Respawn point: The inevitable reincarnation of the corporate office
arstechnica.com
arstechnica.com
ETA: Interesting that the above has resulted in high controversy in both up/down votes and replies. I can tell this is a very emotional issue for people. To be clear I'm not interested in forcing people to do anything, just trying to share my experiences. I would be disappointed if my job went permanently remote, and would probably start looking for a new one.
Lots more remote work now for remote folks (with businesses required to have a go at it, and learning it’s easier than expected), and I’m sure office folks will still find businesses that will offer that model.
I don't have a problem with people who feel that way, but for myself I would find that very bleak given the substantial fraction of my life I am expected to spend working. Different strokes for different folks I guess.
I read it as work without those connections lost meaning (for them). I can see that point - many of my best experiences doing difficult technical work have been with very tight knit teams that are difficult to maintain working remotely, let alone create.
Which isn't to say its-just-a-paycheck jobs are wrong in any sense, just that it's not enough for everyone.
Please forgive the bluntness of my opinion. First the business world made excuses that remote work just wasn’t as productive as in person work, and then a pandemic forced an experiment that proved that assertion to be untrue. Now the excuse is, “well, remote just isn’t as good as in person for building team bonds and collaboration” even when teams at billion dollar orgs (both young and old) are able to do so.
Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but facts and data are not negotiable, and this is important distinction when large scale presence decisions are being made for workforces.
For what it's worth, I've a experienced a fair range of what is possible. I've worked on local, mixed, and remote teams in both IC and lead roles.
This experience has led me to believe that: (a) it is possible to have good cohesion in a remote group (b) it is harder to do and (c) it is especially hard to do with a new group & company. Perhaps less universally (d) it's really hard with mixed hardware/software groups.
It's undoubtedly true that lots of large organizations do it, with varying levels of success but generally pretty well (there are exceptions). It's also true that they invest a fair amount into making this work, in my experience, and the infrastructure matters.
I've experienced very well functioning remote groups, less so mixed remote/local - but I certainly believe it's possible. It's always required more effort and intention, and they've never quite reached the same level of cohesion as some small local teams.
As you note though, YMMV.
Also I didn't mean to suggest "remote work == just a paycheck" though I can see how that might be ambiguous.
Got anything to back that up? After being forced to switch to all remote, my organization is reporting various levels of productivity loss across all departments.
The effects of remote work in areas like mentorship, culture, employee attrition, information flow, knowledge sharing, talent identification, strategic decision making, bottom-up idea generation, etc. will take years to become clearer. And it won't be until we have a sizable number of fully remote companies competing against non-remote companies for years that we will be able to make a real judgement of how they compare in productivity.
Until then, the demand for square feet paradoxically won't be any less. If you're rotating in half the workforce at a time, but require them to space 2x apart, you end up needing the same amount of floor space.
On top of that: In German there is the expression "Quadratlatschen" ("square shoes") for shoes of very large size. I guess these are for humans with square feet. I guess such shoes are soon in demand, then.
Because that’s what it is in imperial system? Metric has square meters, imperial uses square feet (sq ft). Maybe the poster could have used square yards. What’s so funny about it?
Well, the person had explained that they juxtaposed a different image based upon a more literal / different interpretation of the phrase, perhaps triggered by the similar phrase in their native German. That is basically the root of all humor.
As an aside, I would think the phrase "demand for square footage" more appropriate and common. "Square feet" isn't often used in the more generalized context, but rather for specific measurements (i.e. 1900 square feet), at least in my neck of the woods.
I will confess that I set aside a particular afternoon a week to read in a corner of my local Starbucks, just as a way to get out of the house.
Personally I'd much rather be outside than in a loud cafe. I might even get the chance to see a tree or hear a bird.
What do you think drives your need for separate spaces? I'm lucky enough to have a SFH in the suburbs, so I can move around within my house a lot, so maybe that is part of why I find it fine (although my wife hates working from home still.)
I ask because while I am perfectly comfortable at home, there is an underlying drive to get outside and engage with the world that doesn't go away. I'm curious if some people have it and some people don't, hence why some are more comfortable with certain parts of working from home.
I have been working from home for two years now, and off and on prior to that, it's always been a goal of mine, and I knew I would need to build in tools to cater for that part of me when I did go full time.
I do wonder if clear delineations helps- when my kids are home (or during distance learning, when they know I'm SUPPOSED to be done with work), I'm done with work, pretty much whether I like it or not, and for a long time I had dedicated home office space; that has been taken over by said distance learning children.
I think this pandemic will be an opportunity and driver of a reshuffling: mostly back the way it was before but with some visible structural changes. For example perhaps increased use of management consultants as proposed in this article). Maybe hiring more people than before due to a more efficient model that can take advantage of having more people.
The companies that make these changes the soonest, and make the changes that turn out to be the good ones (hard to tell except in retrospect) will of course be by definition the winners.
Long term, I really hope we arrive at a scenario where people can focus on one job at a time and choose the most productive environment for them/their team.
The narrative that remote work == work + childcare is just false though. Current pandemic situation is not normal in any sense and the loss of general services is very painful for everyone.
Have you tried it yourself? Technically you're correct, in reality just being in the house means you can be available.
The current situation with child care effectively closed has created the situation where you have to do both work and care for the kids. If you move that same situation into the office, it’s not going to be pretty.