This also suggests that willingness to allow remote work can be a useful proxy for how toxic the workplace will be. Additionally newly found in companies are going to have less of a reason to want to ever invest in office space, it’s easier to order people back to an office when there was an office to begin with. I expect more companies to be less likely to have office space and have more of their employees be remote as a general rule. Going to an office might become associated with older businesses and all the baggage that comes with
This is a side point, but I get mildly infuriated when articles like this state “Some leaders say they insist on full-time in-person work because it boosts productivity, despite clear evidence that it does not.” Oh? Clear evidence? I can’t find any. Can you? There are 3 journal articles referenced in that sentence, none of which say anything about productivity. I poked around Google Scholar and find that productivity gain / loss is still unknown, and depends greatly on the work and the field. Do you have to use actual physical stuff in an office? Definitely lower productivity working from home. Do you work with a team that’s all in the same office? Also a solid productivity loss. But if you don’t work with anyone in your office and all your stuff is online? No probably no productivity loss (but I didn’t find a specific reference there).
I’ve seen a ton of posts saying WFH is so clearly better for revenue and productivity, and it’s more about the sunk cost of the office space rented or a boss wanting to lord over his employees. And yes, I like that narrative and it works well for me, but the actual research just isn’t there and it bugs me that it’s stated like a solid irrefutable fact. It’s not! it’s a gray area! it depends!
This has been studied for decades since the 90s. Oracle and IBM both did big “floating office” trials several diff times and much has been written about them. A lot of the downsides really come down to team psychology more than anything to do with efficiency or productivity or collaboration. Simply put, people are significantly more empathetic towards people they are in a room with, and significantly more likely to feel hostility or animosity towards someone who isn’t. You’ve almost certainly experienced this if you’ve done a lot of work with remote teams - even when everything is fine there’s almost a universal instinct to talk shit about the other team.
There are well understood ways to deal with this, mind you, but you actually have to be proactive about it. Most CEOs simply don’t understand this, or are too lazy to deal with it.
From the article: " it turns out that ordering people back to the office full time is a power and status move. It’s a signature strategy of leaders who exhibit narcissistic qualities"
I have a friend who could do her job 100% remotely, but the company won’t let them and just allows one or two days a week max.
And, I’m not kidding, some higher up said that they need employees at the office so that the parking lot looks nice and full for visiting clients. You can’t make this shit up.
Employees should suggest “decoy day”, when everyone bands together to build fake cars to fill the parking-lot and thus impress visiting clients. You could organize a whole Potemkin Village thing, where a small number of in-office employees are re-used to look busy for those visiting clients.
Maybe soon we could all get self-driving cars and have it drive itself to the office so the parking lot looks pretty
“Let’s go ask Tom in accounting.”
Tom in accounting:
I was skeptic about his new workout regimen including self-decapitation, chopping off his hands, and ripping his legs off at the knees, but the results are undeniable!
He’s the chair of the gym club, why would you doubt his regimen?
Don’t ask, just go into the bread stool.
NYT reporter saying what every worker dealing with this shit already knows.
Exactly why federal employees were told telework is cancelled and now managers act like telework is some sort of impossible magic and not something that’s been around since the 90s.
Unfortunately we were forced to do too much telework in 2020 and you can’t put the Magic Smoke back in the electronics
So many companies claim “collaboration” is a prime reason for Return To Office and yet these same companies gladly use offshore teams for development work if they believe they can save money, proving that collaboration as a goal is a lie. A short overlap in time, if any, between onshore and offshore teams proves the claim is gaslighting.
Yep, that’s me. When I’m at the office I rarely interact with anyone live.
A project I’m on now has been a bit more of a challenge lately. Usually we have teams at two locations and you just need to hand off. But this project has three people with very little overlap, in: IST, UTC, EST
“Is for better cooperation and team cohesion” says the boss via videocall, the grainy image reflecting the limited signal reach of his third house build in the Alps slightly south of Geneva.
My cubicle, 9 hours per day, is smaller than his shoe cabinet, and each pair of shoes is presumably more than my yearly salary.
“Then why you are so afraid as to be one continent over?” asks one of the office workers, his eyes pissed. The Boss silences promptly the microphone before returning to speak as almost nothing happened: “I hope you have a great day”.
We say nothing. He knows. 20 pairs of eyes look at him through the webcam. A person in front shows both middle fingers, promptly reflected in the smaller viewport of the camera.
“Collaboration” “Mentoring” Outside of thee military, few companies have any mechanism to train people to move up the corporate ladder. If you’re not there watching the boss, then you have no idea how to do their job. If the boss can’t see you, they can’t delegate the little tasks that amount to job training. If the boss can’t see you, they have no way to evaluate whether you’re helping or not.
The boss got his job by watching his boss and being in the right place when some opportunity came up, so that’s their entire understanding of corporate advancement.
Companies these days are just plain all day this functional entities that are increasingly lacking basic functions like training.
In most places, the boss got his job by kissing ass and/or being a fucking nepobaby more likely than not.
The other real reason: the Epstein class that owns the companies also owns the office real estate and also owns residential real estate, of which they do not want the value to go down because of supply increase if office space is repurposed as residential.
The business owners own the oil companies, the restaurants nearby, and the real estate companies, too.
It’s as simple as that. They make money by charging their employees for transportation and for the other things in-office employees have to spend money on.
I cycle to work and never get lunch from the restaurants nearby. Can I WFH then?
I did quit my last job a few days after they required me to do a multi hour train commute on a regular basis. Fuck that. If I can’t walk/ride I don’t want it. I do feel a little bad for the dev who is still there, I was the only one keeping a wave of stupid 1st line questions going his way each day.
Oh well, new job pays more and I can cycle to work easily. Better work environment too.
I ditched my shitty corporate gig for a much nicer one a couple miles from home, better benefits too. I don’t usually work from home, but they will let me if the need arises. These in person demanding corpo clowns insisting people take horrible commutes can fuck allll the way off.
https://removepaywalls.com/https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/22/opinion/office-work-wfh-bosses.html
Non paywall and no login
This is supposed to be a gifted article and so no paywall.
Even with gifted articles, the NYT refuses to accept that I’m not a bot (possibly because of my aggressive ad and JS blocking). I appreciate alternatives.
Sure, but they still require a login and account.
Good point.
We were drunk on federal covid assistance and failed to transition downtowns into anything more than these towers of huberous. With no affordable housing and high parking costs, there was no reason for anyone to come downtown. Businesses cried big tears and now we all sit in traffic. It is a circle of fuck that is just built to recoup my wages.
*hubris
