Lyft CEO tells employees they must return to the office

It will be interesting to see how this plays out over the next decade. I don’t doubt that there are some people who are more productive in the office, but there are also a lot of people who are more productive from home as well. And there’s an undeniable competitive advantage when your company isn’t spending tens to hundreds of millions of dollars on Bay Area office real estate while your competitors are.

The incumbents have decided that RTO is a top priority, whether because the types of personalities that tend toward leadership positions like being at the office better (and are probably more extroverted if I had to guess), or perhaps RTO is a convenient alternative to layoffs. Whatever the reason, there are hundreds of new startups that began as remote companies during the pandemic and will continue working that way with remote work ingrained into the culture from the beginning, and I am very curious to see if there is any noteworthy difference in success outcomes based on this factor a few years from now.

My personal guess is that in the short-term remote work will start to disappear, but in the long-term it will make a strong and permanent comeback as a lot of these startups begin to displace the previous tech companies that once led the market.

I bet he actually thinks this is what most of his employees do. Like huddling around a whiteboard connecting boxes with lines or some shit until they all solve the "problem" and then give each other big high fives. Absolute doofus running this company.

I think people who run businesses see this as a purity test of who is “really invested in the company”. But the reality is that your best employees know they can move on and do, and you’re left with the desperate. Terrible strategy for innovation, but maybe ok if your company doesn’t foresee any big changes coming.

Screw these in-person bosses. If you didn't have culture before COVID you're not going to magically have it after coming back either. Employee gatherings need to be intentional & not stuffing people on the same floor & hoping to sneak in a conversation or two between back to back team calls with geographically spread out team members ironically

RTO really feels like you want miserable people. People who spend an hour or more commuting. People who pay super-high rents just to avoid the commute. People who can't relax because there's no nature...

I moved to the suburbs next to the mountain. Takes me > 1.5h to get to the office, but I never do.

I feel so much better...

If there's anyone left at Lyft waiting to be poached, now's the time.

Lyft is screwed. Can't imagine how this goes any other way.

Even under an RTO mandate to a sinking ship, people will still go in. Who are are they going to run to? Nobody is hiring and paying the same rates unless your resume say AI.

> The announcement about returning to the office came a day after Lyft said in an SEC filing that it would cut 1,072 employees – or 26% of its workforce – and eliminate 250 open positions.

Another company hoping some number of workers would self-select and leave so the company can evade the consequences of firing people to puff up a falling stock value. Anyone want to bet they'll do a buyback in the next couple of quarters?

I've wondered this in the pushback against RTO:

As an employee, if you make a push to change the parameters of your job, how close do you get the definition of being a contractor?

According to the IRS: "The general rule is that an individual is an independent contractor if the payer has the right to control or direct only the result of the work and not what will be done and how it will be done."

I guess the 26% layoffs weren't enough and they're hoping for more attrition.

No software company should force it's employees to come offices.

Employees are more productive when they work from where they likemost

At this point you can really just give a recipe for this type of article.

- business-brain CEO is flailing

- no better justification than "whiteboards" and "personal connection"

- leadership actually lied when they promised to support remote work

- trying to sell a hybrid setup as "balance" rather than half-assed and distracting

And the totally expected outcome which is of course that everyone ignores it, and a couple months later the CEO has to start counting to 3 in a parental tone for the umpteenth time.