CEOs are at their wits’ end – they don’t know how to get their employees back in(cnbc.com)
cnbc.com
CEOs are at their wits’ end – they don’t know how to get their employees back in
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/10/01/ceos-are-at-their-wits-ends-dont-know-how-to-get-employees-back-in.html
108 comments
It seems like all your problems with WFH are really problems with having out-of-state employees. Those aren't the same thing. What's stopping you from hiring remote workers who live within the state lines?
I worked for a very small company that had people in different states and even a different country. That said, it's reasonable for a small business to decide that you don't want to hire out of state. Unless you have specific needs and are located somewhere unusual, hiring a few people in-state shouldn't be that big a limitation.
In general, the overall trend seems to be people moving away from urban areas but staying in cities--with a few obvious exceptions where a greater metro area spans into neighboring states as in New England.
In general, the overall trend seems to be people moving away from urban areas but staying in cities--with a few obvious exceptions where a greater metro area spans into neighboring states as in New England.
I run one of those companies and hence speaking from experience. I want to hire employees (not contractors) all over the United States but it is such a pain. I did that in 2 states already (in addition to primary state) and drowning with shitty paperwork.
I agree it is a mess, both domestically and internationally
We do this and are hiring remote largely fine in the US:
- book keeper shared w multiple startups
- who handles most states + outside person for rest
- we also use Gusto here, though they did screw up one key state and never took responsibility, so we will be leaving them
We will be switching to an intl'l friendly PEO so we can do intl better, if folks have recs
Anyways if you have enough $ to hire people, I strongly recommend paying a bit: they can do it way faster and properly, including maintenance, so you gain time and $ vs you doing it slowly and at opportunity cost. Problem still exists, but a small but of $ per new hire makes it go away.
I do occasionally worry about rogue states / districts who increase our legal risk, like parts of Texas...
We do this and are hiring remote largely fine in the US:
- book keeper shared w multiple startups
- who handles most states + outside person for rest
- we also use Gusto here, though they did screw up one key state and never took responsibility, so we will be leaving them
We will be switching to an intl'l friendly PEO so we can do intl better, if folks have recs
Anyways if you have enough $ to hire people, I strongly recommend paying a bit: they can do it way faster and properly, including maintenance, so you gain time and $ vs you doing it slowly and at opportunity cost. Problem still exists, but a small but of $ per new hire makes it go away.
I do occasionally worry about rogue states / districts who increase our legal risk, like parts of Texas...
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… if you’re a small company then your other option is to offer a large relocation benefit and high salary to get someone to move to the location you’re in. So a return to in person work wouldn’t solve your issue of hiring someone out of state
But then you are asking people to relocate which these days, people don't want to do. I mean young people may if given a good relocation but people with families are not willing to do it that easily.
Honest question: how big is the trade off of not offering an employee insurance and instead increasing compensation and letting them get their own? Is there a ton of cost savings in companies offering insurance vs going the other route?
This is less of a problem with WFH and more of a problem with regulation, IMO.
But to an extent, they are linked. I want to open up candidate pool by hiring anywhere in the US but too much bullshit to hire an employee who will work out of state.
This doesn't make sense. Why does a business need to be registered in a state to have employees there? Tons of businesses are registered in Delaware without them having any but token employees or owners there.
We've used ADP to handle the taxes, unemployment, and payment paperwork, but several providers in this space. Insurance seems to be flexible enough to handle as well.
Zenefits and others work fine to ensure benefits are built appropriately.
We've used ADP to handle the taxes, unemployment, and payment paperwork, but several providers in this space. Insurance seems to be flexible enough to handle as well.
Zenefits and others work fine to ensure benefits are built appropriately.
You still have to register as a business entity with each state's Secretary of State office if you employ a person in that state. I expect there are numerous reasons for this, but certainly among them is that the unemployment systems, healthcare benefits systems, and part of the tax system are all regulated/managed at the state level and so the state needs records of entities to deal with that. My company (Auxon) is Delaware C-corp headquartered in Portland, OR, but with a distributed team in different parts of the US and Canada.
We use Gusto to manage much of the ongoing headache of maintaining legal compliance across multiple regions. However, even with that there's often a manual bootstrapping process that has to happen that's still the old school bureaucratic navigation approach.
In some cases folks like Zenefits, Gusto, and ADP have services and capabilities to act as an agent for your business to make all the state-by-state stuff as invisible to you as possible, but it's not a perfect system. That said, we've not found the caveats to be particularly onerous either, so YMMV.
We use Gusto to manage much of the ongoing headache of maintaining legal compliance across multiple regions. However, even with that there's often a manual bootstrapping process that has to happen that's still the old school bureaucratic navigation approach.
In some cases folks like Zenefits, Gusto, and ADP have services and capabilities to act as an agent for your business to make all the state-by-state stuff as invisible to you as possible, but it's not a perfect system. That said, we've not found the caveats to be particularly onerous either, so YMMV.
> Tons of businesses are registered in Delaware without them having any but token employees or owners there.
That's the opposite. Yes, you can register someplace like Delaware and not have any employees there. But you can't have employees living in Delaware and not be registered there.
That's the opposite. Yes, you can register someplace like Delaware and not have any employees there. But you can't have employees living in Delaware and not be registered there.
I am not downvoting you but you need to check this. There is something called "nexus" and you can google it. You can get away with it but if you have employees working more than a certain number of days in a state, you need to register your business there even if you don't conduct actual business there. This is what my CPA has told me and google confirms it.
You should really check the responses to your comment, and you should be a bit concerned if you DO have employees in multiple states.
Many states have labor departments whose rules and laws apply to you if you have even just 1 employee in their state. There has recently been a lot of discussion on HN regarding Colorado's law around requiring salary ranges be posted for job openings. If you have even a single employee in CO, your business is covered by this legal requirement.
Many states have labor departments whose rules and laws apply to you if you have even just 1 employee in their state. There has recently been a lot of discussion on HN regarding Colorado's law around requiring salary ranges be posted for job openings. If you have even a single employee in CO, your business is covered by this legal requirement.
Hey I appreciate the caution. I did a poor job representing our current situation. We are looking into a multi-state remote workforce but haven't decided/deployed yet. Thanks for the heads up!
For starters, employees are taxed based on where they live. To pay those taxes, you need to set up withholdings with a state tax ID.
To be accurate, employees are taxed by some combination of where they live and where they work--which usually ends up something like paying whichever is highest. [If they're remote only where they live matters for the most part, modulo various state tax rules that may require tax payments even for short stints of working on-site or otherwise in a different state.]
Yes, I didn’t mean they weren’t taxed in other ways. Just that their home state taxes explain the requirement for registration there.
When you hire an employee in a new state, you usually have to do these things differently:
1. State income and payroll taxes
2. State unemployment insurance
3. Workers compensation insurance
For each of #1 and #2, you have to:
- calculate how much you owe
- calculate how much the employee owes
- pay the money
- file regular returns
Of course, before you can file a return, you have to register your company with the state tax bureau and the unemployment insurance agency in that state.
1. State income and payroll taxes
2. State unemployment insurance
3. Workers compensation insurance
For each of #1 and #2, you have to:
- calculate how much you owe
- calculate how much the employee owes
- pay the money
- file regular returns
Of course, before you can file a return, you have to register your company with the state tax bureau and the unemployment insurance agency in that state.
My understanding is that you typically need a business license for a state where you have employees and, while various companies can handle a lot of the day to day payroll/benefits, you can't outsource everything and there are typically legal and other costs associated with adding an employee in a different state.
> Tons of businesses are registered in Delaware without them having any but token employees or owners there.
If your company is registered in Delaware but your office is in California, you’re also required to register your company in California. Repeat this for every state you operate in or have employees.
If your company is registered in Delaware but your office is in California, you’re also required to register your company in California. Repeat this for every state you operate in or have employees.
The state of Delaware should start advertising itself as the easiest place in the US to hire remote workers. I don't know why you would want to live there but this is their chance to show off what they've got and attract new residents.
They have to deposit unemployment premiums and payroll taxes to the state of the person they hired. Those rates vary depending on the legislation and regulations in each state.
Legally the corporation may be a registered entity in Delaware, but they must register with each state they have any employees in for tax reporting and collection purposes. Employers also generally pay an employment tax in addition to your salary, but you don’t see it because it comes out of their pocket, not yours. That tax is what funds state unemployment insurance programs, and in some states every time you fire someone, in some cases no matter the reason, that tax liability goes up. It’s a disincentive toward bad behavior on frequently firing people.
That said, I agree that this needs to change and it needs to change now. I’d write my senators, but I live in Texas. Unless I was an insane conspiracy theorist nut job with 50000 Facebook “friends”, they don’t give a shit. Fucking sociopaths, man…
That said, I agree that this needs to change and it needs to change now. I’d write my senators, but I live in Texas. Unless I was an insane conspiracy theorist nut job with 50000 Facebook “friends”, they don’t give a shit. Fucking sociopaths, man…
I agree this is a huge pain, but the benefits of being able to hire the best people where they already are still outweighs the paperwork overhead. I have found the least painful solution to be using Rippling as an HR/payroll system and Northwest Registered Agent to register an entity in each needed state. Between the two, it takes relatively little time and no physical mailing of forms to get set up in each new state.
We’ve hired people in remote states with Gusto (I think they do most of the setup with payroll/unemployment tax), and we have a small business United Healthcare PPO plan that seems to work everywhere, even though we setup the plan and LLC in AZ (and I’m in CA, myself).
But I’m there with you. It should be as easy as “1099-ing,” and frankly that is the easiest option for us if they’re willing to accept that arrangement (many won’t, because they don’t want to hire a CPA or track their own write offs).
But I’m there with you. It should be as easy as “1099-ing,” and frankly that is the easiest option for us if they’re willing to accept that arrangement (many won’t, because they don’t want to hire a CPA or track their own write offs).
Note that tons of companies do it but deciding to just "1099" an employee is not really legal. Whether or not an employee is a W2 employee or a 1099 contractor is solely supposed to be a function of the work that employee does and how they do it. Importantly, neither the employer nor the employee just gets to "decide" how they want to be classified, and you're not supposed to have 1099 employees in essentially the same roles as W2 employees.
Like I said, tons of businesses still do this, and there are ways to structure the job so that someone can be correctly designated a 1099 contractor (e.g. they have more flexibility over their hours and equipment). Still just wanted to call this out because lots of people seem to be under the misperception that you get to just arbitrarily choose your employment classification.
Like I said, tons of businesses still do this, and there are ways to structure the job so that someone can be correctly designated a 1099 contractor (e.g. they have more flexibility over their hours and equipment). Still just wanted to call this out because lots of people seem to be under the misperception that you get to just arbitrarily choose your employment classification.
Gusto is very helpful but it doesn't do everything for you. You still have to setup the company on the state's websites (sometimes very shitty) and then connect with Gusto. We use Gusto as well so I know what you are talking about.
WFH doesn't mean you need to hire in geographically disparate areas
edit: spelling
edit: spelling
> You cannot 1099 everyone especially if they are only working for you as a full time employee (IRS won't like that)
One way smaller companies do accomplish this is with "professional employer organizations." A PEO is the legal employer of the full-time staff, provides their insurance, processes their W-2s, etc. An executive at the company is the actual day-to-day manager of the staff, and the company pays the PEO to cover all the staffing expenses. Not as relevant when you also want to pay staff with equity, but it's a fine option for paying staff with cash and benefits in multiple states or countries.
One way smaller companies do accomplish this is with "professional employer organizations." A PEO is the legal employer of the full-time staff, provides their insurance, processes their W-2s, etc. An executive at the company is the actual day-to-day manager of the staff, and the company pays the PEO to cover all the staffing expenses. Not as relevant when you also want to pay staff with equity, but it's a fine option for paying staff with cash and benefits in multiple states or countries.
That sounds very unattractive to me as a potential employees. So I'm not really being hired and I have to deal with this PEO if I have issues with insurance of any sort.
Small companies do hire employees in multiple states. I've been in that position myself and know many other small distributed companies. But it is paperwork and cost.
[ADDED: Maybe it's fine but it would be a red flag for me.]
Small companies do hire employees in multiple states. I've been in that position myself and know many other small distributed companies. But it is paperwork and cost.
[ADDED: Maybe it's fine but it would be a red flag for me.]
Background: I used to belong to a 50 person company that used TriNet and now run a ~10 one that uses Gusto (multi-state).
Honestly, if you are in a small company, having a PEO helps tremendously for both being an employee and the company's management.
> So I'm not really being hired and I have to deal with this PEO if I have issues with insurance of any sort.
(1) When would your employer ever have to deal with insurance issues even at a F500? That's all done directly with the carrier unless it has to do with the benefits calculation, which would be no different to do at a F500 with benefits and one that uses TriNet.
(2) If you did actually have to deal with insurance issues, trust me you want to go through a larger organization to deal with carriers. Carries don't give great customer service to small biz / independent LLCs.
(3) Yes, you legally are an employee of <insert PEO here> but who cares? There are few instances where this actually has an effect.
Honestly, if you are in a small company, having a PEO helps tremendously for both being an employee and the company's management.
> So I'm not really being hired and I have to deal with this PEO if I have issues with insurance of any sort.
(1) When would your employer ever have to deal with insurance issues even at a F500? That's all done directly with the carrier unless it has to do with the benefits calculation, which would be no different to do at a F500 with benefits and one that uses TriNet.
(2) If you did actually have to deal with insurance issues, trust me you want to go through a larger organization to deal with carriers. Carries don't give great customer service to small biz / independent LLCs.
(3) Yes, you legally are an employee of <insert PEO here> but who cares? There are few instances where this actually has an effect.
>When would your employer ever have to deal with insurance issues even at a F500?
Large companies will get involved when there are insurance-related issues. How effective they'll be is another question.
Large companies will get involved when there are insurance-related issues. How effective they'll be is another question.
To chime in as another TriNet "user" (e.g., employee of a startup that used them), they're pretty great on both ends. They handle a lot of regulatory and benefit management for the employer (state/local taxes, 401(k) programs, health benefits), and for the employee, TriNet's HR dashboard feels modern and easy to use. When my current company was abruptly forced to switch from "independent subsidiary of BigCo" to "division within BigCo", we had to switch from TriNet to all of BigCo's internal HR systems -- most of which are clearly powered by HR IT companies like Workday and UltiPro -- and they are all just terrible.
Uh, anyway, yes, PEOs seem like good ideas. :)
Uh, anyway, yes, PEOs seem like good ideas. :)
I worked for a fully remote startup who used Trinet (PEO) and was issued equity, didn’t seem to be an issue. There are challenges if you want to hire and issue equity across international borders, I believe you have to incorporate a related entity in the country you’re issuing equity in to support such compensation issuance.
We use Trinet and while I think there are weird challenges to the whole thing, I know our international employees have stock options just like those of us in the US. They were even able to exercise some of their options when we had a weird event that let us do that. So it's definitely doable! I'm not sure how much of a hassle it is for the executive team to deal with all of that, but I do know that we got to the result.
Appreciate you sharing the datapoint.
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This is very interesting. I might use this. What is a good and reputable one that you’ve heard people using successfully? And also not too costly?
Is this like an umbrella company?
Can't all of these problems be solved by only hiring remote workers in-state?
Yes but then you are restricting your candidate pool AND then you will piss people off who are looking for remote anywhere jobs and get flak for not posting a "true WFH job" :)
ugh, you also have to pay the employees, too! why can't there just be some option where a company doesn't need to make any of these silly tradeoffs!?
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Businesses could solve the insurance problem by lobbying the government to institute universal health care.
I am a small business owner with employees in multiple states.
We use the Qualified Small Employer Reimbursement program which lets us reimburse our employees for the health insurance premiums and other health-related expenses they pay as we don’t qualify for a traditional group plan.
We use the Qualified Small Employer Reimbursement program which lets us reimburse our employees for the health insurance premiums and other health-related expenses they pay as we don’t qualify for a traditional group plan.
Yes but you still have to register the business for Unemployment Insurance, payroll taxes etc in the state.
Yeah definitely, I was mostly responding to say that there is a somewhat flexible option for health insurance.
We use Gusto for payroll but have to spend a not-insignificant amount of time wrestling with each state’s system. Plus there are a growing number of cities or metros that you have to register with as well.
We use Gusto for payroll but have to spend a not-insignificant amount of time wrestling with each state’s system. Plus there are a growing number of cities or metros that you have to register with as well.
> You can get away hiring foreign contractors but until there is real legislation to hire people anywhere easily, this is a pain in the neck especially for smaller companies.
This is what PEOs and EOR companies are for.
> Yes Gitlab does it and all but they have cash to spend and circumvent lot of BS regulations with employment and taxes.
They likely use a PEO/EOR for their foreign employees.
These are known issues with known solutions, they're just costly.
Just some of the players:
https://pilot.co/
https://papayaglobal.com/
https://velocityglobal.com/
https://www.trinet.com/
This is what PEOs and EOR companies are for.
> Yes Gitlab does it and all but they have cash to spend and circumvent lot of BS regulations with employment and taxes.
They likely use a PEO/EOR for their foreign employees.
These are known issues with known solutions, they're just costly.
Just some of the players:
https://pilot.co/
https://papayaglobal.com/
https://velocityglobal.com/
https://www.trinet.com/
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My father started his programming career in the 1970s when you were expected to wear a shirt and tie to the office every day. Then there was an energy crisis, and they turned up the temperature on the air conditioners. They also let everyone wear short sleeve shirts for the first time (still ties though). My father wore short sleeves for the rest of his career, even after the energy crisis was over and the temperature returned to normal. Once you give workers a benefit it's extremely hard to go back.
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Jim Cramer is a shit-artist and so I assume that anyone on his show talking about any issue is also a shit-artist with an agenda. As such, I have to assume that this is just a bunch of hot air and that businesses are going to try to use this to change labour laws to their benefit to address this "real issue"
pretty interesting that nowhere in the article does it mention that any of these CEOs have tried, say, offering higher compensation/better benefits compared to similar remote-friendly jobs.
when i see "at their wits' end" i take that to mean "we've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas"
when i see "at their wits' end" i take that to mean "we've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas"
Nowhere in the article does it make a case that returning to the office is desirable outside of the CEO’s need to feel important.
I recall reading a few articles after the first year of the pandemic talking about this very thing and how once employees realised how much unpaid time they pissed away each day getting to work that it would be impossible to get them back.
The only case for people going back to the office are people who want to be in an office environment. And I think those people are disappearing rapidly. My partner was one of those people who wanted to get back to the office and has had a pretty significant change of mind in the last year.
What I want to know is who are these CEOs that they are only just dealing with this issue two years into this pandemic when lots of people were already discussing this?
If these folks are so behind the curve on this issue then why are they even CEOs in the first place?
The only case for people going back to the office are people who want to be in an office environment. And I think those people are disappearing rapidly. My partner was one of those people who wanted to get back to the office and has had a pretty significant change of mind in the last year.
What I want to know is who are these CEOs that they are only just dealing with this issue two years into this pandemic when lots of people were already discussing this?
If these folks are so behind the curve on this issue then why are they even CEOs in the first place?
The CEOs are trying to convince their existing workers to return to the office, not attract new ones. Maybe I'm not typical here, but I'd be pretty uncomfortable if my company announced a raise that only office attendees are eligible for with the explicit goal of pressuring people to go in.
I was talking about this with my partner and that was her first response. Clearly enhanced wage packages are something that only work for C suite 'employees'
> "we've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas"
I always love this
> "we've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas"
I always love this
No single CEO will be able to pull off the feat.
Just like it took a large exogenous shock to get companies to let people work from home, it's going to take another shock to get people back into office.
That shock will come in the next economic downturn, and employment market tilts in favor of employer.
Outside the U.S., people have long returned to office, and the trend is continuing.
Longer term, it will become more clear which industry and what companies WFH is a competitive edge vs liability.
Highly productive, self-motivated, competent workers are in certain sectors are over-represented on HN, but that's not the norm.
Having worked in sectors with distributed and WFH workforce, tighter supervision and protocols are required to keep competitive edge.
Just like it took a large exogenous shock to get companies to let people work from home, it's going to take another shock to get people back into office.
That shock will come in the next economic downturn, and employment market tilts in favor of employer.
Outside the U.S., people have long returned to office, and the trend is continuing.
Longer term, it will become more clear which industry and what companies WFH is a competitive edge vs liability.
Highly productive, self-motivated, competent workers are in certain sectors are over-represented on HN, but that's not the norm.
Having worked in sectors with distributed and WFH workforce, tighter supervision and protocols are required to keep competitive edge.
My experience has been that people just move slow af ever since the lockdowns and remote only. Like I get it we all have differing amounts of equity and “ceos are evil” is common amongst some of the boot camp devs. However, that’s not an excuse to just cruise control through the week. It’s pretty frustrating to see some that some people are barely doing any work, people are offline on slack or have blocked off whole afternoons as busy. You’d think it would have become more efficient with lockdowns..
Not in US and in my knowledge software engineers haven't returned to office. WFH became so normal people are seeking jobs outside the country to the extend local companies can't find people to hire.
Note that this article is not really about in-office vs. remote/WFH preferences in general. It's primarily focused on that the COVID situation is still such that a lot of companies don't feel they can force people back in the office, are not necessarily comfortable with doing so, and that many people are not willing to. (Now, perhaps COVID safety is in part an excuse but still.)
> COVID situation is still such that a lot of companies don't feel they can force people back in the office
If only someone had done something about 18 months ago and stopped the virus from blowing up into a economy-wrecking disaster.
If only someone had done something about 18 months ago and stopped the virus from blowing up into a economy-wrecking disaster.
I don't disagree but turning this thread into a snide echo chamber isn't great. Please don't do this here.
OK let's ask the question differently. The reason people aren't returning to the office is because of the COVID-19 situation. We have ways to fix that.
Mitigation: isolation, quarantine, social distancing of those suspected, their families, and the elderly
Suppression: All of the mitigation measures, but applied to the entire population, plus closure of all non-essential activity
We also have one we didn't have 18 months ago: a vaccine, and vaccine mandates.
CEOs could be going to their elected representatives and pushing hard for these to happen. Why aren't they doing that? Why is the US content with ineffective half-measures that are prolonging the economic disruption that CEOs are so concerned about? Instead of say 6-9 weeks of disruption followed by a safe return to pre-pandemic activities, the US re-opened too early because of pressure from business. They weren't thinking long term, and now instead of short-term pain we have entire industries and supply chains disrupted. And yes I know this a global thing but the failures of the US to behave as a world citizen are, arguably, driving the continued global disruption.
Mitigation: isolation, quarantine, social distancing of those suspected, their families, and the elderly
Suppression: All of the mitigation measures, but applied to the entire population, plus closure of all non-essential activity
We also have one we didn't have 18 months ago: a vaccine, and vaccine mandates.
CEOs could be going to their elected representatives and pushing hard for these to happen. Why aren't they doing that? Why is the US content with ineffective half-measures that are prolonging the economic disruption that CEOs are so concerned about? Instead of say 6-9 weeks of disruption followed by a safe return to pre-pandemic activities, the US re-opened too early because of pressure from business. They weren't thinking long term, and now instead of short-term pain we have entire industries and supply chains disrupted. And yes I know this a global thing but the failures of the US to behave as a world citizen are, arguably, driving the continued global disruption.
Why do they insist on having their employees in the office? Are they so hidebound they can't innovate ways to disrupt office culture and build the future of work?
Yes
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In theory they would adapt but in practice many lack the skills to do so. CEO's who are hired in simple times when market stays the same aren't tested on how well they adapt to change, so when change happens many CEO's wont know what to do. Easiest way to handle it is to ignore the change and just continue with the old ways (which often kills even the largest of companies).
In fairness, this isn't just about CEOs. All supporters of remote work (including myself) aside, there is no shortage of people who really would like to get back to pre-pandemic office work which isn't going to happen if most of their co-workers meander into the office one day a week, if that.
> if most of their co-workers meander into the office one day a week, if that.
An innovative mix office/remote work ought to be able to address such challenges. I prefer remote work myself, but I am fully empathic with people who prefer office work. I know people with families who don't have the space or quiet to work from people. People living in tiny apartments that just want to be elsewhere. People with roommates.
Stating the choice as "either go back to the office or work from home" is a false dichotomy.
An innovative mix office/remote work ought to be able to address such challenges. I prefer remote work myself, but I am fully empathic with people who prefer office work. I know people with families who don't have the space or quiet to work from people. People living in tiny apartments that just want to be elsewhere. People with roommates.
Stating the choice as "either go back to the office or work from home" is a false dichotomy.
I’m empathetic. But not to the point where I’ll come into an office to keep them company.
Same here, but I would be OK with a schedule that included (post-pandemic) a mix of remote and scheduled mandatory in-person work. As a programmer, once at the end of a sprint and the beginning of the next for example.
On the flip side, if you work at a company that has employees across time zones, and your team is in say NY and SF, what value does mandating "in-person" interaction have? You're not going to fly everyone from both coasts to a meeting all the time. I'm not even sure C-level corporate board meetings, where companies seemed to be more than willing to fund travel, were fully in-person before the pandemic.
Perhaps what's really up for discussion is the concrete value of in-person, in-the-office, working. I know there are some that would say people being together in the same space is essential, and at the other end there are some who say the cost outweighs any value. The truth is that people are different, and treating individuals as cattle doesn't have much nuance.
On the flip side, if you work at a company that has employees across time zones, and your team is in say NY and SF, what value does mandating "in-person" interaction have? You're not going to fly everyone from both coasts to a meeting all the time. I'm not even sure C-level corporate board meetings, where companies seemed to be more than willing to fund travel, were fully in-person before the pandemic.
Perhaps what's really up for discussion is the concrete value of in-person, in-the-office, working. I know there are some that would say people being together in the same space is essential, and at the other end there are some who say the cost outweighs any value. The truth is that people are different, and treating individuals as cattle doesn't have much nuance.
We do fly our broader team to get together maybe a few times per year. They’re scattered across two continents. There are relatively few people I work with regularly who are in one of our local offices and fewer who regularly come in.
How many people does that include and what levels?
Pre-pandemic, there are a couple of different extended teams but I think the smaller one is about 40 and it's a pretty broad range of levels from fairly junior (e.g. a year or two out of being an intern) people up to VP.
ADDED: If you have mandatory regular in-person work, that does mean you now need to fly in people who are actually remote with the cost and travel time that implies or it means that "WFH" means working from a ~2 hour drive/train ride from the office.
ADDED: If you have mandatory regular in-person work, that does mean you now need to fly in people who are actually remote with the cost and travel time that implies or it means that "WFH" means working from a ~2 hour drive/train ride from the office.
If all you do is talk to your immediate co-workers you lose contact with rest of the business. The larger the business the worse this gets. I have been endlessly productive in lockdown, and for the first six months it did not matter that I was not picking up on gossip etc. Lately I am realising all the changesI missed (and others missed). It makes everything harder.
So IMO if CEOs want to keep the value of those sort of interactions, (ie have everyone in the office) do waaaaay more communication, more cross-org meet-ups and mixers, have people come into office on same day for lunches and social activities
The thing that "being in an offi e" facilitates is cross-pollination of ideas, just like a city does. And what facilitates that is not working but interacting
So IMO if CEOs want to keep the value of those sort of interactions, (ie have everyone in the office) do waaaaay more communication, more cross-org meet-ups and mixers, have people come into office on same day for lunches and social activities
The thing that "being in an offi e" facilitates is cross-pollination of ideas, just like a city does. And what facilitates that is not working but interacting
I was not picking up on gossip
...
It makes everything harder.
Fixing _that_ problem may or may not be a matter of putting butts-in-seats again.
Eh? I don't see that as a.problem at all - not all communication is top-down, ideas also start from the bottom, not all ideas or dialogue is scripted .. to expect there not to be a gossip / side-channel as an effective marketplace of ideas, that's a problem.
The longer this WFH pandemic continues the more reinforcement my personal decision to not return to full time in office receives. I see absolutely no benefit to going to an office everyday. My team (and company) has functioned as well as we did the 5 years I worked there prior.
New defaults emerge. I was unofficially remote pre-pandemic (in that I didn't have an assigned desk and rarely went in to the nearest office). But I already see people who thought they'd come back in 2-3 days a week who find that number slipping downwards to a day or maybe not at all on a given week.
What companies need to do is pay people for their time to and from work. Job done.
If you want workers to spend 1 - 2 hours a day getting to the office then pay them.
If you want workers to spend 1 - 2 hours a day getting to the office then pay them.
For start they could provide private offices. Open-plan office is hygienically unsuitable for regular use.
I think most people just don't want to be under someone's control. At least, that is the case for me. Simple as. People not returning to their wage cages is a non problem. Spend less on childcare, spend less on food, commute less, improve health, spend exactly the needed time to achieve assigned tasks. WFH options are good for everyone except for megalomaniacs.
Precisely. It turns out many of us were working to cover the expenses of working! Without commuting, day care, eating out, and so forth we're saving an enormous chunk of money.
Asking us to return to the office is asking us to effectively take a pay cut and reduce the hours we enjoy with our families.
Asking us to return to the office is asking us to effectively take a pay cut and reduce the hours we enjoy with our families.
Any money I've saved has been more than cancelled out by inflation (particularly food prices). So now, going back to the office would be unaffordable.
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I don't know about most, but I know that I personally don't mind going to work if I have a nice office. Open spaces are not nice. Having people behind my back bothers me for some reason, it makes me feel on the defensive and I'm not able to focus as much as I want. Open spaces also means that wearing a mask is mandatory, and 8 hours of mask-wearing gives me headaches at the end of the day. I do however like being able to take a day or two a week to WFH, as it's nice to be able to take care of the laundry or tasks like this during a work day.
My view may be biased by being young, not having a family and living alone. Though I'm glad that my older collegues are able to spend more time with their family. My parents didn't have WFH when I was young, and I can easily see how a day or two for each parent could have made everything better.
As a final point, as I don't have a very active social life, going to the office fills that "interacting with humans face to face" need for me. That's not a reason to force others to come, of course, but if society switch to more WFH, I hope alternatives will emerge for people like me that have a more "passive" style of socializing. Vocal chat just isn't the same, and webcams don't help.
My view may be biased by being young, not having a family and living alone. Though I'm glad that my older collegues are able to spend more time with their family. My parents didn't have WFH when I was young, and I can easily see how a day or two for each parent could have made everything better.
As a final point, as I don't have a very active social life, going to the office fills that "interacting with humans face to face" need for me. That's not a reason to force others to come, of course, but if society switch to more WFH, I hope alternatives will emerge for people like me that have a more "passive" style of socializing. Vocal chat just isn't the same, and webcams don't help.
Depending upon your location and interests, there are probably various activity clubs (like hiking to pick a random example) around where you live. Certainly I don't depend on the office (aside from travel/events) at all for socializing--though I did at one point much earlier in my career.
There are activity clubs, bars, lots of thigns like that, but that's why I talked specifically about "passive" socializing. I would call these things "active" socializing. I personally have a hard time with these kind of things, so in a way WFH could make my life a bit harder. Again, it's not a reason to stop people from doing it, or anything like that, but it's still a consequence of the shift, and I don't know how to solve this.
> I think most people just don't want to be under someone's control
I'm not sure it's as black and white as that!
I've worked from home for a number of years and I used to think people were insane to want to go into an office but I've changed my tune in the last year or so for one simple reason: hardly anyone is set up to work from home!
At my last company (small, only 21 employees - they got rid of their office earlier this year), I was one of only three people in the video calls with an actual home office. Everyone else was working from a living room, bedroom, or in two cases, the couch with a laptop on their knees.
One of the couch-workers left at around the same time as me recently for a company that worked from an office for the very reason that she could work from an office.
It's horses for courses: some people like it and have an actual space to work properly and others don't. In my case I have a desktop computer, two monitors, a comfy chair, a motorised stand-up desk etc. I'd never get this level of comfort in an actual office.
As well as the physical space issues, there is the psychological aspect too. I spend 5 days a week in the house all day by myself. I'm a contractor so making office friendships isn't something that motivates me (doesn't mean I hate everyone, just some people :D). I'm fine with that. I have a couple of friends I've known for many decades and that's enough for me. I can also get work done no problem and still put the washing on, nip out for groceries etc.
I know of colleagues that crave the human interaction... which is fine. I don't. I get enough from my family and the daily (and mostly pointless) video calls.
However, if I had to work from a laptop at my dining room table, It'd suck hard!
I'm not sure it's as black and white as that!
I've worked from home for a number of years and I used to think people were insane to want to go into an office but I've changed my tune in the last year or so for one simple reason: hardly anyone is set up to work from home!
At my last company (small, only 21 employees - they got rid of their office earlier this year), I was one of only three people in the video calls with an actual home office. Everyone else was working from a living room, bedroom, or in two cases, the couch with a laptop on their knees.
One of the couch-workers left at around the same time as me recently for a company that worked from an office for the very reason that she could work from an office.
It's horses for courses: some people like it and have an actual space to work properly and others don't. In my case I have a desktop computer, two monitors, a comfy chair, a motorised stand-up desk etc. I'd never get this level of comfort in an actual office.
As well as the physical space issues, there is the psychological aspect too. I spend 5 days a week in the house all day by myself. I'm a contractor so making office friendships isn't something that motivates me (doesn't mean I hate everyone, just some people :D). I'm fine with that. I have a couple of friends I've known for many decades and that's enough for me. I can also get work done no problem and still put the washing on, nip out for groceries etc.
I know of colleagues that crave the human interaction... which is fine. I don't. I get enough from my family and the daily (and mostly pointless) video calls.
However, if I had to work from a laptop at my dining room table, It'd suck hard!
THIS. 100%
"...as high levels of Covid infections persist 18 months into the pandemic," seems to be a pretty key point that no one seems to be noting.
Instead of trying to get people back in the office, why not try harder to figure out how to better manage a remote workforce?
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> CEOs are at their wits' end to figure out how to get their employees back to the office as high levels of Covid infections persist 18 months into the pandemic.
Gee, i wonder why!
My employer asked in a survey what would make you feel OK to return to the office and my reply was "3 months of <5/100k cases in the metro area, 80%+ vaccination rate in the metro area, and vaccinations approved for children", all of which are both true answers and externalities they cannot control at all.
Gee, i wonder why!
My employer asked in a survey what would make you feel OK to return to the office and my reply was "3 months of <5/100k cases in the metro area, 80%+ vaccination rate in the metro area, and vaccinations approved for children", all of which are both true answers and externalities they cannot control at all.
Putting aside the topic of remote work. The main problem here, is that the USA, like most of the rest of the world, is applying a band-aid over a gaping wound in hopes of stopping the bleeding.
Every single time we had a lockdown, or increase in restrictions, we then had the opposite happen shortly after. Restrictions were lifted arbitrarily or too soon, as well as push-back from a small minority who is either tired of how the government is/was handling the situation, in a dire living situation or being bombarded with misinformation and spreading it.
Why is it that in a country as developed and with the education level of the USA, we have to incentivize people to take a drug that could save them, either from death, a horrible experience or from chronic ailments after said experience in some cases.
We quite literally had states offering prize money, beer, food and other things so that people would get vaccinated. The fact that these programs had to exist in the first place is ludicrous. The fact that so many people who identify as anti-vaxxers, anti-maskers are so open about it and proudly and loudly scream it at others is in itself insane.
For the first wave of COVID, the world handled it as best as it could, for how prepared it was (not very). But after so many waves of COVID spread, we're still handling it poorly, with so many wrong or unclear voices that it is staggering.
I'm sorry for rambling on, but this topic is exhausting and a never ending cycle of doing without committing to it, which keeps us in the cycle.
Every single time we had a lockdown, or increase in restrictions, we then had the opposite happen shortly after. Restrictions were lifted arbitrarily or too soon, as well as push-back from a small minority who is either tired of how the government is/was handling the situation, in a dire living situation or being bombarded with misinformation and spreading it.
Why is it that in a country as developed and with the education level of the USA, we have to incentivize people to take a drug that could save them, either from death, a horrible experience or from chronic ailments after said experience in some cases.
We quite literally had states offering prize money, beer, food and other things so that people would get vaccinated. The fact that these programs had to exist in the first place is ludicrous. The fact that so many people who identify as anti-vaxxers, anti-maskers are so open about it and proudly and loudly scream it at others is in itself insane.
For the first wave of COVID, the world handled it as best as it could, for how prepared it was (not very). But after so many waves of COVID spread, we're still handling it poorly, with so many wrong or unclear voices that it is staggering.
I'm sorry for rambling on, but this topic is exhausting and a never ending cycle of doing without committing to it, which keeps us in the cycle.
> I'm sorry for rambling on,
If you have to qualify your text with this, you should reconsider posting it and perhaps revise the wording or message.
If you have to qualify your text with this, you should reconsider posting it and perhaps revise the wording or message.
Or not. This often applies to sayings like "no offense but, <offense>".
I can easily find room for "I'm sorry for rambling on, ..." to account for people not feeling like there's room for their input. Social anxiety is a thing.
I can easily find room for "I'm sorry for rambling on, ..." to account for people not feeling like there's room for their input. Social anxiety is a thing.
It's OK to politely acknowledge the potential negative sides of any given choice you make. Nothing is absolute or binary. Everything has pros and cons.
jcadam(2)
Nobody is talking about the challenges WFH brings for small employers since we are all so fascinated with the positives so far. As a small business owner, you want to hire an employee out of state ? Just 1 employee on W2 ? Great. Go setup and register your company in that state and deal with crazy paperwork even for 1 employee. Oh you want to offer them health insurance ? Hmm, your insurance company doesn't operate well in that state. Now what ? Ok you try to come up with separate reimbursement/comp for that employee. Oh, your state offers Sick leave by law but then what do you do for employee not in that state ? Lot of hurdles.
Yes, there are services like remote.com etc these days but they don't really help you build your own organic team in house. You cannot 1099 everyone especially if they are only working for you as a full time employee (IRS won't like that). You can get away hiring foreign contractors but until there is real legislation to hire people anywhere easily, this is a pain in the neck especially for smaller companies. Large companies should have no excuse.
I am all for remote (have some of our best employees remote) but as a business owner, it is a lot of hurdles legally to go through. Yes Gitlab does it and all but they have cash to spend and circumvent lot of BS regulations with employment and taxes. I want a federal law in the United States that allows you to hire anyone in any state without doing the "Register in my state" bullshit and all that nexus crap. We can then talk a big game.