He just wants me to be in office just for the shake of being in office..
That's what most companies which now have a 'hybrid' model do. Many around here (UK) advertise at being 'hybrid', meaning 2 days in a office a week. But, really, why?
I think most companies don't have a solid justification for this.
IMHO, if there must be set days in office they must be special days with everyone in office the same day and a focus on face-to-face interactions. If it's to code in office instead of at home 1-2 days a week there is no point at all.
In my case I would not care about going to the office if it were anywhere near downtown. That way I could go down to my local pub or game store after work. However, my company is located in the periphery of the city. If I want to go anywhere that means getting in my car once more.
If you're an executive and have a choice between pissing off your employees (who you view as fungible) and pissing off people in your network who could make your life/the life of your company more difficult, the obvious answer is to piss off your employees. If local and state governments can't depend on office workers for $$, they might need to start doing things like raising corporate tax rates or stop giving companies incentives/grants/exemptions. Basically in person is worse for the company's long-term bottom line but it's better in the short term for the people making the decisions. What does the CEO care if the company takes a hit in ~5 years? They won't be working there. They do care if they have to start paying more taxes or explain to the board why all of a sudden they have to start paying expenses that previously were offloaded due to agreements.
That's my read on it anyway. It's a fascinating social problem wherein the interests of the higher ups and the interests of the company as a whole are at odds.
Well there's plenty of readings like that, but there's very little evidence they're actually _true_. They're just stories told around fires about evil gods depriving poor workers of wfh.
I see plenty other (often misguided) reasons why managers keep pushing for RTO, but "my companys office space, oh egads" is almost never one.
Knowing the 'gods' are stupid rather than evil doesn't change 'acting in their own interests but not the interests of employees/the long term health of the company' problem. Why are they buying into these misguided reasons? Because it benefits them to do so. Why are they listening only to the RTO side? Because those institutions are more trusted by the decision makers.