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Apple employees threaten to quit as company takes hard line stance on remote work:
Apple employees claim the company is not budging on plans to institute a hybrid work model for corporate workers and is in some cases denying work-from-home exceptions, including one accommodation covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act.
In June, Apple announced a hybrid work schedule that will see employees return to the office for three days a week starting in September, a shift toward normal corporate operations after the pandemic forced a lengthy work-from-home period. Days later, participants of what is assumed to be the same remote work advocacy Slack channel cited by The Verge asked more flexibility, saying that working from home brings a number of benefits including greater diversity and inclusion in retention and hiring, tearing down previously existing communication barriers, better work life balance, better integration of existing remote / location-flexible workers, and reduced spread of pathogens.
That request was flatly denied. In a video to employees late last month, SVP of retail and people Deirdre O'Brien toed the company line on remote work policies, saying, "We believe that in-person collaboration is essential to our culture and our future. If we take a moment to reflect on our unbelievable product launches this past year, the products and the launch execution were built upon the base of years of work that we did when we were all together in-person."
(Score: 2) by Mykl on Tuesday July 20 2021, @11:01PM (2 children)
These workers should be careful what they wish for.
If it does turn out that remote work is "just as good" then there's no reason to hire Silicon Valley locals. Halve the salaries and hire techies in North Dakota or Kentucky. Or perhaps offshore the whole thing?
We all have our horror stories about work done offshore. I do genuinely believe that there is advantage in physical co-location. What percentage of the week that needs to be remains to be seen.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday July 20 2021, @11:36PM
I have watched offshoring fail miserably for two decades, but it's not so much about the lack of butts in chairs. Different problems with different projects and cultures, and sometimes it works, but it never seems to be strong enough to shut down a whole office the way "Outsourced" portrayed. Our current company is trying to use offshoring for growth. I'm in R&D, so we continue domestic R&D and work with partners offshore for various projects. Maybe some day they'll embarass us in terms of productivity or efficiency or innovation - the way the Chinese did the cellphone industry - but in the things I've been doing for the last 20 years? Nah. Hasn't put any downward pressure on my salary.
I think the ability to show up in the office is 99% of the battle, actually coming in? As long as my coworkers aren't there, I seem to have a "need" to be in office about 1 day out of 100. Coworkers are actually easier to reach now than they were when they had a desk they were supposed to be at.
Are Silicon Valley salaries in jeopardy? At this point in my life, I couldn't care less - seems like they should be, but maybe they'll keep splashing out the big bucks and just use it to hire more attractive resumes.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 20 2021, @11:50PM
Offshore is more than just working remotely, its timezone differences, language barriers, cultural nuances, tax implications, regulatory costs, etc. Yes, hiring from the country side or rural areas within the same region would make sense and that's the point. I'd rather move to the country side even with a pay reduction to match the lowered cost of living and work remotely than having to maintain an inflated cost of living so that I'm as close as possible to an over populated and polluted metropolitan hub.