I hope that is the point where they sent the offer.
Even if productivity is better this way, isn't there an advantage to being able to hire people from a wider geography, access to a larger talent pool?
I read @paulg and other leadership type YC people support return to office as well. I recall startups competing for talent desperately. That was why silicon valley startups always had crazy perks. If talent was how my business disrupted and dominated, I would want the most access to talent and give them the best working conditions. Perhaps a subtle pivot in priority has happened? Tech companies no longer believe in a talent-centered strategy? Or there is an over abundance of talent?
I'm just trying to give people the benefit of doubt, that this isn't just cruel people unhappy at the sight of improved quality of life for others.
I think it's more of a litmus test: If you care about your work enough that you're willing to come to the office every day (or even move cities/countries), then you'll be extremely engaged.
So by saying "you have to come to the office 5 days a week", you will only get people who are very engaged and will get a lot done—even if it's not because of the office.
I guarantee there's a Venn diagram of extremely engaged people who also prefer (or will exclusively do) remote work, which office-only companies will miss out on.
But when you're in a high talent-density area like NYC/SF maybe that's not a big concern.
So willingness to come to the office becomes a proxy metric for how much you care, which obviously influences your engagement.
Sure, but what if there is another company closer to me (office), or offering hybrid or full remote work? I can about my work just the same elsewhere.
I think you're on the right track, but in my opinion, it is more about having reliable employees than employees who care or are engaged. Your actual performance and talent could be bad, but so long as you won't ask for too much pay and you won't leave any time soon, that is what these companies want more than talent. This is sort of what I was alluding to. disruptive startups would never think this way, but EA isn't that anymore. neither are google or facebook. they're no longer disruptive, they are complacent and spiraling into the IBM and AT&T like mediocrity.
Sure! I think the (maybe sad) reality is that most larger companies don't actually need excellence in most roles.
First, excellent people tend to have bigger variance and second, most jobs just don't require being that good.
I imagine that in today's Apple, there's no way Jony Ive would be as influential. And maybe that's just how things go:
The types of people who can innovate and change things are dissatisfied with the status quo. But once you ARE the status quo, you seek precisely the people who want to maintain it.
Game-development already is a super-hostile work environment, where "talent" is regularly replaced by some starry eyed university-grad for cheap. If people are just ablative material and payment is all the captain crunch you can eat in the cafeteria, nobody at a cult gets to work remote.
I suppose it's the weird dynamic in our society where you get paid less and have worse working conditions the more passion you feel for your work.
You will also get paid less than you are worth and eventually start to hate what you love.
The intersection between highly paid and passionate is surprisingly rare.
Also, I've seen plenty of people on HN insist that people doing "creative" work (excepting programmers, who are obviously worth every penny) should do so for free so as not to taint the purity of their work with capitalist incentives.
It isn't an assumption that what's fun can't be highly paid, rather it's an assumption that what's fun shouldn't be highly paid.
Or extremely stupid (if for the same money you get WFH without the need to move to another city or even country and waste I don't know how many hours commuting, and spending most of your life in a space that you can't really adapt to your needs).
If you're committed for the right reasons or not ultimately doesn't matter, but it is a filter for candidates.
Plus there are people who genuinely like working from an office full-time.
There's also the question of executives having a stake in the commercial real estate that's used for the office, but I think it's secondary, as they're too okay with firing people for that to be the main reason.
I assume because in the US employees can still sue for what they would consider wrongful termination, especially if the worker is part of a protected group, making firing a very expensive endeavor in the end.
Even people who are actually discriminated against, which is very common, don't typically sue. It's a lot of work to sue, and while you're at it, you don't have a job or health insurance. Most workers are just focused on getting another job so they're not on the street or bankrupted by an unexpected surgery.
I've seen now multiple cases of very obvious discrimination. Nothing actually comes of it. If the brass wants you gone, you're gone. You have no recourse, laws are basically just suggestions when it comes to corporations.
Companies are pretty much always going to prioritize the lowest-risk highest-value option right now, over and over and over, until they eventually fail. This doesn't just pertain to hiring, but all business decisions. RCA, GE, GM, you name it, this is how it's done. It's the American school of business.
I recently got an Amazon recruiter ping, but realized that they couldn’t pay me enough to commute into the city center. I’m not really looking, but if push came to shove, I would have to if the industry is really moving back to the office. Makes me real sad.
The companies bringing employees back to the office aren't typically the owners of these buildings not are they real estate investors.
Sunk cost fallacy may be a factor but it's not the same.
Local businesses want humans near them.. that was the agreement, and the government wants that generated tax revenue.
Many of this big orgs are not "maintaining their side of the agreement" - hence pressure to return.. lest tax breaks get challenged.
Frankly, the idea that there is any logical financial motivation (aside from an idea of increased productivity) for return to office is far fetched.
Not rhetorical - from my perspective, it seems like RTO is plainly a money-waster. If you're hybrid or remote and it's working, why take the risk? And, why pour your pockets on things that don't make you money, like office space? Cubicles don't produce your product, people do.
I mean, it just makes so little sense to me. I don't think that means it's a conspiracy. But, clearly, we are missing something that executives are factoring into this decision.
These sorts of power plays are impossible in a resource-constrained setting.
Meanwhile, spare a thought for the poor devils graduating from CS degree programs right now.
rzz3•8mo ago