2y ago

Remote work is harder to come by as companies push for return to office

www.npr.org /2023/09/01/1196731284/return-to-office-rto-hybrid-remote-work-from-home-zoom

Three and a half years after the start of the pandemic, employers are getting serious about increasing the amount of time workers spend in the office and trying new strategies to overcome resistance.

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2y ago

This anti WFH piece makes my blood boil, thoughts?

www.npr.org /2023/09/01/1196731284/return-to-office-rto-hybrid-remote-work-from-home-zoom

21 comments

This would feel less gas lighty if they were just open about micromanaging, their 10yr commercial lease, keeping up appearances for older clients or whatever. Instead they say the most laughable shit
"What we've found is, people have enjoyed coming back to the office," says Zoom's Chief People Officer Matthew Saxon. "There is a buzz. There's something about being able to go have lunch with your teammates."
Like mother fucker 90% of people eat some sad meal prep shit at their desk.
- My bet is that in 2 years we'll see a stark devide in talent in traditional Vs remote first companies with the latter getting pick of the litter so to speak.
  
  This is already happening. Remote roles are getting the cream of the crop while in office roles are getting the left overs.
  People that are good and know it are not applying to in office jobs. Why would they sacrifice an additional 5-10 hours a week for no more pay and shitty open offices?
- It is nice having lunch with teammates. It's nicer having lunch at home in my sweats.
  
  I much prefer having lunch in my PJs with my cats to having lunch with my coworkers.
- The irony of Zoom encouraging back to the office.
  Eating al desco is depressing, and pretty gross.
  
  The worst is when someone comes up while you’re eating and is like “hey you have a minute?” and then you have to say no fuck off as professionally as possible.
- I have zero interest in lunch with my coworkers and I've pretty much always felt that way.
Remember when global carbon emissions dropped off because everyone was remote? Sure was nice while it lasted I guess.
So I do analysis on this type of data as part of my role at an online job board. Based on our data, a couple things stand out:
Overall job volume is down about 40% year-over-year. So the market in general is a lot tighter.
The proportion of remote roles is dropping, but slowly. A year ago about 70% of our roles were fully remote; now it's about 60%.
The proportion of fully in-office roles has actually remained relatively stagnant, generally floating around 15%-20% at any given time. They're also very difficult roles to fill because A) they're limited to actual geographies and B) they are nobody's first choice
Between February 2023 and now, the median # of applications we get per role has spiked sharply; particularly with remote roles. These roles unsurprisingly remain jobseekers' first choice, and since they're not limited by geography, tend to pull in amuch wider talent pool, especially since the overall number and proportion of remote roles continues to shrink.
So what I'm seeing is many of these remote roles becoming supplanted by hybrid roles, which has pros and cons. They're still limited by the same geographic constraints as in-office roles, since you're not going to be applying to a hybrid role across the country, after all. So you'll see less variety of employers. The advantage is that if there is a hybrid role that looks appealing to you, that you'll be facing a lot less competition than you would for a fully remote role.
Good luck assholes, I'm never going back into an office
I'm surprised share holders of a lot of big companies aren't demanding WFH. Office space is one of the larger chunks of overhead for a company (not just the space but utilities, supplies, maintenance/cleaning).
My guess is as leases are coming to an end that companies will definitely think twice before signing when WFH is an option.
My current job has us in the office a few days every 6-8 weeks and if it went to anymore than that the majority of the team I'm on would quit. It's pretty easy to find work right now with unemployment below 4%
- Because office space 'overhead' was solved for decades ago. The same shareholders of a company own shares in at least a dozen commercial real estate companies. Their bottom line goes up when a company rents or owns commercial property. It doesn't matter if ProductionCo loses 10% revenue a year, RealEstateCo gets at least that much plus all more if they own the surrounding buildings all the restaurants are in that support the office.
  Capitalism, contrary to popular belief, does not optimize for economic efficiency, just profit; and as it turns out profit has little to do with efficiency if you zoom out of any one particular company.
  
  This. The office, the restaurants, the gym, the local stores? They're all owned by the same capitalists, and they want you spending your paycheck there. This is about converting the limited hours of your life into wealth for the rent-seeking bourgeousie: it's still the same company store. It just has a different name.
  No war but the class war.
- We got bought out by a holding corp and none of their holdings are real estate. All tech. We have been 100% wfh and a bit back they closed down the smaller offices but now they are dropping most all of them. Even the main office is being shuttered but they said with that one they are looking for a smaller space but at least for awhile I believe we will have no US offices.

21 comments