I think such an office environment leads to lower productivity. I too present no evidence for this claim.
Personally I think I’m right! We should do it my way.
Personally I think I’m right! We should do it my way.
Being stuck in a chair all day with people watching you is not a good life. Being forced to adhere to arbitrary social convention instead of speaking sincerely and expressing yourself is not a good life.
Choosing to lay in bed, work in the sun, recline on the couch, say hi to your cat, be your most authentic self, is a better life. Personally not dealing with the anxiety and body pain makes me more productive. But maybe everyone is right and we can get more productivity out of people by gutting their personalities and self-appreciation; but if that's the cost, I sincerely do not care. I'd rather everyone enjoy their short lives than spend them colorlessly and regret their choices on their deathbeds.
Iirc it's very roughly like 20-30% want full remote, 50-60% want some type of hybrid (where there's a wide spectrum of hybrid models, from rarely-in-office to usually-in-office), and 10-20% prefer always or almost-always in office.
The ideal situation IMO is to have all options available: some teams are remote, some teams are in-office. The proportion over time should hopefully work out such that everyone can get what they want.
Personally, I'm happier and healthier with a hybrid model (where people work in office the same days) than full remote. And like you, I also know I'm not alone because of people I know who are very unhappy right now due to forced remote during COVID. I sincerely hope we soon enter a future where everyone has options that best suit them.
I'd like that too.
I am curious, why do you like going into the office? Does it give you something that you need, or does being remote too long make you uncomfortable because of something your mind is doing to you, which you have to escape?
I'd also add that I've always had and prioritized a short commute, and I like where I live and wouldn't want to move, so the cons are minimal for me. (The one thing I prefer about remote work is being able to take a 2hr mid-day break those days my brain is just fried; much easier at home, and I can then be more productive after that break.)
Now I know that isn't always guaranteed wherever you work, or wanted at all stages of your life/career. But I understand if people do crave those things.
But, when work ends (quit, layoffs, terminated), those work "friendships" almost always dissolve into nothingness whence they came. When there's no more 40h/week together forced time, they dissolve. The after-work drinks are directly related to work. No common work? No common drinks. No more forced socialization means that fakeness is made apparent.
The real key: focus on not-work. Focus on clubs. Focus on get-togethers. Or parties. Or hell, hookups. Focus on things that don't use the "work" glue to force together. Those things will last when your job changes, or gets bought out, or whatever.
I could do those other things you say, but none nearly for as much time as the time I spend at work, so work friends come quite easily and naturally by comparison. Proximity has a big effect on making friends[0]. And I could do those activities you suggest in addition to getting to know people at work, because those other things happen off work hours. (Though realistically, I'm too old for parties and not single enough for hookups :))
Though, club thing has actually never worked for me. Those acquaintances end up feeling the most distant because we meet too infrequently. Probably requires a hobby you're really into so that you get more frequent exposure to one another (IIUC this makes CrossFit a good way to make friends).
I can't really disagree more with this comment.
Some of the people most important and amazing friendships I've ever made have been created in an office. So many people ex-colleagues are still great friends and over time, our friendships have even grown over the years, even after not working together anymore. Like seriously, I've made friends with incredible people living in cities and working in offices which I don't imagine will ever be replicated with online working.
I now work for a 100% remote, I love it and while I do make friends, there's no way the bonds are even sightly as strong as those I formed hanging out with people, in-person. Since working remote, I've had to make new friends to hang out with and what's funny is, those friendships seem way more lucid and difficult to maintain because it's usually just based around hobbies and the friendships can be soured by the slightest bit of annoyance / jealously or whatever because there's no real consequence to treating each other poorly.
When it comes to my peers that I've worked with face to face, we had to trust each other, share hardships and work through problems and that made us become closer.
What I believe will happen is there will be people who work in offices together, and they will have more leverage over the "remotes" because they'll be a core group of people who share closer ties. Eventually this socializing is what will bring people back to cities and offices, that's where the power will be.
If you could say your school friends were "real friends", you can say your work friends are real friends. Modulo some child-like naivety, you were only friends with your schoolmates because you had to be at school with them. Hell, say you're homeschooled, and you're friends with kids in your neighborhood; you're only friends with them because you have to live around them. You can always make this argument for all except purely Internet friends you plucked from the æther of some Discord server.
No-strings-attached friends are different from school/geographic/work friends, in terms of quality of life threat and the social strategy that should govern your interactions, but I don't think you can't say they're all friends.
So as always one size does not fit all.
I wish it wasn't so popular for people in tech with mental issues to project them onto everyone else, instead of looking at the early family life that made them. Your parents failed if you are so afraid of the other. It is not everyone else's fault that they don't hate people.
Those who it's fake for are not allowed to throw it off. I get my socialization in groups I choose to be a part of where I don't have to curtail my every thought to avoid political retaliation that affects my livelihood.
And get a PhD before you start throwing around words like "mental issues" for things you disagree with.
Wittgenstein was not wrong. Language is meaningless without its connection to the rest of humanity.
Some of my colleagues struggled to maintain their health without their daily walks to the train, or just overworked themselves adapting to remote meetings and tools. Others are physically and mentally much healthier after substituting extra sleep, exercise, or preparation of healthy meals for the commute time.
A close analogy might be weight loss: "nothing" is stopping anyone from eating less, yet most Americans eat more than they should.
Going to the office meant a baseline of 7,000 steps a day, plus quite a few flights of stairs. Plus it was easy to go to salsa and gym after work (because I was already out of the house, so it was easier to to talk myself into going).
I struggle to do any of those things when i'm remote. I know perfectly well that I physically can, but that psychological inertia is extremely powerful.
Plenty of people benefit from imposed structure in their lives.
Yes, it's bad, yes, it's sad, but that's life. It's not all idealism and dreams.