Don't Want To Go Back To Workplace

[rustled]

If conservative thinkers' businesses are proving more efficient without a commute to a traditional workplace, it seems silly to suggest they would be too "inflexible" to adapt.

And yet …

..., but for those who have to earn the money to pay the taxes to pay the government workers, working from home is not going to be a long-term option, they need to come in and meet face to face with their colleagues. You can't problem-solve over Zoom, it just doesn't work as well. I've noticed a huge drop off in productivity from accountants, lawyers and bankers who are all still working from home. They need to get their butts back into the office and have accountability brought back into their lives.

It's in the "thinking" and assumptions being made about people and their work ethic and some perceived impression productivity is going to go down without micromanagement practices in place. There are many progressive businesses that have been able to adapt and even thrive without the old dogma directing them. Not all businesses are run by conservatives.

Using a single comment from another forum poster isn't likely to convince any rational person that conservative business owners are too inflexibly attached to "partisan rhetoric" and "dogma" to read their balance sheets and business statements, and recognize whether or not having some or all employees work from home may be in their businesses' long-term best interests.

Seems to me conservative business owners are pretty good at doing the math and zeroing in on the bottom line, without being distracted by "partisan rhetoric" and "dogma", etc. Seems to me if having folk work from home is good for the business, conservative business owners will be rather inclined to want their employees to work from home, and may well foist it on employees whether their employees want it or not.

[Ka-El]

Using a single comment from another forum poster isn't likely to convince any rational person that conservative business owners are too inflexibly attached to "partisan rhetoric" and "dogma" to read their balance sheets and business statements, and recognize whether or not having some or all employees work from home may be in their businesses' long-term best interests.

You think this sort of thinking is a one off by one far right extremist? You think no one's thinking is ever swayed by pre-existing and often partisan notions? People interpret data through their own lens and act accordingly. There will be businesses that refuse to adapt based mostly on old and rigid ideas. For some this will just be a return to normal, but others may find they start attracting less motivated and talented employees. They may also resist the idea people can be productive at home without being micromanaged. The idea everyone is just going to read their balance sheets and automatically make the best long-term decision is naïve. Old ideas often die hard, and change seems to be especially hard for conservative thinkers. That being said, and as noted already, it would also be a mistake to assume all businesses are run by conservatives.

[spooker]

Using a single comment from another forum poster isn't likely to convince any rational person that conservative business owners are too inflexibly attached to "partisan rhetoric" and "dogma" to read their balance sheets and business statements, and recognize whether or not having some or all employees work from home may be in their businesses' long-term best interests.

Seems to me conservative business owners are pretty good at doing the math and zeroing in on the bottom line, without being distracted by "partisan rhetoric" and "dogma", etc. Seems to me if having folk work from home is good for the business, conservative business owners will be rather inclined to want their employees to work from home, and may well foist it on employees whether their employees want it or not.

Being in the IT sector I've seen the struggle with conservative thinking ... too often it's resulted in marketing/sales running the timeline which developers can't support ... focusing on the "bottom line" is too narrow anymore when people have more options in the job they choose ... many times that results in poor employee attitudes ... progressives have succeeded brilliantly at times though there are plenty of stumbles too ... neither is perfect, working remotely has been a benefit from this pandemic but now we have to make sure it becomes normalized for the right reasons, not just because it shifts the cost of space to the employee ... at the moment the government has a special tax adjustment for working from home as an employee, how will that work in the future?

[Sparki55]

Yea, we must transition to "work from home" if it is at all possible for your job. If you don't you're a backwards thinker falling into conservative rhetoric... Your business will attract dumber people and your business will fail if you don't adapt and make room for change...

That stupid argument aside... my business tried the work from home for 3 months! Then again for another month a few months later. There was zero accountability, if someone didn't pick up their phone you couldn't get ahold of them. Zoom meetings were great, they completely solved the in-person meeting when all we were doing is talking. What zoom didn't solve was the need to collaborate. You can't teach someone over zoom with the same level of understanding. So it works. One day a week from home is all we could do long term. I couldn't imagine hiring a new employee and never physically meeting them. The world will always require in-person business contact.

If zoom (and remote work) was so easy then government officials and tech companies would have abandoned business trips years ago. This is more of a case of trying to force change instead of letting things figure themselves out naturally.

[Ka-El]

Being in the IT sector I've seen the struggle with conservative thinking ... too often it's resulted in marketing/sales running the timeline which developers can't support ... focusing on the "bottom line" is too narrow anymore when people have more options in the job they choose ... many times that results in poor employee attitudes ... progressives have succeeded brilliantly at times though there are plenty of stumbles too ... neither is perfect, working remotely has been a benefit from this pandemic but now we have to make sure it becomes normalized for the right reasons, not just because it shifts the cost of space to the employee ... at the moment the government has a special tax adjustment for working from home as an employee, how will that work in the future?

Good post and great question on the tax adjustments. That will remain to be seen. Another potential unintended impact of moving the workplace home could be the increased empty office space and businesses downsizing their physical locations. In the sort term especially this could reduce the demand for office space and could have other impacts on the economy.

[Ka-El]

If zoom (and remote work) was so easy then government officials and tech companies would have abandoned business trips years ago. This is more of a case of trying to force change instead of letting things figure themselves out naturally.

The impetus for change was the COVID pandemic that forced businesses and organizations to start utilizing the technology that was already there. That has lead to further improvements in the technology and we've learned we can often be just as effective virtually as in person. Yes, this saves immensely on the cost of business travel (bottom line). I certainly agree there will always be the need for some in-person contact, and I suspect many businesses that adapt to having people working from home will adopt a hybrid model where staff come in to the office space a couple days a week, maybe on a rotating basis to share workspace. This is not going to work for every sector but it will for many types of business operations and could have the effect of determining where the best and brightest candidates looking for career opportunities land.

[TylerM4]

I do like the hybrid model but there are a lot of logistical challenges associated.

A transition to a work from home model will really flush out the maturity of a businesses management approach. Are they still trying to use a "at his desk, looks like he's doing work" approach to measuring employee performance? If so, that doesn't transition well to working from home. It's not always easy/doable, but an employee's performance should be judged on outcomes vs "how busy they look". Good leadership understands this. Poor leadership (especially at smaller businesses often owned by people who aren't educated/experienced at management) will result in a business falling apart during a transition to working from home.

Otherwise, I think we need to think bigger about the long term impacts of working from home. Think about the downtown core of a city. Usually the most expensive real-estate/lease, the highest density, longest commute times, etc. Most are white collar jobs that could work from home. Why live in Vancouver, when you could sell and live in the Okanagan while making Vancouver pay? Why live in the Okanagan when you could work and live in the Kootenays? We could see an outright reversal in the trend of people leaving smaller communities to live in bigger ones. Housing may become more affordable, etc. $300k gets you a very nice home in some parts of BC.

[rustled]

Using a single comment from another forum poster isn't likely to convince any rational person that conservative business owners are too inflexibly attached to "partisan rhetoric" and "dogma" to read their balance sheets and business statements, and recognize whether or not having some or all employees work from home may be in their businesses' long-term best interests.

You think this sort of thinking is a one off by one far right extremist?

Nope. Perhaps you think it's a post by a far right extremist - if so, that's your prerogative and nothing to do with what I think, nor is that the topic.

You think no one's thinking is ever swayed by pre-existing and often partisan notions?

Nope. Perhaps you think only people who think differently than you are swayed by pre-existing and often partisan notions - if so, that's your prerogative and nothing to do with what I think, nor is that the topic.

People interpret data through their own lens and act accordingly. There will be businesses that refuse to adapt based mostly on old and rigid ideas.

Sure. And the usual lens for conservative capitalists is the lens of what's best for their bottom line. If having more employees work from home is profitable, why would they insist on an unnecessary expenditure?

For some this will just be a return to normal, but others may find they start attracting less motivated and talented employees. They may also resist the idea people can be productive at home without being micromanaged.

It seems naïve to believe people intent on micromanaging their employees have been unable to find a way to do that while more folk were working from home.

The idea everyone is just going to read their balance sheets and automatically make the best long-term decision is naïve.

Seems to me it's naïve to presume business owners can be divided neatly into progressives who behave correctly and would allow their employees to work from home, and conservatives who can't see the forest for the trees and wouldn't allow their employees to work from home.

Old ideas often die hard, and change seems to be especially hard for conservative thinkers. That being said, and as noted already, it would also be a mistake to assume all businesses are run by conservatives.

It would be a mistake to assume all conservative business owners are micromanaging idiots, too. Perhaps this thread was never intended to be about whether or not people want to go back to the workplace!

I think most business owners and managers will sensibly look at what works best for their businesses' long-term interests.

[spooker]

Good post and great question on the tax adjustments. That will remain to be seen. Another potential unintended impact of moving the workplace home could be the increased empty office space and businesses downsizing their physical locations. In the sort term especially this could reduce the demand for office space and could have other impacts on the economy.

Can we say loft conversions for affordable housing? <grin>

[Ka-El]

It would be a mistake to assume all conservative business owners are micromanaging idiots, too. Perhaps this thread was never intended to be about whether or not people want to go back to the workplace!

It absolutely started out as an invitation to discuss the idea and its potential benefits, but we should have known the usual suspects would show up with the usual derogatory partisan rhetoric about workers. Yes, it would be a mistake to assume all conservative business owners are micromanaging idiots. I’m not even assuming most are, but it is clear some people have the idea workers have no intrinsic motivation and need to be continually supervised - so they can be held to account I guess.

I think most business owners and managers will sensibly look at what works best for their businesses' long-term interests.

Good for you

[The Green Barbarian]

Yea, we must transition to "work from home" if it is at all possible for your job. If you don't you're a backwards thinker falling into conservative rhetoric... Your business will attract dumber people and your business will fail if you don't adapt and make room for change...

That stupid argument aside... my business tried the work from home for 3 months! Then again for another month a few months later. There was zero accountability, if someone didn't pick up their phone you couldn't get ahold of them. Zoom meetings were great, they completely solved the in-person meeting when all we were doing is talking. What zoom didn't solve was the need to collaborate. You can't teach someone over zoom with the same level of understanding. So it works. One day a week from home is all we could do long term. I couldn't imagine hiring a new employee and never physically meeting them. The world will always require in-person business contact.

If zoom (and remote work) was so easy then government officials and tech companies would have abandoned business trips years ago. This is more of a case of trying to force change instead of letting things figure themselves out naturally.

Yes, you nailed it perfectly. It's easy in a government environment to say that everyone should work from home when accountability and "problem-solving" are not really that high up on the list of important items. In the real world, where results matter and making payroll is actually a concern, collaboration is extremely important and requires in person contact. I hear you on the whole disappearing act thing, I've heard no end of stories of how that period April - May - June 2020 turned into a three month holiday for a lot of people who were "quarantining", which was code for put in an hour a day and get paid for an entire day.

The economy can't sustain the lower productivity that has resulted from this whole forced stay at home nonsense, and long-term, government can't either. You can babble on about "conservative" vs "progressive" thinking, but that's just trying to force a misguided political agenda onto human behavioral characteristics, that's been in place for thousands of years. Ultimately people have to meet up and be in person for some part of their jobs, if they are in high level achievement positions. It can't work any other way, it just can't.

[Ka-El]

I do like the hybrid model but there are a lot of logistical challenges associated.

A transition to a work from home model will really flush out the maturity of a business’ management approach. Are they still trying to use a "at his desk, looks like he's doing work" approach to measuring employee performance? If so, that doesn't transition well to working from home. It's not always easy/doable, but an employee's performance should be judged on outcomes vs "how busy they look". Good leadership understands this. Poor leadership (especially at smaller businesses often owned by people who aren't educated/experienced at management) will result in a business falling apart during a transition to working from home.

Otherwise, I think we need to think bigger about the long-term impacts of working from home. Think about the downtown core of a city. Usually the most expensive real-estate/lease, the highest density, longest commute times, etc. Most are white collar jobs that could work from home. Why live in Vancouver, when you could sell and live in the Okanagan while making Vancouver pay? Why live in the Okanagan when you could work and live in the Kootenays? We could see an outright reversal in the trend of people leaving smaller communities to live in bigger ones. Housing may become more affordable, etc. $300k gets you a very nice home in some parts of BC.

Good post Tyler. There are a lot of logistical challenges associated with any major transition, but I know from the networking I’ve done that many, if not most businesses that have this option have made dramatically successful changes already. As you’ve noted, and what I had hoped we might discuss, is the many benefits that could ultimately come out of this transition. Evolution, including social and political evolution is inevitable and the process provides opportunity, and the last thing we want is “thinkers” who don’t want to change because of some misguided assumption that these old practices are human behavioural characteristics that have been in place for thousands of years. Yikes. Our destructive drug laws haven’t worked for the last hundred years and most conservatives would also have us double down on what hasn’t been working up to now. This is just another example of how uncomfortable some people are with change, or what is unknown.

In his book “The Third Wave”, Alvin Toffler (author of “Future Shock”) described the many potential benefits to decentralized communities (business, residential and industrial) that he envisioned would come from our advances in communication and transportation. He saw smaller communities where people were more connected, and where they could either commute via advanced public transportation infrastructure or work remotely from home with our advanced communication technology. Well, that last prediction is coming true – although the impetus to move that way was the result of the pandemic - and there is no evidence productivity has suffered or reason to believe employees will become less productive working from home. In fact, anecdotal evidence from businesses to date has suggested the exact opposite to be true. However, it is very interesting to consider what impact such a move might have on the downtown cores of large cities.

[rustled]

It would be a mistake to assume all conservative business owners are micromanaging idiots, too. Perhaps this thread was never intended to be about whether or not people want to go back to the workplace!

It absolutely started out as an invitation to discuss the idea and its potential benefits, but we should have known the usual suspects would show up with the usual derogatory partisan rhetoric about workers.

It seems unlikely responding with derogatory partisan rhetoric about business owners would help keep the thread on the topic of whether or not folk want to return to the workplace, or prefer to work from home.

It also seems unlikely to me a conservative business owner would ignore their business's bottom line. So if anything, a more conservative business owner would be more likely to insist people work from home whether their employees want to or not - if that is what's best for their bottom line.

[The Green Barbarian]

It also seems unlikely to me a conservative business owner would ignore their business's bottom line. So if anything, a more conservative business owner would be more likely to insist people work from home whether their employees want to or not - if that is what's best for their bottom line.

Yes Rustled, the partisan rhetoric about "conservative thinking" has totally derailed this thread and made it another candidate for the Bickering Room. Here's what the "business owner" (I always find it hilarious when career government workers want to lecture others about "bottom lines" and whether they are "conservative" in their practices, like these people have any idea how the real world functions lol lol lol) is worried about - they are trapped in these crazy things called "leases", that can have up to 10 years of life. Just because all of your people decide to stay home, these "leases" are still active, and the "business owners" have to find a way to utilize this space that they are paying for. It's just that simple.

As "business owners", and dare I say, non-business owners like government, do the math, as these leases expire perhaps they won't be renewed. But that's neither here nor there. What isn't needed are "business owners" being insulted with partisan rhetoric for being "backward" because they want people to return to the offices that are being leased and paid for. That's great that you've become used to working every day in your pajamas, but it's time to grow up again and get back into the real world. Big boy pants and all.

[rustled]

It also seems unlikely to me a conservative business owner would ignore their business's bottom line. So if anything, a more conservative business owner would be more likely to insist people work from home whether their employees want to or not - if that is what's best for their bottom line.

Yes Rustled, the partisan rhetoric about "conservative thinking" has totally derailed this thread and made it another candidate for the Bickering Room. Here's what the "business owner" (I always find it hilarious when career government workers want to lecture others about "bottom lines" and whether they are "conservative" in their practices, like these people have any idea how the real world functions lol lol lol) is worried about - they are trapped in these crazy things called "leases", that can have up to 10 years of life. Just because all of your people decide to stay home, these "leases" are still active, and the "business owners" have to find a way to utilize this space that they are paying for. It's just that simple.

As "business owners", and dare I say, non-business owners like government, do the math, as these leases expire perhaps they won't be renewed. But that's neither here nor there. What isn't needed are "business owners" being insulted with partisan rhetoric for being "backward" because they want people to return to the offices that are being leased and paid for. That's great that you've become used to working every day in your pajamas, but it's time to grow up again and get back into the real world. Big boy pants and all.

No more jogging in late and changing in the middle of a meeting, or peeing in a coffee cup?
I'll bet if a business owner stuck with a lease was sure profits would be achieved over the long term by subletting the property and having employees continue to work from home, that's what the business owner would do.

Whether the employees prefer to work from home, or not!