posted by
Fnord666
on Sunday April 11 2021, @03:43AM
from the home-is-where-the-heart^W-office-is? dept.
from the home-is-where-the-heart^W-office-is? dept.
34% of WFH (work from home) workers say they'd rather quit than return to full-time office work:
A new survey of WFH (work-from-home) employees suggests that many are not yet ready to return to the office. In fact, they may never be ready.
The survey found that 34% of WFH respondents say they would rather quit than return to a full-time office job.
The survey was published by staffing firm Robert Half. It involved more than 1,000 adult employees of US companies, all of whom are currently working from home due to the pandemic.
As mentioned above, more than 1 in 3 said they would look for a new job if they had to again work in the office full time.
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34% of WFH (Work From Home) Workers Say They'd Rather Quit Than Return to Full-Time Office Work
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(Score: 5, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday April 11 2021, @03:59AM (24 children)
That's fine. I mean, it's every worker's right to determine for themselves what conditions they're willing to be employed under. It's also every employer's right to set the conditions under which they're willing to employ someone though. So quit if you like but I don't want to hear any bitching about it being unfair; it was your choice.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @04:15AM (21 children)
So fuck it. They’ve already shown they need you more than you need them. The balance of power has shifted in the case of skilled workers from home. And you can be sure if a few people leave to WFH for another employer, their colleagues will be asking if the new employer is still hiring WFH.
And then there are those who are looking for a reason to start off on their own. It’s not like a real office is needed any more (which was the unspoken justification for shitty WeWork space - to be able to say you have a “real office”).
(Score: 5, Interesting) by fakefuck39 on Sunday April 11 2021, @04:53AM (8 children)
> Employers laid off the deadwood
this is not just false, the opposite is true. they laid off people who temporarily were not needed due to reduced business volume. they kept, and even grew the dead wood. because the dead wood is in charge. I'm an engineer who was hit by that, and had to look for new work. so i have a huge sample size of who got canned at many companies where I know people, as well as the job situation, as I had to get a new one.
the companies laid off people doing the actual work, due to reduced work. at the same time, they hired middle management - yeah, those many levels of "supervisor" "manager" "director" "sr director" who all report up the chain, to more effectively manage the two people who're left actually working. this literally happened at my office - a bunch of tech staff canned, new regional vp hired, at a salary of all theirs put together.
who else stayed? the hr retards. and their job is to create work for themselves. they post a position that will maybe exist in a year, update it every two weeks to make it show up new, collect qualified resumes, do literally hundreds of first-level interviews, rinse, repeat. about half the jobs I looked at last march when I was canned - they're still there. And, by the way, Robert Half's jobs - a shitty bottom-feeder staffing firm, are all still there. Now, you may think RH - sounds like a decent firm! Jersey Temporaries doesn't sound so decent - sounds like temp people for a lawn mowing service. Yeah, that's RH too.
When companies go back to in-office, they're all going to go back to in-office. We tried the remote thing - big push for that like 15 years ago. Then companies reversed direction. The purpose of in-office has nothing to do with work. It's so that people who can bring no other value to the work outside of being physically present, the people in middle management, can feel in control and feel important. A real office has not been needed work for many jobs for a long time. you're wrong in assuming the point of being in the office was to facilitate work. covid didn't change any of that.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Unixnut on Sunday April 11 2021, @10:51AM (4 children)
> this is not just false, the opposite is true. they laid off people who temporarily were not needed due to reduced business volume. they kept, and even grew the dead wood. because the dead wood is in charge. I'm an engineer who was hit by that, and had to look for new work. so i have a huge sample size of who got canned at many companies where I know people, as well as the job situation, as I had to get a new one.
I don't know. To counter with my own anecdote. During the covid period my company has been hiring like crazy. One thing I did notice when I was hiring for an engineer, is that the quality of applicants were very poor, and most said were let go when covid hit.
Talking to my boss, who talked to the bosses of companies in the area, said that that there are two currents going on:
1. Covid allowed a lot of companies to let go of poorly performing employees, without having to justify the decision to HR/employment tribunals/etc... especially as the government was willing to provide some "covid relief" money to those affected. So there was a bit of a "clear out" of such employees using covid as an excuse.
2. Those employees that were good were needed during this difficult period. They themselves were not willing to move to other jobs. Having a steady job where you have proved yourself (i.e. didn't get let go in the "clear out") was golden during the period of uncertainty. So a talented person was not willing to risk moving to a new company, go through 6 months probation, etc... and risk being let go and having no job during a pandemic.
So good people didn't want to risk moving jobs, while not so good people were let go. The result was quite a large pool of applicants for jobs, many of which were not considered good enough. We really struggled to find decent people.
Also, during this time working from home was for everyone, which a lot of people took a liking to (myself included). It was interesting to see that some people really did have an improvement in performance and productivity, while others didn't. Some really struggled without an office to go to (this was mostly people living alone in shoebox apartments, and people stuck in small houses with small children).
This worked well for most of 2020, but things starting going a bit sour in the start of 2021, as the government started lifting restrictions. A lot of tech companies said they were willing to offer permanent work from home, while at the same time my company insisted WFH was temporary and everyone was expected to go back to the office once the government says it is ok. This is despite a "work from home" survey showing that around 60% of the company wanted to continue working from home permanently.
The result was that in the last three months, almost half the employees in my department have resigned, and moved to companies offering permanent WFH (almost all of them went to Amazon, interestingly), which really impacted the companies functioning (those of us left have almost double the workload, and projects are missing deadlines now). Now the company has backtracked a bit and is not saying "yes" or "no" to allowing work from home, but are "considering the option".
Amazon actually contacted me as well, to offer me a permanent WFH position if I pass their interviews. I've decided to try for it, in case my company decides against allowing permanent WFH. So you can count me in the "34%".
It depends on the company as well, those who are more "pointy haired boss" type places are more likely to prefer keeping brown nosing management employees than those who do the work, likewise business where the actual workload goes down due to the government restrictions. Difference is that in my sector, the move to doing almost everything online has resulted in an explosion of work during the restrictions.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @01:18PM (2 children)
Watch out at Amazon. They have a history of stack ranking. I don't know if they still do, but reviews say that you will still have to out-perform your previous self every quarter if you want a raise each year.
Amazon's interview process is 90% core leadership principle questions, and 10% coding.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @03:15PM
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Tuesday April 13 2021, @10:15AM
I've never worked at Amazon, but from friends who have tried it was quite telling that their signing stock only vested 5% after one year. Most big companies expect that the first year is for you to find out if you're happy there and if you stay for a year you'll probably stay for a long time, so a big chunk of the stock vests at the end of the first year. Amazon expects a lot of people to leave so skews the incentives really far to the future to try to discourage this. In spite of that, they still have a lot of people leaving before the majority of their signing stock vests.
TL;DR: When your incentive structure assumes high turnover, it's probably a sign of a toxic working environment.
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2, Flamebait) by fakefuck39 on Sunday April 11 2021, @06:18PM
yes, if you're laid off, you're not essential. i was a presales engineer, sales stopped for about 6 months, they laid off the presales engineers to save money. nothing wrong with that.
the employees that were good were not needed during this period. the employees who were lowest paid were, so the highest paid ones got canned, so the least number of people could get fired. the reason you got a bunch of shit resumes when a bunch of people were looking for work is your company, the position you had open, and likely the compensation. you're not selecting from the available pool - you're selecting from a pool of whoever was interested to submit a resume to you. with very few good positions open, all the good people went to those positions, and you got applications for the leftovers. but do go on and pretend it's the resource pool, not you.
you're also in a business that saw an increase during lockdown. we're talking about businesses that saw a downturn. you're literally not in the group of companies, which are most companies, that is being discussed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @10:57AM
In my case, all the company's staff was retained, 95% of us are WFH except the sys and net adm who sporadically need to get psychical. All the ergonomic chairs and extra "productivity" gadgets were sent by courier at the "home office" approx July last year and the company pays the power and internet cost.
Since July last year, the team grew by at least 20%, over all 4 timezones, all hired in a WFH arrangement.
We may get to set foot in the office, if we exercise this option, somewhere in Sept this year. For the foreseeable future, most of us will probably choose to work at most 2 days/w from the office. I think the company will start to cut from the office floor costs first before cutting from the work force once the pandemic is over.
Take some guesses about the industry.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @12:23PM
At least not to your previous employer.
That’s just the way it works in every recession or economic contraction.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday April 11 2021, @04:42PM
It's the same old story, management decided who to lay off and guess who they deemed essential?
Occasionally middle management gets a correction, but top management never has.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday April 11 2021, @10:38AM (11 children)
If that's what you believe, go right ahead and set your required working conditions accordingly. Just keep in mind your employer is under no obligation to continue your employment if they disagree. And they're not going to have any problem at all replacing you with as many unemployed people as there currently are.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @12:19PM (7 children)
Posted by someone whose last real job was when exactly?
The world has changed. Should have happened a decade ago because the technology was available then, but there’s a lot of inertia to overcome.
Stick to playing around with Perl and slash - obsolete is your speed.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @12:54PM (1 child)
What exactly is a real job, dear?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @03:17PM
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday April 11 2021, @01:04PM (3 children)
The world can change back. We'll see what changes are permanent.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @03:29PM (1 child)
Hard to justify when many people are both happier and more productive.
Especially given the large portion of the population that won’t get vaccinated, and the smaller population that vaccines don’t generate sufficient immune response.
Working from home will also make the next pandemic less impactful on the economy. We’ve had 3 coronavirus infections crossing over to humans in the last 20 years. It was just luck that the previous ones (SARS-COV-1, MERS) weren’t full blown pandemics .
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday April 11 2021, @10:16PM
In other words, the last pandemic of this seriousness was a century ago. It's just luck we had another since.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @04:38PM
Change is always permanent. That's why you can't go home again.
For example, PHBs can make monkeys play video games with their brains, eventually they'll be rewired to cut&paste in modern languages, and all you script kiddies will be out of work, reminiscing about the good old days.
Mongo only pawn, in cruel game of life.
(Score: 1) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday April 11 2021, @11:56PM
So you're saying I should be someone else's dancing monkey, why? I'm not a chicken-shit like you. I'm willing to take greater risks for greater rewards and self-determination.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by sjames on Sunday April 11 2021, @04:43PM (2 children)
But if the employers are smart, they won't press the issue at this time. There are plenty of others applying for jobs, many of them were deadwood that got cut loose at the first good excuse (tough economic times, there's a pandemic you know). If the employee wanting to keep working from home was deadwood, they would have already been dumped. So if they decide to leave, there's a better than 50% chance the replacement hire will be deadwood on arrival.
It's also worth considering for employers that if the employees dutifully return to the office, they may well do so with one foot out the door. They'll either find a work from home job elsewhere or become deadwood over the next couple years.
If employers were any good at management, they'd throw a party if the union went on a rulebook strike.
(Score: 1) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday April 11 2021, @11:57PM (1 child)
Plenty of unemployed people were not deadwood. Labor is most certainly not a seller's market at the moment.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Monday April 12 2021, @02:44AM
Sure, about half are not deadwood. Thus the 50% chance.
As the economy bounces back, it's going to get harder to find good hires. A bad time to have a bunch of employees with one foot out the door.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 12 2021, @10:20AM
I doubt the average US "work from home" worker is that great. So they should keep in mind that there are probably hundreds of thousands of cheaper workers in other countries who can work from home and do the same job for less than half the US worker's cost.
So you US workers please go ahead and quit. We'll take your jobs.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by DeathMonkey on Monday April 12 2021, @03:50PM
How quickly does your position change if that employer chooses to require vaccines?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @04:04AM (2 children)
It’s a win-win except for brown-boxers and their managers. If you’re skilled enough that you kept your job working from home in the pandemic, someone else will hire you.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @06:42AM (1 child)
Here's a bigger and more detailed survey if anyone is actually interested in the question,
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/covid-one-year-on-americans-are-more-productive-working-from-home-canva-study-reveals-301238113.html [prnewswire.com]
Study had 2000 participants and tfa goes on to cut up the data in multiple different ways.
My take after reading it? Gee, who would have guessed that people differ (doh)--some are productive at home, others in a group, etc. One size doesn't fit all.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @11:14AM
True in my case. Huge boost. It impacted on the personal life though, even if there's limited opportunities to have a rich personal life during lockdowns.
True, so much less banter during meetings. I reckon the couple of jokers in the team simply can't do standup comedy over Zoom - meeting are a lot more to the point now.
Not in my case, but I can see reasons for this to happen when the amount of BS goes lower and the amount of meaningful work increases.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @04:09AM (4 children)
Once those naive schmucks who thought they were hot shit realizes that they are hot shit no more, they will crawl back on their knees.
Shit, being a social animal sucks.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @04:21AM (3 children)
A well rounded career nowadays should include both self employment and worktop to an employer.
After all, your needs and desires change over the period of a lifetime - your choice of work should reflect that. Otherwise you’re just a drone.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @04:40AM (2 children)
Oh, superman, self-reliant man...
Nice fantasy, but you can't escape from the fact that we evolved from monkeys.
Good luck with your life.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @05:19AM
Some of our ancestors evolved before monkeys. Some of the rest of you did evolve from monkeys. And, quite recently, it seems.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @12:56PM
(Score: 3, Interesting) by krishnoid on Sunday April 11 2021, @04:57AM (3 children)
I wonder if this is something of a work cycle, where people work for a company for a few years, get some successes under their belt, then move on based on that with a bump in salary. It's been ~12 months, so maybe it was time for people who can work from home to look for greener pastures anyway.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @06:57AM (2 children)
Slightly different take: Once you've had a chance to work from home, you know that it is possible, you may find you like it and that you are more productive without office gossip & politics. I think a lot of people will stay home and start their own small companies.
Anyone see any recent stats on new sole proprietorships, LLC and INC filings in different parts of the USA (and/or the world)?
(Score: 2) by NateMich on Sunday April 11 2021, @06:56PM (1 child)
I can't find any recent stats, but I suspect the numbers are way down. Sure, maybe office workers are more likely to strike out on their own, but overall the past year has been horrible for small businesses.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @10:59PM
Great opportunity to start up a n a new location outside the city centres, which will be the last to recover.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Sunday April 11 2021, @07:25AM (7 children)
I've never had to stay at home, and I'd rather quit than do that. Working from home is awful for me: there's the wife, the kid, the cats annoying me, and - most importantly - home time is not for work. It's entirely psychological, I know. But when I'm home, I'm not at work. That's always how it's been for me.
Also, if I was to provide an office space with heating, electricity and internet in my house to work, I sure as hell would expect the company to cover my expenses. Because I can see the obvious scam coming from a miles away with that one: the company telling their employees to work from home without any compensation (because hey, we let you stay at home, what are you complaining about?) or else. Well I don't think so...
(Score: 4, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @07:55AM
You're dead to me and your Internet privileges are hereby revoked!
(Score: 5, Interesting) by krishnoid on Sunday April 11 2021, @07:59AM (1 child)
That's the obvious scam? I thought it would be what this guy [npr.org] pulled off.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 12 2021, @10:37AM
How's that a scam? He was just doing what his bosses do except maybe better:
I suspect the employees of the Chinese consulting firm weren't being paid 50 grand annually...
Lots of US WFH workers can be replaced with cheaper and better workers from other countries.
If companies have difficulty figuring out who to hire maybe they can hire that US "scam" worker to identify good workers or outsourcing firms, seems like he's good at it ;).
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @12:46PM
Work from home has allowed many people to really scale back spending, so much so that now that they want to spend money on home improvements since they’re spending more time there anyway, there’s a shortage of wood, from 2x4s to decking to in-ground swimming pools. Even bicycles, bike tires and tubes, are back ordered. And we’re going to see trillions more stimulus.
Throw in the billions in private investment as companies remove their dependence on Chinese manufacturing for critical goods, and its going to be a repeat of the Roaring 20s after the 1918 pandemic.
And let’s not forget the benefits of cheaper green energy over the next decade. More jobs taken away from foreign oil producers and moved to local wind and solar projects and grid upgrades.
And spending to combat the effects of global overheating and its consequences.
Boom times are coming. Just not for downtown office towers and the businesses dependent on them.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @01:00PM
There’s a diverse in your future. Why not embrace it now instead of making everyone miserable?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Sunday April 11 2021, @04:47PM
I don't know your pay scale or neighborhood restrictions, but a nice office for one sized trailer can be had for $40k or less, and it is clearly 100% work related expense for tax purposes.
Quiet, self contained, and if the family is poorly behaved you can relocate it somewhere nice just far enough away...
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @07:01PM
Are you sure you’ve thought this through? If you quit rather than work from home, aren’t you stuck at home anyway? If you’re going to be stuck at home anyway? Isn’t it better to at least have a job than to be looking for one? If just for the better pay?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by shrewdsheep on Sunday April 11 2021, @10:23AM (2 children)
I have worked from home for over a year now. Before, I definitely was more productive at the office, as it imposed a rhythm which I lacked at home. In the meantime, this has turned around. Especially the meetings have now become bearable. For larger meetings, I can turn off the camera, mute and work on something else. For meetings with fewer people, I safe the time walking to the location and it is easier to cut short the meetings (I have to leave now, leave online meeting). As a result, I would not like to go back to the office full time, though I can imagine coming back, say, two days.
(However, the home-schooling thing was/is a painful drain on productivity.)
(Score: 2) by looorg on Sunday April 11 2021, @11:48AM
I think I'm in the camp that doesn't want to go back, but at the same time I might not have much of a choice. I used to work a lot more home but had to be at the office mostly for meetings and such. So in that regard perhaps it has not changed that much. But I would want to be there even less. But it's sort of up to the employer if they are down with it. So far they are. That said it not only a blessing but instead also a bit of a curse. If I (or you or anyone) doesn't have to be at the office anymore the pool of potential employers grows rapidly -- which could be both great and bad. I could work somewhere else but also someone else could take my job if they are not tied to my geographical area. So it could be bad, or good. Don't know just yet.
As far as the Zoom/Teams/whatever meetings I think I hate them even more then before. It's just such a crap substitute for actual physical real meetings. The only one that should be happy about them are the budget people that can note how much money they save by not sending people around. Phone meetings was somewhat annoying before, now it has even more technology that can go wrong and seeing a picture sometimes doesn't really add that much to the whole experience.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday April 11 2021, @04:50PM
For me the thing that has improved the most since lockdown started is coworkers willingness to do Zoom and similar remote meetings properly.
We have had the technology for 15+ years but 50%+ of my coworkers were resistant to using it.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @03:59PM (1 child)
Go to Professional Hitman School. That's what I did, & it was the best life choice I ever made. This world needs more cheap assassins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 11 2021, @11:05PM