Some of the pandemic increase in time worked may have been a net benefit to the folks working. A lot of people I know spent at least some of the time they otherwise would have spent commuting working remotely. And, since commuting sucks, ended up happier for it. Anecdotes aren’t data, but this pattern was very common among people I know.
The business got more benefit. Harder to argue it is for the employees.
If the business got more benefit, they would be fighting to keep this setup - and none are.
The companies “fighting” against this stuff are mostly large and not necessarily aiming at the same target for “benefit” as one might think.
On the whole, remote work gave workers more agency. That highlighted that the control that some layers of management weakened in some ways. It also highlights that poor processes are more easily exploited. Companies don’t vet their employees well where that is important, but not mandated by customer contracts… thus we’ve learned that many frauds are trivially accomplished if you never see people.
On the flip, less remote may ultimately be in the employees interest. If you’re some high level JPMC employee making $500k from your ski cottage in Vermont… well let’s say your NYC salary doesn’t reflect the market, and if you can succeed in Vermont, you can probably be replaced by someone making $100k in Iowa, $50k in Latin America or less in Asia.
The loudest voices on HN and other places about the awesomeness of remote work are really celebrating their success arbitrage… which always cuts both ways.
Businesses are not Austrian spherical rational actors. They are run by people with their own agendas that have much but not perfect alignment with the company.
I think you are probably right, however it could just be that managers are paranoid.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal%E2%80%93agent_proble...
CEOs are not the living embodiment of a company. They are an agent with their own values too.
None are is a pretty wide brush. The ones that are not are not making news headlines. Only the companies demanding RTO are making headlines.
There are plenty of smaller start ups that are remote only. There are also companies boot strapping so they again are not making news with funding rounds.
TLDR Just because something is not in the news does not mean it does not exist.
pesky evidence
Is any of this based upon evidence? As best I can tell, the demand for RTO is entirely vibe bossing.
And people work for businesses for their own self interest. A more successful business can afford to pay its employees more. Employees get more satisfaction from completing accomplishments. Tasks which make employees lives easier are more likely to get done. There is less stress when things are less crammed schedule-wise.
I mean we've all experienced the feeling of "I want to get this done but there just isn't enough time." Taking more hours of your day just exhausts you more, but eliminating a task that doesn't help you, whether it be busywork or a commute, is fantastic. If given the choice between sitting in traffic and knocking things off my to do list, what kind of freak would choose the former?
There is a huge gulch and lag in most businesses between profit and benefit for the employees. Increased profit in the short and medium term rarely goes towards the employees benefit while losses tend to more directly impact employees (layoffs) rather quickly.
Oftentimes profit means hiring more people, not pay existing people more.
outside of tech I'd agree, but the execs keep giving me big stock packages (I'm a mid-level at a company you have heard of) and the line going up has pretty immediately paid off for me.
isn't that normal for engineers? the sentiment you're expressing is one I can relate to more for employees who are only compensated with salary
If you're a mid-level employee at a company on heard of (this describes me too) then I find it difficult to believe that the company stock performance is meaningfully related to your performance. I know for sure that our stock price would not suffer a penny if I dropped dead tomorrow, even if nobody noticed for years and my paychecks kept piling up in my bank account).
The problem is that a disproportionate amount of the additional profit when an employee works more hours (or just all of it) tends to go to the business not the employee who is actually doing the work.
In my case, I learned that grinding 12-16-hour days on a single skill (coding) isn’t beneficial to anyone. The quality drops, mistakes creep in, and the risk of burnout skyrockets. Clients typically only care about delivery. Did the thing get done, and does it work?
Meanwhile, some managers and even teammates seem to care more about the hours you clock than whether you crossed the finish line. I’ve never fully understood that mindset. Why glorify effort over results, especially in knowledge work?