Almost all remote-work news is negative now but was positive in the beginning of the pandemic. Have you noticed this or am I going crazy?

Earlier in the pandemic many news and magazine organizations would proudly write about how working from home always actually can lead to over working and being too “productive”. I am yet to collect some evidence on it but I think we remember a good amount about this.

Now after a bunch of companies want their remote workers back at the office, every one of those companies are being almost propaganda machines which do not cite sound scientific studies but cite each other and interviews with higher ups in top companies that “remote workers are less productive”. This is further cementing the general public’s opinion on this matter.

And research that shows the opposite is buried deep within any search results.

Have you noticed this? Please share what you have observed. I’m going paranoid about this.

randon31415 ,

Productivity was never the point of work. Increases in productivity thus was never a boon to those in charge.

stackcheese ,

but the ai revolution though

art ,
@art@lemmy.world avatar

In a lot of ways it’s still more marketing than a revolution. AI can’t do my job yet. Not saying it never will but we’re a lot farther away from that than most people think.

Aux ,

A lot of people love WFH, a lot of people hate WFH. This forced experience has caused yet another split in society.

HerrLewakaas ,

Why? Just let people work wherever the fuck they want to, no reason to divide society. If anything, division is just a tool for companies to manipulate us into doing what they want us to

Gingernate ,

I think it was forced because of covid. Now that covid isint an issue, I completely agree

Aux ,

Because people are different.

meldroc ,

I think a lot of it is crappy control-freak managers, used to “managing by walking around”, who feel lost when all the peons are out and working remote.

The companies that let workers act on their own recognizance are most likely far more pleasant to work for, while the companies that have a million little rules and do things like forced RTO tend to be the ones with asshole bosses that are miserable workplaces.

steakmeout ,

Nobody hates WFH.

meekah ,
@meekah@lemmy.world avatar

Only a sith deals in absolutes

Mikina ,

I really don’t like WFH, it’s not working for me personally, and I’m really glad that we have an office I can go to.

paddirn ,

I’ve got small kids, so while I generally like WFH, there have been times where I absolutely just wanted to GTFO and go into the office. Our company did full WFH for awhile, then gradually phased us back in to the office, but for me the best schedule we had was where we were one week in-office, one week WFH, that was the absolute best and gave me the best of both worlds. Without kids though, I would probably prefer WFH a good portion of the time, just so I could have some freedom during lulls in the workload to catch up on home stuff.

meldroc ,

I’m sort of like that - I LOOOOVE WFH, and do it all the time, but at the same time, I work for a brewery that is probably one of the few genuinely good and decent workplaces, and going to the office at the brewery is genuinely fun. Helps when you have cool coworkers, and can drink beer while you work (though that’s rough on productivity…)

itsJoelle ,

Nobody hates optional WFH with no strings for doing so.

Personally, I love WFH. I love being home and by myself. Additionally, I may end up not leaving my house until the weekend and I love it since I despise driving. But I understand that would drive people insane. However, for me, I needed to recharge my introvert batteries over the weekend instead of seeing friends. Now I’m a social butterfly in my off time ☺️

Zink ,

Is it possible for me to love WFH but also avoid it most of the time because my productivity is shit at home?

Having a nearby office with the option to work from home is the best of both worlds for me. I guess for those of you who do better working from home, you could take or leave the nearby office part!

hydrospanner ,

Key difference is that you realize that different people work differently.

My workplace is full of talking heads in upper management who constantly repeat what boils down to, “I’m more productive in the office than at home, therefore everyone must be more productive at the office than at home, therefore we need to bring everyone back.”

Which is obviously horse shit.

I live alone, and working from home not only means no commute, no parking costs, comfy clothes, and all the conveniences of home…it also means having all my notes and documents at hand, not having to function from a random empty cubicle, no distraction from constant non-work-related chatter, no interruptions from coworkers walking by and deciding to talk, and when we’re in crunch time, it also means I’ll consider working OT to help speed things along! Working in the office means “don’t even bother asking me to work OT”.

I work harder, get distracted less, and somehow have better technology uptime from home, so it benefits my employer and I prefer it. All my meetings still have to be online because there’s rarely ever a time where all parties are in the office at the same time.

The only reason for me to come into the office is because someone 3+ grades above me said so.

Zink ,

Yeah, looking for a one size fits all solution to something with so many effects on people’s daily activities is asking for trouble.

It’s great that now the wfh option exists much more substantially than a few years ago, but it sucks that so many seem to want to stuff that cat back in the bag. It seems counterintuitive if your goals are maximizing profits and talent retention. It makes me wonder how much of it is driven by the order class trying to protect real estate investments.

ycnz ,

Mediocre executives loathe it with every fibre of their being.

kogasa ,
@kogasa@programming.dev avatar

I don’t hate it as a concept, but I recognize that it contributed to my burnout during the pandemic. I would personally prefer a hybrid schedule over pure WFH.

Aux ,

A lot of people hate working from home. People with kids, who want to spend some time of the day in peace. People living in house shares with bad neighbours. People living with abusive partners or parents. People with mental issues who feel more comfortable with people around them. Don’t be an ignorant dick.

Ninja9p5 ,

I think the companies were lying to us when covid started. They said working from home was awesome and we could still do our jobs well so investors wouldn’t get scared. But now they want us to come back to the office and they say working from home is bad for us. They are just trying to trick us into doing what they want.

whofearsthenight ,

I mean, it’s just capitalism. Beginning of the pandemic: thank god for remote work, don’t worry investors we’re not going out of business. End of pandemic: welp, I have to justify my position and why we’re paying all this real estate get back in the office so I can micro-manage you and create useless meetings no one needs so no one realizes that I don’t really do anything around here.

Stinkywinks ,

Middle management wants to have a reason to exist. They want people driving to work spending money on the way there and back. Landlords care about their giant office buildings not being rented that should instead just be replaced with affordable housing.

BeardedGingerWonder ,

No doubt you’re right about some middle management and I see this said a lot. Anecdotally I don’t believe I’ve met any middle management that want to be back in the office. If I’m honest I don’t think I’ve ever met middle management that enjoys middle management, it’s a ton of fucking stress keeping senior management happy with heir batshit detached requests and interpreting it into something moderately sensible so individual contributors can be productive and actually achieve the shit that needs done.

Meanwhile Steve can’t seem to wrap his head round the fact that just because he likes formatting his code a particular way isn’t a good reason to ignore the team coding standards, Cheryl and Sushant have decided to book expensive holidays for the same week without clearing the leave first - so I’ll be spending Christmas supporting the app on top of everything else even though I booked it off in the system in January and ultimately I hate this fucking job because I can’t do the thing I’m actually fucking good at.

hibsen ,

Preach. I hate almost every day as a manager of managers, and I don’t give a rat’s ass if any of them or their employees ever come into the office ever again. If their content is completed on-time and it’s quality work, they could make it while living in Nepal for all I care, but of course we’re being forced to come back to the office 50% of the time to do the same work we did at home for three years.

I’m doing what I can to encourage people to apply for exemptions and approving all of them that I can before someone decides I’m “not supporting the return-to-work initiative” enough and fires me. Frankly at this point it’ll be a relief.

ClockNimble ,

Working from home is legitimately amazing. My bud oes not need to sit at your desk with your lame chair and keyboard. He has a much faster pc at home with the big clicky-clackies. Ten hour work day? He will bring that shizz down to 6-8 with the same productivity and can play games on the side.

I get that it doesn’t work for everyone, especially those with task management issues, but out of the 40 people I know, 2 do better in an office.

DarkMessiah ,

Yup, corporations need to justify owning the big-ass office buildings they bought out, so they’re paying to make their own opinions be reported on over the actual truth. As usual.

jonne ,

It’s not just the corporations renting those offices, it’s the politicians of downtown areas that fear a downturn in tax revenue due to more empty offices and less people getting their daily coffee/lunch/after work drinks.

And of course, if everyone’s working remotely, this means it’s a lot easier to find a better job without even needing to leave the house to interview, which gives employees a better bargaining position (downside is that employers will start looking at employees in lower paying countries as well).

Sharpiemarker ,

downside is that employers will start looking at employees in lower paying countries as well).

Tale as old as time

Yearly1845 ,

[Thread, post or comment was deleted by the author]

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    jonne ,

    Eh, all those cities are Democrat run. Economically they’re essentially the same.

    Buelldozer ,
    @Buelldozer@lemmy.today avatar

    Republicans did a shitty job of planning New York City? When did this happen?

    lemmyseizethemeans ,

    It’s the commercial mortgage backed securities market.

    Remember 2008 when they bundled up all those home mortgages that were based on shitty unpayable loans and sold off securities to retirement funds etc? But then people couldn’t pay and the entire economy imploded resulting in massive bank failures?

    Same deal. All those office space loans have been collateralized into securities. The 1% and the banking industry understand perfectly that if they don’t force people to return to office, the entire system will implode again. Even after Dodd Frank the regulations on over the counter derivatives are still mostly non existent.

    jonne ,

    I wonder why they bother, considering they’ll probably get bailed out again anyway.

    lemmyseizethemeans ,

    There’s always money in the banana stand

    gornar ,
    @gornar@lemmy.world avatar

    And the proven financial benefit of having people work from home must not be as profitable as corporate real estate, or companies wouldn’t be requiring in-office work again!

    Eldritch ,
    @Eldritch@lemmy.world avatar

    I find it real fascinating how many people are blindsided by the fact that the people who own things that focus on making a profit skew the information they put out to benefit themselves. Did they think they were impartial or something? I mean they claim their neutral they don’t ever show that they’re neutral.

    nightscout ,
    @nightscout@lemmy.world avatar

    Yes, I have observed this and it is very frustrating. In many cases, these “articles” are opinion pieces being circulated by those with a financial interest in commercial real estate (or someone carrying the water of someone who has such an interest). Those who have any sort of financial interest in commercial real estate are going to be against remote work for obvious reasons.

    Cities and real estate moguls arguing that people have to engage in an absolutely fruitless, draining, exhausting, expensive commute to keep a handful of people rich. They want to punish you to keep some elite people rich.

    What needs to happen is workers need to fight back as much as possible. If your job can be done remotely, make it a priority to work for a company that allows you to do your job remotely. There’s NOTHING about my job that requires me to go into an office. I have worked successfully at home for many years and if my organization required me to come in, I would do everything I could to leave and find something else that allowed me to telework. If you’re looking for a job and have the luxury of being a little bit choosy, let recruiters know you will ONLY consider remote options.

    Anecdotally, I think these opinion pieces are way overblown. My spouse was recently contacted by a recruiter about a job. The job was not remote and my spouse told the recruiter they would only consider remote-only options. The recruiter sighed and said, “That is what I keep getting told.”

    Boozilla ,

    It’s about money and control. Money invested in and harvested from owning commercial properties. Control from making employees do things they don’t want to, just to beat them down and “keep them in line”. A lot of bosses exercise power for its own sake, unfortunately.

    I have empathy for folks who want to collaborate, and/or be mentored, and/or socialize at work. I no longer want or need those things from my job, but…I came up that way so it would be hypocritical of me to say that others shouldn’t want them.

    On the other hand, cars are destroying everything and commuting in 2023 (if you don’t truly need to) is just dumb. Progress always comes with some amount of pain and adjustment.

    Marcy_Stella ,

    It’s simple, during the pandemic they couldn’t have workers come in but they couldn’t have just no work force so they pushed for work from home and made it seem like a big positive to keep money flowing into their pockets. Now that they can have people come into the office they need to justify their leases and justify their middle management oversight so they need people coming back to the offices. It’s not about whats convent or comfortable for the workers, it’s what can make them the most money and justify expenses as to not spook investors. If the company could cancel even half of their leases they would and have most everyone work from home and maybe even cut back on middle management. However they got 20-30 year leases to save money(in month to month payments) and it’d be really expensive to exit the deal sooooo justifying the lease is more important.

    chicken ,

    it’s what can make them the most money and justify expenses as to not spook investors

    Seems contradictory to me. I think they don’t actually give a shit about making the company money, they’re just straight scamming investors in favor of their own personal interests where they can get away with it.

    Blamemeta ,

    The news is propaganda. Welcome to the club.

    Snekeyes ,

    The best is this article using AI to show what a remote worker would look like after 70 years working from home. So ridiculous it’s laugable. The propaganda is strong. Lol

    indiatimes.com/…/model-shows-what-remote-workers-…

    They also made another article about what the worker looks like after 20 years w life-size model too news.sky.com/…/life-sized-model-shows-what-office…

    cheesemonk ,

    Is the argument here that employees won’t buy ergonomic furniture and desks? Because with all the gas money I’m saving I’ve bought a nicer chair and monitor than I had in office…

    Snekeyes ,

    The content was made by office furniture companies… which probably took a hit w wfh… but … like you noted. You bought better. Same here. My place had chairs from the 60s

    Vlyn ,

    That easy, beginning of the pandemic: Companies panic that all their employees would call in sick. Or some even die (not that they’d care, but a lot of companies have a bus factor of one). So remote work gets tolerated or praised, everything works great.

    Now the pandemic is “over”, it’s safe to go back into the office. Companies have massive real estate costs, so they want to put their employees back into the office. Besides middle managers being afraid of their jobs as they seem to have become useless if they can’t look over your shoulder and micromanage you.

    It’s never about facts, it’s always what the companies and managers want in the moment.

    ItsMeForRealNow OP ,

    I agree with this the most.

    monobot ,

    Me too, what I have learned is to avoid all media promoting going back to office, since they are just PR tool and can not br trusted.

    circuitfarmer ,
    @circuitfarmer@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

    Corpos actively trying to get people back to the office so middle management doesn’t feel as useless.

    Commutes are a detriment to the worker, but not to the company.

    GrabtharsHammer ,

    I think it’s not so much about middle management. They implement the policies of the actual decision makers.

    I think it’s because the people who actually make these decisions perform their work mostly via face-to-face meetings, handshakes, projecting personal charisma, reading body language, and personal networking. This leads to an overestimation of how much of other jobs depend on time spent in the same room with others.

    The executive imagines the meetings they missed, leading to lost opportunities. So they see a loss of productivity.

    They don’t appreciate how much easier it was to edit that manual or analyze that data without Joe the human tuba trying to breathe around his phlegm in the cube next door, or without the folks three rows over arguing about which director’s vision of Superman was best.

    circuitfarmer ,
    @circuitfarmer@lemmy.sdf.org avatar

    The executive imagines the meetings they missed, leading to lost opportunities. So they see a loss of productivity.

    This is a fantastic point, and one I had not considered.

    From this standpoint, the side pushing for return to office really does feel like they’re in the right. I think I would argue that a subset of those folks are still pushing a return for the wrong reasons (e.g. thinking that remote work lowers productivity naturally, not just based on an observation of their own missed meetings or face time), but otherwise I agree entirely.

    Snekeyes ,

    They need to fake working and that’s hard to do when remote is based on output. Ie, did the work get done or not. Being a middle manager w people to bother in office means they can fake it or have issues all day and be talking …

    Tsubodai ,

    This hits the nail on the head at my work. Immediate manager couldn’t care less where we are, and has said frequently that the team is more productive from home.

    It’s the higher ups that are pushing for return to office, constantly sending out surveys, arranging free-form “open door” meetings and things like that because they’re lost without seeing people face to face.

    I can concentrate far more effectively at home, where I’m in full control of my environment, and I spend up to half of my day in video calls with people in different locations anyway.

    jhulten ,

    You are forgetting the value of commercial real estate portfolios. If the buildings are empty and no one wants to use them, they drop in value.

    newsweek.com/crash-worse-2008-crisis-predicted-co…

    monobot ,

    Commutes are a detriment to the worker, but not to the company.

    It should be, count commuting in my eighth hour work day and let’s see how much they prefer WFH.

    RedstoneValley ,

    I’d say it’s not all black or white. In my industry (software) most of my friends and colleagues have strong opinions about staying remote. It’s mostly along the lines of “either let me continue to work from home or find someone else”. Also most of the headhunter messages I get on LinkedIn offer up to 100% remote jobs. Of course this is all anecdotal and depends heavily on the field of work. But maybe it’s worth considering that you have the power to shape your own future. If you do not want to work in an office, you’ll find something else. Don’t let those corporations fool you.

    assassin_aragorn ,

    I think remote work is here to stay exactly because of what you’ve said. Companies always want highly skilled workers and experts. Those people have a lot of leverage when it comes to offers and hiring. Offering and maintaining remote work is a big plus when weighing offers, especially when you consider who these knowledge workers are.

    They’re at least 5 years out of college and many have started families. And they’ve realized that they want to spend more time with their family and kids and not waste it commuting to work. Most are probably 10+ years of experience in their relevant industry and with 12-15 year olds. I feel like that demographic had a massive awakening with COVID about where their priorities lie.

    I think it’s unlikely for remote work to stay at just the experienced knowledge professional level. Hell with 3 years of semi relevant experience I was able to leverage +$5000 on my salary for a remote job. Companies need more and more skilled office workers. This opposition to remote work won’t last, I think.

    McScience ,

    See I’m in software dev and I am constantly getting recruiter calls asking me for in-office work. I’m the guy saying “you literally cannot pay me enough to go back in an office”… but I’d gladly take 2/3 or maybe even 1/2 my current pay for a 4-day, 32 hour work week.

    SocialMediaRefugee ,

    It isn’t propaganda to look at the real-world ramifications of this.

    1. The hard drop in commercial real estate is going to end in a lot of big loans going unpaid. Might end in some bank failures.
    2. The drop in assessed value is going to hit cities hard in the pocket as they depend a lot on these property taxes from commercial properties to pay theirs bills (social programs, subsidized public transportation, police, fire, public housing, roads, etc).
    3. It will increase sprawl as more people can now live anywhere and push into wilderness areas and we lose more open space.
    4. A lot of small businesses depend on those dense commercial areas. You’ll see more contractors, restaurants, etc having to close and downtowns getting deserted like happened in the 70s as people fled to suburbs.

    You see a lot of people saying “just turn them into residences!”. It is very difficult and expensive to turn buildings designed as open office spaces into residences.

    ItsMeForRealNow OP ,

    But corporations have achieved very difficult things in a very short span that cost very many billions like - pivoted to AI which was very difficult until ChatGPT became popular.

    monobot ,

    Well… mabye they shulould have been nice to workers and have normal apartment prices.

    I wouldn’t call those examples real world, they created their own problem. Real world is worker trying to live semi normal life.

    MechanicalJester ,

    Re: Sprawl. The world is actually rather empty. A lot of changes are going to happen in domino fashion.

    MajorHavoc ,

    Indeed. And work location is still only one of many reasons to prefer city life. Cinemas, grocery stores, bars, stadiums and playgrounds aren’t going to instantly spread into our most rural areas.

    MajorHavoc ,

    Good points. Regarding point 2, I think we’re going to see cities shift to trying to attract people rather than corporations.

    Attracting an employer is now a less reliable way to attract their staff to a community.

    I suspect we will soon find that policies that attract great grocery stores into a walkable neighborhoods are more effective for cities than implementing lax corporate tax policies.

    dangblingus ,

    Businesses wanted to seem like they cared about people’s health and safety at the beginning of the pandemic, now commercial property values are tanking and that means the ruling class loses a vector from which they can siphon wealth away from the working class.

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