management did this.

Management is too busy sucking up to Doge. I mean we need to wear our badges at all times. We're still doing the 5 bullet points? Even FDA which has had massive RIFs is bringing back 2 day/wk telework and has told everyone that they're done with the bullets. Us nope - keep sucking up to OPM/DOGE/WH like the spineless leaders you are.

Paul has been confirmed. Where the hell is he? I realize a town hall doesn't come together the next day but not even an email to staff?

You were always supposed to wear your badge, even if many people didn’t. And who the f cares about spending two minutes (max) on the five things email.

Maybe after two huge DIFs we can get back to TW twice a week, or even better, maybe we stop complaining about stupid stuff, and we avoid the RIFs altogether. (And FDA’s telework is really limited in terms of who can take part, so you probably don’t want to use that as a model.)

I mean you sound like one of those SEC people who feels soooo blessed to be here at all. I don't feel that way so YMMV. It's not that wearing a badge is a big deal or 5 seconds on a bullet email is a big deal, it's that leadership is being spineless. If they can't say no to 5 bullets, you legit think they'll say no when DOGE says hmm you know what you need a 15% RIF, the retirements weren't enough. News flash - they won't. So this spinelessness isn't protecting us from anything in the future.

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think it’s accurate to call it a “right” (or else they wouldn’t have been able to get rid of it. Probably a privilege. I agree it sucks thag management did this.

It's definitely a right. Have you never heard the expression of a right without a remedy because that's where we are but it was definitely a right under the agreement subject to individual performance.

Without opening the whole debate of lunch time or not, how much do we think they're simply going to be checking badge swipes for 8.5 hours per day versus matching up badge swipes to whatever your stated entrance and exit time is supposed to be per your schedule?

I've never gotten to work on time ever in my life unless it's something important like court or registrant meeting. So it's not about to happen in middle age. But I'm not a cheater either - if I'm 20 min late, I stay 20 minutes later. This was never ever a problem for anyone in before times. I wonder if it's a problem now.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think it’s accurate to call it a “right” (or else they wouldn’t have been able to get rid of it. Probably a privilege. I agree it sucks thag management did this.

Management is too busy sucking up to Doge. I mean we need to wear our badges at all times. We're still doing the 5 bullet points? Even FDA which has had massive RIFs is bringing back 2 day/wk telework and has told everyone that they're done with the bullets. Us nope - keep sucking up to OPM/DOGE/WH like the spineless leaders you are.

Paul has been confirmed. Where the hell is he? I realize a town hall doesn't come together the next day but not even an email to staff?

You were always supposed to wear your badge, even if many people didn’t. And who the f cares about spending two minutes (max) on the five things email.

Maybe after two huge DIFs we can get back to TW twice a week, or even better, maybe we stop complaining about stupid stuff, and we avoid the RIFs altogether. (And FDA’s telework is really limited in terms of who can take part, so you probably don’t want to use that as a model.)

Anonymous wrote:Sick.outs.

Hahah. Honestly I'm hoping people take a TON of time off. Call tomorrow? Sorry you'll have to handle it without me, I'm off, need to take the day off to go to the mechanic for 45 minutes. Sorry my foot is kinda itchy, I'm taking the day. On my period, you don't want to know - taking the day. From a friend at FDA that's what is bringing back flexibility and limited telework for them as the powers that be are noticing that nothing it getting done and people are disappearing at the most inopportune times. Some groups there are officially now 2 days/wk though I'm hearing that's doctors - people they really need to retain. While others don't have it so official but are being given the nod that teleworking 1-2 times/pay period is fine.