Amazon Andy Jassy shouldn’t make RTO decisions in echo chamber of CEOs feelings(fortune.com)
fortune.com
Amazon Andy Jassy shouldn’t make RTO decisions in echo chamber of CEOs feelings
https://fortune.com/2023/09/05/amazon-andy-jassy-return-to-office-decisions-echo-chamber-ceo-feelings-work-gleb-tsipursky/
249 comments
I'd add that underlying all that / in addition to that is the fear that people aren't putting their jobs first. That's what drove all the "quiet quitting" bullshit.
The pandemic made people stop and take stock of their lives. A lot of people realized that they were putting work first and life is too fucking short to put everything else second to work.
The tech layoffs have further emphasized the futility of putting work first. You might have put your career first but your employer sure as shit wasn't putting you first. Why live far from the rest of your family in a high cost-of-living area to have your life dominated by work if BigCorp is just going to throw you overboard at the first sign of a dip in profits? Not even a cut to save the business, just a cut to ensure that activist shareholders and top-line execs preserve obscene profits, bonuses, and salaries.
RTO is there to remind you that they control your life, right down to where you live. Be thankful to have a job or they'll take it away from you and your health insurance, too.
The pandemic made people stop and take stock of their lives. A lot of people realized that they were putting work first and life is too fucking short to put everything else second to work.
The tech layoffs have further emphasized the futility of putting work first. You might have put your career first but your employer sure as shit wasn't putting you first. Why live far from the rest of your family in a high cost-of-living area to have your life dominated by work if BigCorp is just going to throw you overboard at the first sign of a dip in profits? Not even a cut to save the business, just a cut to ensure that activist shareholders and top-line execs preserve obscene profits, bonuses, and salaries.
RTO is there to remind you that they control your life, right down to where you live. Be thankful to have a job or they'll take it away from you and your health insurance, too.
We laid off half of our employees, and the other half seem demoralized. We have no idea why so we're going to try making everyone come back to the office.
Also hey everyone we made record profits this year! Great job! Pay raises are on hold though due to economic uncertainty. Remember, we're a family!
Also hey everyone we made record profits this year! Great job! Pay raises are on hold though due to economic uncertainty. Remember, we're a family!
This is what's really getting under my skin. The messaging is not even hidden anymore.
It's right out in the open that many companies are making enormous profits and giving out astonishing executive bonuses, at the same time as freezing salaries and layoffs.
It's not adding up, and I'm kind of just waiting to see if more people are going to become as fed up with it as I am, or if we're all just too comfortable.
It's right out in the open that many companies are making enormous profits and giving out astonishing executive bonuses, at the same time as freezing salaries and layoffs.
It's not adding up, and I'm kind of just waiting to see if more people are going to become as fed up with it as I am, or if we're all just too comfortable.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2023/08/25/t-mobile-lay... (T-Mobile to lay off 5,000 people nationwide, after Sprint merger promised more jobs)
https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/t-mobile-anno... (T-Mobile US announces $19 bln shareholder return program)
https://apnews.com/article/amazon-layoffs-jobs-cuts-jassy-0e... (Amazon cuts 9,000 more jobs, bringing 2023 total to 27,000)
https://www.seattletimes.com/business/amazon/amazon-reports-... (A year after historic loss, Amazon posts $6.7 billion quarterly profit)
https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/t-mobile-anno... (T-Mobile US announces $19 bln shareholder return program)
https://apnews.com/article/amazon-layoffs-jobs-cuts-jassy-0e... (Amazon cuts 9,000 more jobs, bringing 2023 total to 27,000)
https://www.seattletimes.com/business/amazon/amazon-reports-... (A year after historic loss, Amazon posts $6.7 billion quarterly profit)
It's almost as if corporations only care about their shareholders and give zero shits about their employees.
I always thought this was obvious. That’s why we need regulation.
This is also why we need unions.
what regulations would you propose?
Take a look at worker and consumer protections in the EU and you'd be heading in the right direction. Or what we used to have. The minimum wage was original a living wage. Specifically it was designed so the worker was doing more than just surviving.
> worker and consumer protections in the EU and you'd be heading in the right direction
Youth unemployment rate in France was 17-18% in 2022. Even today, it is 16% - https://tradingeconomics.com/france/youth-unemployment-rate
Seems like existing workers are being protected at the cost of new entrants. Utterly predictable, since companies will be hesitant to set up shop in France because of onerous process of firing low performers.
Youth unemployment rate in France was 17-18% in 2022. Even today, it is 16% - https://tradingeconomics.com/france/youth-unemployment-rate
Seems like existing workers are being protected at the cost of new entrants. Utterly predictable, since companies will be hesitant to set up shop in France because of onerous process of firing low performers.
Doing away with at will employment would probably be a good start.
piva00(1)
> It's right out in the open that many companies are making enormous profits and giving out astonishing executive bonuses, at the same time as freezing salaries and layoffs.
I started my career at a large defense contractor. This was long ago, back when one had a mail cubby to receive memos and the link. I remember receiving one memo that stated: 1. The company didn't hit the metrics needed to trigger profit-sharing with the employees 2. The executive team had different metrics which were hit, so they'd get bonuses
It was a good life lesson for 22 year-old me.
I started my career at a large defense contractor. This was long ago, back when one had a mail cubby to receive memos and the link. I remember receiving one memo that stated: 1. The company didn't hit the metrics needed to trigger profit-sharing with the employees 2. The executive team had different metrics which were hit, so they'd get bonuses
It was a good life lesson for 22 year-old me.
Economic uncertainty has been a thing since I got in the industry in 2009. Just when do CEOs feel certain about the economy?
Greed at the CEO level is so widely distributed, none of them think they're responsible for inflation.
Maddening.
Maddening.
I think greed is an essential ingredient to become CEO in the first place. I simply cannot imagine a non-greedy non-sociopath becoming CEO of a big corp.
RTO is there to remind you that despite claims of talent shortages and after taking into account the fact that a substantial portion of the workforce is okay with returning to the office, for many companies the supply of talent is greater than the demand for talent.
Hilarious that companies were complaining about tech shortages while simultaneously having interview processes consisting of multiple rounds of absurd competitive programming questions that require months of preparation for and have nothing to do with the job. There was never a talent shortage, that's just a narrative companies pushed to increase labor supply, lobby for more visas, and justify outsourcing
A lot of this is because of WFM, 5 years ago when you applied for a job you had to compete with all the bozos within 50 miles looking for a job but now you have to compete with all the bozos in the country looking for a job. five years ago they'd get 20 CVs for a job and now they are getting 1000. Even if they job market is tighter companies don't notice because they are getting 50X the number of resumes for a job. Further they can hire some guy in South Dakota who will happily work for half of what some guy in Manhattan will work for. In short WFH has fucked things up, it's a lot like how online dating hasn't helped people find love people are lonelier than ever even though they have a much larger selection. We work better in person and in smaller groups.
This isn't a new thing that just started in the last few years. The tech job interview process five years already had all of the bad things that it does today. Cracking the Coding Interview was published in 2008.
I find it ridiculous that at a time when US workers had all the power after decades of no
power at all (the last couple of years), they prioritized WFH benefits which only serve to weaken any individual worker’s standing in the market.
If there is no advantage to your job being done while being physically collocated within the US, there is no advantage to your job being done by someone in the US.
What 90% of the people commenting here don’t seem to realize is that their argument for WFH implicitly states that the fact that they were being paid more than their counterparts in cheaper locales means they were being overpaid. And yeah, some of the LCOL folks are going Amen to that, except even the lowest cost of living employees is a few times more expensive than counterparts in Asia, South America, Eastern Europe and even Western Europe.
Jobs are more likely to move from LCOL and HCOL US locations to cheaper places abroad than from HCOL to LCOL US locations because the HCOL/LCOL US cost multiple is somewhere at 1.25 to 1.5 at most, whereas the US LCOL/place abroad cost multiple is closer to 2-4x.
If there is no advantage to your job being done while being physically collocated within the US, there is no advantage to your job being done by someone in the US.
What 90% of the people commenting here don’t seem to realize is that their argument for WFH implicitly states that the fact that they were being paid more than their counterparts in cheaper locales means they were being overpaid. And yeah, some of the LCOL folks are going Amen to that, except even the lowest cost of living employees is a few times more expensive than counterparts in Asia, South America, Eastern Europe and even Western Europe.
Jobs are more likely to move from LCOL and HCOL US locations to cheaper places abroad than from HCOL to LCOL US locations because the HCOL/LCOL US cost multiple is somewhere at 1.25 to 1.5 at most, whereas the US LCOL/place abroad cost multiple is closer to 2-4x.
"If there is no advantage to your job being done while being physically collocated within the US, there is no advantage to your job being done by someone in the US."
Time zone still makes a difference, there are very few jobs that can be completely or largely asynchronous. Then, the assumptions are that talent is everywhere, which is true if we ignore the numbers but focus only on the existence of talent (i.e., 1 talented person is enough), and that the work culture is somewhat irrelevant, i.e., what matters is throwing warm bodies, cannon fodder if you will, at the problem.
Now, anyone who has dealt with outsourced in-house IT services to India or other cheaper countries in terms of wages has quickly recognized that companies have traded paying more and having problems solved for paying less and having the problems persist. I am speaking generally and without any trace of discrimination in my thinking, I am just observing.
If you allow me an analogy, for many decades African soccer teams have been on the verge of "exploding" on the international stage, perhaps winning the World Cup (think of the Nigerian team in 1994) because of their undeniable raw talent. But we are still here, 30 years later, hoping for that victory, with the best results achieved by a Moroccan team full of players raised professionally elsewhere.
Culture is important, and not easy to transmit or acquire, especially when physically elsewhere. If I had stayed in my home country and worked remotely for a U.S. company, I would have done a much poorer job at work, due to my lack of knowledge of U.S. work culture and "proper" ways of working.
Time zone still makes a difference, there are very few jobs that can be completely or largely asynchronous. Then, the assumptions are that talent is everywhere, which is true if we ignore the numbers but focus only on the existence of talent (i.e., 1 talented person is enough), and that the work culture is somewhat irrelevant, i.e., what matters is throwing warm bodies, cannon fodder if you will, at the problem.
Now, anyone who has dealt with outsourced in-house IT services to India or other cheaper countries in terms of wages has quickly recognized that companies have traded paying more and having problems solved for paying less and having the problems persist. I am speaking generally and without any trace of discrimination in my thinking, I am just observing.
If you allow me an analogy, for many decades African soccer teams have been on the verge of "exploding" on the international stage, perhaps winning the World Cup (think of the Nigerian team in 1994) because of their undeniable raw talent. But we are still here, 30 years later, hoping for that victory, with the best results achieved by a Moroccan team full of players raised professionally elsewhere.
Culture is important, and not easy to transmit or acquire, especially when physically elsewhere. If I had stayed in my home country and worked remotely for a U.S. company, I would have done a much poorer job at work, due to my lack of knowledge of U.S. work culture and "proper" ways of working.
Canada has most of the cultural and timezone compatibility and yet their wages are <40% of the SF wages. No wonder bulk of the new hiring in our team has been in Canada after doing two rounds of layoffs in the US.
Add to that, Canada has been inviting talented migrants in bulk (good for Canada and those migrants!) and that is a recipe for disaster for high tech wages in the US. Again, asking for remote work is just digging your own graveyard.
Add to that, Canada has been inviting talented migrants in bulk (good for Canada and those migrants!) and that is a recipe for disaster for high tech wages in the US. Again, asking for remote work is just digging your own graveyard.
Also there’s a massive continent called South America in the same time zone. Further, there’s also large swathes of Central America.
But this claim that time zone matters isn’t even true in the way the GP thinks. If time zone does indeed matter, it strengthens the case to move the entire team wholesale to cheaper locales than keep anyone hired in the US.
But this claim that time zone matters isn’t even true in the way the GP thinks. If time zone does indeed matter, it strengthens the case to move the entire team wholesale to cheaper locales than keep anyone hired in the US.
This is all very theoretical in nature. In fact, I don't know of any U.S.-based company who successfully outsourced their whole operations to South America, India, or, as the comment above the one I am responding to proposed, Canada.
Time zone is one reason. The other is about work culture, ways of culture, schools, the academic world, the media, the circle of friends that often overlaps with the circle of professional acquaintances, the expectations.
Time zone is one reason. The other is about work culture, ways of culture, schools, the academic world, the media, the circle of friends that often overlaps with the circle of professional acquaintances, the expectations.
A big chunk of our engineering and product headcount has moved to Canada. Looking at our engineering org, Canada has disproportionate number of employees compared to the US.
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> Culture is important, and not easy to transmit or acquire, especially when physically elsewhere. If I had stayed in my home country and worked remotely for a U.S. company, I would have done a much poorer job at work, due to my lack of knowledge of U.S. work culture and "proper" ways of working.
You’re literally making my argument for me. Like you say, culture is important and not easy to transmit online. Americans working remote will have no company culture whereas the Europeans and Asians (who have returned to office in much larger numbers) will actually build company and working culture and will start outperforming their U.S. counterparts. As a bonus, they won’t even cost as much.
Again, one does not need to argue that remote work is superior or inferior than in office work to see that pushing to eliminate in office work in the short period of time American workers had power in decades, was eliminating the only advantage they had that justified their higher earnings. Whether remote work is superior or not, pushing for it is a great example of turkeys voting for Christmas.
You’re literally making my argument for me. Like you say, culture is important and not easy to transmit online. Americans working remote will have no company culture whereas the Europeans and Asians (who have returned to office in much larger numbers) will actually build company and working culture and will start outperforming their U.S. counterparts. As a bonus, they won’t even cost as much.
Again, one does not need to argue that remote work is superior or inferior than in office work to see that pushing to eliminate in office work in the short period of time American workers had power in decades, was eliminating the only advantage they had that justified their higher earnings. Whether remote work is superior or not, pushing for it is a great example of turkeys voting for Christmas.
I’ve worked remotely for almost a decade and for the last 2 years, I worked at a fully remote company. The company had just as much “company culture” as the precious primarily in person companies I’ve worked at.
And from our survey results, our completely US based teams reported higher team cohesion (and demonstrated better performance) than teams with a mix of nationalities.
Unless a company is willing to completely relocate offshore, there is always going to be an advantage for US based developers. And as long as a company is targeting primarily US consumers, their is an advantage to being located here.
And from our survey results, our completely US based teams reported higher team cohesion (and demonstrated better performance) than teams with a mix of nationalities.
Unless a company is willing to completely relocate offshore, there is always going to be an advantage for US based developers. And as long as a company is targeting primarily US consumers, their is an advantage to being located here.
If you’re argument is that workplace culture distinguishes US workers and foreign workers, wouldn’t you be pushing for some in office presence?
Either:
a) workplace culture is hard to transmit online, in which case you’d need in-office for new workers
b) workplace culture can be transmitted online, in which case foreign workers can be integrated well into the company (even if this process takes decades)
Either:
a) workplace culture is hard to transmit online, in which case you’d need in-office for new workers
b) workplace culture can be transmitted online, in which case foreign workers can be integrated well into the company (even if this process takes decades)
c) the workplace culture is not transmitted just at work, or in the specific company one works for. It is a matter of expectations, the circle of friends overlapping with the circle of professional acquaintances, of media consumed, of etiquette.
Working remotely does not mean being in a cave since birth and communicate with a radio with your manager and co-workers.
There are some cultures, and I come from one of them, who are different, and let's limit ourselves to work culture informed by the culture of the country at large, from the U.S. work culture. For instance, Indian culture is very hierarchical, more title-oriented than the U.S. work culture, and largely people don't like--or straight-up refuse--to admit they don't know something.
Working remotely does not mean being in a cave since birth and communicate with a radio with your manager and co-workers.
There are some cultures, and I come from one of them, who are different, and let's limit ourselves to work culture informed by the culture of the country at large, from the U.S. work culture. For instance, Indian culture is very hierarchical, more title-oriented than the U.S. work culture, and largely people don't like--or straight-up refuse--to admit they don't know something.
Honestly all of the stuff you listed comes from work (except consumed media). It might not be from a specific workplace, but from a career at similar workplaces, but with the same idea more or less.
I kinda disagree.
For example, expectations may come from work, but not from your work, but from the work of others not at similar workplaces (the "work culture" more in general). One of the (mildly) "shocking" cultural moments I experienced when I first came to the U.S. more than a decade ago was that shops were mostly open at all times during the day and on Sundays (and some supermarkets 24/7, which was very new to me).
Did it inform me, rather brutally, about the way people in the United States view work? Yes. If I had had a conversation about the same work culture living all my life in Spain, would I have been informed in the same way? No.
I met some of my professional acquaintances in tech at the gym, not at work. It is much harder to get the same exposure in Mendoza, Argentina (first name that came to my mind, I am looking for wine).
For example, expectations may come from work, but not from your work, but from the work of others not at similar workplaces (the "work culture" more in general). One of the (mildly) "shocking" cultural moments I experienced when I first came to the U.S. more than a decade ago was that shops were mostly open at all times during the day and on Sundays (and some supermarkets 24/7, which was very new to me).
Did it inform me, rather brutally, about the way people in the United States view work? Yes. If I had had a conversation about the same work culture living all my life in Spain, would I have been informed in the same way? No.
I met some of my professional acquaintances in tech at the gym, not at work. It is much harder to get the same exposure in Mendoza, Argentina (first name that came to my mind, I am looking for wine).
Amen to that. I have written about this a few times before. US workers clamoring for WFH/remote are thinking only in the short-term. If jobs can be shipped to South Dakota, they can be shipped to Colombia or Mexico as well.
WFH either works or it doesn’t. If it works, it will happen. Outsourcing either works or it doesn’t. Short of regulation, if it works, it will happen.
Workers pushing for work from home isn’t going to change this. If in office is a competitive advantage, companies will pay more for in office employees. If it’s not a competitive advantage, no amount of workers not pushing for WFH will cause companies to pay for offices.
Workers pushing for work from home isn’t going to change this. If in office is a competitive advantage, companies will pay more for in office employees. If it’s not a competitive advantage, no amount of workers not pushing for WFH will cause companies to pay for offices.
Clearly corporate leaders believe that in-office is a competitive advantage. That’s why they are pushing RTO, conspiracy theories aside.
If they are instead forced to offer universal wfh as a concession to the labour market, then yes, outsourcing might be more attractive.
If they are instead forced to offer universal wfh as a concession to the labour market, then yes, outsourcing might be more attractive.
Who is forcing them to offer universal WFH? Are you saying people pushing for WFH are going to be able to force WFH on every employee and every company?
I’m not saying people who are pushing for WFH will be successful, I’m speaking of a hypothetical situation.
No one is pushing for universal work from home, so there’s nothing to succeed at. I’ve never heard anyone say that they think no one should be allowed to work from an office.
You can logically continue that argument all the way to its conclusion. If Jobs can be shipped to Mexico, why not the entire corporation? If the only thing that matters is cost, clearly LCOL countries should be leading the world in tech innovation. But they don’t.
> why not the entire corporation?
Because a corporation needs officers and senior management. Those people are typically in the owner class who benefit from cheap labor. Owner class still prefers to live in rich urban metros.
Because a corporation needs officers and senior management. Those people are typically in the owner class who benefit from cheap labor. Owner class still prefers to live in rich urban metros.
I haven’t noticed hiring has gotten any worse since 2020. If anything I think 2020 was the peak of multiple rounds of ridiculous competitive programming challenges. The last few interviews I’ve had didn’t have any leet code style problems.
Those companies should be celebrated.
You're not kidding. Seeing 500 applicants for a local job with remote options. There aren't 500 people here that have the skills.
There would be a labor shortage if employees wouldn’t work themselves to death/refuse to be treated that way.
It is more convenient to attempt to unionize in person I suppose.
Unionization is more likely to occur when the variance of workers' wages (in the technology sector, this is total compensation) is low. In tech, the variance of workers' wages is high.
Only need a simple majority. By definition, the majority isn't high earning in a cohort. Agree we're just arguing over likelihood, won't know how serious people are until they're tired of being ground down by people like Jassy.
> By definition, the majority isn't high earning in a cohort
I don't think that's true here. A cohort doesn't have to have a particular distribution, and even if it does in this case, that doesn't mean the cohort isn't high earning relative to the rest of the population.
I don't think that's true here. A cohort doesn't have to have a particular distribution, and even if it does in this case, that doesn't mean the cohort isn't high earning relative to the rest of the population.
Most workers in the tech sector are young, and young people earning below-median salaries are salivating at the idea of moving, at some point in the near future, due to their skills, market conditions, luck or wishful thinking, into the above-median bracket.
Add to that the fact that the job market for tech workers is extremely fluid, and I don't think unionization is going to happen anytime soon.
Add to that the fact that the job market for tech workers is extremely fluid, and I don't think unionization is going to happen anytime soon.
> I'd add that underlying all that / in addition to that is the fear that people aren't putting their jobs first.
I'm a terrible manager. I openly admit that "real life" comes first, and constantly remind people on my team that it should for them, too. Only you know what you want and need, and the company will do what's best for itself, so it's only fair that you do the same for yourself.
I'm a terrible manager. I openly admit that "real life" comes first, and constantly remind people on my team that it should for them, too. Only you know what you want and need, and the company will do what's best for itself, so it's only fair that you do the same for yourself.
Imho, all the buzz around "quiet quitting" and stupid tiktok videos bragging about how little work one does in a day have contributed somewhat to the current RTO backlash. Workers were rubbing it in. Time to show minions their place! /s
Been quiet quitting since before it was a name
I work at Amazon, so I have that bias, but I'm very very skeptical of that line of argument. Remote work has the potential to save companies truly enormous sums of money, both on real estate, and on reduced salaries. For many companies, being able to freely hire anywhere would absolutely reduce mean compensation, instead of paying massive tech hub salary premiums. The interests of city and state governments, real estate companies, hardly come into it.
I find it very easy to believe the straight-forward motive given; that leaders are concerned by the impacts of remote work on collaboration, innovation, mentorship and other kinds of productivity that come through group work. That's been my experience too.
At the same time, I think remote work can be very successful, maybe even more effective than traditional office work, but it almost certainly takes skills and practices that are attuned to that way of working. It's not unreasonable to believe that an entire workforce wouldn't simply adapt to that in the long term in just a 3 year time frame driven by a pandemic.
I find it very easy to believe the straight-forward motive given; that leaders are concerned by the impacts of remote work on collaboration, innovation, mentorship and other kinds of productivity that come through group work. That's been my experience too.
At the same time, I think remote work can be very successful, maybe even more effective than traditional office work, but it almost certainly takes skills and practices that are attuned to that way of working. It's not unreasonable to believe that an entire workforce wouldn't simply adapt to that in the long term in just a 3 year time frame driven by a pandemic.
As a follow faang+er I totally understand the need for rto. Im perfectly fine with 3 days rto like my company and many others adopted which is perfect medium for everyone. In my team we get 3 days intense meetings done from Tuesday to Thursday. The devs have at least 2 days alone times for shipping the code. The company sold the buildings and the remaining building utilization is very high therefore the cost saving is also there. Everyone is happy in the end.
The question is what's the reason to increase from 3 days to 5 days? My guess is that unlike other tech companies, Amazon has high offline presence especially with a global logistic network. They are pressured by the local governments and other parties that if they don't mandate 5 days rto to prop up the cities, they are gonna lose many benefits or deals. So it's probably cheaper for Amazon choose 5 days rto instead.
The question is what's the reason to increase from 3 days to 5 days? My guess is that unlike other tech companies, Amazon has high offline presence especially with a global logistic network. They are pressured by the local governments and other parties that if they don't mandate 5 days rto to prop up the cities, they are gonna lose many benefits or deals. So it's probably cheaper for Amazon choose 5 days rto instead.
> Im perfectly fine with 3 days rto like my company and many others adopted which is perfect medium for everyone.
It's not the perfect medium because it requires living in some of the most expensive real estate markets on the planet. How much does a house for a family of four cost by your office?
It's not the perfect medium because it requires living in some of the most expensive real estate markets on the planet. How much does a house for a family of four cost by your office?
3-days per week seems to fall into the category of a fairly awful daily commute is... still awful. I'd fairly willingly do a day or sometimes two of a two-hour commute each way into my city office (which I sometimes go into for customers) but not more often than that.
I wouldn't commute 2 hours to work, even once a month. Too much risk to my personal safety. There's no way I'm driving on a highway with semi-trucks just to do some meetings.
So you live in the city already and don't need to drive on the highway to your office? Or? You don't otherwise drive on the highway to go any place?
I actually don't need to drive into the city for a day event but it still takes me 2 hours to take the train and subway.
I actually don't need to drive into the city for a day event but it still takes me 2 hours to take the train and subway.
I work from home and would never work in an office even with a "normal" commute. Two hours on a regular basis is something else though, I think there's definitely an added risk to a long distance commute that doesn't get talked about enough.
I do work from home but I also go into an office to meet with customers and I otherwise drive on highways on a regular basis. I'm an hour drive into the nearest major city to see a play. If I commuted into my nominal office a few days a week I'm pretty sure my overall risk wouldn't be much increased.
2 days would definitely be better for the devs. That's how it works for lots of us even before mandate. So the significant change for lots of the ppl was from 2 days to 3 days ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. That's the cost of staying in the company I guess
It does feel as if there's a break point for me between 2 days and 3 days where a lousy commute is tolerable vs. one that's not. But there's also a big what you're used to thing going on.
I understand why 3 days is needed for certain positions. Even for ICs there are senior techleads who have less coding requirement but more design and pm requirements and they need to juggle projects with multiple groups and the same time. For them frequent communication with large groups of people is probably more efficient when it's done in person
Though at larger companies those people are probably pretty scattered around anyway. Not a single person on my (non-development) team is within hundreds of miles of each other.
I was going to say, what about those of us working for globally distributed companies? We should go to an office so we can then use a conference room to Zoom with some people in another office? I don’t see how the office magically creates better collaboration, actually it’s worse.
What about people that want to live in HCOL areas and work a few days a week with other talented engineers? Why should their wants not be considered?
When you're remote, you can work wherever you want including HCOL locations. You'll also be able to work with better engineers since you'll be pulling from the global talent pool and not just that within commuting distance of some office.
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What you are requesting is the fully remote company, that's a totally different story. I don't see which faang company is transitioning into that. With the faang pay you can choose to stay in sf, or move to other offices, or going remote, or leave for fully remote companies.
The policy is that Remote workers are still remote. Only non remote workers are required return to office.
The policy is that Remote workers are still remote. Only non remote workers are required return to office.
> What you are requesting is the fully remote company
RTO is a new policy, they could simply have continued to allow employees to work from home.
RTO is a new policy, they could simply have continued to allow employees to work from home.
Yes. As I said in my previous post, remote workers are not required to rto. RTO only applies to non remote workers. Actually remote visits are limited because the offices are kinda full now.
Or are you talking about let everyone going remote? That's transitioning into a fully remote company which is not happening
Or are you talking about let everyone going remote? That's transitioning into a fully remote company which is not happening
> Or you talking about let everyone going remote? That's transitioning into a fully remote company which is not happening
This was the state of things before the RTO mandates. The whole company was remote until they started demanding people come in 3 days a week.
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/09/07/andy-jassy-says-he-wont-forc...
This was the state of things before the RTO mandates. The whole company was remote until they started demanding people come in 3 days a week.
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/09/07/andy-jassy-says-he-wont-forc...
Remote work from pandemic period is a totally different story. The companies are forced to let people to work remotely because of the covid, not they really want to go fully remote.
My original post was about typical 3 days(hybrid) vs Amazon's 5 days(fully onsite). My stand is that hybrid is fine for certain people and positions if the people think that it's worth it. If you don't like it, that's fine. I never said you have to take non remote positions. I was only commenting on the Amazon's fully onsite issue anyway
My original post was about typical 3 days(hybrid) vs Amazon's 5 days(fully onsite). My stand is that hybrid is fine for certain people and positions if the people think that it's worth it. If you don't like it, that's fine. I never said you have to take non remote positions. I was only commenting on the Amazon's fully onsite issue anyway
> Remote work from pandemic period is a totally different story. The companies are forced to let people to work remotely because of the covid, not they really want to go fully remote.
Amazon's stock hit an all time high during this period. They chose to take that arrangement and modify it, now they have worker discontent (and a lower valuation).
Amazon's stock hit an all time high during this period. They chose to take that arrangement and modify it, now they have worker discontent (and a lower valuation).
Citation needed on Amazon's stock price and WFH setup. I'd argue it was more because of crazy levels of money printing. As soon as stimmies dried up and the Fed started hiking interest rates, stocks dropped while we were still WFH.
The entire stock market hit an all-time high during this period. Because of $3 trillion from quantitative easing.
>It's not the perfect medium because it requires living in some of the most expensive real estate markets on the planet.
This applies to the entire United States if everything that could were to go fully remote. Why hire someone for 6 figures in <a US state> when you could hire someone in Brazil to do it for 40% of the salary?
This applies to the entire United States if everything that could were to go fully remote. Why hire someone for 6 figures in <a US state> when you could hire someone in Brazil to do it for 40% of the salary?
Because they have tried it and failed. There was this whole massive push for outsourcing to India in the 90s and 00s. Customers hated it, communication suffered, and more problems were created than solved. It’s why there has been a massive on-shoring of things like call centers to LCOL parts of the US.
What medium-large company didn't already have teams in low cost of living countries before the pandemic?
And they continued to pay their US based employees more (including employees relocating from cheaper locales) because CEOs believed (whether rightly or wrongly is irrelevant) that there was a significant advantage to having them physically collocated with their teams in the US.
Essentially, US workers have spent the last 2 years screaming at CEOs that no, they’re idiots, there is absolutely no benefit to physically collocating employees in the US and they should not have paid them anymore.
Turkeys voting for Christmas.
Essentially, US workers have spent the last 2 years screaming at CEOs that no, they’re idiots, there is absolutely no benefit to physically collocating employees in the US and they should not have paid them anymore.
Turkeys voting for Christmas.
You enjoy your 3d/wk RTO, but please don't claim it's a perfect balance. To me more than 1 day a month is unacceptable at this point. Why would I want to go into downtown Seattle to do exactly what I could have done from my house deep out in the sticks of Kitsap County where rent is significantly lower for the space and it's nearly dead silent and - most importantly - I'm largely left tf alone? The only reason is social bonding with coworkers, so a day a month or so for that purpose seems sane, and worth the ferry ride over. More than that is incompetent management trying to own and control me and/or being ineffective at managing distributed/asynchronous teams, barring a few specific industries that require on-site development for some reason or another (embedded on highly-specialized hardware, perhaps).
> incompetent management trying to own and control me and/or being ineffective at managing distributed/asynchronous teams,
We are looking at the same thing but through different lenses. It is true that most of the current management layers are inept at managing remote workforce effectively. But they are capable of managing an in-office workforce - that's how they got promoted in their positions in the first place (mostly).
Guess what is easier decision for the decision makers - change their own skillset and habits, or force everyone back to office?
We are looking at the same thing but through different lenses. It is true that most of the current management layers are inept at managing remote workforce effectively. But they are capable of managing an in-office workforce - that's how they got promoted in their positions in the first place (mostly).
Guess what is easier decision for the decision makers - change their own skillset and habits, or force everyone back to office?
So let's say they go full remote for jobs that allow it - why should they hire you, then? Why not hire someone in Vancouver for 80% of your salary, or Mexico for 60%, or Brazil for 40%?
All the reasons companies already don't successfully do that at the scale the RTO fear mongers claim they will: work culture, language barriers, various workplace and taxation laws that are/aren't in their favor, and frankly, experience and expertise. I bring value to a business that's worth paying American wages for, and so do so many folks I've worked with. This isn't to say there's not excellent engineers in other countries - there absolutely are. But (1) the tech industry has been centered on the US for so long that a lot of the top talent in this industry is concentrated here, and (2) the folks in other countries who bring the expertise and experience a senior or staff or beyond engineer in the US does aren't that much cheaper, because they know companies can and will pay high rates for the right talent.
Funny you mention Vancouver, which I used to live in and, talking to tech folks there, it was routinely called the "H1B holding pen" at the time - the place tech companies would hire folks and bring them to work at US wages while awaiting visa paperwork to head down to, say, Redmond or San Francisco. And BC famously has a huge brain drain to WA and CA on account of - you guessed it - salaries, and those folks often never went back to Canada. Back to: the talent concentrated here and demands a certain wage.
Funny you mention Vancouver, which I used to live in and, talking to tech folks there, it was routinely called the "H1B holding pen" at the time - the place tech companies would hire folks and bring them to work at US wages while awaiting visa paperwork to head down to, say, Redmond or San Francisco. And BC famously has a huge brain drain to WA and CA on account of - you guessed it - salaries, and those folks often never went back to Canada. Back to: the talent concentrated here and demands a certain wage.
Surprise, companies have been outsourcing for decades and not slowing down, and WFH or not does not change any of that. My company's current headcounts are almost only in India, yet they are asking people to come in 3 days a week.
Right - and this resistance against RTO from a basis “companies are doing it just because of sunk costs” has a logical conclusion companies should increase outsourcing further.
If you all are in the office for the same three days a week (Tu-Th) then you aren't saving anything on real estate costs- you still need to have desks for everyone in the company at the same time. The only way you save on real estate costs is allowing flexibility on which days you come in, such that some people are in Mon-Wed and some are in MWF and some are in TuThFri etc. Then you can share desks and save money on real estate, because five people can share three desks. But then every meeting will still have people working from home that day, and so you will be in the office but on Zoom to your regular coworkers.
So the two goals are incompatible: saving costs on real estate necessarily means spreading people's WFH days out such that no more than 60% of the company is in the office on any given day, but then you don't really get the 'easy to talk to people, have meetings and build culture' effects that RTO is supposed to kick off.
So the two goals are incompatible: saving costs on real estate necessarily means spreading people's WFH days out such that no more than 60% of the company is in the office on any given day, but then you don't really get the 'easy to talk to people, have meetings and build culture' effects that RTO is supposed to kick off.
Tu-Th is my team's arrangement. The only requirement is 3days rto so not all teams are the same
The cities give huge tax breaks to companies based on how many employees they have there. The tax incentives are why Amazon is moving workers from Seattle to Bellevue. Also, Amazon doesn't own most of its offices so the companies they rent from are pushing for it. It's a convoluted mess but there is money to be made from rto.
I think it is illuminating to consider how these debates would go very differently if employers where the ones whose budgets paid for all the hours/fuel spent in office commutes, and clearly showed that change with RTO.
There's no inherent reason commute costs are usually borne by employees, it's just tradition--and perhaps what is/isn't an appealing alternate-compensation expense under tax-code.
There's no inherent reason commute costs are usually borne by employees, it's just tradition--and perhaps what is/isn't an appealing alternate-compensation expense under tax-code.
Think about this one for a minute - if companies paid for this type of stuff, they would expect to have a say on exactly where you live. Not "you need to be within driving distance of the office" but more like "you need to rent next door to the office". Yes, there are very good reasons the cost of commuting is left in employee hands to decide.
That seems a bit slippery-slope, compare: "Think about this one for a minute - if companies paid for health insurance, they would expect to have a say in exactly what you eat..."
Companies are already indirectly paying via increased wages due to a smaller supply of possible hires, the difference is that it's harder for them to see and agree when an office+commute is inefficient. (Or at least, inefficient when ignoring hard-to-measure things like executive prestige or investor-relations or local tax breaks.)
Companies are already indirectly paying via increased wages due to a smaller supply of possible hires, the difference is that it's harder for them to see and agree when an office+commute is inefficient. (Or at least, inefficient when ignoring hard-to-measure things like executive prestige or investor-relations or local tax breaks.)
Companies paying for health insurance is silly as well. We should get rid of it rather than compounding the problem with employer-provided commute. /shudders
They would not be providing the commute directly, it's simply an explicit part of the compensation package rather than an implicit one.
I’m pretty sure employers are paying a lot more for workers to be in office than for them to work from home. The commute would be a tiny fraction of the electricity office space and other costs they pay for workers to be in office.
Hmm, just to prime the pump with some quick napkin-math... If it's an average of 200 ft²/employee [0] and $45/ft²/month [1] that gives a cost $108k/employee/year.
In comparison, lets imagine someone already making $80k/yr, a 40-mile heavy-traffic roundtrip commute taking 2 hours (1.25x time) and adds $10 in daily gas... That's about +22.5k in costs.
So yes, in direct math it's probably not as big, but having a physical office probably satisfies other hard-to-quantify priorities of corporate executives, such as personal prestige, sense of control, and how things look to investors.
[0] https://blog.naiop.org/2018/05/top-trends-and-metrics-to-wat...
[1] https://www.commercialcafe.com/office-market-trends/us/wa/se...
In comparison, lets imagine someone already making $80k/yr, a 40-mile heavy-traffic roundtrip commute taking 2 hours (1.25x time) and adds $10 in daily gas... That's about +22.5k in costs.
So yes, in direct math it's probably not as big, but having a physical office probably satisfies other hard-to-quantify priorities of corporate executives, such as personal prestige, sense of control, and how things look to investors.
[0] https://blog.naiop.org/2018/05/top-trends-and-metrics-to-wat...
[1] https://www.commercialcafe.com/office-market-trends/us/wa/se...
This doesn't add up to me. The priorities of corporate executives are to please the board of directors. BoD priorities are to please shareholders/investors. Shareholders/investors are pleased by growth/profits. That is, the investors care not about "how things look" but instead how they actually are, as in quarterly reports, share price, etc.
If employees are happier and more efficient working from home, it satisfies the priorities of all the above parties. If RTO makes people unhappy and either less productive OR makes them not want to work for that employer, it goes against the incentives and priorities of all the above parties.
If employees are happier and more efficient working from home, it satisfies the priorities of all the above parties. If RTO makes people unhappy and either less productive OR makes them not want to work for that employer, it goes against the incentives and priorities of all the above parties.
> This doesn't add up to me.
I agree, I added a correction because I think it's off by a factor of 12 due to month-vs-year price quotes.
I agree, I added a correction because I think it's off by a factor of 12 due to month-vs-year price quotes.
CORRECTION: That figure from [1] doesn't actually specify the time period, but other sources [3] imply it is per year rather than per month. This means I overstated the cost of office-space by a factor of 12, and it should probably be more like $9k/employee/year.
That also means the office-rent cost is significantly less than if the employer began paying for employee commutes.
[3] https://www.squarefoot.com/leasopedia/dollars-cents-much-cos...
That also means the office-rent cost is significantly less than if the employer began paying for employee commutes.
[3] https://www.squarefoot.com/leasopedia/dollars-cents-much-cos...
That’s $45/sqft per year, not per month. A 20,000 sqft office tower floor does not generate $10.8M a year in rents.
All CRE listed as price per square foot are per year prices.
All CRE listed as price per square foot are per year prices.
>I think it is illuminating to consider how these debates would go very differently if employers where the ones whose budgets paid for all the hours/fuel spent in office commutes
A significant number of employers do allocate budget and incur expenses for employee commuter benefits. And unclaimed commuter benefits results in cost savings for the employer, I'm not really sure I understand the point being made here.
A significant number of employers do allocate budget and incur expenses for employee commuter benefits. And unclaimed commuter benefits results in cost savings for the employer, I'm not really sure I understand the point being made here.
[deleted]
> The only group not benefitting from RTO are the actual workers.
That depends on the worker’s goals. If your goal is to have work/life balance or “personal” productivity then, yeah, I empathize. But there is more investment I put back into my team when I’m in person. It’s not just my code output. I find it very hard to mentor young engineers remotely.
Also, if you are a stockholder, like many engineers, and if teams do in fact have more “synergy” (bleh) then it’s also good for the workers via stock based comp.
That depends on the worker’s goals. If your goal is to have work/life balance or “personal” productivity then, yeah, I empathize. But there is more investment I put back into my team when I’m in person. It’s not just my code output. I find it very hard to mentor young engineers remotely.
Also, if you are a stockholder, like many engineers, and if teams do in fact have more “synergy” (bleh) then it’s also good for the workers via stock based comp.
When I was young and learning my trade I had a group of older co-workers who decided they liked me enough to invite me to join their lunch group. It was a very informal mentorship, they showed me the ropes, provided guidance and generally made me better at my job. This was all because they knew me enough and liked me enough to put in the effort, they got little out of it other than enjoying watching another guy come up in our field. Now I'm a grey beard with less than a decade left and I'd like to return the favor but to whom? I don't work in an office and I have no relationship with most of my co-workers, I do my job and they do theirs. Management could force me to mentor one or more of the engineers but that probably wouldn't work out very well for anyone. There's no relationship with my co-workers anymore because we never see each other and while slack and zoom is great for a 20 something it just doesn't work for me and in the end I'm the one with the institutional knowledge that I won't be passing along to the loss of both the employee and the company.
> That depends on the worker’s goals.
If the worker's goals aren't pro-worker then the business certainly won't be. Your goal of training others is admirable, but that can be often be remote and won't stop them from getting rid of you the moment it is convenient.
If the worker's goals aren't pro-worker then the business certainly won't be. Your goal of training others is admirable, but that can be often be remote and won't stop them from getting rid of you the moment it is convenient.
I prefer working in person so from my PoV requiring RTO is pro-worker.
> ny/ca/ma type states don't want their white collar workers moving to low tax states and working from there
NY doesn’t care where you live, they’ll gladly tax you and aggressively pursue said taxes no matter if you get any benefit from those tax dollars or not.
NY doesn’t care where you live, they’ll gladly tax you and aggressively pursue said taxes no matter if you get any benefit from those tax dollars or not.
While it is a travesty that the Supreme Court declined to hear a challenge to the “convenience rule”, NY state only taxes income from work performed outside of NY state if the worker sometimes works within NY state and could have worked in NY state.
https://www.tax.ny.gov/pdf/memos/income/m06_5i.pdf
The premise is:
>If a nonresident employee . . .performs services for his employer both within and without New York State,
So if you never worked in NY state, or move away from NY state, then you are not liable for NY income taxes.
https://www.tax.ny.gov/pdf/memos/income/m06_5i.pdf
The premise is:
>If a nonresident employee . . .performs services for his employer both within and without New York State,
So if you never worked in NY state, or move away from NY state, then you are not liable for NY income taxes.
I've read through the NY state convenience rules. They are written so poorly that Albany, in theory, can tax someone who attends on-site meetings in NY for two days out of the year that otherwise works remotely from Fairbanks, Alaska, which is utterly ridiculous.
At some point I expect SCOTUS will slap that law down based on the Interstate Commerce Clause but the correct challenge has not reached the docket yet. But I also expect that almost everyone that might be affected by this has just worked around the NY state law by now.
But for those of you considering working remotely for a company based in New York state you should be aware of the convenience rules. Based on my reading of them I would recommend against working remotely or ensure that the company helps you comply with the convenience laws so you don't fall afoul of them.
At some point I expect SCOTUS will slap that law down based on the Interstate Commerce Clause but the correct challenge has not reached the docket yet. But I also expect that almost everyone that might be affected by this has just worked around the NY state law by now.
But for those of you considering working remotely for a company based in New York state you should be aware of the convenience rules. Based on my reading of them I would recommend against working remotely or ensure that the company helps you comply with the convenience laws so you don't fall afoul of them.
> They are written so poorly that Albany, in theory, can tax someone who attends on-site meetings in NY for two days out of the year that otherwise works remotely from Fairbanks, Alaska, which is utterly ridiculous.
Every state has the right to collect tax from income earned from work performed within the state’s boundaries. Sports players and performers often pay a ton of state income tax while only working in a state for 3 hours.
Are you suggesting that people who travel to work to NY owe NY income taxes on ALL of their income, even that which was earned outside of NY?
> At some point I expect SCOTUS will slap that law down based on the Interstate Commerce Clause but the correct challenge has not reached the docket yet.
I am not so sure about this. With the South Dakota Wayfair ruling, and the proliferation of “market based sourcing” rules for determining taxable revenue, even this conservative Supreme Court does not seem to be leaning towards canceling that. Right now, if you have a business in one state (including just you working by yourself as a 1099 contractor), and sell your services to a recipient in a state with market based sourcing rules, then you will owe business taxes to the state where the benefits of your work was received, even though you never stepped foot or even shipped anything physical to that state.
See this for example:
https://www.withum.com/resources/new-jersey-legislation-impl...
Every state has the right to collect tax from income earned from work performed within the state’s boundaries. Sports players and performers often pay a ton of state income tax while only working in a state for 3 hours.
Are you suggesting that people who travel to work to NY owe NY income taxes on ALL of their income, even that which was earned outside of NY?
> At some point I expect SCOTUS will slap that law down based on the Interstate Commerce Clause but the correct challenge has not reached the docket yet.
I am not so sure about this. With the South Dakota Wayfair ruling, and the proliferation of “market based sourcing” rules for determining taxable revenue, even this conservative Supreme Court does not seem to be leaning towards canceling that. Right now, if you have a business in one state (including just you working by yourself as a 1099 contractor), and sell your services to a recipient in a state with market based sourcing rules, then you will owe business taxes to the state where the benefits of your work was received, even though you never stepped foot or even shipped anything physical to that state.
See this for example:
https://www.withum.com/resources/new-jersey-legislation-impl...
I'm guessing you're just citing what you found in a Google search and have never actually dealt with NY taxes. In reality, NY state demands payment from you if you so much as checked your work email inside JFK while you were waiting for a connecting flight. I know literally dozens of people who can attest to this fact.
I did the best I could by linking to a document regarding the policy being discussed on New York’s state website. Not sure how I could do better unless I had experience litigating this very issue.
> In reality, NY state demands payment from you if you so much as checked your work email inside JFK while you were waiting for a connecting flight.
This qualifies as working within the state of NY, and hence makes you liable for paying taxes on the income (from that work only). I do find it egregious that NY state would go after a worker for checking work email in an airport, but that is a separate issue from what the person I replied to had erroneously insinuated, which is that NY taxes income from work performed outside of NY, even if you move away.
> In reality, NY state demands payment from you if you so much as checked your work email inside JFK while you were waiting for a connecting flight.
This qualifies as working within the state of NY, and hence makes you liable for paying taxes on the income (from that work only). I do find it egregious that NY state would go after a worker for checking work email in an airport, but that is a separate issue from what the person I replied to had erroneously insinuated, which is that NY taxes income from work performed outside of NY, even if you move away.
> So if you never worked in NY state, or move away from NY state, then you are not liable for NY income taxes.
Sorry, it’s not that simple. I’m not speaking about things “I’ve read”, I’m speaking from first hand experience including fighting this via attorneys. I (as well as others) have not stepped foot in the state of NY for work for an entire calendar year in the past, did not live in NY when hired nor have any even pseudo claim to residency, yet do to convenience of employer regulations, pay NY state income tax on all income from said employer.
Sorry, it’s not that simple. I’m not speaking about things “I’ve read”, I’m speaking from first hand experience including fighting this via attorneys. I (as well as others) have not stepped foot in the state of NY for work for an entire calendar year in the past, did not live in NY when hired nor have any even pseudo claim to residency, yet do to convenience of employer regulations, pay NY state income tax on all income from said employer.
That is wild. I do not see how that should survive a legal challenge (obviously it somehow has thus far if you are experiencing it), given the wording that NY state itself uses in their own tax law.
Especially if you live and work in a state with income tax, because the Supreme Court ruled that the state where you work has the right to tax your income and other states have to give you a tax credit for taxes paid to the other state.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comptroller_of_the_Treasury_of...
Does your employer show an employer ID on your W-2 for the state you work in?
Seems crazy to me that another state would allow New York to take its income tax from a person working in their state, and the federal courts to allow this to continue. Makes a mockery of the whole system.
Especially if you live and work in a state with income tax, because the Supreme Court ruled that the state where you work has the right to tax your income and other states have to give you a tax credit for taxes paid to the other state.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comptroller_of_the_Treasury_of...
Does your employer show an employer ID on your W-2 for the state you work in?
Seems crazy to me that another state would allow New York to take its income tax from a person working in their state, and the federal courts to allow this to continue. Makes a mockery of the whole system.
RTO is not some huge secret conspiracy.
Companies have long-term leases on their offices. Office space is the single most expensive line-item on most companies financials. They want to maximize the use of these very expensive assets, and having workers in the offices accomplishes this.
From a more practical perspective, working from home is great for more senior workers who are already established in their careers and know what they're doing, but it's hugely detrimental to the career development of younger workers, who largely learn from working alongside their older/more senior counterparts. Communicating over email, slack, zoom, etc., just isn't the same, and you can see this across pretty much every white collar domain--even programming. This is why companies have pretty much settled on hybrid schedules; it allows for the in-person collaboration while still allowing workers greater freedom in where they work.
And while you're complaining about "the workers" consider that essentially all blue-collar jobs have been on-site full-time even through the pandemic.
Companies have long-term leases on their offices. Office space is the single most expensive line-item on most companies financials. They want to maximize the use of these very expensive assets, and having workers in the offices accomplishes this.
From a more practical perspective, working from home is great for more senior workers who are already established in their careers and know what they're doing, but it's hugely detrimental to the career development of younger workers, who largely learn from working alongside their older/more senior counterparts. Communicating over email, slack, zoom, etc., just isn't the same, and you can see this across pretty much every white collar domain--even programming. This is why companies have pretty much settled on hybrid schedules; it allows for the in-person collaboration while still allowing workers greater freedom in where they work.
And while you're complaining about "the workers" consider that essentially all blue-collar jobs have been on-site full-time even through the pandemic.
> They want to maximize the use of these very expensive assets, and having workers in the offices accomplishes this.
This is the same rationale as finishing your dinner after you're full because you don't want to "waste it." The food is still wasted; it's just wasted on needlessly making you fatter. If you don't actually need the office space to make the company run, you're wasting the same amount of money whether you force someone to sit in it or not (except when you force them to sit in it, you're not only wasting the money but burning employee morale).
This is the same rationale as finishing your dinner after you're full because you don't want to "waste it." The food is still wasted; it's just wasted on needlessly making you fatter. If you don't actually need the office space to make the company run, you're wasting the same amount of money whether you force someone to sit in it or not (except when you force them to sit in it, you're not only wasting the money but burning employee morale).
Sunk cost only works under the assumption that in office work adds zero or negative value for the company. Clearly corporate leaders don’t believe that.
it's really the assumption that it adds zero or negative value or less than the employee morale is worth. I believe it adds value, but that value is very, very small.
> Office space is the single most expensive line-item on most companies financials
Is it? Not payroll? Expensive commercial real estate in the US rents for $80/sq ft/year (source: https://www.matchoffice.com/news/rental-rates-for-commercial...). Tech workers are generally factored in at using 250 sq ft (source: https://web.mit.edu/e-club/hadzima/how-much-does-an-employee...). So, $20k per year, per employee for rent in the most expensive cities in the country. How can that possibly be more expensive than payroll?
Is it? Not payroll? Expensive commercial real estate in the US rents for $80/sq ft/year (source: https://www.matchoffice.com/news/rental-rates-for-commercial...). Tech workers are generally factored in at using 250 sq ft (source: https://web.mit.edu/e-club/hadzima/how-much-does-an-employee...). So, $20k per year, per employee for rent in the most expensive cities in the country. How can that possibly be more expensive than payroll?
counterpoint: all my young engineers who started during the pandemic vastly prefer working from home most of the time with 1-2 days a week in the office. Some want remote only.
Your counterpoint was just my point about RTO actually being a transition to a hybrid schedule rather than a fulltime return to office 5 days a week...
Working remote-only is doable for a senior-level employee with an established career, but it will kill a younger employee's career. A lot of things happen in person that can't be replicated through emails, slack, etc.
Working remote-only is doable for a senior-level employee with an established career, but it will kill a younger employee's career. A lot of things happen in person that can't be replicated through emails, slack, etc.
I joined my current company at the height of the pandemic. So did at least hundreds of other people, many of which joined as their first job. I am a top performer at the company, and I also can't tell how other people who joined around the same time and worked fully remote the first two years would have been any better in their career had the pandemic not happened. I don't see any young employee's career killed. This is all just empty talk.
I graduated in 2020 and absolutely feel that my learning and career have suffered immensely. This is a very common thought amongst people in my cohort.
Your observations as a recent graduate match my observations. RTO (specifically, hybrid, but that depends on the position) made a huge difference in learning and career development for younger employees at my company.
I do think it's quite hilarious that all of the older employees are claiming that their younger counterparts are doing just fine now that RTO is happening but just months ago were claiming that these newer hires were lazy or incompetent when WFH was at its zenith.
I do think it's quite hilarious that all of the older employees are claiming that their younger counterparts are doing just fine now that RTO is happening but just months ago were claiming that these newer hires were lazy or incompetent when WFH was at its zenith.
This is not true at all. Younger employees are even more equipped for remote work than older employees. They grew up with Discord, Youtube, Twitch... lots have even contributed to open source software. The junior people on the remote teams I've worked on have always been super engaged and rewarded with more responsibility.
I am not sure I find this explanation convincing. If a corporation thinks it could increase profits without RTO and after eating office real-estate losses, it'll do so. The real estate companies and the middle managers do not make decisions for these companies. If wasted office costs are $10M, but more happy, productive, and efficient remote employees make an additional $20M, there wouldn't be RTO.
Are certain cities (like NYC) taxing unoccupied office space? If so, how much? This information is much more convincing than a claim that companies are enforcing RTO to make middle managers feel like they are "presiding over their kingdom".
Are certain cities (like NYC) taxing unoccupied office space? If so, how much? This information is much more convincing than a claim that companies are enforcing RTO to make middle managers feel like they are "presiding over their kingdom".
I read somewhere that big cities ( SFO) with tech concentration are giving tax breaks to companies that will bring their employees back in-office.
Cities like SFO with estimated 30% vacancy which primarily rely on corporate taxes will collapse!
Cities like SFO with estimated 30% vacancy which primarily rely on corporate taxes will collapse!
Is that bad? SFO isn’t known for being a well run city. A dose of bitter medicine might be exactly what it needs for long term health. Seattle is the same. We spend absurd amounts of money and get very meager results. This is what happens when your only tax revenue is property tax. If they taxed income they’d be incentivized to increase wages and employment. Instead they’re incentivized to drive up property values and barely keep the working class alive.
Just as an FYI, neither the city of Seattle nor the state of Washington has an income tax.
Do what ever you want CEO's but don't be surprised when you have to bend over backwards for talent in other ways while advanced economies populations get smaller every generation and the up and coming areas need to be remote.
But don't get it twisted, everyone sees through your HR cornballs pretending a food truck coming by once a week is worth a 2 hour commute everyday.
But don't get it twisted, everyone sees through your HR cornballs pretending a food truck coming by once a week is worth a 2 hour commute everyday.
> and the up and coming areas need to be remote.
Looking around the world, all the up and coming areas are mega-metro areas from Tokyo to Bangalore and from Sao Paulo to Shanghai. Or are you generalizing from a tiny handful of Americans who may be going to midwest / rockies after Covid?
Looking around the world, all the up and coming areas are mega-metro areas from Tokyo to Bangalore and from Sao Paulo to Shanghai. Or are you generalizing from a tiny handful of Americans who may be going to midwest / rockies after Covid?
Japan and China are not up and coming, they have worse demographics decline in their future than America. Vietnam is up and coming. You will need remote as a part of your Megacorp.
Driving from the suburbs in most American areas to a city is an hour each way.
Driving from the suburbs in most American areas to a city is an hour each way.
I think it's really interesting to watch how poor performing CEOs have been through this period. The work from home decisions, and the subsequent hiring of remote workers with no thought of the long term was a massive mistake. It's just a pure example of CEOs operating at a very low level of competence. No strategic plan for what the business looks like in 2 years time, no forward planning of how these decisions might bind your hands. No, the stock market was up because of stimulus so these companies all just threw money out the door.
Now we're on the other side of it and they've basically all admitted they just massively fucked up. So what's next? A thoughtful and long term strategic discussion about how we organise distributed teams (because let's face it, most of these teams are distributed geographically even if they're all office based), a serious discussion about how workers are willing to trade some level of flexibility for compensation and loyalty?
Nah, instead we're going to insultingly insist that all our workers are lazy assholes and tell them "Forget the deal we made, you can't trust our word. See you on monday".
Also, Bonus points as Andy Jassy to just whenever someone points out your doing something with absolutely no evidence it's correct just shout "Yeah well AWS!". Beyond parody.
Now we're on the other side of it and they've basically all admitted they just massively fucked up. So what's next? A thoughtful and long term strategic discussion about how we organise distributed teams (because let's face it, most of these teams are distributed geographically even if they're all office based), a serious discussion about how workers are willing to trade some level of flexibility for compensation and loyalty?
Nah, instead we're going to insultingly insist that all our workers are lazy assholes and tell them "Forget the deal we made, you can't trust our word. See you on monday".
Also, Bonus points as Andy Jassy to just whenever someone points out your doing something with absolutely no evidence it's correct just shout "Yeah well AWS!". Beyond parody.
Not one person here even admits the possibility that some WFH people are not really working. Or at least Jassy believes that.
Marissa Mayer ended WFH at Yahoo for exactly that reason:
https://money.cnn.com/2013/02/25/technology/yahoo-work-from-...
If you're CEO of a company that's shitty to work for, you have to suspect that everyone except the middle managers and suckups is just phoning it in. Literally.
Edit: all you people taking issue with this are just preaching to the converted (each other). I'm talking about what CEOs think, not what actually is.
Marissa Mayer ended WFH at Yahoo for exactly that reason:
https://money.cnn.com/2013/02/25/technology/yahoo-work-from-...
If you're CEO of a company that's shitty to work for, you have to suspect that everyone except the middle managers and suckups is just phoning it in. Literally.
Edit: all you people taking issue with this are just preaching to the converted (each other). I'm talking about what CEOs think, not what actually is.
I worked at a huge company 30+ years ago (~300K employees). There was an engineer on our floor whose entire team, including his manager, had left the company in a short period of time. The company acted as if the entire team was gone, cancelling all their projects. He fell through the cracks.
Initially he sat at his desk all day reading newspapers and books, ready to do any work he was asked to do. Eventually he got bored and started up his own one-man business that he operated from the office. All the while he continued collecting a salary and benefits from the big company. This had been going on for two years when I left the company.
My manager and my skip level manager both seemed quite aware of what was happening. But this guy was in another division of the company, so they didn't think it was their problem to solve.
The lesson... for a big enough company, you can be just as invisible in the office as you are at home, but the office gives better plausible deniability.
Initially he sat at his desk all day reading newspapers and books, ready to do any work he was asked to do. Eventually he got bored and started up his own one-man business that he operated from the office. All the while he continued collecting a salary and benefits from the big company. This had been going on for two years when I left the company.
My manager and my skip level manager both seemed quite aware of what was happening. But this guy was in another division of the company, so they didn't think it was their problem to solve.
The lesson... for a big enough company, you can be just as invisible in the office as you are at home, but the office gives better plausible deniability.
this literally just described Milton from Office Space. :_)
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BUE0PPQI3is
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BUE0PPQI3is
You have never seen hours long discussions of Game of Thrones, Bachelor, sports, etc? Professional water cooler jockeys who transit from conversation to conversation to eat up the majority of work hours?
I once read a claim that all work is done by the square root of the total company head count. Honestly, that does not feel too far off from reality.
I once read a claim that all work is done by the square root of the total company head count. Honestly, that does not feel too far off from reality.
The claim is Price’s Law, originally an observation about academic publications in a field - half of them come from the square root of the number of contributors, now taken as a general MBA style business rule of thumb. One which joins nicely with evaporative cooling, the idea that the top performers also have the most skills and experience because they are working harder, have the easiest time leaving for another job because they are the most driven and have the better work history to talk about, perhaps the most contacts from the more work done.
And together, there is likely to be a big overlap between the most useful employees and the ones who have the easiest chance of leaving. Lose sqrt(employees) of people for any reason where they self select - e.g. cancelled bonuses, deathmarch project, austerity measures, return to the office - and it’s likely to hurt disproportionately.
And together, there is likely to be a big overlap between the most useful employees and the ones who have the easiest chance of leaving. Lose sqrt(employees) of people for any reason where they self select - e.g. cancelled bonuses, deathmarch project, austerity measures, return to the office - and it’s likely to hurt disproportionately.
Regarding. ..square root part I also find it intuitively true. Another way is to find people who most other need to reach out to during work, again that number probably come close to square root.
Feels too high IMHO…
This is bullshit.
If you can get away with "not really working" remotely, you will also get away with "not really working" in the office.
If you can get away with "not really working" remotely, you will also get away with "not really working" in the office.
Walk around any office in Seattle or SF, and you'll see many people on Amazon, Reddit and YouTube as well... the only difference is they had to commute from Pleasanton/San Jose/Duval/Renton/etc. first.
Most of the people I know who shifted to WFH from in-office during COVID ended up buying places in cities outside of the "urban" radius, and now feel like they are randomly being forced back due to nth-order repercussions around overpaid pandemic hires and shortsightedness from executives who spent all of 2020-2021 remarking in memos how successful and wonderful WFH was for everyone.
In my opinion, it's not that people don't want to work in offices. It's that cities are hostile places for work, period. Companies can start by covering 100% of moving expenses, guaranteeing safety inside and around corporate offices, and offering in-office daycares/preschools for free just to start the conversation.
Most of the people I know who shifted to WFH from in-office during COVID ended up buying places in cities outside of the "urban" radius, and now feel like they are randomly being forced back due to nth-order repercussions around overpaid pandemic hires and shortsightedness from executives who spent all of 2020-2021 remarking in memos how successful and wonderful WFH was for everyone.
In my opinion, it's not that people don't want to work in offices. It's that cities are hostile places for work, period. Companies can start by covering 100% of moving expenses, guaranteeing safety inside and around corporate offices, and offering in-office daycares/preschools for free just to start the conversation.
Forget about whether or not people are “working”. That’s just micromanagement.
There is either work not done, or work finished. If work isn’t being finished, then people aren’t working. If it is, then people are working. That’s all you need to know.
There is either work not done, or work finished. If work isn’t being finished, then people aren’t working. If it is, then people are working. That’s all you need to know.
Have you consider alternative explanations such Yahoo! doing a stealth layoff by shaking off employees who want remote working or require it because they reside in a different metro area? IBM was infamous for shaking off headcount by requiring employees to move cities. Or management’s inability to measure performance so they resort to lowest common denominator methods like ending remote work instead of just correcting individual bad behaviors through discussions, PIPs, termination, etc.
I think she felt she could turn things around with her MAVEN strategy (don't ask me to remember what that stood for). So for that, she needed people.
Your last sentence is right on, though.
Your last sentence is right on, though.
My coworkers regularly spend one and half hour chatting during lunch.
That's definitely worth your commute to the office and better than working from home, right?
That's definitely worth your commute to the office and better than working from home, right?
When I worked at Yahoo during the mid-naughts, I had about 1 day of work a week, if that. Most of the other time my entire team spent playing video games, watching the stock market, getting food (food wasn't free at the time but I believe the smoothies were), etc. It was a bizarre environment and couldn't wait to leave.
Amazon monitors your work laptop day and night... They know if you work or not.
Only if you're not smart enough to defeat their monitoring.
I certainly admit the possibility, but if you have no way to catch that situation then you have bigger problems. Demanding RTO is a lazy and ineffective attempt to plaster over the gaps.
I'll admit it, some people don't work at home, or only work minutes a day. But I've known people that did the same in the office. What did Marissa Mayer do about them?
The most annoying part about all of this is how smug and proud some of these companies were about announcing that they were remote first and hiring all of these people on promises of being "all in" on a distributed remote workforce which they saw as the future. I get that everyone likes to be able to change their mind at any time, but commitments that affect people's lives need to be honored if there can ever be any sort of working trust.
I personally love working in the office and I hate working from home. I worked at a remote-only company during the pandemic and I never felt so unproductive, twiddling my thumbs waiting to hear back from my coworkers because I didn't know where they were, or they would be MIA for hours on end.
However, I don't understand why WFH isn't a discussion entirely between the manager and the employee. Why is this something that's being mandated from high above like the Ten Commandments. If someone wants to WFH and the manager is okay with it, and the employee can justify it with performance reviews, why does anyone care?
This should strictly be a performance issue, and if the employee is unproductive at home, then either force RTO on her, or fire her. It feels more like the higher-ups don't trust their own performance review system, but it seems like that's really the answer. If the manager is unproductive because of unproductive employees, then fire the manager as well. This is NOT a hard problem to solve, what it requires is accurate attention to performance on all levels. It shouldn't be a blanket edict because this is 2023 and we've already shown that WFH can definitely work for many people.
However, I don't understand why WFH isn't a discussion entirely between the manager and the employee. Why is this something that's being mandated from high above like the Ten Commandments. If someone wants to WFH and the manager is okay with it, and the employee can justify it with performance reviews, why does anyone care?
This should strictly be a performance issue, and if the employee is unproductive at home, then either force RTO on her, or fire her. It feels more like the higher-ups don't trust their own performance review system, but it seems like that's really the answer. If the manager is unproductive because of unproductive employees, then fire the manager as well. This is NOT a hard problem to solve, what it requires is accurate attention to performance on all levels. It shouldn't be a blanket edict because this is 2023 and we've already shown that WFH can definitely work for many people.
All these companies have leases burning a monthly hole in their pockets. So I guess they figure they should get people into those buildings.
It's a foolish sunk cost fallacy.
It's a foolish sunk cost fallacy.
A more savvy (or less short term) take is that these places are able to negotiate favorable leases right now. Once office space fills up again, those prices will go up again.
I think the real reason lies between "butts in seats" and layoffs.
I also feel like there is a class of management that feels good about themselves by having subordinates observe them with all the trappings of their office. These are the people that want a dress code and spend money to look good at work even if nobody ever sees a customer. They have to have the bigger office -- not out of need -- to demonstrate their position. Bigger desk. They might have a better computer than developers even though they never use anything more taxing that Excel (this happened a lot more 20 years ago, less today). These people want to return to office, otherwise nobody knows how much they are in charge of.
I think the real reason lies between "butts in seats" and layoffs.
I also feel like there is a class of management that feels good about themselves by having subordinates observe them with all the trappings of their office. These are the people that want a dress code and spend money to look good at work even if nobody ever sees a customer. They have to have the bigger office -- not out of need -- to demonstrate their position. Bigger desk. They might have a better computer than developers even though they never use anything more taxing that Excel (this happened a lot more 20 years ago, less today). These people want to return to office, otherwise nobody knows how much they are in charge of.
Companies also get tax incentives based how many butts are in seats. So, it’s not just a sunk cost fallacy at play here
> When asked for data to support the move, Jassy lacked a good answer. He said that he spoke to “60 to 80 CEOs of other companies over the last 18 months,” and “virtually all of them” preferred in-office work.
Are they colluding to suppress wages/working conditions?
These tech companies already colluded in the past to suppress wages.
Are they colluding to suppress wages/working conditions?
These tech companies already colluded in the past to suppress wages.
My company's CEO used words no other than "we believe collaboration is better in-person" to justify forcing everyone to work in the office three days a week. The usual "revitalize downtown" or "support local business" argument doesn't even apply in our case because company is on a highway. You know this decision is not based on any concrete data but purely on the investment in those useless buildings and wanting to force people out.
I have never had an in-person joint whiteboard session that was actually productive. I have had several virtual whiteboard sessions that were very productive (thanks cheap graphics tablets!).
Just a data point, but my experience has been exactly the opposite of yours.
And I say this as someone who invested a lot of time and political capital trying to find good (and within constraints) virtual whiteboard solutions.
And I say this as someone who invested a lot of time and political capital trying to find good (and within constraints) virtual whiteboard solutions.
I haven’t found a good one either but imagine iPads with pencils might just be close enough. Haven’t tried though, sounds expensive.
A base model iPad + Apple Pencil 1 offsets about $400 in MSRP. A more decent setup would be iPad Air + Apple Pencil 2 for $650. And of course there are a ton of software that helps prototyping or organizing ideas collaboratively, online.
If any company actually cares about collaboration, they should give every employee a set of these. They cost a fraction of a developer's work laptop and are negligible compared to their salary. There is hardly anything that can't be done online.
But of course companies are not going to do that. They are going to instead ask you to drive one hour to the office and pay for the gas on your own money, then write on whiteboard in real buildings so that the money wasted on the lease is worth something.
If any company actually cares about collaboration, they should give every employee a set of these. They cost a fraction of a developer's work laptop and are negligible compared to their salary. There is hardly anything that can't be done online.
But of course companies are not going to do that. They are going to instead ask you to drive one hour to the office and pay for the gas on your own money, then write on whiteboard in real buildings so that the money wasted on the lease is worth something.
> They cost a fraction of a developer's work laptop and are negligible compared to their salary. There is hardly anything that can't be done online.
They also cost a fraction of a fraction of prime office space leases...
They also cost a fraction of a fraction of prime office space leases...
I'll chip my vote in for "stealth layoff". Phrasing research in terms of "why do you prefer hybrid work over 'fully remote'?" is misrepresenting what's under debate – mandatory RTO policies.
So the amount of the people that report internally that they were given 30 days to relocate or to "voluntary resign" makes this very plausible.
Now, I have been called from several competitors to leave AWS for the couple of years, but I was happy with the company, projects, prospects, etc. The clusterf*ck of decisions the company made in the past several months made me finally reach out to them when the RTO was announced, and I finally quit. I am going to work from the office (hybrid) on the next job, but at least I'm not going to work for Amazon. And that sparks joy.
Now, I have been called from several competitors to leave AWS for the couple of years, but I was happy with the company, projects, prospects, etc. The clusterf*ck of decisions the company made in the past several months made me finally reach out to them when the RTO was announced, and I finally quit. I am going to work from the office (hybrid) on the next job, but at least I'm not going to work for Amazon. And that sparks joy.
Andy Jassy is showing 1M+ Amazon employees that Amazon has become a "Day 2" company.
That’s what I wrote on my farewell email - just a little more corporate-speaky :)
All the bragging about working multiple jobs or just clocking 20hours at most on so many forums like Blind, etc. is now coming to roost.
So yeah, many abused WFH and now the backlash is here. Amazon, Google, Apple, Meta, Zoom, Bloomberg ... all have the same conclusion: you can't trust people, at scale, to work full time from home.
These stories were posted here too! You think no exec reads HN?
So yeah, many abused WFH and now the backlash is here. Amazon, Google, Apple, Meta, Zoom, Bloomberg ... all have the same conclusion: you can't trust people, at scale, to work full time from home.
These stories were posted here too! You think no exec reads HN?
> All the bragging about working multiple jobs or just clocking 20hours at most on so many forums like Blind, etc.
I don't follow these forums where people are saying this, but your comment struck me because neither of the two things you listed are wrong, as long as the person involved is doing acceptable work. This assumes there are no requirements to disclose other jobs, no enforceable non-compete agreements, etc. The consequences for doing unacceptable work—or not doing any work at all—are well-established from before covid, and would still apply in this case: that is, if they can't do the job, fire them. I agree that it's different and perhaps scary new world for executives, but what about it is wrong?
I don't follow these forums where people are saying this, but your comment struck me because neither of the two things you listed are wrong, as long as the person involved is doing acceptable work. This assumes there are no requirements to disclose other jobs, no enforceable non-compete agreements, etc. The consequences for doing unacceptable work—or not doing any work at all—are well-established from before covid, and would still apply in this case: that is, if they can't do the job, fire them. I agree that it's different and perhaps scary new world for executives, but what about it is wrong?
If you're contractor, this is the right mindset - I get paid for a unit of delivered work.
Employees get full-time salaries to be available, well, full time.
WFH makes people hard to reach - sorry, was out walking the dog, etc. - and all the other stuff that would never fly in an office.
Not disclosing your other side gigs is a violation of most work contracts btw.
Employees get full-time salaries to be available, well, full time.
WFH makes people hard to reach - sorry, was out walking the dog, etc. - and all the other stuff that would never fly in an office.
Not disclosing your other side gigs is a violation of most work contracts btw.
If the CEOs based their decision on these sort of posts I seriously have to question their leadership ability. I think the main reason why we see management in favor of RTO is because in my experience WFH exposed how little contribution comes from management.
In my experience many managers (at all levels) like to make the "informal rounds" where they go around the office and have chats with everyone to see what they are doing (instead of e.g. Looking at tickets or waiting for the weekly meeting). That mostly stopped with WFH, so suddenly many in management felt like they are not working anymore. The thing is this absence was often helping the engineers etc to be more productive.
In my experience many managers (at all levels) like to make the "informal rounds" where they go around the office and have chats with everyone to see what they are doing (instead of e.g. Looking at tickets or waiting for the weekly meeting). That mostly stopped with WFH, so suddenly many in management felt like they are not working anymore. The thing is this absence was often helping the engineers etc to be more productive.
Absolutely and easily provable - go work at a company with the employee count of FAANG and zero managers. As all managers are useless, this company will EASILY outperform the stupid FAANGs.
Just like an army without officers, amazing stuff.
Seriously, what's going on here on HN? YC has managers ffs!
Just like an army without officers, amazing stuff.
Seriously, what's going on here on HN? YC has managers ffs!
Care to strawman much? Did the OP say anything about 0 managers? Most FAANGS cut a higher percentage of managers than developers over the last year. It seems they think they can get away with a lower proportion of managers.
Valve.
And many CEOs run multiple companies and is part of several boards of other companies.
Why is it suddenly unethical for a mid level, much less paid employee to do so?
> So yeah, many abused WFH and now the backlash is here.
You can't "abuse" WFH. Either you're producing results that satisfy your manager or you are not. Also, any exec making decisions based on Blind posts should be fired.
You can't "abuse" WFH. Either you're producing results that satisfy your manager or you are not. Also, any exec making decisions based on Blind posts should be fired.
I’ve never worked at a company where managers actually had the time to actually assess the quality of a single reports work.
A managers job is generally more team results oriented.
A managers job is generally more team results oriented.
The point is that unless a manager has an actual reason to complain about someone's performance, there is no problem. Believing urban legends about people "slacking off" while WFH just mean that manager or executive should be fired.
How managers do not detect it?
Either way, they’re getting what they asked for: either folks back in the office with poor morale or resignations. Has reached a new level of low morale and distrust in leadership.
Unless it's a thinly veiled layoff, in which case it makes perfect sense.
So people should be screwed out of their severance? Just lay people off, you hired them be an adult and fire them.
That's the whole point.
Why fire people and pay them severance when you can get them to quit instead?
Of course, you're going to lose the people with talent who can find other jobs - and retain the ones who can't.
But seems like a trade they are eager to make.
Why fire people and pay them severance when you can get them to quit instead?
Of course, you're going to lose the people with talent who can find other jobs - and retain the ones who can't.
But seems like a trade they are eager to make.
Yeah, the problem is the people most willing to just leave are the ones that can get something else reasonably fast (which end up being your better employees).
AWS has been in decline in terms of quality for years now. They aren't innovating well and even higher turnover will only make things worse. Notice how Amazon is really far behind in LLMs despite having so many research scientists on staff.
AWS has been in decline in terms of quality for years now. They aren't innovating well and even higher turnover will only make things worse. Notice how Amazon is really far behind in LLMs despite having so many research scientists on staff.
They are well versed at meat grinder operations.
Why even lay off with mutual agreements paying severance? Just fire people and deal with the consequences.
> Why even lay off with mutual agreements paying severance?
PR
> Just fire people and deal with the consequences.
Or why not reduce headcount and not deal with the consequences? That's what they're trying to do.
Everyone has been bitter of tech workers for the better part of a decade. You're not going to lose points with the public for treating tech workers like normal workers.
PR
> Just fire people and deal with the consequences.
Or why not reduce headcount and not deal with the consequences? That's what they're trying to do.
Everyone has been bitter of tech workers for the better part of a decade. You're not going to lose points with the public for treating tech workers like normal workers.
Why deal with the consequences when they don’t have to?
One thing I learned in adulthood is that smart (not necessarily ethical) people steal credit when things are good and avoid responsibility for anything unpopular as there is no payoff for it.
They are on the hook for paying severance, unemployment insurance and such. If the employee is the one who “quit” well it’s “their choice”…
Yes but then that would mean less money for the company and the investors, so you see the difficulty that poses. /s
Or if there's some other ulterior motive like promises to local government
I think its a combination of over hiring over the pandemic, higher interest rates and an opportunity to reduce salaries for future hires.
Reduced salaries for future tech workers is going to be a double whammy because I doubt tech stocks are going to continue growing like they did in the past decade.
It really boosts your income when your equity doubles or triples in value during the vesting period.
It really boosts your income when your equity doubles or triples in value during the vesting period.
I don't think that makes sense. You can just go back and not work. Learn a new skill or something while in the office. You basically fire people who physically can't come back or people who are not afraid of losing their job. You probably don't want to fire based on that.
I'm convinced that the main reasoning behind this is that it implicitly keeps employee retention higher than with WFH, where employees are free to learn skills that are beneficial to THEM in their free time, and interview much more easily for new/better roles.
This is one of the primary contributors to the decision, not only the free time/etc. contribute to the higher retention but also the sense of beloning, and friendships that are made in workplaces.
Is the "80% regret" number misleading?
From the Fortune article:
> A whopping 80% of bosses reported that they regret their initial return-to-office decisions, according to new research from Envoy, which interviewed more than 1,000 U.S. company executives and workplace managers who work in person at least one day per week.
But it's not clear if 80% of the executives...
(a) regretted reducing WFH at all, or
(b) regretted certain details of how they tweaked the policy, e.g. how they communicated it, the number of in-office days required, etc., or
(c) were unhappy about their data's availability, quality, or freshness.
Unfortunately the report from Envoy [0] isn't much clearer:
> 80% of executives say they would have approached their company’s return-to-office strategy differently if they had access to workplace data to inform their decision-making.
This is one case where seeing the original questionnaire would be helpful, but I'm not finding a link to it. So it's really hard to decide if Envoy's conclusions are justified.
[0] https://envoy.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Workplace_Data_...
From the Fortune article:
> A whopping 80% of bosses reported that they regret their initial return-to-office decisions, according to new research from Envoy, which interviewed more than 1,000 U.S. company executives and workplace managers who work in person at least one day per week.
But it's not clear if 80% of the executives...
(a) regretted reducing WFH at all, or
(b) regretted certain details of how they tweaked the policy, e.g. how they communicated it, the number of in-office days required, etc., or
(c) were unhappy about their data's availability, quality, or freshness.
Unfortunately the report from Envoy [0] isn't much clearer:
> 80% of executives say they would have approached their company’s return-to-office strategy differently if they had access to workplace data to inform their decision-making.
This is one case where seeing the original questionnaire would be helpful, but I'm not finding a link to it. So it's really hard to decide if Envoy's conclusions are justified.
[0] https://envoy.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Workplace_Data_...
Was expecting this to be about AWS's Recovery Time Objectives!
"Return to office" is all about control. Companies want to control their workers' lives to squeeze every last ounce of work out of everyone. They'd demand employees live on premise if they could get away with it. Forcing employees to commute to the office and have their social circle consist of fellow employees increases company power over the employee.
Really what these companies should be doing if they want to lure the minions back into the cages is to entice them with things like benefits and compensation increases. Making ultimatums like this is just terrible for morale, and I imagine many talented employees will leave. I don't use AWS, and hearing this kind of thing makes me less likely to want to use AWS in the future, for the same reasons I prefer not buying clothes made in sweatshops
Really what these companies should be doing if they want to lure the minions back into the cages is to entice them with things like benefits and compensation increases. Making ultimatums like this is just terrible for morale, and I imagine many talented employees will leave. I don't use AWS, and hearing this kind of thing makes me less likely to want to use AWS in the future, for the same reasons I prefer not buying clothes made in sweatshops
Unfortunately Amazon is one of those companies which can get away with this.
Moats so strong that they could completely fuck over (as they have been doing for a while) their employees but will still end up okay as a business.
CEOs with moats as thin as a razor will see this as correlation though and burn their companies to ground forcing their employees to RTO.
Moats so strong that they could completely fuck over (as they have been doing for a while) their employees but will still end up okay as a business.
CEOs with moats as thin as a razor will see this as correlation though and burn their companies to ground forcing their employees to RTO.
What is the sentiment of the investment community? Researchers covering Amazon and majority shareholders influence the decisions that Jassy is making. He's not taking a hard line just because he's a tough guy who doesn't care about employees. Focus on the situation.
Well, as an employee of Salesforce, I witnessed operating margin goals of activist investors drive a layoff this year. (And Salesforce just met those goals last week.)
Part of me wonders if that's just broad inflationary concerns and uncertainty about the world economy, pushing for profits over everything else.
Really seems short-sighted, but, so did the "hire everything that breathes" era in the 2010s, too.
Part of me wonders if that's just broad inflationary concerns and uncertainty about the world economy, pushing for profits over everything else.
Really seems short-sighted, but, so did the "hire everything that breathes" era in the 2010s, too.
Ooh - nice observation!
Large investors are motivated to carefully examine the issue, with a singular focus on the company's performance w.r.t. their fund's goals.
Presumably those fund managers are somewhat dispassionate about the managements' and employees' takes on the topic, excepting for how they'll affect the company performance.
Large investors are motivated to carefully examine the issue, with a singular focus on the company's performance w.r.t. their fund's goals.
Presumably those fund managers are somewhat dispassionate about the managements' and employees' takes on the topic, excepting for how they'll affect the company performance.
Offices make it easier to control employees and their time.
Amazon is one of the most successful companies of this century. This might be misguided, but let’s actually grapple with why, not just invent strawmen to attack. Surely, Amazon has thought this through and really believes their company will perform better in office.
One of the things I've learned over my career is that basically everyone is winging it, and successful companies often don't understand what makes them successful.
Also, unless you are a saint, your reports are lying to you because of the power imbalance. These two factors combined are the cause of lots of incredibly boneheaded business decisions.
Also, unless you are a saint, your reports are lying to you because of the power imbalance. These two factors combined are the cause of lots of incredibly boneheaded business decisions.
Past performance is no guarantee of future results. Amazon of ~7 years ago was a great customer experience. Second to none in online retail. I happily had a Prime subscription. I avoid 2023 Amazon like the plague because of multiple bad experiences with their shipping and lack of trust that what I receive will be genuine and fit for purpose. It's basically AliExpress with faster shipping.
I think Amazon (at least their retails arm) is largely coasting on its past success at this point. If another retailer came along and offered the 2023 Amazon shopping experience they would crash and burn instead of becoming the dominant e-commerce website.
I think Amazon (at least their retails arm) is largely coasting on its past success at this point. If another retailer came along and offered the 2023 Amazon shopping experience they would crash and burn instead of becoming the dominant e-commerce website.
Jassy and Zuckerberg have both said that new employees (even experienced hires) are underperforming compared the workers who were in an office setting at some point. With a couple of years of turnover, that can compound quite a bit.
Thinking back to when I started working, I somewhat buy that. I would have had a much harder time getting up to speed (both technically and institutionally) in a remote environment, where the barriers to learning from your peers are higher and the feedback processes (especially in a company formed around in-person work) are slower.
It was explained to me by local non-profit folks in the know that Amazon's RTO decisions need to be understood in the context of downtown Seattle real estate politics. Amazon brings a lot of people downtown -- fueling local businesses -- and as a consequence the city council provides Amazon a huge amount of leeway and power -- even siding with Amazon against the community. Consequently, if Amazon doesn't continue to publicly advocate for RTO, then the city council will have no reason to continue with the red carpet treatment which, concretely, means increased taxation and compliance requirements.
So, there is a significant game theory component to Amazon's RTO position that can't be discussed publicly.
So, there is a significant game theory component to Amazon's RTO position that can't be discussed publicly.
I imagine Amazon could downsize their downtown Seattle footprint to match their current needs, face increased taxes, and still come out ahead.
This seems like mostly an attrition play.
The capital class also despises the labor class. I wouldn't down-play the pure spite motive, either.
This seems like mostly an attrition play.
The capital class also despises the labor class. I wouldn't down-play the pure spite motive, either.
These sort of red carpets go far beyond taxation.
Things like some executives wife gets pulled over drunk and the police give her a ride home and a warning. The son gets caught holding and the case disappears. Homeless people in their neighborhood get told to move along to your neighborhood. That sort of thing.
Things like some executives wife gets pulled over drunk and the police give her a ride home and a warning. The son gets caught holding and the case disappears. Homeless people in their neighborhood get told to move along to your neighborhood. That sort of thing.
That's basic inequality. Amazon execs will remain rich regardless of whether Amazon has a higher city tax bill.
> That's basic inequality.
It isn't. Beat cops probably aren't going to take your bribe, you have to pre-bribe the community like Amazon has so you are "too big to fail" in a sense. It's like the company town of old but built with public dollars.
It isn't. Beat cops probably aren't going to take your bribe, you have to pre-bribe the community like Amazon has so you are "too big to fail" in a sense. It's like the company town of old but built with public dollars.
Seattle would fight that tooth and nail. Amazon could simply say they are thinking of withdrawing from the city and Seattle would throw tax breaks at them that would make NYC's concessions to amazon look pale in comparison. See Boeing as an example. Cannot have an exodus of talent, that is bad news bears for any major city (see Detroit as a historic example)
Nope, any noise of tax break to super rich company like Amazon in politically charged city like Seattle will raise huge public outcry and no one really want that.
Another thing to understand in asking RTO Amazon gets implicit support of city/builders/ tons of other vendors. Further it should be no surprise (but it is!) that multiple hundreds of thousand dollar a year earning employees are going to get no sympathy on their plight from public at large. So why should CEO care at all on this issue.
Another thing to understand in asking RTO Amazon gets implicit support of city/builders/ tons of other vendors. Further it should be no surprise (but it is!) that multiple hundreds of thousand dollar a year earning employees are going to get no sympathy on their plight from public at large. So why should CEO care at all on this issue.
They get the last laugh after years of tech worker compensation going bonkers and having to compensate those plebs.
Plus, it's hard for execs to lie to your face over a recorded zoom call.
I'm sorry I mean be wrong about the details.
I'm sorry I mean be wrong about the details.
// there is a significant game theory component
Funny, I read your first paragraph and thought it doesn't make sense from game-theory point of view. If Amazon wants to lower city council's power over it, the easiest thing it can do is not be dependent on Seattle (ie - if your workforce is distributed, Seattle is irrelevant)
Funny, I read your first paragraph and thought it doesn't make sense from game-theory point of view. If Amazon wants to lower city council's power over it, the easiest thing it can do is not be dependent on Seattle (ie - if your workforce is distributed, Seattle is irrelevant)
Amazon is already deeply dependent on Seattle. US-WEST-1 is distributed across 13 or more locations in downtown Seattle. They have 4 or 5 skyscrapers there as well. There is a huge population of employees living in the area.
They are dependent on Seattle and Seattle has a reciprocal dependency on Amazon. "Just" adopting a distributed workforce position means putting a large investment in real estate at risk. Why would they do that?
They are dependent on Seattle and Seattle has a reciprocal dependency on Amazon. "Just" adopting a distributed workforce position means putting a large investment in real estate at risk. Why would they do that?
I've heard that too, but I can't imagine anybody in a city administration having enough juice to make a CEO care at all. How would that conversation go?
I always understood the reasoning to be that companies don't want the value of their real estate or 10-year leases to drop, which low occupancy portends.
For anyone familiar with Seattle politics, this is absurd. The city council has been openly antagonistic to Amazon for the better part of a decade.
Yes, easy evidence is the passage of this tax:
https://www.seattle.gov/city-finance/business-taxes-and-lice...
https://www.seattle.gov/city-finance/business-taxes-and-lice...
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But he will.
Return To Office in early 2023 caused many people hired during the pandemic to uproot their family and move closer to their assigned office.
Some of these folks are now being told that the office they moved closer to is not a “Hub” for their organization and that they now need to Relocate To Hub.
Most engineering teams will not be colocated even after this relocation as there a multiple hubs.
There is a strong belief that Amazon will have a 5 days in office policy starting after the holidays and further Relocate To Team initiatives. The delay is to mitigate the risk of attrition affecting Peak and to get people to move before they’re told they need to be in the office 5 days (sunk cost).
A textbook lesson in how to boil a frog courtesy of McKinsey. Hopefully customers enjoy the taste of boiled frogs.
Some of these folks are now being told that the office they moved closer to is not a “Hub” for their organization and that they now need to Relocate To Hub.
Most engineering teams will not be colocated even after this relocation as there a multiple hubs.
There is a strong belief that Amazon will have a 5 days in office policy starting after the holidays and further Relocate To Team initiatives. The delay is to mitigate the risk of attrition affecting Peak and to get people to move before they’re told they need to be in the office 5 days (sunk cost).
A textbook lesson in how to boil a frog courtesy of McKinsey. Hopefully customers enjoy the taste of boiled frogs.
>There is a strong belief that Amazon will have a 5 days in office policy starting after the holidays
It's not just a belief and it's not just Amazon. Anyone who has been paying attention knows that "mandatory 3 days/wk RTO" will quickly morph to "recommended 5 days/wk RTO" which will then morph to "mandatory 5 days/wk RTO". The endgame is very much a return to status quo ante, i.e. full time in office; hybrid was always intended to be transitory despite the messaging.
It's not just a belief and it's not just Amazon. Anyone who has been paying attention knows that "mandatory 3 days/wk RTO" will quickly morph to "recommended 5 days/wk RTO" which will then morph to "mandatory 5 days/wk RTO". The endgame is very much a return to status quo ante, i.e. full time in office; hybrid was always intended to be transitory despite the messaging.
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Layoffs by another name, local city government want their tax base back, Real estate companies (not mom and pop stuff, real holding companies with reits etc) want to keep real estate from "crashing", ny/ca/ma type states don't want their white collar workers moving to low tax states and working from there , middle managers want to be seen and "preside over their kindgom" etc.
The only group not benefitting from RTO are the actual workers.