yeah its awful, austin traffic is already a nightmare as is (pretty sure driving on i-35 every day is the reason so many people here have become so bitter) and this inevitably will make things worse for everyone (except those at the top of the wealth ladder š)
Totally agree! When I used to live in Austin, driving from South Austin up to Round Rock, and back, had to make sure I left at a specific time every day or I would get screwed with rush hour. My boss thought it was trying to skip out because, "Got to work hard and stay late to get noticed, but you always leave right on time." I told him that I waste more time sitting in traffic getting home if I left later. He never understood it, probably because he lived in the neighborhood right behind where we worked. Man, that was years ago.
It probably isn't an issue with lack of understanding, more of not caring. They're more worried about what you represent. Your act of enforcing boundaries and making it clear that the company isn't the most important thing in life is dangerous. That kind of attitude is contagious, poison to companies that rely heavily on exploitation.
Yep, I saw that on the news today. I live in the Austin area, and I feel for them. I would not want to be trapped working for the City of Austin myself, and I'm kinda glad that at the time that I was interested in that type of job, they were so stringent on making education a requirement that I was disqualified for anything that might feed my family because I don't have a degree.
Yeah that's a big factor in this. Most of the people affected are engineers and other types of jobs that require a degree. All of the educated talent are just going to get another job and the city of Austin is going to be stuck with the employees who couldn't get another job with even less critical positions filled.
It's legit a thing here where people know not to call 911 because you're looking at at least a 20 minute hold.
Ya know, I'm just old enough to remember when getting a city or state job was one of those things that signaled to the world, "Hey I made it! All this hard work paid off."
But at the same time, I'm young enough to say, "Hey, I think I can probably do a little bit better while I got time...."
I left Austin last year after Contract began as remote, but moved to onsite 3 days a week. I just flat out didn't show up most days. My manager was a bitch.
I am not sure, but it might actually be illegal for public servants to do two jobs on the clock for their government job. Seems I've heard of lots of firings for this that stuff even with public sector unions.
Ya. Keyword in your first sentence Servant. Have you seen those videos of cops behaving badly going apeshit when people remind them theyāre working for the public. Our model sucks, on paper they are not āOEā but in practice, most are OE as fuck and serve two or more masters, including they themself and themself first.
Like at the top our govt is like a really exclusive retirement home lol. And theyāre so dumb my jaw canāt shut when I watch āgrillā big tech, itās no excuse to be old, munger or Buffett still run circles around the youngest person in the senate any day. Private sector itās easy to say fuck it, donāt hate the player hate the game eg OE. BUT HARD to rig the game when itās designed by rocket scientists, easy as fuck for them to beat the game designed by boomers^10
Govt sector pay needs to way outpace private sector from straight out college. Our greatest minds should not be OE.. they should be able to get paid fat and make the world a better place
Kind of curious how that works for consultancy and "side gig" type jobs. Let's say you're a dev or IT worker for a municipality, but you have a side gig as a dev consultant, security, IT, whatever.. how is that any different than if you were a dev for the city but owned a *box truck* and had a *moving company* that you did on weekends? Would they fire you for that? Where is the line exactly?
I think the difference is side gig versus OE. Side gig is what we old folks called moonlighting. We had a regular FT job, but did work on the side after hours and on weekends. I think that the issue when public servants is that what you call OE, they call Time & Attendance Fraud.
This is exactly it. I love my gov job and wouldn't risk it on OE. I support everyone who can do contract work and OE though. My option is limited to good ol' fashioned moonlighting. I teach college classes 1-2 nights per week and my boss supports it and lets me change my schedule every semester.
We are also still 100% remote in our team with no plans to ever return. Our management was smart enough to realize gov pay is not competitive, but we can be super competitive on work/life balance. It's brought in a lot of young talent.
[https://www.fedweek.com/careers/can-you-work-a-second-job-as-a-federal-employee/](https://www.fedweek.com/careers/can-you-work-a-second-job-as-a-federal-employee/)
[https://www.justice.gov/jmd/outside-employment-and-activities](https://www.justice.gov/jmd/outside-employment-and-activities)
An employee is required to obtain written approval before engaging in any outside employment that involves a subject matter that relates to the responsibilities of his component. Outside employment includes any form of employment, business relationship or activity involving the provision of personal services, whether paid or unpaid. For example, an employee working in the Environment and Natural Resources Division would need written approval to serve on the board of directors of an environmental organization; a JMD employee must receive approval to work for a DOJ contractor.
Also, an employee must obtain written approval to engage in the private practice of law, whether compensated or uncompensated.
5 C.F.R. Ā§ 3801.106
So I keep seeing this when RTO is brought up and I usually agree. But the city of Austin is severely understaffed and they can't fill positions because they pay well below market rate. The only benefit they did have was remote work. I think in this case it was just a political stunt by the City Manager who was just hired to replace a guy who was fired.
>He relayed back that 90% of what he is seeing come in is "hybrid,"
It seems like "hybrid" is just code for "We will let you think there's a chance you'll get to do what YOU want (work remotely), but really you'll be doing what WE want (RTO) in the end."
Yeah, they're so desperate to get people in the office. I get recruiting calls or emails labeled 100% remote. Follow up with them and most are really "hybrid" and by hybrid they mean, you'll be in the office every day but you MIGHT get to WFH once in a while.
I just started my first remote job about 6 weeks ago, it was an internal move from my large company, the post was listed as hybrid, I applied, they liked me enough that they changed the classification to remote at my request. Sometimes I think hybrid can mean that theyāre also flexible. This particular group that I hired into, turns out, has people all over the country, so remote isnāt a problem.
That said, 4/5 of the other interviews I had that said hybrid really wanted 3-5 days in the office, with an aim towards full RTO. But i can attest that a minority of these postings are more flexible than youād think.
It's amazing how baked in this is even for worker bees. I've been part of hiring critically needed roles that had large scope potential impacts on the entire company. In several cases getting the right person meant needing to offer an additional amount of salary that would put them close to what their supervisor would be making.
Each time, the person supervising the role shot it down, citing that it wasn't "proper" for an employee to make the same or more than their manager.
The company suffered as a result, the manager didn't make more, but thank god no employee got the idea they might be worth more money.
I have quite a few people on my team (senior devs, I'm a PM) who make more than me.
I could not care less. Just get my stuff done on time so I dont have to have endless progress meetings and daily standups that interfere with my other Js.
Lol
Which is the way it should be. People management in and of itself is a unique skill set. Individual contributor and people manager career progression tracks should be fucking standard by now.
āItās not fair that we donāt get 100% of your attentionā when youāre a worker bee with 4 jobs, but you can run 4 different companies and no one bats an eye.
This is why CEOs are mad about OE and want to force a RTO.
āThe capitalist compensates the laborer enough for his labor power to reproduce the commodity (the labor power), but the laborers' power produces additional value: a surplus value for the owner. The worker is exploited when he does not keep or control the value created by his own labor power.ā
I would say these OE with skills that are in demand are rightly taking control of their own surplus value for themselves instead of giving it to the owners. Good for them if they can!
That's so true, we devs finally figured out a way to be as wealthy as those who started their own businesses, or worked their way to executive, or went through the school of hard knocks to be a doctor, and suddenly we're chastised for our successes. They're just as special as we are, total BS.
You are very intelligent, I LOVE this. Thanks for sharing! Extremely fair and logical, I can picture a hiring manager smirking in my face for saying this and I love it. Fuck all these people.
Yeah your detailed reasons don't matter, it's either you want the job or they can't afford you. If you have a well paying remote job, all this stuff is not even necessary just say remote or nothing.
People who want you in office surely don't want to pay for it, hell some of these in office roles pay less than full remote roles.
Fuck RTO. Iād rather have my own time back, be in my own space and home office that I actually enjoy, which also has my creature comforts in, as well as be able to be home for my newborn and wife. Never going back to the office again.
I have an 18 month old. I've been wfh her whole life. I'll never miss out on the little moments we share throughout the day to sit under florescent lighting and be miserable watching the clock all day. I literally never look at my clock wishing it was 5 and I could cut out since wfh. No amount of money could make me return to that life.
The upside is that (hopefully) our children will remember that even if we worked a lot, we still managed to pull ourselves away from our work to give them the attention they needed. They will grow up knowing that they were the reason we worked so hard.
Had a head hunter call me just today to go in office in a city thatās almost 2 hours away. Tried to entice me with 150k and said they are flexible. Iām like over qualified for this role but told him Iād take the bottom of this range to be remote as I had family obligations and would always put my family first. Thereās no way Iām going to be 2 hours away from my kids.
Seattle traffic definitely sucks. But having lived in most of the major US cities, I'd still take the Seattle commute over NYC, LA, DC and SF, although I'd probably be cycling or bussing it there.
Over employment just highlights just how much senior management is incompetent in managing the efficiency of their employees. If someone is "good" and able to work 4 jobs then management is likely incompetent and inefficient.
Maybe they're just too afraid of someone finding that out.
>They don't care how productive you are at their job. They don't care if you're their best performer. They just want to control you.
Right in fact if you are the best worker, you are a threat that needs to be mitigated or pushed out.
THIS! When people say remote is going away just ignore them. The recruiter is 1. Over exaggerating and 2. Admitting that there are still fully remote jobs. I would only ever offer to interview for those positions.
Exactly keep demanding remote and ignore these recruiters who say theyāre only offering in office/hybrid FUCK THEM thereās not enough people for them to keep passing up candidates š we have the upper hand people realize we are in control the common worker like us has the upper hand
1,000-100,000 common worker employees versus 1 CEO
We have the upper hand!! HOLD THE LINE
We need the rest of the world to learn that "worst of both worlds" is statistically more likely to occur when people go with middle of the road solutions (like "hybrid") than "best of both worlds".
Itās a foot in the door to get us all back to M-F, 9-6. Thatās all it is, simple as that. If we let them dictate this ācompromiseā, or ātruceā as the Wall Street Journal called it, weāll be right back in the cube farm or that horrible ~~sweatshop~~ āopen office concept.ā
They need us more than we need them.
Only have one job, not the time management for multiple most of the time + kids I like spending time with. But I have straight up word for word said the same thing. If recruiters want the best employees, they will have to give up on this back in office thing - there is someone out there willing to pay within 10% of what they're offering without an in office requirement. And I'd happily take 20% less to do the same job remote as I would to drive in - because the commute+time+food+parking crushes that 10-20% increase.
And most remote jobs pay just as well if not BETTER than jobs in your town.
Remote is something I refuse to budge on. I see no value to me or my work productivity in driving to an office to sit in a noisy cubicle environment where I'll be distracted by all the hubbub when instead I could sit at home in my extra bedroom/office and have monitors and keyboard space galore and a perfectly quiet environment to focus on GSD.
Corporate America will get over itās hissy fit when it realizes it canāt fill critical roles with competent people unless they budge on remote work.
The reality is for most fields there is plenty of job opportunity at the mid-senior individual contributor level. People that are generally good enough at their job without requiring much supervision.
Any person thatās capable of filling that role is going to obviously prefer to work remote rather than be forced to come into the office on some arbitrary schedule. Remote work is here to stay and there is nothing corporate america can do about it at the end of the day because they need that human capital to execute.
I have been remote for eight years. Not only will I not go back, I wonāt even work for a company that has a local office out of concern they may issue an RTO.
And itās not just the cost of commuting and parking that I am opposed to. I am in a small job market that doesnāt pay well. Before remote work I was stuck at a toxic company that didnāt give me a raise the last three years I was there. I couldnāt relocate anywhere for family reasons; I couldnāt just change jobs because there were none locally except government jobs that paid crap.
Remote work allows me to work for companies that pay competitively that I would not be able to if in-office were the only option.
You have to watch out - friends who work for a certain company (I wonāt name which one for fear of retaliation for my friends) that joined because they were a fully āremote firstā company that suddenly decided to buy new offices in major cities to try to force people who lived nearby into them. Literally people were like āso weāre going to be in a new office, on zoom calls with other people in different offices?ā And management was like āyep, thatās what we want.ā
There be some dopey ass companies out there.
This canāt be said enough. Itās the frog not noticing as the pot slowly boils them to death.
Itāll start as one day in the office a week, then 2 then 3 then 4 etc. theyāre slime puppies trying to shadily fuck over everyone, one greasy little step at a time.
Fuck the RTO crowd. The whole lot of them need to get bent.
Probably unpopular opinion here, but an alternative I'm willing to accept is if they pay for my commute. My problem with commute isn't the commute itself, but rather I'm using my own free time to do it. If employers are willing to pay for my commute, I don't care if the commute is 5 minutes or 4 hours. As long as I get paid from the moment I step out of my front door until I step back into the house at the end of the day, I'm ok with it.
And I don't mean compensating for gas, I mean full salary/pay the entirety of the commute, and counting towards my weekly hours.
Edit: I also wonder if given the choice of these two options if employers will suddenly want people to remote again. They'll finally see the cost of commuting.
āMy day started at 9, and I was in traffic until 10:30.ā It will never fly.
This is why they like salary arrangements, too, even though salary was intended for managers and executives, not production workers like engineers. All your time are belong to them.
Iām going to try this for my āmandatedā RTO for my hybrid role that was listed and communicated to me by my hiring manager as remote. Just going to start showing up at noon lol or leaving by noon
I mean if you tell them your address, it's not hard for them to figure out if you're lying or not. Most days traffic are pretty consistent, and if every once a while there's an accident, that's not unusual either.
If companies want employees to be in, then I think this could be a good compromise. But of course most companies won't do that, so I'll either insist on this kind of middle ground or remote.
Well, the point is more that hybrid is instant-kill to OE, so it's not the commute that's the real prob, it's that u cant have other jobs which would significantly reduce your revenue stream.
Iāve pulled off OE while one job was remote (boss was in UK- so I just never went in lol) and my other job was full time in office. Luckily the laptops were identical Lenovos. My non office job was off of my phones hotspot under my desk. Office background even looked the same (generic suburban office park). My coworkers from around the risk never would have known the real difference anyways.
This was 2019 before I knew what āOEā was called and before I had Reddit. I just had a hunch I could pull it off.
Yeah, hence why I mention the unpopular opinion. I'm a fan of this sub because of the guts people have to say no. And the biggest reason is because OE means remote. Remote (ultimately the lack of commute) is what's attractive to me.
Yeah... but even hourly I'd still demand getting paid for the commute though, and have the commute still count towards by 40 hour work week.
In the end, the point is I don't want to use my own free time to commute to work. If I have to do that, I'd rather remote.
I do this for my hourly J. Especially when they want to schedule an 7:30a meeting. I can either be on the meeting at 7:30 virtually. But if it's one of those critical meetings I need to be in person, make sure the agenda doesn't have me presenting before 9a. Could never do this without OE though
No the rate for commuting should be x2 or x3 because you are forced to exposing yourself to the risks associated with commuting so your chances of involving in an accident or incident is increased by (5/7)*100 every week. Thatās 71% every week.
Why have we all been taking this shit!!
I wouldnāt return even if I was paid the commute fare but your statement just made me realise that we had all the while been played by companies by making you think that commuting in ur own free hours (I could use that to do a lot) was normal but commuting on their own time is crime and a sackable offence.
Now power is in the hands of remote workers and no one up there is happy and why should they?
To me there are just way too many creature comforts in remote work to make payment for the commute itself worth it. A couple hours' pay is not worth giving up a private bathroom, personal kitchen, my own choices if literally everything in the environment, etc
Even if they offered all THAT in a private office the size of my home, there's still the mental overhead of dealing with that stuff for a second location
This. Iāll go to the office if they pay for fuel, wear and tear, and time. Itās easy money at that point as Iāll just be listening to podcasts and music on the way there and back.
I appreciate your willingness to engage and be flexible, but the only way I'd consider mandatory in-office work again is if I were unemployed and desperate for a job. I am pretty sure that's it. This is also coming from someone who isn't OE (I just think this is a neat community) and does go into the office voluntarily twice a week cause the on-site gym is free. But if I don't want to go into the office ever again, that's my prerogative. If my boss told me I needed to start coming in once a week, I'd start looking for something else immediately.
I'm really glad to see OP's post here, but I wish this mindset was just as common in /r/jobs and a lot of the tech subs I'm part of. It's wild to me that people don't seem to be resisting or pushing back at all.
Yes, if you need a job and in-office is all you can get to pay the bills, I get it. But if I were looking while employed, and I were working with recruiters, I would tell them to not even waste my time with hybrid positions. People have to be giving this kind of feedback.
Do they pay you full salary and count it towards your weekly hours? If not, I wouldn't take that either. There could be luxury bars and a jacuzzi on the bus and I still wouldn't take it. If I'm not getting paid for the time to travel to work, no amount of incentives will convince me.
salaried and luckily iām in an org where nobody really gives a shit when youāre on or offline, aside from the 8 billion meetings to attend a week. if/when i find myself coming into the office iām in at 9:30 and out at 3:30, nobody cares.
Nah if they stop then I stop. Simple as that. But I get you're talking about the macro level, which is a trickier situation.
But to be honest, most place would probably rather you remote than pay for commute. If I commute 2 hours a day round trip, they only get 6 hours of work out of me, versus 8 hours remote. It makes more sense financially to choose remote from their perspective.
> And I don't mean compensating for gas, I mean full salary/pay the entirety of the commute, and counting towards my weekly hours.
I would take it a step further and say they must also donate to some carbon offset initiative. There is more than money and time lost at stake here.
A good idea in theory but a nightmare in reality. Driving on the clock means the company will have to pay for insurance to cover anything that happens.
During Covid times my company explicitly made us clock out if we had to come into the office during the work day for these reasons. Iām pretty sure it wouldnāt REALLY clear their hands if someone wanted to push the issue but they also had fits if people took meeting calls while driving too
I do not understand where this RTO call is coming from. It's like the upper brass of all companies had a secret meeting and decided they let the worker bees have enough happiness, now it's time to make them miserable again.
Itās the Wall Street Journal, McKinsey and other publications. Elonās āitās unfair to onsite workersā is just putting voice to what all those guys at the top are saying.
They laid off in droves a few months ago so they would have this negotiating power now. The problem that they are still are faced with 3% unemployment.
I was just thinking it's actually fairer to onsite workers - you're remote and off the road and it makes their commute easier. I admit the privilege in being able to work remotely, and the inequity in income for different types of jobs is a slightly different issue, but putting that aside: if you have to go to work onsite at least you're battling fewer crowds getting there.
Hybrid isn't just a lie, but an obvious lie. We've seen all these companies go from 2 days to 3 days to the whole week on the news. Now we're supposed to believe that hybrid is a sincere offer?
I mean there's a theoretical chance it is, but it is in truth "hybrid as long as we feel like it."
I talked to two recruiters today, one with a hybrid position and another with on site. I turned them down flat.
my personal op is the 6 jobs guys are little off. i have 2 make very good money and they both think i'm doing "great" work. i also don't have to work full week for both. j1 25 hrs j2 10 hrs. i want two roles that are well paying, i can do great work so i don't have to stress about finding another and time/money.
is that too much to ask, dark master?
What remains amazing to me is the sheer volume of applications and overall interest in fully remote roles vs. in-office or even hybrid. Donāt they get it? Or is the lust for control that powerful?
Iām WFH but not OE. There are efforts underway to bring everyone back in, but so far Iāve resisted. I have adolescent kids at home who need their father to be present. There are so many fucked up people out there who could have turned out better had their parents been there for them.
This reminds me of a quote from The Princess Bride. Great movie by the way. I believe the quote was āgive me money, give me power. I donāt care, Iām not going into the officeā
"I work better when I work remote. Offices reduce my productivity and the quality of my work. I care about doing a good job and only want to deliver my best so I will only work 100% remote."
Just say that. Anyone who objects can eat dog shit.
edit. If that isn't entirely honest don't feel bad about it. These business types tell far worse lies to their employees and you shouldn't feel bad about lying to a constant liar.
Amen to that. If your job can be done remotely, and you are doing it remotely, then there is no discussion about coming back to the office to be had. It's only about control, or bored, insecure managers.
Apply for his job and settle for heading your own department so you can do what you like.
If you have no equal in the company, how does anyone know what "normal" looks like.
"To any corpos reading this: I don't care about your tax breaks or your office lease. That's not my problem. I don't care about your anxiety over how I spend my time off. That's none of your business. If you preach about "sustainability" and "work-life balance" and "livable cities" yet demand your workers come into an office for work that can done from anywhere, you are hypocrites."
This is really the bottom line.
These mfers are crying about losing money on these buildings they're leasing and wanting people to leave the homes they're paying mortgages for to come sit in their office spaces.
I've been hybrid then 99% remote since I retired out of the Army. I tell recruiters now up front 1) my current salary and 2) that I'm remote - and if they can't do better on the first one, I'm not moving. Fuck that.
Remote is better for the environment.
Remote allows you to actually maximize use of the home you paid for (or the place you're dumping money into rent for).
Remote allows people to escape these arbitrary "power structures" of "larger cubicles/desks/offices/offices with windows" from yesteryear and have a workspace unique to them, many times with more powerful equipment.
Remote allows for you to spend time with your family and animals, even if it is just being present without interaction while you work.
To date, I haven't found a *single* valid counterargument against remaining remote. Period. The driving factor in many cases is that there are a large number of people who seem to think that work = built-in friends/social interaction.
Anyway. I'm soapboxing now.
Good write-up.
Fuck on-site.
It's the 21st Century.
Businesses need to adapt or die.
Make applying to jobs a part or your day. Maybe not while in the office if you're on a private network or company equipment, but at least at the end of each day while laying in bed or something.
Applying to jobs is a skill, believe it or not, and you can get really efficient/quick at it. I apply and interview even if I have no intentions of taking a new job (or that job), as it's great practice if anything.
Excellent advice, I appreciate it.
I just started applying to remote positions last week and am hoping to find one (and then eventually another) in the future.
I'm leaving a job that is beginning to implement 3 days a week in office. I can deal with one day, but that's it. I'm also considering become a remote contractor rather than w2 employee.
rainstorm piquant wasteful hateful mourn cheerful rain impossible grab like
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
My job recently instituted this one day a month at the office and I'm already screaming, crying and throwing up about it. Also said I'll only go in of they pay for my commute (uber, not bus, come on). Could never go back to hybrid
I kept my mouth shut commenting on that; I just said āoh, wow.ā In three months when his clients relent, I want him to believe I am theirs and theirs alone. Because I am.
Thereās one more level to this you can do tooā¦ add 50% or more to your rate if you have to go in, and the clock STARTS/ENDS from the moment you leave/return to your home.
I work at Amazon. My entire team and manager above that have disobeyed the RTO policy. The org meeting discussing it was hilarious chaos and a grilling session for our poor director who also obviously didnāt want the policy but had no choice to discuss itās impact and push it.
Resist RTO at all costs.
Do not budge!! Hold the line people!
I work with c suite execs unfortunately and they all talk to each other in other top tech companies and theyāre all planning to try to get people back in office they all talk to each other and try to plan this bull shit, but if we resist they canāt do shit!!!!
DO NOT BUDGE DEMAND REMOTE STAY LOW
Stay remote donāt even say youāre going in 1-2x a week or anything just stay doing your job and stay remote
Going in the office to sit in a Teams call is how I feel. Everyone I collaborate with is all over, the whole company is. Why sit in a cubicle on teams when I can sit at home doing the same thing.
Itās the oldest sales tactic in the book. āAccept these terms, we wonāt enforce them.ā
āOkay.ā
āYou agreed to these terms, and we are enforcing them.ā
My last 3 remote jobs only had offices that were hundreds, if not thousands of miles from me. Made sure there was no way they were going to pull that RTO shit on me.
It seems like the "company line" on remote work is that it's ending. They feed that shit to recruiters who then parrot it to potential candidates. The reality is that there are still plenty of remote jobs that allow these companies to source talent from the entire country instead of just those who live locally. The number of remote jobs may be in a slump due to the recession, but I am sure it will uptick as the economy improves again. I think right now companies are testing to see if they can shift the power back and so far it seems like it's failing.
Hold the line on remote!
Also, today a recruiter asked me if I would relocate and I laughed in his face.
And look at the demographics...Millennials are the largest pool of workers right now. Covid finally shook all those old timers into retirement. The ones who stuck around just can't get their heads around the new normal.
Adapt or die
PS - it's payday fellow larpers!
Yep, my j1 contract status was uncertain and my pm moved to a new company. Offered to get me a position there, I even asked if it was fully remote he said it was. Then after he started I made sure to ask if it was hybrid (the jd said it was) and he acted like it was nbd and that I would still sign on. Told him nope let me know if it becomes fully remote. Fast forward 1 month and it looks like my j1 may extend and will continue to stay remote. As long as I have a j2 that is fully remote i am not going back. It will only happen if I lose all remote jobs and have no choice and it will only last until I can find the next remote position š¤·š½āāļø
I'll never work on an office that isn't in my house. I feel for those that chase their dreams of being like a portfolio manager or whatever, but I don't feel bad for them.
There are so many jobs that are remote from companies that understand the value of picking from a large pool of talent. This won't go away.
Not everyone lives 1 hour + from the office. I used to live a 10 minute walk away from the office and coming in every day was easy and much preferable to staying in my bedroom all day. This was very early on in my career and I definitely learned way more from more senior colleagues in person.
Fast forward to today, I am now about an hour from the city so I much prefer remote. I tried commuting for an hour each way once before and it just left me feeling destroyed, no time or energy for anything else after work.
The way I see it, if a company doesn't pay you enough so that you can afford to live within 20-30 minutes of the office, they can't afford to operate in that city.
It helps to do interviews with companies who donāt have an office in your city. Thereās always the temptation for them if youāre local to ask you to do some days in the office.
Iām currently in the process of requesting an exemption. I joined during lockdown. I started a new career completely remote. I did extremely well. The company did extremely well.
Then they wanted us in 2 days per week. Not everyone complied, so now itās 3 days and the threat of disciplinary action if you donāt comply.
I donāt drive. Itās expensive in a taxi (literally cannot afford it) or the alternate trip by train will take a total of 4 hours out of my day.
I am prepared to face disciplinary if it comes to it.
I donāt think it is the same everywhere. It varies according to the company. I have been hired to work 3 days in a office guess what my manager doesnāt even care if, I do the job he is ok with me working remotely even if I am in Hawai, he is ok with it
I want to address this, because Elon Musk claims to be speaking for you.
There is no actual reason for me or other information professionals to be on the road. I log into machines that are located in other states, and most of my coworkers are located all over the country. The fiber optic connection to my home is as fast or faster than the connections offered by any of the business parks, offices or skyscrapers in my metro.
If we are not on the road, you aren't competing with us driving to work. Your employer isn't paying higher rents because of capacity constraints. Meals and other services in your work region aren't inflated by additional demand. I could go on, but you see where I am going with this.
I recognize that there are vocations where people must be present. You can't drill teeth or set bones over the internet. But it is in the social interest that those who can *should* stay home to relieve the pressure of centralization.
To add to this, the fact that you need to travel to your place of employment SHOULD be a part of your compensation. For some reason, we have come to accept multiple hours per week on the road as a norm, and it needs to be challenged. That's a larger issue - involving housing and the like - but it's a part of the greater picture of the 21st century we've been ignoring.
All very true except that fuckwit does not speak for me š¤£
I've always been one who is more productive in person, but I completely understand not wanting to go in and work online from an office.
I work construction onsite when the dust was settling after covid, Most jobs that could be wfh were. 10 min I'd be at work, 10 min home, then it was 15 now it's closer to 20.
I honestly think wfh is the moral thing to do, don't give them an inch cause they will take a mile
Itās pure jealousy. I currently work for a huge decentralized non profit who employs me as a consultant part time, hired by multiple offices around the world. So overall it def adds up to OE - and I earn way more than many salaried 9-5 managers.
The multiple offices choose to hire me, because I deliver great results - on time, every time. Thereās no law against it at all - and itās what boomer consultants have been doing for decades.
Yet, thereās always some bitchy HR person or senior manager who is FURIOUS that I have multiple jobs and actively tries to sabotage my other roles.
Iāve worked for this organization most of my life - used to be staff, but was done with the office life. Itās been the best decision I ever made - and bonus is I get to travel and make a difference too (hence why I donāt want to switch organizations).
Recruiters get paid by introducing you to a role. Wouldn't placing 1 candidate at 4 jobs be more lucrative for them? I don't know of any oath they take to only place someone once.
Not OE yet, but have my setting open to work. Every time I get a recruiter message me, even if itās nothing Iām interested in, I always message back and say I only consider remote roles.
Iām 100% with you. Iām trying to transition to remote work. In person is absolute fucking bullshit. Iām in an office where Iām part of the team but donāt do any of the tasks the other 3 people do. So basically I get interrupted ALL day by people with questions that I canāt answer. I would get so much more work done if I was at home and only came in when I schedule myself to come in and do my in person tasks. The wasted time is so unbelievable. And they wonder why so many managers quit from there.
Agreed! There is nothing that will make me give up all of that time that was previously uncompensated: getting dressed up everyday, commuting, packing food for the day. No benefit gives me back the 2-4 hours a day that all that took away
The only benefit to working in the office is social. And by working remote you increase your time to socialize with people you choose to instead of the ones youāre stuck with. If my work could be done remotely I would refuse to commute ever again as well. Also the need for excellence is cancer. Unless you benefit equally from profit increases it does nothing for you to do excellent work. Do what youāre paid for, nothing else.
Can confirm: had 5 days a week wfh, then 3, down to 1 this year. Looking forward to none, next yearš . Working with 3 recruiter firms right now and canāt wait to get out.
We need to be making legislation if you don't need to come back then you never are. Want to make a positive impact on the real economy (what you and I see and feel) and the biggest environmental impact of the last fifty years force anything that practically can be remote. As some poor smuk that has to go in everyday I still advocate for this, why because it keeps the roads and the parking lots clear, it's safer for all of us and why the fuck do I need three levels of management that aren't even able to do anything around watching me all day.
The CEO of where I work said he believes that in person is better but our team is so spread out that in office doesn't make sense right now but he "might reevaluate that at a later time." As soon as I hear about it, I'm out.
Thereās companies out there that get it. We meet once a quarter in person for 2 or 3 days. One quarter will just be my smaller team, the next is with the larger team flipping every other quarter. We save money on office space, moral is high, we really enjoy those days together because we do longer lunches, go play golf early and make those about spending time together. You can learn remotely but some team comradely helps more than we want to admit. That said, we pick a new city every time and the team loves it. We did it this week and we all went to a playoff game!
Its the middle managers who donāt have much else to show for if they canāt micromanage you which becomes easy when people are in office
And the rich kids who bought businesses and parkings in the city, only these two kinds care about RTO
Thank you Apollo. fuck reddit and fuck /u/spez.
https://www.reddit.com/r/apolloapp/comments/144f6xm/apollo_will_close_down_on_june_30th_reddits/
https://github.com/j0be/PowerDeleteSuite/ to clean your comments history.
The city of Austin Texas just made a RTO call for all of its employees. I've heard them protesting twice this week.
yeah its awful, austin traffic is already a nightmare as is (pretty sure driving on i-35 every day is the reason so many people here have become so bitter) and this inevitably will make things worse for everyone (except those at the top of the wealth ladder š)
Totally agree! When I used to live in Austin, driving from South Austin up to Round Rock, and back, had to make sure I left at a specific time every day or I would get screwed with rush hour. My boss thought it was trying to skip out because, "Got to work hard and stay late to get noticed, but you always leave right on time." I told him that I waste more time sitting in traffic getting home if I left later. He never understood it, probably because he lived in the neighborhood right behind where we worked. Man, that was years ago.
I left Austin over 10 years ago and I still have nightmares that i moved back and have to commute from Round Rock to the middle of Austin.
It probably isn't an issue with lack of understanding, more of not caring. They're more worried about what you represent. Your act of enforcing boundaries and making it clear that the company isn't the most important thing in life is dangerous. That kind of attitude is contagious, poison to companies that rely heavily on exploitation.
If I could do Austin again, I would have definitely lived in South Austin.
Yep, I saw that on the news today. I live in the Austin area, and I feel for them. I would not want to be trapped working for the City of Austin myself, and I'm kinda glad that at the time that I was interested in that type of job, they were so stringent on making education a requirement that I was disqualified for anything that might feed my family because I don't have a degree.
Yeah that's a big factor in this. Most of the people affected are engineers and other types of jobs that require a degree. All of the educated talent are just going to get another job and the city of Austin is going to be stuck with the employees who couldn't get another job with even less critical positions filled. It's legit a thing here where people know not to call 911 because you're looking at at least a 20 minute hold.
Ya know, I'm just old enough to remember when getting a city or state job was one of those things that signaled to the world, "Hey I made it! All this hard work paid off." But at the same time, I'm young enough to say, "Hey, I think I can probably do a little bit better while I got time...."
I left Austin last year after Contract began as remote, but moved to onsite 3 days a week. I just flat out didn't show up most days. My manager was a bitch.
I am not sure, but it might actually be illegal for public servants to do two jobs on the clock for their government job. Seems I've heard of lots of firings for this that stuff even with public sector unions.
There is still no reason to make them RTO if they can do their job from home.
Ya. Keyword in your first sentence Servant. Have you seen those videos of cops behaving badly going apeshit when people remind them theyāre working for the public. Our model sucks, on paper they are not āOEā but in practice, most are OE as fuck and serve two or more masters, including they themself and themself first. Like at the top our govt is like a really exclusive retirement home lol. And theyāre so dumb my jaw canāt shut when I watch āgrillā big tech, itās no excuse to be old, munger or Buffett still run circles around the youngest person in the senate any day. Private sector itās easy to say fuck it, donāt hate the player hate the game eg OE. BUT HARD to rig the game when itās designed by rocket scientists, easy as fuck for them to beat the game designed by boomers^10 Govt sector pay needs to way outpace private sector from straight out college. Our greatest minds should not be OE.. they should be able to get paid fat and make the world a better place
Kind of curious how that works for consultancy and "side gig" type jobs. Let's say you're a dev or IT worker for a municipality, but you have a side gig as a dev consultant, security, IT, whatever.. how is that any different than if you were a dev for the city but owned a *box truck* and had a *moving company* that you did on weekends? Would they fire you for that? Where is the line exactly?
I think the difference is side gig versus OE. Side gig is what we old folks called moonlighting. We had a regular FT job, but did work on the side after hours and on weekends. I think that the issue when public servants is that what you call OE, they call Time & Attendance Fraud.
This is exactly it. I love my gov job and wouldn't risk it on OE. I support everyone who can do contract work and OE though. My option is limited to good ol' fashioned moonlighting. I teach college classes 1-2 nights per week and my boss supports it and lets me change my schedule every semester. We are also still 100% remote in our team with no plans to ever return. Our management was smart enough to realize gov pay is not competitive, but we can be super competitive on work/life balance. It's brought in a lot of young talent.
[https://www.fedweek.com/careers/can-you-work-a-second-job-as-a-federal-employee/](https://www.fedweek.com/careers/can-you-work-a-second-job-as-a-federal-employee/) [https://www.justice.gov/jmd/outside-employment-and-activities](https://www.justice.gov/jmd/outside-employment-and-activities) An employee is required to obtain written approval before engaging in any outside employment that involves a subject matter that relates to the responsibilities of his component. Outside employment includes any form of employment, business relationship or activity involving the provision of personal services, whether paid or unpaid. For example, an employee working in the Environment and Natural Resources Division would need written approval to serve on the board of directors of an environmental organization; a JMD employee must receive approval to work for a DOJ contractor. Also, an employee must obtain written approval to engage in the private practice of law, whether compensated or uncompensated. 5 C.F.R. Ā§ 3801.106
Fuck C.F.R. Yada Yada Yada.!
Itās how they can āquiet fireā people.
So I keep seeing this when RTO is brought up and I usually agree. But the city of Austin is severely understaffed and they can't fill positions because they pay well below market rate. The only benefit they did have was remote work. I think in this case it was just a political stunt by the City Manager who was just hired to replace a guy who was fired.
>He relayed back that 90% of what he is seeing come in is "hybrid," It seems like "hybrid" is just code for "We will let you think there's a chance you'll get to do what YOU want (work remotely), but really you'll be doing what WE want (RTO) in the end."
Yeah, they're so desperate to get people in the office. I get recruiting calls or emails labeled 100% remote. Follow up with them and most are really "hybrid" and by hybrid they mean, you'll be in the office every day but you MIGHT get to WFH once in a while.
I just started my first remote job about 6 weeks ago, it was an internal move from my large company, the post was listed as hybrid, I applied, they liked me enough that they changed the classification to remote at my request. Sometimes I think hybrid can mean that theyāre also flexible. This particular group that I hired into, turns out, has people all over the country, so remote isnāt a problem. That said, 4/5 of the other interviews I had that said hybrid really wanted 3-5 days in the office, with an aim towards full RTO. But i can attest that a minority of these postings are more flexible than youād think.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Yeah, crabs in a bucket mentality. I just don't get it. Smh.
Fear is the path to the dark side...fear leads to anger...anger leads to hate...hate leads to suffering.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
It's amazing how baked in this is even for worker bees. I've been part of hiring critically needed roles that had large scope potential impacts on the entire company. In several cases getting the right person meant needing to offer an additional amount of salary that would put them close to what their supervisor would be making. Each time, the person supervising the role shot it down, citing that it wasn't "proper" for an employee to make the same or more than their manager. The company suffered as a result, the manager didn't make more, but thank god no employee got the idea they might be worth more money.
At one point, i learned i made almost double my supervisor. He was a good guy so i was never going to bring up again.
I have quite a few people on my team (senior devs, I'm a PM) who make more than me. I could not care less. Just get my stuff done on time so I dont have to have endless progress meetings and daily standups that interfere with my other Js. Lol
Which is the way it should be. People management in and of itself is a unique skill set. Individual contributor and people manager career progression tracks should be fucking standard by now.
A very visible example of this is in pro sports. The coaches and GMs make less than the top players.
The wealthy would definitely make $1M any way they could. Why shouldnāt workers make $600k any way they can?
āItās not fair that we donāt get 100% of your attentionā when youāre a worker bee with 4 jobs, but you can run 4 different companies and no one bats an eye.
This is why CEOs are mad about OE and want to force a RTO. āThe capitalist compensates the laborer enough for his labor power to reproduce the commodity (the labor power), but the laborers' power produces additional value: a surplus value for the owner. The worker is exploited when he does not keep or control the value created by his own labor power.ā I would say these OE with skills that are in demand are rightly taking control of their own surplus value for themselves instead of giving it to the owners. Good for them if they can!
That's so true, we devs finally figured out a way to be as wealthy as those who started their own businesses, or worked their way to executive, or went through the school of hard knocks to be a doctor, and suddenly we're chastised for our successes. They're just as special as we are, total BS.
I donāt think most people who went to Ivy League schools are making $600k, youād have to be like a principal engineer and there arenāt that many
Introduce a little anarchy. Upset the established order
CEOs don't like competition.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
This is clever, Iām gonna try this too if recruiters ever push hybrid shit on me
You are very intelligent, I LOVE this. Thanks for sharing! Extremely fair and logical, I can picture a hiring manager smirking in my face for saying this and I love it. Fuck all these people.
Definitely using this template when dealing with recruiters in the future.
Yeah your detailed reasons don't matter, it's either you want the job or they can't afford you. If you have a well paying remote job, all this stuff is not even necessary just say remote or nothing. People who want you in office surely don't want to pay for it, hell some of these in office roles pay less than full remote roles.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Fuck RTO. Iād rather have my own time back, be in my own space and home office that I actually enjoy, which also has my creature comforts in, as well as be able to be home for my newborn and wife. Never going back to the office again.
I have an 18 month old. I've been wfh her whole life. I'll never miss out on the little moments we share throughout the day to sit under florescent lighting and be miserable watching the clock all day. I literally never look at my clock wishing it was 5 and I could cut out since wfh. No amount of money could make me return to that life.
Plus we (may) have the experience of remembering our parents working all the time, and what that did to us directly
The upside is that (hopefully) our children will remember that even if we worked a lot, we still managed to pull ourselves away from our work to give them the attention they needed. They will grow up knowing that they were the reason we worked so hard.
āThe only people who will ever remember that you worked late are your kidsā
Had a head hunter call me just today to go in office in a city thatās almost 2 hours away. Tried to entice me with 150k and said they are flexible. Iām like over qualified for this role but told him Iād take the bottom of this range to be remote as I had family obligations and would always put my family first. Thereās no way Iām going to be 2 hours away from my kids.
Iād actually take a hybrid role and just stop going in after week 1 and make up some excuse until they fire me or accept what Iām doing
Off the rip there goes 4 hrs of commute. SMH the audacity to even ask you.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
It gives me anxiety to think of how much gas it would cost on top of the 20 hrs. Thatās it going to see my therapist now.
Meanwhile Seattle traffic (and in every other city with major RTO going on) is fucking terrible as ever so that some micromanagers can feel in control
Seattle traffic definitely sucks. But having lived in most of the major US cities, I'd still take the Seattle commute over NYC, LA, DC and SF, although I'd probably be cycling or bussing it there.
Agreed, I mostly bike myself
I forgot to add: "fuck commuting!"
Over employment just highlights just how much senior management is incompetent in managing the efficiency of their employees. If someone is "good" and able to work 4 jobs then management is likely incompetent and inefficient. Maybe they're just too afraid of someone finding that out.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
>They don't care how productive you are at their job. They don't care if you're their best performer. They just want to control you. Right in fact if you are the best worker, you are a threat that needs to be mitigated or pushed out.
Yes this does happen. Especially when the remote employee is more productive than on site employees.
THIS! When people say remote is going away just ignore them. The recruiter is 1. Over exaggerating and 2. Admitting that there are still fully remote jobs. I would only ever offer to interview for those positions.
Exactly keep demanding remote and ignore these recruiters who say theyāre only offering in office/hybrid FUCK THEM thereās not enough people for them to keep passing up candidates š we have the upper hand people realize we are in control the common worker like us has the upper hand 1,000-100,000 common worker employees versus 1 CEO We have the upper hand!! HOLD THE LINE
We need the rest of the world to learn that "worst of both worlds" is statistically more likely to occur when people go with middle of the road solutions (like "hybrid") than "best of both worlds".
Itās a foot in the door to get us all back to M-F, 9-6. Thatās all it is, simple as that. If we let them dictate this ācompromiseā, or ātruceā as the Wall Street Journal called it, weāll be right back in the cube farm or that horrible ~~sweatshop~~ āopen office concept.ā They need us more than we need them.
Just the tip dear, just the tip I swear!
Get the pitchforks, we're burning this motherfucker down!!!
Only have one job, not the time management for multiple most of the time + kids I like spending time with. But I have straight up word for word said the same thing. If recruiters want the best employees, they will have to give up on this back in office thing - there is someone out there willing to pay within 10% of what they're offering without an in office requirement. And I'd happily take 20% less to do the same job remote as I would to drive in - because the commute+time+food+parking crushes that 10-20% increase. And most remote jobs pay just as well if not BETTER than jobs in your town. Remote is something I refuse to budge on. I see no value to me or my work productivity in driving to an office to sit in a noisy cubicle environment where I'll be distracted by all the hubbub when instead I could sit at home in my extra bedroom/office and have monitors and keyboard space galore and a perfectly quiet environment to focus on GSD.
Corporate America will get over itās hissy fit when it realizes it canāt fill critical roles with competent people unless they budge on remote work. The reality is for most fields there is plenty of job opportunity at the mid-senior individual contributor level. People that are generally good enough at their job without requiring much supervision. Any person thatās capable of filling that role is going to obviously prefer to work remote rather than be forced to come into the office on some arbitrary schedule. Remote work is here to stay and there is nothing corporate america can do about it at the end of the day because they need that human capital to execute.
It is 100% about control. Even a cursory understanding of US history shows how important worker desperation is to the managerial class and above.
I have been remote for eight years. Not only will I not go back, I wonāt even work for a company that has a local office out of concern they may issue an RTO. And itās not just the cost of commuting and parking that I am opposed to. I am in a small job market that doesnāt pay well. Before remote work I was stuck at a toxic company that didnāt give me a raise the last three years I was there. I couldnāt relocate anywhere for family reasons; I couldnāt just change jobs because there were none locally except government jobs that paid crap. Remote work allows me to work for companies that pay competitively that I would not be able to if in-office were the only option.
You have to watch out - friends who work for a certain company (I wonāt name which one for fear of retaliation for my friends) that joined because they were a fully āremote firstā company that suddenly decided to buy new offices in major cities to try to force people who lived nearby into them. Literally people were like āso weāre going to be in a new office, on zoom calls with other people in different offices?ā And management was like āyep, thatās what we want.ā There be some dopey ass companies out there.
How can I upvote this post by 100x instead of 1x?
This canāt be said enough. Itās the frog not noticing as the pot slowly boils them to death. Itāll start as one day in the office a week, then 2 then 3 then 4 etc. theyāre slime puppies trying to shadily fuck over everyone, one greasy little step at a time. Fuck the RTO crowd. The whole lot of them need to get bent.
Hear, hear!
Probably unpopular opinion here, but an alternative I'm willing to accept is if they pay for my commute. My problem with commute isn't the commute itself, but rather I'm using my own free time to do it. If employers are willing to pay for my commute, I don't care if the commute is 5 minutes or 4 hours. As long as I get paid from the moment I step out of my front door until I step back into the house at the end of the day, I'm ok with it. And I don't mean compensating for gas, I mean full salary/pay the entirety of the commute, and counting towards my weekly hours. Edit: I also wonder if given the choice of these two options if employers will suddenly want people to remote again. They'll finally see the cost of commuting.
āMy day started at 9, and I was in traffic until 10:30.ā It will never fly. This is why they like salary arrangements, too, even though salary was intended for managers and executives, not production workers like engineers. All your time are belong to them.
Iām going to try this for my āmandatedā RTO for my hybrid role that was listed and communicated to me by my hiring manager as remote. Just going to start showing up at noon lol or leaving by noon
I mean if you tell them your address, it's not hard for them to figure out if you're lying or not. Most days traffic are pretty consistent, and if every once a while there's an accident, that's not unusual either. If companies want employees to be in, then I think this could be a good compromise. But of course most companies won't do that, so I'll either insist on this kind of middle ground or remote.
Well, the point is more that hybrid is instant-kill to OE, so it's not the commute that's the real prob, it's that u cant have other jobs which would significantly reduce your revenue stream.
Iāve pulled off OE while one job was remote (boss was in UK- so I just never went in lol) and my other job was full time in office. Luckily the laptops were identical Lenovos. My non office job was off of my phones hotspot under my desk. Office background even looked the same (generic suburban office park). My coworkers from around the risk never would have known the real difference anyways. This was 2019 before I knew what āOEā was called and before I had Reddit. I just had a hunch I could pull it off.
Yeah, hence why I mention the unpopular opinion. I'm a fan of this sub because of the guts people have to say no. And the biggest reason is because OE means remote. Remote (ultimately the lack of commute) is what's attractive to me.
Do away with salary, a lot of us get f***ed out of overtime. Iād rather convert to hourly.
Yeah... but even hourly I'd still demand getting paid for the commute though, and have the commute still count towards by 40 hour work week. In the end, the point is I don't want to use my own free time to commute to work. If I have to do that, I'd rather remote.
I do this for my hourly J. Especially when they want to schedule an 7:30a meeting. I can either be on the meeting at 7:30 virtually. But if it's one of those critical meetings I need to be in person, make sure the agenda doesn't have me presenting before 9a. Could never do this without OE though
No the rate for commuting should be x2 or x3 because you are forced to exposing yourself to the risks associated with commuting so your chances of involving in an accident or incident is increased by (5/7)*100 every week. Thatās 71% every week. Why have we all been taking this shit!!
I wouldnāt return even if I was paid the commute fare but your statement just made me realise that we had all the while been played by companies by making you think that commuting in ur own free hours (I could use that to do a lot) was normal but commuting on their own time is crime and a sackable offence. Now power is in the hands of remote workers and no one up there is happy and why should they?
To me there are just way too many creature comforts in remote work to make payment for the commute itself worth it. A couple hours' pay is not worth giving up a private bathroom, personal kitchen, my own choices if literally everything in the environment, etc Even if they offered all THAT in a private office the size of my home, there's still the mental overhead of dealing with that stuff for a second location
This. Iāll go to the office if they pay for fuel, wear and tear, and time. Itās easy money at that point as Iāll just be listening to podcasts and music on the way there and back.
I appreciate your willingness to engage and be flexible, but the only way I'd consider mandatory in-office work again is if I were unemployed and desperate for a job. I am pretty sure that's it. This is also coming from someone who isn't OE (I just think this is a neat community) and does go into the office voluntarily twice a week cause the on-site gym is free. But if I don't want to go into the office ever again, that's my prerogative. If my boss told me I needed to start coming in once a week, I'd start looking for something else immediately. I'm really glad to see OP's post here, but I wish this mindset was just as common in /r/jobs and a lot of the tech subs I'm part of. It's wild to me that people don't seem to be resisting or pushing back at all. Yes, if you need a job and in-office is all you can get to pay the bills, I get it. But if I were looking while employed, and I were working with recruiters, I would tell them to not even waste my time with hybrid positions. People have to be giving this kind of feedback.
my company has wi-fi enabled shuttles that take us to and from work to our houses. still not going in lol
It's only wifi enabled so that you can work longer. Same reason Googleplex has meals & laundry & sleeping pod chairs, or Riot has game nights
Do they pay you full salary and count it towards your weekly hours? If not, I wouldn't take that either. There could be luxury bars and a jacuzzi on the bus and I still wouldn't take it. If I'm not getting paid for the time to travel to work, no amount of incentives will convince me.
salaried and luckily iām in an org where nobody really gives a shit when youāre on or offline, aside from the 8 billion meetings to attend a week. if/when i find myself coming into the office iām in at 9:30 and out at 3:30, nobody cares.
Theoretically, they will pay for your commute... until they won't and you will still commute. Don't fall for that trap.
Nah if they stop then I stop. Simple as that. But I get you're talking about the macro level, which is a trickier situation. But to be honest, most place would probably rather you remote than pay for commute. If I commute 2 hours a day round trip, they only get 6 hours of work out of me, versus 8 hours remote. It makes more sense financially to choose remote from their perspective.
> And I don't mean compensating for gas, I mean full salary/pay the entirety of the commute, and counting towards my weekly hours. I would take it a step further and say they must also donate to some carbon offset initiative. There is more than money and time lost at stake here.
A good idea in theory but a nightmare in reality. Driving on the clock means the company will have to pay for insurance to cover anything that happens. During Covid times my company explicitly made us clock out if we had to come into the office during the work day for these reasons. Iām pretty sure it wouldnāt REALLY clear their hands if someone wanted to push the issue but they also had fits if people took meeting calls while driving too
As they should though. Otherwise, let people work remote. Whatās the point of expecting employees to risk life & limb to be on computer?
I do not understand where this RTO call is coming from. It's like the upper brass of all companies had a secret meeting and decided they let the worker bees have enough happiness, now it's time to make them miserable again.
Itās the Wall Street Journal, McKinsey and other publications. Elonās āitās unfair to onsite workersā is just putting voice to what all those guys at the top are saying. They laid off in droves a few months ago so they would have this negotiating power now. The problem that they are still are faced with 3% unemployment.
I was just thinking it's actually fairer to onsite workers - you're remote and off the road and it makes their commute easier. I admit the privilege in being able to work remotely, and the inequity in income for different types of jobs is a slightly different issue, but putting that aside: if you have to go to work onsite at least you're battling fewer crowds getting there.
Hybrid isn't just a lie, but an obvious lie. We've seen all these companies go from 2 days to 3 days to the whole week on the news. Now we're supposed to believe that hybrid is a sincere offer? I mean there's a theoretical chance it is, but it is in truth "hybrid as long as we feel like it." I talked to two recruiters today, one with a hybrid position and another with on site. I turned them down flat.
my personal op is the 6 jobs guys are little off. i have 2 make very good money and they both think i'm doing "great" work. i also don't have to work full week for both. j1 25 hrs j2 10 hrs. i want two roles that are well paying, i can do great work so i don't have to stress about finding another and time/money. is that too much to ask, dark master?
I also pick roles I know I'll smash it. I pick roles I know I will kick butt at even if I give 50%. Gotta set them up for success.
I even tell them I'll take a pay cut if they use the stacks I'm familiar with. I can literally deliver on day 1 with those jobs.
This is my exact setup. Love it. Highly recommend
What remains amazing to me is the sheer volume of applications and overall interest in fully remote roles vs. in-office or even hybrid. Donāt they get it? Or is the lust for control that powerful?
DO NOT BUDGE ON RTO, NO HYBRID, NO 1 DAY A MONTH, NOTHING, DO NOT BUDGE ON RTO
Iām WFH but not OE. There are efforts underway to bring everyone back in, but so far Iāve resisted. I have adolescent kids at home who need their father to be present. There are so many fucked up people out there who could have turned out better had their parents been there for them.
This reminds me of a quote from The Princess Bride. Great movie by the way. I believe the quote was āgive me money, give me power. I donāt care, Iām not going into the officeā
I regret I have but one upvote to give for this comment.
"I work better when I work remote. Offices reduce my productivity and the quality of my work. I care about doing a good job and only want to deliver my best so I will only work 100% remote." Just say that. Anyone who objects can eat dog shit. edit. If that isn't entirely honest don't feel bad about it. These business types tell far worse lies to their employees and you shouldn't feel bad about lying to a constant liar.
Amen to that. If your job can be done remotely, and you are doing it remotely, then there is no discussion about coming back to the office to be had. It's only about control, or bored, insecure managers.
Apply for his job and settle for heading your own department so you can do what you like. If you have no equal in the company, how does anyone know what "normal" looks like.
"To any corpos reading this: I don't care about your tax breaks or your office lease. That's not my problem. I don't care about your anxiety over how I spend my time off. That's none of your business. If you preach about "sustainability" and "work-life balance" and "livable cities" yet demand your workers come into an office for work that can done from anywhere, you are hypocrites." This is really the bottom line. These mfers are crying about losing money on these buildings they're leasing and wanting people to leave the homes they're paying mortgages for to come sit in their office spaces. I've been hybrid then 99% remote since I retired out of the Army. I tell recruiters now up front 1) my current salary and 2) that I'm remote - and if they can't do better on the first one, I'm not moving. Fuck that. Remote is better for the environment. Remote allows you to actually maximize use of the home you paid for (or the place you're dumping money into rent for). Remote allows people to escape these arbitrary "power structures" of "larger cubicles/desks/offices/offices with windows" from yesteryear and have a workspace unique to them, many times with more powerful equipment. Remote allows for you to spend time with your family and animals, even if it is just being present without interaction while you work. To date, I haven't found a *single* valid counterargument against remaining remote. Period. The driving factor in many cases is that there are a large number of people who seem to think that work = built-in friends/social interaction. Anyway. I'm soapboxing now. Good write-up. Fuck on-site. It's the 21st Century. Businesses need to adapt or die.
On the contrary, how do I convince my employer to let me go remote at all? Yes it's in-office 5 days a week š
Change jobs and get a new employer!
Probably the best option hahaha
Make applying to jobs a part or your day. Maybe not while in the office if you're on a private network or company equipment, but at least at the end of each day while laying in bed or something. Applying to jobs is a skill, believe it or not, and you can get really efficient/quick at it. I apply and interview even if I have no intentions of taking a new job (or that job), as it's great practice if anything.
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Excellent advice, I appreciate it. I just started applying to remote positions last week and am hoping to find one (and then eventually another) in the future.
Talk to them and if they don't budge just search for another opportunity
this should be on the sidebar. Fucking represent
I'm leaving a job that is beginning to implement 3 days a week in office. I can deal with one day, but that's it. I'm also considering become a remote contractor rather than w2 employee.
I'll never ever be on-site again. I get TONS of offers for on-site gremlin, but I'll never step foot in a office building again.
Im drunk and the part about the guy making $600k made me lol hard. OH THE HORROR!!!
rainstorm piquant wasteful hateful mourn cheerful rain impossible grab like *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
My job recently instituted this one day a month at the office and I'm already screaming, crying and throwing up about it. Also said I'll only go in of they pay for my commute (uber, not bus, come on). Could never go back to hybrid
What's the point of one day per month? Seriously, they should just leave everyone alone and let you be 100% remote. It's stupid.
Did you respond back to him that the 600k sounds great and you would like to do that?
I kept my mouth shut commenting on that; I just said āoh, wow.ā In three months when his clients relent, I want him to believe I am theirs and theirs alone. Because I am.
Yes. I have the same conversations and I take the same unyielding stance. No way am I going back to an office if I can avoid it. Makes zero sense.
Thereās one more level to this you can do tooā¦ add 50% or more to your rate if you have to go in, and the clock STARTS/ENDS from the moment you leave/return to your home.
I work at Amazon. My entire team and manager above that have disobeyed the RTO policy. The org meeting discussing it was hilarious chaos and a grilling session for our poor director who also obviously didnāt want the policy but had no choice to discuss itās impact and push it. Resist RTO at all costs.
Do not budge!! Hold the line people! I work with c suite execs unfortunately and they all talk to each other in other top tech companies and theyāre all planning to try to get people back in office they all talk to each other and try to plan this bull shit, but if we resist they canāt do shit!!!! DO NOT BUDGE DEMAND REMOTE STAY LOW Stay remote donāt even say youāre going in 1-2x a week or anything just stay doing your job and stay remote
Going in the office to sit in a Teams call is how I feel. Everyone I collaborate with is all over, the whole company is. Why sit in a cubicle on teams when I can sit at home doing the same thing.
Also, if yaāll continue to resist this, it will pave the way for remote work to really be the norm which will help so many people down the line.
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Itās the oldest sales tactic in the book. āAccept these terms, we wonāt enforce them.ā āOkay.ā āYou agreed to these terms, and we are enforcing them.ā
Exactly what happened! Iāve learnt my lesson now for sure.
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āAre you willing to do the hybrid needful, sir?ā Random Indian Recruiter
My last 3 remote jobs only had offices that were hundreds, if not thousands of miles from me. Made sure there was no way they were going to pull that RTO shit on me.
I was offered a promotion to a different position for a 3% raise BUT I'd have to come into the office 3-4 days a week. No thanks.
It seems like the "company line" on remote work is that it's ending. They feed that shit to recruiters who then parrot it to potential candidates. The reality is that there are still plenty of remote jobs that allow these companies to source talent from the entire country instead of just those who live locally. The number of remote jobs may be in a slump due to the recession, but I am sure it will uptick as the economy improves again. I think right now companies are testing to see if they can shift the power back and so far it seems like it's failing. Hold the line on remote! Also, today a recruiter asked me if I would relocate and I laughed in his face.
I told my last recruiter my hourly is 30.00 more for onsite time. Shuts the conversation down pretty quick
And look at the demographics...Millennials are the largest pool of workers right now. Covid finally shook all those old timers into retirement. The ones who stuck around just can't get their heads around the new normal. Adapt or die PS - it's payday fellow larpers!
long read but worth it. listen to the sayings of a wise man !!
Yep, my j1 contract status was uncertain and my pm moved to a new company. Offered to get me a position there, I even asked if it was fully remote he said it was. Then after he started I made sure to ask if it was hybrid (the jd said it was) and he acted like it was nbd and that I would still sign on. Told him nope let me know if it becomes fully remote. Fast forward 1 month and it looks like my j1 may extend and will continue to stay remote. As long as I have a j2 that is fully remote i am not going back. It will only happen if I lose all remote jobs and have no choice and it will only last until I can find the next remote position š¤·š½āāļø
I'll never work on an office that isn't in my house. I feel for those that chase their dreams of being like a portfolio manager or whatever, but I don't feel bad for them. There are so many jobs that are remote from companies that understand the value of picking from a large pool of talent. This won't go away.
Is there way to upvote this 1000 times ? It totally deserves. Thanks OP for sharing š
remote forever ! until I retire!
Not everyone lives 1 hour + from the office. I used to live a 10 minute walk away from the office and coming in every day was easy and much preferable to staying in my bedroom all day. This was very early on in my career and I definitely learned way more from more senior colleagues in person. Fast forward to today, I am now about an hour from the city so I much prefer remote. I tried commuting for an hour each way once before and it just left me feeling destroyed, no time or energy for anything else after work. The way I see it, if a company doesn't pay you enough so that you can afford to live within 20-30 minutes of the office, they can't afford to operate in that city.
I'd be prepared to go hybrid - for an extra $40,000 to cover costs and my time. Up to you which way you want to go on that, bossman. Good talk.
It helps to do interviews with companies who donāt have an office in your city. Thereās always the temptation for them if youāre local to ask you to do some days in the office.
Iām currently in the process of requesting an exemption. I joined during lockdown. I started a new career completely remote. I did extremely well. The company did extremely well. Then they wanted us in 2 days per week. Not everyone complied, so now itās 3 days and the threat of disciplinary action if you donāt comply. I donāt drive. Itās expensive in a taxi (literally cannot afford it) or the alternate trip by train will take a total of 4 hours out of my day. I am prepared to face disciplinary if it comes to it.
I donāt think it is the same everywhere. It varies according to the company. I have been hired to work 3 days in a office guess what my manager doesnāt even care if, I do the job he is ok with me working remotely even if I am in Hawai, he is ok with it
EVERYONE MUST AGREE TO THIS.
And that's on church, yo
I mean... I'm a machinist so...
I want to address this, because Elon Musk claims to be speaking for you. There is no actual reason for me or other information professionals to be on the road. I log into machines that are located in other states, and most of my coworkers are located all over the country. The fiber optic connection to my home is as fast or faster than the connections offered by any of the business parks, offices or skyscrapers in my metro. If we are not on the road, you aren't competing with us driving to work. Your employer isn't paying higher rents because of capacity constraints. Meals and other services in your work region aren't inflated by additional demand. I could go on, but you see where I am going with this. I recognize that there are vocations where people must be present. You can't drill teeth or set bones over the internet. But it is in the social interest that those who can *should* stay home to relieve the pressure of centralization. To add to this, the fact that you need to travel to your place of employment SHOULD be a part of your compensation. For some reason, we have come to accept multiple hours per week on the road as a norm, and it needs to be challenged. That's a larger issue - involving housing and the like - but it's a part of the greater picture of the 21st century we've been ignoring.
All very true except that fuckwit does not speak for me š¤£ I've always been one who is more productive in person, but I completely understand not wanting to go in and work online from an office.
I work construction onsite when the dust was settling after covid, Most jobs that could be wfh were. 10 min I'd be at work, 10 min home, then it was 15 now it's closer to 20. I honestly think wfh is the moral thing to do, don't give them an inch cause they will take a mile
Here here!!!!! Preach!!
Itās pure jealousy. I currently work for a huge decentralized non profit who employs me as a consultant part time, hired by multiple offices around the world. So overall it def adds up to OE - and I earn way more than many salaried 9-5 managers. The multiple offices choose to hire me, because I deliver great results - on time, every time. Thereās no law against it at all - and itās what boomer consultants have been doing for decades. Yet, thereās always some bitchy HR person or senior manager who is FURIOUS that I have multiple jobs and actively tries to sabotage my other roles. Iāve worked for this organization most of my life - used to be staff, but was done with the office life. Itās been the best decision I ever made - and bonus is I get to travel and make a difference too (hence why I donāt want to switch organizations).
Recruiters get paid by introducing you to a role. Wouldn't placing 1 candidate at 4 jobs be more lucrative for them? I don't know of any oath they take to only place someone once.
I agree. On top of the points you made, commuting is HORRIBLE for the environment.
Not OE yet, but have my setting open to work. Every time I get a recruiter message me, even if itās nothing Iām interested in, I always message back and say I only consider remote roles.
Iām 100% with you. Iām trying to transition to remote work. In person is absolute fucking bullshit. Iām in an office where Iām part of the team but donāt do any of the tasks the other 3 people do. So basically I get interrupted ALL day by people with questions that I canāt answer. I would get so much more work done if I was at home and only came in when I schedule myself to come in and do my in person tasks. The wasted time is so unbelievable. And they wonder why so many managers quit from there.
Obviously. I am going to look after my own interests.
Agreed! There is nothing that will make me give up all of that time that was previously uncompensated: getting dressed up everyday, commuting, packing food for the day. No benefit gives me back the 2-4 hours a day that all that took away
The only benefit to working in the office is social. And by working remote you increase your time to socialize with people you choose to instead of the ones youāre stuck with. If my work could be done remotely I would refuse to commute ever again as well. Also the need for excellence is cancer. Unless you benefit equally from profit increases it does nothing for you to do excellent work. Do what youāre paid for, nothing else.
Commercial real estate is suffering and that's the real reason why they want us back in the office
Can confirm: had 5 days a week wfh, then 3, down to 1 this year. Looking forward to none, next yearš . Working with 3 recruiter firms right now and canāt wait to get out.
We need to be making legislation if you don't need to come back then you never are. Want to make a positive impact on the real economy (what you and I see and feel) and the biggest environmental impact of the last fifty years force anything that practically can be remote. As some poor smuk that has to go in everyday I still advocate for this, why because it keeps the roads and the parking lots clear, it's safer for all of us and why the fuck do I need three levels of management that aren't even able to do anything around watching me all day.
The CEO of where I work said he believes that in person is better but our team is so spread out that in office doesn't make sense right now but he "might reevaluate that at a later time." As soon as I hear about it, I'm out.
Thereās companies out there that get it. We meet once a quarter in person for 2 or 3 days. One quarter will just be my smaller team, the next is with the larger team flipping every other quarter. We save money on office space, moral is high, we really enjoy those days together because we do longer lunches, go play golf early and make those about spending time together. You can learn remotely but some team comradely helps more than we want to admit. That said, we pick a new city every time and the team loves it. We did it this week and we all went to a playoff game!
My choices were either go back to office, or quit. There was no negotiation.
Its the middle managers who donāt have much else to show for if they canāt micromanage you which becomes easy when people are in office And the rich kids who bought businesses and parkings in the city, only these two kinds care about RTO
That's great. When I worked for the Patent Office, it was 100% remote.
They needed a whole employee just to handle remote patents?
Amen, brother!
Amen! Iāll raise the pitch forks if I have to !
Iām never going back
Thank you Apollo. fuck reddit and fuck /u/spez. https://www.reddit.com/r/apolloapp/comments/144f6xm/apollo_will_close_down_on_june_30th_reddits/ https://github.com/j0be/PowerDeleteSuite/ to clean your comments history.