Comment by xyst 4 days ago
What sucks is that other companies will follow Amazon because “Amazon did it”. Other company I worked at went to a “hybrid model” to be followed at the end of last year. Ended up “silent quitting” by using up all of my PTO and sick time which allowed enough time to get my bonus and find a new job. Of course I was put on a PIP but by that time I was already gone, lol.
> From my experience though WFH just doesn’t work.
Apparently, it does work with thousands of consultants and contractors, and it did work during the years of lockdowns. We didn’t see any productivity decrease, generally speaking. But we all know the whole back-to-office thing is just because C-levels want to justify the grants from banks, investors, etc., by showing a “working office with people in there.” Middle managers wanted it back because, as it turned out to everyone, they were useless, so it was a justification for their positions. Additionally, real estate landlords lobbied to push it back because, without rent income, they wouldn’t be able to pay it back to the banks. The government has its reasons too, because it’s easier to focus on building small hubs and maintaining infrastructure for these offices instead of starting to work on rural areas. It ultimately shifts the power dynamics from the government, landlords, and banks to the average person, and that was an absolute no-no direction for them and had to be killed early on.
>From my experience though WFH just doesn’t work. People aren’t as invested in the company and they produce worse results. If companies could figure out how to keep productivity and quality up while not paying rent I’m sure they would, it’s just nobody has figured out how to do that on a large scale yet.
There is good thing called stock based compensation.
Because why would I want to sabotage MY money?
Of course it aint perfect.
It’s cute that you think most people can afford to live 10 minutes from work in cities.
> From my experience though WFH just doesn’t work. People aren’t as invested in the company and they produce worse results.
What a terrible take. I've been remote for 7 consecutive years at a couple of companies and I was always invested in their produce. You know why? Cause they gave me RSUs so I actually cared about the value of the stock. Nothing to do with being remote or not.
> From my experience though WFH just doesn’t work.
Your inability to WFH is not shared by most people. Sounds like you were the one quiet quitting by default (even if not realizing it).
There's a reason its cheap, you pay with your life: https://data.cityofchicago.org/Public-Safety/Homicide-Map/53...
I'd be willing to bet that it's closer to 10 minutes than an hour (over/under 40 minutes) for most Americans. The full 60 minute AVERAGE commute is still pretty rare. These conversations make it seem like the norm. In my mid-size city, my colleagues commute from 3-50 minutes a day. Average is probably 25-30 minutes.
Depends on the city, but fortune-500 types tend to be located in very busy cities. So there is a bias here. The average American isn't working in a fortune 500 office. Commuting to the average McDonald's is certainly shorter than commuting to the average Amazon office. There many millions of people in food service - Amazon employs 35,000 SWE.
I don’t care about references from that dog shit place filled with micromanagers and corporate grinders working on projects that have no meaning and add zero value to company and the world. Hence, silent quitting. RTO just gave me the push to move on from the bullshit.
> From my experience though WFH just doesn’t work
Corporate profits tell another story
> People aren’t as invested in the company and they produce worse results
Anecdotal. What backs up this claim? Just your personal experience? What’s your data?
> companies could figure out how to keep productivity and quality up while not paying rent I’m sure they would, it’s just nobody has figured out how to do that on a large scale yet
What do you think happened during COVID-19…
Have seen many companies reduce their corporate building costs due to shift to remote work. In some cases, it was eliminated entirely the following year.
As I mention, this is just from my personal experience. I would expect Amazon doesn't make a decision like this without significant internal data, there is a lot of money to be saved if someone figures out how to do work from home.
Amazon has yet to share any of that internal data with its internal employees or the outside world. The only reasoning shared has been vague talk about energy being higher and culture being easier to spread. There is a lot of money to be saved and a lot of initiatives that would benefit from broad embracing of WFH by Amazon.
They claim to support improving DEI for neuro-divergent and mobility-impaired folks, where WFH would be a massive improvement in their ability to contribute without being required to commute into the office which might present challenges for them.
They claim to support sustainability and achieving carbon neutrality, but forcing employees into the office burns significant fossil fuels and puts wear on vehicles and increases pollution since the majority of the workforce winds up driving a car to work. They will increase this measurable impact by 60%+ by mandating another 2 days of office-work per week.
Much more likely, there are motives to doing this change that are not aligned with data and stated goals. That could either mean nefarious goals or lacking data. But it's more likely nefarious goals, since WFH didn't seem to be hurting anything according to all the data anyone has been able to tell. I'd expect someone to be able to come up with plausible ways that WFO is better than WFH in a data-oriented manner, but it really does seem to be down to personal preference for individuals on how they like to work. Who knows, maybe Andy Jassy really likes to work in-office and thinks that anyone saying they don't is lying and lazy. We have as much evidence for that as everything else that's been conjectured.
Well right, Amazon will never share their internal data with you, and they will use language to avoid insulting anyone. The fact they, along with most other major tech companies, are going back to in person work is what’s telling. If Amazon could find a way to avoid spending money on office space they would.
What I can say and have been saying is that in my experience, it doesn’t work. It attracts employees who don’t understand the mission and people who want to do as little work as possible. If it works for you that’s great, but to attribute the move back to offices as some nefarious plan to waste money fundamentally misunderstands how businesses work. It also makes me wonder if you’re exactly the kind of employee I don’t want to hire
> ruin your reputation
How would this happen, exactly?
Say you saw an acquaintance get put on a performance improvement plan and then leave the company, would you want to recommend them for a job at a new company if they asked? If you were the manager who witnessed an employee fail to complete basic tasks, would you refer them to new positions?
> ...would you want to recommend them for a job at a new company if they asked?
Depends on the reason for the PIP.
Sometimes folks who get put on them are bad fits for the demands of that particular job at that particular company and would do (and end up doing) stellar elsewhere.
Sometimes folks get put on them to try to ward against theoretical anti-ageism/anti-racism suits fired off in response to an upcoming layoff.
And SOMETIMES folks get put on them because of stack ranking... where managers are obligated to push out a certain number of people every single year.
I've seen scenarios one and three personally, and scenario two seems totally plausible because there's no intelligence/competence test required to become a business owner or manager... so such folks make all sorts of dumbass mistakes.
If you're the sort of person who automatically passes over someone because their previous manager thought poorly of them, then that explains so much about you opinions expressed in this subthread.
I’m invested in my company because they pay me. If you think there’s anything else you’re deluded. Just give people RSUs if you’re so worried about that.
Silent quitting is a great way to permanently ruin your reputation. Even if you never get a job there again, you could never ask your coworkers or management for a job. Silent quitting is indistinguishable from being a bad employee.
From my experience though WFH just doesn’t work. People aren’t as invested in the company and they produce worse results. If companies could figure out how to keep productivity and quality up while not paying rent I’m sure they would, it’s just nobody has figured out how to do that on a large scale yet.
Edit: My experience with WFH has to do with software development. It may work for other fields, however WFH often attracts the wrong kind of employee which is why I don't do it anymore. If you can't be bothered to drive 10 minutes into work you probably aren't that motivated and you probably won't stay that long.