Great article. Posts mentioning extroversion/introversion are my personal bat signal for me to comment. American workplace culture has always been biased in favor of extraversion. Companies did not just value teamwork but outright fetishized it to the point where you have no alone time to work on the things you have to get done without distractions. Being introverted myself, work from home was a godsend and I was more productive at home than in the office.
I've read a lot of articles saying that there isn't a difference in productivity between remote and non remote work, but they're all written by people who are established in their careers. I just started working this year and it's been incredibly difficult to get up to speed remotely, and a lot of my classmates from the class of 2020 agree. I think it would be a lot easier if we'd been in person. Part of that is because I get really tired on video calls so I have less bandwidth for interactions overall, and the other thing is that in the open office setting, I'd be able to listen into coworkers conversations and learn from those. With remote work, the ramp up has been a lot more difficult because I'm alone and not exposed to technical discussions around me.
I forwarded the article to many of my former coworkers. The company is requiring staff to work in the main office because...otherwise the office would be empty and we will have all this wasted space. Of course, current staff and new hires in other parts of the country are being allowed to be fully remote. I’ve heard the same from other friends that work for companies that own their buildings.
Can we stop with these tone-deaf articles? How many of these authors have actually worked at a top tech company? The perks are absolutely absurd, you'd be insane not to want to return to office. Free food that tastes better than paid food, free on site BJJ which would cost $200/month elsewhere, and even the ability to apply to teach your own martial arts classes using the company's resources for advertising and gym space. Understand what working from office entails before criticizing it.
You must work for a really large company with tons of office amenities designed to keep employees at the office for as many hours of the day as possible. FWIW, these companies often do well with single 20 somethings who basically go to work and hang with their work friends all the time but less well with employees who get married and have children and typically want to spend a considerable amount of time with that spouse and those kids. Also, the vast majority of people who work in offices DON'T work for some big company like Google. Most offices don't have free food; they have a kitchen into which you can bring your own food, or you can order from a pricey nearby restaurant. Most offices don't have free martial arts (or any other kind of exercise) on site. Great that you work at an office that has all of these amenities. Even better that you enjoy them. Keep in mind that the majority of offices do not have any of that, and the majority of people want to spend less time at work, not more.
How are you even going to meet a partner if you are at work all day, commuting for the rest and the gender ratio in the area is quite lopsided with dating at work discouraged or even banned? Seems to me a huge price to pay not to have (the chance of) love in your life in exchange for "free" food and laundry.
None of that stuff is free, it's just baked into your salary. It's a portion you don't get to spend how you choose, instead the company spends it with the intention of keeping you in the office longer. It's adult day-care in exchange for work. And imagine how far your tech salary would go if you weren't forced to live in the bay area.
That makes sense theoretically but I don't think it works that way in practice. They're already paying us way more than we deserve for what we do, so it's not going to get any bigger if the perks go away. The salary is also adjusted by location, which means it gets smaller if you move out of the bay area.
I'm not trying to bait you into an argument, I'm genuinely curious: Do you think you are paid more than you deserve? Are you saying that in relation to the value you create for the company or do you just compare it to the average?
Thank you so much for this article. I just used it as a weapon to fight the "You work better at the office" bullshit at my organisation. I agree with E V E R Y S I N G L E W O R D you wrote there.
Great article. Posts mentioning extroversion/introversion are my personal bat signal for me to comment. American workplace culture has always been biased in favor of extraversion. Companies did not just value teamwork but outright fetishized it to the point where you have no alone time to work on the things you have to get done without distractions. Being introverted myself, work from home was a godsend and I was more productive at home than in the office.
Agreed on the intorversion part. This has been the best year and a half of my entire work career as I've been WFH.
Very stimulating read. I would have liked to see a discussion of the inequities of commuting also -- another "hidden factor" in office politics.
luke o'neill had a good piece about this in his newsletter a little while back. https://luke.substack.com/p/commuting-is-psychological-torture
I've read a lot of articles saying that there isn't a difference in productivity between remote and non remote work, but they're all written by people who are established in their careers. I just started working this year and it's been incredibly difficult to get up to speed remotely, and a lot of my classmates from the class of 2020 agree. I think it would be a lot easier if we'd been in person. Part of that is because I get really tired on video calls so I have less bandwidth for interactions overall, and the other thing is that in the open office setting, I'd be able to listen into coworkers conversations and learn from those. With remote work, the ramp up has been a lot more difficult because I'm alone and not exposed to technical discussions around me.
If we don't return to the office how will they justify the ROI on all those new open office plans though?
I forwarded the article to many of my former coworkers. The company is requiring staff to work in the main office because...otherwise the office would be empty and we will have all this wasted space. Of course, current staff and new hires in other parts of the country are being allowed to be fully remote. I’ve heard the same from other friends that work for companies that own their buildings.
Can we stop with these tone-deaf articles? How many of these authors have actually worked at a top tech company? The perks are absolutely absurd, you'd be insane not to want to return to office. Free food that tastes better than paid food, free on site BJJ which would cost $200/month elsewhere, and even the ability to apply to teach your own martial arts classes using the company's resources for advertising and gym space. Understand what working from office entails before criticizing it.
You must work for a really large company with tons of office amenities designed to keep employees at the office for as many hours of the day as possible. FWIW, these companies often do well with single 20 somethings who basically go to work and hang with their work friends all the time but less well with employees who get married and have children and typically want to spend a considerable amount of time with that spouse and those kids. Also, the vast majority of people who work in offices DON'T work for some big company like Google. Most offices don't have free food; they have a kitchen into which you can bring your own food, or you can order from a pricey nearby restaurant. Most offices don't have free martial arts (or any other kind of exercise) on site. Great that you work at an office that has all of these amenities. Even better that you enjoy them. Keep in mind that the majority of offices do not have any of that, and the majority of people want to spend less time at work, not more.
How are you even going to meet a partner if you are at work all day, commuting for the rest and the gender ratio in the area is quite lopsided with dating at work discouraged or even banned? Seems to me a huge price to pay not to have (the chance of) love in your life in exchange for "free" food and laundry.
None of that stuff is free, it's just baked into your salary. It's a portion you don't get to spend how you choose, instead the company spends it with the intention of keeping you in the office longer. It's adult day-care in exchange for work. And imagine how far your tech salary would go if you weren't forced to live in the bay area.
That makes sense theoretically but I don't think it works that way in practice. They're already paying us way more than we deserve for what we do, so it's not going to get any bigger if the perks go away. The salary is also adjusted by location, which means it gets smaller if you move out of the bay area.
I'm not trying to bait you into an argument, I'm genuinely curious: Do you think you are paid more than you deserve? Are you saying that in relation to the value you create for the company or do you just compare it to the average?
Free BJ? Sign me up!
Thank you so much for this article. I just used it as a weapon to fight the "You work better at the office" bullshit at my organisation. I agree with E V E R Y S I N G L E W O R D you wrote there.