Apple Wants Staff Back In Offices By September (bbc.com) 208
In a company-wide memo to staff on Wednesday, CEO Tim Cook said workers must return to their desks for at least three days a week, though exceptions will be made. The BBC reports: Some staff members will be given the option to work the remaining two days remotely. Teams that require "in-person" work will return for four or five days. Apple also told staff they will be able to apply for the chance to work remotely for two weeks a year. However, managers will need to approve remote work requests.
Mr Cook said that despite a smooth transition to remote working, it was not an adequate replacement for in-person collaboration. "For all that we've been able to achieve while many of us have been separated, the truth is that there has been something essential missing from this past year: each other," he said in the document. "Video conference calling has narrowed the distance between us, to be sure, but there are things it simply cannot replicate." He added: "I know I'm not alone in missing the hum of activity, the energy, creativity and collaboration of our in-person meetings and the sense of community we've all built."
Mr Cook said that despite a smooth transition to remote working, it was not an adequate replacement for in-person collaboration. "For all that we've been able to achieve while many of us have been separated, the truth is that there has been something essential missing from this past year: each other," he said in the document. "Video conference calling has narrowed the distance between us, to be sure, but there are things it simply cannot replicate." He added: "I know I'm not alone in missing the hum of activity, the energy, creativity and collaboration of our in-person meetings and the sense of community we've all built."
Think differently. Or not. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Think differently. Or not. (Score:4, Informative)
Managers tend to be extroverts. They like being around other people all the time, and have no inhibitions at all about imposing that on people who dislike it.
Software developers, of course, need to be able to concentrate in order to get anything done, so isolated environments tend to suit them better. When others start sending slack messages or whatever, a developer can take a minute to finish what they are working on before even glancing at their IM to see what's new.
Of course, managers absolutely hate that last bit. They love the option to walk right over to you and inturrupt you in order to force an immediate response. Also, they have no solid means of measuring the productivity of software developers, so they default back to "if I can't see you sitting at your desk, you are probably slacking off," which just reinforces their belief that people must be in the office in order for the business to be productive.
I think it is just a matter of time before all businesses go back to the pre-pandemic model.
You gotta feel for them (Score:3)
Apple built a giant cool circle campus, I could see the desire would be strong to draw people bak in to make use of it...
Apple does also have a strong culture of having engineers wander around and talk to each other though, I could see they would want to preserve that.
Re: You gotta feel for them (Score:5, Insightful)
Cool isn't really a word I would use to describe it, and from what I understand the employees don't really care for it.
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> Cool isn't really a word I would use to describe it, and from what I understand the employees don't really care for it.
They have lots of green space in the middle and a monstrous round building surrounding it.
They built a literal walled garden to keep their employees in where they can control everything and dictate every aspect of work life.
Why should anybody want out? Does working from home really sound that Epic in comparison? Choice sounds dangerous for everybody.
Re: You gotta feel for them (Score:2)
How is having nice, plant filled, inner and outer area at your office a bad thing? Why do plant mean dictatorship?
Not to keep people in... (Score:5, Informative)
They built a literal walled garden to keep their employees in
I don't know if you've stepped foot in California recently, ESPECIALLY anywhere with open green spaces, but it's not to keep employees in - it's to keep human feces out,.
Who would not love a giant park where you could actually go out and look up at the sky and trees as you walk, without worrying that you are stepping in shit or needles with every step?
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Is that really a problem outside of San Fran?
Re: Not to keep people in... (Score:5, Informative)
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Re: Not to keep people in... (Score:3, Informative)
Itâ(TM)s a major problem in every minor city and almost every beach in California and Oregon now too.
Santa Barbara, a town with maybe 100,000 people has over 3000 homeless living in the streets and parks. Napa, same problem. The state government has banned police from clearing out homeless encampments or arresting them.
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Hmm. No wonder people are leaving.
Re: Not to keep people in... (Score:5, Insightful)
Itâ(TM)s a major problem in every minor city and almost every beach in California and Oregon now too.
Santa Barbara, a town with maybe 100,000 people has over 3000 homeless living in the streets and parks. Napa, same problem. The state government has banned police from clearing out homeless encampments or arresting them.
Your solution to homelessness is arresting them or shooing them off?
Did you ever think that is the reason the problem is so bad? Treating them like inhuman scum.
I work, or at least before the plague, worked in London a city of 8.9 million people. You rarely ever saw a homeless person because:
1. We take reasonable measures to prevent people from becoming homeless in the first place.
2. Have support systems to help homeless people get off the streets and into work.
2 is the most difficult because 1 prevents you from becoming homeless from simply losing your job or a run of bad luck. So most of the homeless are there because they're too scared to seek out the assistance that is offered. This means that the mainstay of our homeless are either runaways scared of being sent back (abusive homes/care) or mentally ill (I.E. paranoid delusional), both of which still deserve and need our help.
I worked in a business park in London, it was a nice big green area with a few tall glass buildings and nary a fence in sight... Maybe your society should try helping the homeless rather than demonising them.
Re: Not to keep people in... (Score:5, Informative)
You need to understand that the culture is very different from just 'down on your luck' people who have lost their jobs.
I live in California, and I've been here for a long time. In the 5 main metro areas (San Diego, LA, San Francisco, Portland, Seattle) I've seen a huge increase in people who feel that working, paying taxes, paying for shelter, etc is just a bad choice, one they don't want to be part of.
Walking along the river in Portland, I've been told many times that I am a sucker for having a job, and being involved in the economy. I'm a fool for working. And, these people after spewing their tirade will then ask for money. Seriously.
It's a cultural issue, not a safety net issue. There is a huge culture of people who want to live on the fringe of society.
Most of this is probably to be blamed on drug use. (I am a big drug user too...but I am a functional pot head)
I work in a college town, and there is a whole society of homeless people who make their living by stealing students computers, bicycles, backpacks. They stand on the corner and tell people that society sucks, and they are stupid for being part of it. I've lived here for over 20 years, and you see the same type of people rotate through all the time.
This culture is prevalent in west coast cities, largely due to the good weather and liberal political climate. Someone else mentioned Santa Barbara...that city has perfect weather. If I were living outdoors I would go there ..not London.
You should come here and interact with these people. They are NOT generally down on their luck. They are proud of who they are, and where they are at. Spend some time in a major American west coast city and you will quickly learn that the guy berating you for working has absolutely no concern for society, and doesn't want to be part of it.
Re: Not to keep people in... (Score:3)
Ouch. America has a serious problem.
Why won't america fix it?
Re: You gotta feel for them (Score:5, Insightful)
Or if you can work remotely, you can find a place to live that has a large garden, or is near one, or near a beach etc - whatever you like.
You can cook the food you want, not be beholden to the available choices in a cafeteria, or you can choose to live near a place that has lots of food choices.
Re:You gotta feel for them (Score:5, Insightful)
Apple built a giant cool circle campus, I could see the desire would be strong to draw people bak in to make use of it...
There was a story about the huge trading floor that was built when a stock exchange renovated. But when traders found out they can trade from their desktop computer in their office, poof!, the huge brand new trading floor became empty.
Rather than trying to turn back the clock and force people to work in the old way, it is much better for everyone to move on with the times.
Re:You gotta feel for them (Score:4, Insightful)
it is much better for everyone to move on with the times.
Perhaps.
It is easy to say "WFH works fine!"
It is much harder to name companies that have made it work over the long term.
Prior to the pandemic, many companies tried and failed.
Perhaps the technology and tools have improved enough that this time will be different. But that isn't clear.
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The fail was usually not due to productivity problems. Generally, it was managers that just couldn't handle it cheating on the WFH policy until it barely existed.
Re:You gotta feel for them (Score:5, Interesting)
The fail was usually not due to productivity problems.
Can you name some companies that had good productivity with WFH?
Yahoo made a big commitment to WFH, but they didn't produce much and finally abandoned it.
Generally, it was managers that just couldn't handle it
So WFH requires competent managers who are good at measuring productivity and skilled at motivating remote employees?
Can I see a show of hands of everyone who knows managers like that?
Re:You gotta feel for them (Score:5, Interesting)
Gitlab seems to have done ok. Same with ElasticSearch. Linux kernel has done really well, despite the fact that they have no power to fire people.
So WFH requires competent managers who are good at measuring productivity and skilled at motivating remote employees?
Most managers are so bad at motivating employees, that being away from them in the office can only improve productivity. If you have to rely on the threat of punishment to motivate people, then you're a taskmaster not a leader.
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The trouble is that all these things are anecdotes. Gitlab's done OK and ElasticSearch. Who knows if they would have done better if they ha managed to get all their engineers into an office building together.
The Linux Kernel isn't a company but, on the other hand, two companies have produced operating system kernels of roughly equivalent capability. If we limit ourselves to the 64 bit versions of Linux, XNU and the NT kernel (mainly because the 32 bit XNU kernel isn't the product of one organisation), it wo
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Is Linux kernel developed at home? As I understand it, most kernel contributions are from corporations like Intel and Red Hat. I imagine these corporations have physical offices and that their workers worked in them pre-covid?
Re: You gotta feel for them (Score:3)
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My current job is working on industrial devices that are operated remotely. Internet link to a control system that is at least 3 hours drive away if it needs someone to physically push a button.
Working from home is actually quite useful in that it forces engineers to make sure everything can be done remotely so they can avoid having to commute in to press a button.
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Yahoo made a big commitment to WFH, but they didn't produce much and finally abandoned it.
Then they demanded that everyone return to the office and stopped producing at all.
Most of the world's Free Software is WFH. It pretty handily pushed Solaris, SCO, AIX, etc. etc. out of the market.
Pretty much everybody was WFH last year whenever and wherever it was at all possible, did you forget that already?
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I dont want to say where I work but its not a small company.
We have done a complete data center move with all staff being remote for over a year. This is multiple applications across thousands of servers.
Productivity is just as good as it was prepandemic. The people who didnt work before the pandemic arent doing anything remotely either. The workers, the people who did the bulk of the work, are still just humming alone.
Communication is by IM or phone. I would have to say we have done incredible in a WFH mod
Re:You gotta feel for them (Score:5, Insightful)
It is much harder to name companies that have made it work over the long term.
Prior to the pandemic, many companies tried and failed.
Nearly every company that survived the pandemic, survived with having a portion of their staff working remotely, some for months, some for more than a year.
There is no excuse for management to claim "remote working won't work" anymore, because the fact is laid bare for all to see -- it can work, and can work well in many different cases.
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It's probably harder to make the switch than it is to just start out fully WFH. I know a fair few startups that have managed to be fully WFH from day 1. In one I interviewed at but eventually declined had people working in timezones 8 hours apart without any major issues.
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I've been work for home for 5 years. In fact, my company after the pandemic no longer has a physical office and started hiring the best talent we could find anywhere in the world. We now have engineers in over a dozen countries. We had to adjust, we use UTC as a common time zone, we record meetings for off-hours team members (which happens on both sides of the pond), and we implemented a culture of writing over a culture of meetings. Everyone reads the material and comments on it, this repeats, then when we
Re:You gotta feel for them (Score:4, Informative)
Apple does also have a strong culture of having engineers wander around and talk to each other though, I could see they would want to preserve that.
They have a strong culture of engineers not being able to talk to eachother, even going so far as to ensure that engineers on different projects can't even access eachothers work areas. Access passes are very restricted, they take secrecy to a whole new level.
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If you have to rely on randomly bumping into people then there's a communication problem.
If you're an employee you should be able to easily find out who works on a given project such as xcode, and then contact either individuals or the team as a group if you need to discuss something.
And if you run into a random guy in the corridor, how do you know he works on xcode unless you already know him?
"chance" (Score:2)
> apply for the chance to work remotely for two weeks a year.
This makes it sound like a fucking lottery. I really hope this is just bad wording.
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And it's just 2 weeks. Is "working from home" some kind of code for "only work 20% of the time" to them? Why even offer this at all unless that's what they mean.
Well good luck with that (Score:5, Insightful)
Never ever stop being short sighted corporte America!
I realize that collaboration is better in person but this paradigm shift forced by COVID has shown more or less no productivity loss and in some cases productivity gains. Genie is out of the bottle and most people are going to want to keep their current work / life balance. I know I will
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I started with a new company in April. I was wfh out of state from day one and am not expected to come into the office except for large meetings / kickoffs / et al.
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At the end of the day, most of the companies that are demanding this sort of thing have, whether or not the individual employees have perceived it, experienced some loss in productivity since working from home began. While COVID has proved that in dire circumstances it may be possible to work from home for some industries, that doesn't mean that a company should consider it as an alternative when it is no longer being effectively mandated by the objectively more important interests of public health and sa
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This grandiose idea that working for a company is working on something bigger than yourself is so last century, though. Gone are the days were people sign up to a job expecting to do it for the next 30 years.
People now sign up with a company with the explicit plan that they will be out of there in two years. Companies themselves treat their workers less like an investment and more like a cost in need of minimization.
That and the millennial generation, and even more so the zoomzooms, are more conscious than
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Human beings are biologically wired to be social creatures, millions of years of evolution has shaped that, and that's not going to be offset by the introduction of some newer technologies that happen to allow us to function at what might otherwise be considered satisfactory levels.
We cooperate best with people that we know personally and actually see regularly. A company that has everyone working from home, all other things being equal, is more likely to have employees that experience less of a social
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Productivity will be lower if your staff are tired from commuting, stressed from not having enough time to do all their personal/family stuff like taking the kids to school. Even just the extra pollution from the commute has an effect.
So while being in the same room can help cooperation at times, it has a very real and significant cost too. Literally, the company has to pay rent on the office.
Previously a lot of that cost was paid by the employees. Now that more opportunities to work remotely are opening up
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There are many factors to consider for loss of productivity.
In many cases people with kids lost their childcare/schools. They couldn't go to work *and* look after their kids, but they can work from home and look after their kids at the same time albeit with reduced efficiency. So it's not the working from home that caused the loss of productivity, rather than trying to look after kids and work at the same time.
Once childcare facilities resume, people with kids would be free to concentrate on work during the
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Not necessarily. Some companies are contemplating getting rid of their hyper-expensive office space and wouldn't have anywhere but at home to put new hires.
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Translation from corp speak (Score:5, Insightful)
Translation: we just built a one billion dollar circle in the middle of some of the most expensive land in America. We need to use it.
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Are you sure the headline didn't say "Apple Wants Staff Back In Orifice by September?"
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Translation: we just built a one billion dollar circle in the middle of some of the most expensive land in America. We need to use it.
Translation: We're listening to the endless layers of middle management who are insisting we justify their existence.
Refusal to evolve (Score:5, Insightful)
Commuting is polluting, wasteful and when not absolutely necessary a degenerate waste of time.
Old people are obstacles to change. The question should only be how to make commuting ever less necessary and NEVER DESIRED because it's wasteful burden.
Those who adapt well to WFH should be emulated not denigrated. Modern connectivity should be used with the goal of supplanting in-person workplace interaction by BETTER systems, not humoring PHBs.
Re:Refusal to evolve (Score:5, Insightful)
Old people are obstacles to change..
And young morons have no life experiences to draw on. They are happy to repeat the mistakes that old people made long ago.
I love it when some asshat, who was in his mom's cooter 5 mins ago, tries to convince me that he/she has the answers to anything.
You don't know shit. And you revel in it.
Re:Refusal to evolve (Score:5, Insightful)
A guy who’s been on Slashdot for a couple of months is calling a guy who’s been here 20+ years a “young moron”?
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Unless your post is meant as a parody, you are illustrating the exact type of behavior from older workers that leads people (young and old) to not take them seriously. If you went off like this at work none of your colleagues would be impressed. Just smile and nod and hope the conversation ends soon.
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He does have a point, roundabout maybe but a point...
young moron lol
talk to me in another 20 years
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Sometimes young people are obstacles to change.
My lawn. Get off of it.
Re: Refusal to evolve (Score:2)
+1 Perspective
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Old people are obstacles to change..
And young morons have no life experiences to draw on. They are happy to repeat the mistakes that old people made long ago.
I love it when some asshat, who was in his mom's cooter 5 mins ago, tries to convince me that he/she has the answers to anything.
You don't know shit. And you revel in it.
You're the perfect example of what the GP was talking about.
You're basically an old person who thinks they have all the answers and ironically, doesn't realise that they're all wrong as he berates someone and dismisses their ideas simply because of their age.
There are two types of fool in this world, the first says it is old therefore good, the second says it is new therefore good.
Personally I listen to the idea and judge it on it's merit rather than the person who said it.
Now as for WFH, I've b
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No it's just common sense, commuting is a bad thing and we need to reduce it as much as possible.
Even my grandfather, who would be in his 90s were he still alive, always hated commuting and would seek to avoid it whenever possible.
He moved between several companies through his career, but always sought to live close to where he worked.
On several occasions that meant passing up a higher paying city job for one in a smaller town so that he could live within a few minutes of the workplace, rather than paying c
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It is. Face it. Most things done these days, at least in the service economy, can be done remotely. There is no need for my accountant to commute to an office. There is no need for my network administrator to go to the site. There is no need for my customer service rep to be in an office. And so on.
Now to be sure, there are some things that have to have physical interaction. How can you do maintenance on my car without physically being there? (At least until fully function robots become a thing.) And then
Re:Refusal to evolve (Score:5, Interesting)
Those who adapt well to WFH should be emulated not denigrated.
THIS!
I still remember the days when teenagers texting were ridiculed, including here in /. They were ridiculed for not making phone calls so they could talk and listen, there were claims that these people would grow up unable to talk and communicate properly, etc, etc.
Now, fast forward 20 years, nearly everyone use some forms of text messages to communication, rather than making phone calls, and those texts enable people to be even more connected than phone calls (e.g. group chats). Those teenagers 20 years ago now grown up to become adults, and we do not have a flood of adults incapable of talking or communicating.
Widespread remote working will enable competitive advantage to the companies that embrace it. They are capable of hiring the best from the whole country, or even the whole world, all the time saving on office rents, while their competitors are stuck with people living near their expensive offices. A team of remote staff naturally have resilience against natural disasters/disruptions, there is no need to close the office due to rainstorms, snowstorms, tornadoes, flooding, etc.
From a wider view, widespread remote working will allow a levelling of real estate prices, instead of everybody having to squeeze into a few large cities where most jobs are, pushing estate prices sky high, people can live where ever they like, becoming customers to local businesses around the country, resulting in higher quality of life for a large section of the population.
We should look towards the future, rather than trying to live in the past forever.
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From a wider view, widespread remote working will allow a levelling of real estate prices, instead of everybody having to squeeze into a few large cities where most jobs are, pushing estate prices sky high, people can live where ever they like, becoming customers to local businesses around the country, resulting in higher quality of life for a large section of the population.
It will be interesting to see if this helps more rural areas like you suggest or if it just makes suburban living near major cities more attractive. So far I have seen companies being more willing to let people work remote as long as they live close enough to come into the office periodically without needing airfare. But acceptance of being full remote in another part of the country is less palatable. This could help with housing prices as you suggest, but not necessarily as drastic as helping communities a
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It's not age, it's culture, habit, and personality. Some can't work at home due to kids, spouses, or other issues.
However... We should tax the shit out of companies for every employee that has to commute to an office. It's the only thing businesses seem to understand.
middle management only cares about meetings (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: middle management only cares about meetings (Score:3)
Itâ(TM)s funny you think that WFH causes managers who like meetings to stop making meetings.
Oh sure... (Score:5, Interesting)
"the hum of activity". I don't suppose it has anything to do with that billion dollar corporate office currently gathering dust now does it? I swear, these fuckers are all reading from the same playbook. Where I work it's the same message. Gotta get back in the office to "preserve the culture", "leverage synergies that can only occur face to face"...and on and on.
Fortunately our CIO recognized this was bad policy and went to the CEO and the board of directors and convinced them of the error of their ways. The feedback from our employees was overwhelmingly in favor of having to option to return to work in the office full time, part time or never. Choice vs Edict. Unfortunately they were a bit slow to come to that realization and in the interim a lot of people left the company. I mean a lot.
I'm not sure if this will happen at Apple but I do know this - their competitors are waiting in the wings, ready to scoop up disgruntled employees. I've been saying this for a while now but work from home has become part of the basket of benefits that people have come to expect, along with paid vacation, healthcare, 401K and parental leave. Companies that won't allow work from home are doing so at their own peril.
Put it this way - if you are interviewing with two companies and all other things being equal, one offers work from home and another doesn't. Which one are you going to choose?
Re:Oh sure... (Score:5, Insightful)
"the hum of activity"
That hum of activity is the reason we wear noise cancelling headphones in the open plan offices they make us commute to.
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Complete non sequitur for most people. If I could make 80% of the the salary I would at apple working for a different company elsewhere, I'd probably do it. Once apple is willing to hire you, they or a competitor will again. Now imagine you made 150K at apple but could take home $110-$120K in the midwest (or insert wherever), where property is 1/2 the price. Which one are you going to choose? That's the more li
Re: Oh sure... (Score:2)
Unless your job involves hardware, since Apple is partly a hardware company, and R&D for hardware usually requires physical manipulation of the device.
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The actual number of people who get or need hands-on with prototypes at Apple HQ is in the single-digit-percentages. Most of their workforce is software and design; two things that CAN be done from home... even the design and prototyping doesn't require hands-on all the time either.
Remember, Apple hardware is DESIGNED in the USA, not made.
Re: Oh sure... (Score:2)
Depending on the market there are some options. Google and Facebook have offices outside of the Bay area, so if you can happen upon a job at another FAANG then you'll likely see RSUs.
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Well, then things aren't exactly equal if one offers higher pay than the other, or better benefits, or more stability.
In your example you have a more difficult decision to make. Some people will take the blue-chip company with the higher pay. Others will put greater value on the shorter commute, or more interesting work, or less corporate politics that you might find in a smaller company.
I guess it all comes down to how much of a premium you put on working from home. For some it's a big deal. Others not so
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On the other side of that, if the commute isn't an issue you can easily get a much nicer place to live for less than half of what you have to pay to get a tolerable commute to Sillycon Valley.
The higher paying office only employer is starting with a few thousand a month deficit.
Toldja. (Score:4, Insightful)
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A year ago everyone was tossing around the phrase 'new normal', and with regards to work-from-home, especially so. "Working in-person is outdated, we'll never go back to it, productivity is actually better, this is the new normal!" Yeah not so much, I knew as soon as things got back to something like normal all that would go away. Bosses are bosses, they're anal retentive to start with, and if they can't sneak around and spy on you working then they get all anxiety-ridden and just can't cope. So back to the cube farm you go!
I both agree and disagree.
The place I'm at was 100% in-person prior to the pandemic, but leaned hard into remote work as soon as the pandemic started, to the point that we've now pivoted to remote-only. We announced plans last year to allow anyone to continue full-time remote work after the pandemic ended. At that point we were no longer limited by geography, so we could hire from anywhere in the US, rather than being limited to the talent that was available in the small pond where we're based. As we starte
This is fine (Score:3)
Now, if Apple insists in bringing everyone to the office 100% after a while, then that'd be a very dumb move as it will simply create resentment. The way I see it, most white and pink collar jobs that were being done remotely will shift into some sort of hybrid model. The genie is out of the bottle (work can be done remotely) and companies competing for talent will have to dangle that carrot to attract/retain workers.
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It's not really ok. It forces people to co-locate with the office location which limits living choices, and it's still a massive waste of time and carbon on commuting those 2 or 3 days a week.
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It's not really ok.
No. It is ok if it is a balance that is agreeable to the majority of workers and serve the employer's needs. There will be workers who will want to remain remote full time. There will be workers who would want to go to the office full time, and there will be workers who will want to stay in a hybrid system.
No compromise is ever going to satisfy everybody, and you all need to stop projecting your predilections on the general case that serves a particular company.
A hybrid system is not new, it's old and p
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People that are any smart and can work remotely are leaving California en masse due to its shitty policies, high taxes and regulations
The number of people leaving Cali during the pandemic that matches this description barely qualified the "en masse" adjective.
Moreover, jobs do not belong to employees, they belong to the employer. And an employer has the power to dictate where employees are to conduct business.
I live in South Florida (which is pretty damned expensive.) I could have moved to a cheaper place during the pandemic (and using the pandemic as a reason or excuse.)
But then what? I would depart the largest job market south of
"but there are things it simply cannot replicate" (Score:5, Insightful)
Look on the bright side (Score:3)
The end of WFH means also a stronger position to negotiate as otherwise they could hire anybody anywhere in the world.
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Which would be far less of an issue if you could live somewhere much cheaper. Companies would prefer people in the same timezone and able to commute in occasionally. It's just the high wages that are an issue, but if you don't need high wages and can enjoy an even better quality of life by simply living someone cheaper then it benefits both parties.
Workers prefer their home instead of Biodome. Huh. (Score:3)
The vaccine isn't immunity (Score:2)
Tl;Dr it is way too soon to be going back into the office.
Re:The vaccine isn't immunity (Score:4, Interesting)
I think you misunderstand what vaccine immunity is and does.
Regardless of the disease, it doesn't put you in a bubble. If your body comes in contact with the virus -- measles, mumps, rubella, hepatitis, chickenpox, or the coronavirus behind COVID19 -- and the virus will instantly and mechanically begin attacking cells and replicating. It attacks you regardless of your vaccine status.
With immunity (either through vaccination or prior exposure) your body recognizes it and can immediately begins producing effective antibodies. It may take hours or even days for all of them to be eradicated, but either way your body knows exactly how to counterattack. You are still infected with the disease if someone with an airborne disease coughs on you, its just that your body sees it and immediately begins the counterattack so it doesn't spread and overwhelm your system. Since the disease is immediately fought in your body and replication is limited, you are unlikely to develop enough of the virus to spread to others. It can still theoretically spread as it exists in your body, but it is extremely unlikely as the number is low. Same with serious infection and hospitalization, if your body's response is not effective enough you might still become ill or even hospitalized, but the vaccination's immunity usually limits the damage the disease can do.
Those who have been vaccinated and have had time for their body to adapt (normally two weeks after the second dose) can return to their normal activities without fear of this disease, just like you can go about your activities without fear of measles, mumps, rubella, or other diseases for which you have been vaccinated. People who otherwise are in good health and normal conditions (e.g. not immunocompromised or living with someone who is immunocompromised) have no reason they couldn't.
I'm just glad it doesn't look like a disease like tetanus. Five vaccine doses as a kid, plus boosters every decade as an adult. That disease really wants to attack.
Re: The vaccine isn't immunity (Score:5, Interesting)
That's the simple, generic, and wrong view.
The complex view is more ... complex than that. See also this [dreamwidth.org].
Essentially there are several responses to an infection that generate immunity, called immunoglobulin. There is IgA and IgG, the former for nose/throat, the latter mostly for lungs.
Now intramuscular vaccines tend to produce predominantly IgG, so if vaccinated, Covid would still infect your upper respiratory tract (i.e. throat amd nose). You'd presumably fight it off as a small cold and it would not descend into your lungs, but you'd probably still be infectious to others, as your mouth and nose are the primary mechanisms by which you spread the virus.
But you should (1) really read the article, there's a lot more to it even than what I've told you, and (2) just accept that even the experts still know very little about all this. So you & me know a lot less. Be aware of this, and be more humble. Everyone is entitled to a cautionary opinion, and you shouldn't interfere with that out of dangerous half-knowledge.
Re: (Score:2)
Meanwhile, many of us "went back to the office" as far back as last May.
Re: The vaccine isn't immunity (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
HVAC crews and other maintenance people probably had significantly reduced human contact after the shutdowns started. Imagine being in a production environment working shoulder-to-shoulder with people wearing cheap cloth masks over 9-10 hour shifts, with many wearing the masks under their nose due to the discomfort of constantly having to rebreath your own hot exhalations. That describes most people in manufacturing and food processing in the United States over the past year. At least some of the food pr
Get ready for more H1B1s (Score:3)
Honestly I don't know where these people who refusing to go to the office are going to find jobs. If your job can be done remotely it can be done by someone in the developing world who is going to work for a lot less. On the other hand if part of the job requirement is to come into work they can always bring in some H1B1s if the locals won't do it. Especially the really big companies like Apple with substantial HR departments, they'll have no problem doing to the visa paperwork.
Dude (Score:2)
Did he say "serendipity"? (Score:2)
This is an appeal to authority, but... (Score:2)
Tim Cook runs a company worth over $2,000,000,000,000. Maybe he knows a thing or two about what's important for its success? Time will tell, of course, but "Tim Cook is a boomer who doesn't understand how to run a modern company" doesn't really stick.
Re: (Score:2)
Either he knows a thing or two about what's important for success, or he's just riding on the backs of those who ran the company before he came onboard.
Cook didn't come up through the ranks at Apple, either. He was with Compaq and IBM prior to 2011.
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He's been running the company for a decade at this point and things seem to be going well. Poor CEOs have driven companies into the ground on much shorter timeframes. Is he just riding on the backs of the people really running the company? If he is, so what? The most important thing a CEO can do is make sure they're surrounding themselves with good people. Mission accomplished.
Same thing at the company I work for (Score:2)
Then the pandemic hit and they had no choice but to allow everyone to work remotely. As far as I can tell, once things were up and running, there was no change in product
Working from home is not optimal (Score:2)
We all like to work in our pajamas in the comfort of our own homes.
I am a coach, I teach teams how to work together and write applications. While we have managed to work remotely, it is far from ideal as a coach.
80% of human communication is non-verbal. It is easy to overlook how useful body language is until you can't use it. When I am teaching something and I can't see the group, it is impossible to tell if I lost my audience. I can't tell if they are understanding what I am saying, if they are distr
The Extroverts have suffered enough. (Score:3)
Sure the Introverts have been suffering their whole lives trying to seem more personal having their whole day productivity sucked away due to silly small talk. But those Extroverts had over 1 year with limited contact with people, is killing them. They never grew up in a society that constantly told them to smile more and be more personal, otherwise you will be labeled as some weirdo who may have autism. They just don't know how to handle an environment where their natural personality isn't openly welcomed and encouraged.
Now those introverts are getting credit for their work, because no one is talking the ear off management, because management will need to judge performance by the numbers and metrics vs their gut feelings. That can't happen, the order of things is the Extroverts do the talking and the credit, while the Introverts suffer the environment
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to the welcoming arms of far more open and innovative companies that value their employees' preferences.
Can you name some of these open and innovative companies?
How successful are they?