Hacker News Reader

I would tend to agree RTO is primarily about middle managers and control

Though, I think the following could suffer from post-hoc rationalization fallacy:

> We noted that this kind of friendship definitely would not have happened if we were working remote.

Yes, I am great work friends with some of my former colleagues from foreign offices that I rarely saw in person. Similarly have good friends on my current fully remote team. I also have good friends from the fully in office era.

Turns out it's more on you as a person to figure out friendship than arbitrary spatial collocation.

Is it? The social ties that get built are stronger with in person interactions for me too. It’s not totally a wild hypothesis.

Depending on your home, it is often easy to create strong social ties with your neighbours or within your neighbourhood. Especially if you have kids.

Then the anecdote would be different. Definitely post-hoc since there's also plenty of workplaces you never end up with friends from. I am reasonably outgoing and have kept only a handful of friends from various past jobs. Mostly one group is still mostly friends (but we co-founded together so perhaps an unusual group).

> It’s not totally a wild hypothesis.

No, it's not, I agree. Though, plausible and intuitive do not equate to true and supported by evidence. It is the difference of human knowledge pre-1700s vs post, when science came along and basically said, "yeah, you think that, but how do you know that?" Post-hoc rationalization is quite powerful stuff. That something wound up happening, does not make it a generally true thing. Other factors can be at play.

I have the opposite problem as you: I've done tech all my life but live in a place where there are few tech opportunities, and it's a bit late in my life to switch to being a longshoreman. So I kind of have to find remote opportunities, even as it becomes more difficult to do so.

I just turned down a job that I would've been amazing at, because they're in person 3 days a week.

They lost literally tens of millions in grant opportunities that I have written and the experience I bring, because they wouldn't go remote 3 days instead of just 2.

I understand wanting some time in person, absolutely. I hate it, but it does make certain processes much easier. But to not negotiate at all, even when the candidate is perfect for the job and happy with everything else? Ridiculous.

I’m sure the person that took that job is grateful.

It's still open. So instead of filling it with a massively qualified candidate, they chose pain.

I suppose the bet from executives is: recession/influx of former government employees will allow for relatively easy replacement of candidates. I am not sure which consideration is more cynical and/or misguided.

[flagged]

We’re on HN; regardless of the validity of your point, there’s less inflammatory ways to word it.

Turning down a job because your potential employer values arbitrary control of their employees over the actual value they created and being frustrated at the silliness of it is so normal. If this is "pain in the ass" behavior I can't imagine how milquetoast and ChatGPT professionalism your company Slack must be.

I'm legit sorry if that's how I'm coming across. Don't read tone in text, because there's no sharpness or self-importance meant at all.

I'm not sure how else to say what I'm saying. My qualifications are literally perfect for the job. My experience is perfect for the job. My location is perfect for the job. My attitude is perfect for the job.

It was billed as remote up to four days but the department head only allows 3. That was a deal breaker. I legitimately only negotiated on that. I was willing to take a pay and title cut because I agree with the mission of the institution.

It seemed like a no brainer to me.

No personal attacks please.

Not a personal attack. Merely observing that he's coming off as someone I would not want to work with. This answers his tacit question of why they wouldn't accept his deal.

I gather that you didn't intend it as a personal attack, but we have to moderate by effects, not intent. By that standard, "how much of a pain in the ass you seem to be" is squarely in the personal attack category. Not a borderline call!

How did you get to the point of turning it down before finding out about the in person days?

Asking whether the job requires in person presence is usually among the first questions to ask in an interview (e.g., the screening part)

I've noticed companies that recruit on LinkedIn marking roles as remote, then at the very bottom of the long job description it mentions that it is in fact not remote. I could see someone making it through the initial calls without it coming up. I'd go so far as to say some companies may use it as a backhanded tactic.

I asked about remote and was told the company was up to 4 days a week remote.

Apparently I should've asked specifically about the role? Even though we were already talking about that role?

> they're in person 3 days a week.

> I asked about remote and was told the company was up to 4 days a week remote.

Wait, do they work 7 days a week?

If that's their attitude (and I've seen companies where it is), that's a huge red flag.

No, I worded that weird.

They said they were remote 4 out of 5 days. But the specific department is only remote 2 of the 5 days for that position.