COVID-19 set the remote work revolution on a fast track — is remote work here to stay?

guest · Oct 9, 2020

Microsoft Will Let Employees Work From Home Permanently
October 9, 2020
https://www.forbes.com/sites/carlyp...ill-let-employees-work-from-home-permanently/

Microsoft will let its employees work from home permanently, even once the COVID-19 pandemic is over.

In an internal memo seen by The Verge that highlights the company’s plans to create a “hybrid workplace”, Microsoft said it will allow employees to work from home freely for less than 50% of their working week, but has said that managers will be able to approve permanent remote work if staff request it.
Click to expand...

Currently, the cast majority of the company’s employees are working from home, and Microsoft previously said they would not reopen office until at least January 2021.
The Verge reports that "most" of Microsoft's 150,000 employees would be able to take advantage of one of these remote-work offerings.

“The COVID-19 pandemic has challenged all of us to think, live, and work in new ways,” says Kathleen Hogan, Microsoft’s chief people officer, in the note to employees.

“We will offer as much flexibility as possible to support individual workstyles, while balancing business needs, and ensuring we live our culture.”
Click to expand...

guest · Oct 18, 2020

Google's Internal Data Suggests Employees Feel Less Productive At Home
October 13, 2020
https://inside.com/campaigns/inside-dev-2020-10-13-24831/sections/210120

Google's engineers are struggling to code while working from home, according to a new report from The Information. The publication said it looked at an internal survey that revealed 31% of the tech giant's engineers felt they'd been highly productive from March through the end of June. That's an 8% drop from a record high in the previous quarter. Newer engineers were more affected by this trend.

The news comes as reports reveal Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella is tired of working from home, while Stanford economics professor Nicholas Bloom adds he believes remote work is, for many, a "productivity disaster" that he fears will hurt innovation.

However, these statements contradict a recent report unveiled during the September DevOpsWorld 2020 conference examining the impact of Covid-19 on software development, where many reported an increase in productivity.

Click to expand...

guest · Oct 19, 2020

Make remote work permanent? No way, say Bay Area leaders
October 17, 2020
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/make-remote-work-permanent-no-way-say-bay-area-leaders/ar-BB1a6B8Z

That’s the path regional planners have chosen for a more livable and less congested community.
Bay Area leaders are already saying, no way.

The Metropolitan Transportation Commission is drawing heavy fire from lawmakers, the business commmunity and transit supporters for a proposal that would require big companies to have their employees work from home at least 60 percent of the time by 2035.
The proposal is aimed at reducing vehicle commuters and greenhouse gas emissions, but Bay Area politicians and business leaders say it would encourage Silicon Valley companies to pick up and leave.

“This will spur a flight of large employers from the Bay Area,” said San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo, comparing the idea to paving lanes directly from Silicon Valley to Texas.
Click to expand...

San Jose and San Francisco both have tech giants — Google and Salesforce — spending billions of dollars to design and develop new campuses with a higher density of homes and apartments near transit. A work-from-home mandate could disrupt those plans, Liccardo said.

“I’m concerned about a parade of unintended consequences,” he said. “This undermines the incentives to live near work.”
Click to expand...

guest · Oct 20, 2020

Silicon Valley is exhausted from working at home
Working from home is taking its toll
October 19, 2020
https://www.techspot.com/news/87187-burnout-during-work-home-hitting-tech-firms-hard.html

In a nutshell: In a survey of more than 3,000 employees at some of the country’s biggest tech firms including Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Apple and Facebook, a full 68 percent said they feel more burned out working from home than they did while working in an office. Only 18 percent said they feel less burned out while working from home, with the remaining 14 percent conceding that they feel the same level of burnout at home as in the office.

The freedom to work from home is feeling like anything but for the majority of tech workers recently surveyed by workplace chat app Blind. Burnout was highest at PayPal, Walmart and Facebook at 90 percent, 82 percent and 81 percent at each company, respectively.
In another survey of 2,758 participants, 3 out of 5 said they are working more hours from home compared to what they put in while at the office.
Click to expand...

And in what can be perceived as a silver lining, around half of those polled said they felt their managers / employers understood their mental health needs during work from home.
Click to expand...

guest · Oct 21, 2020

Amazon to let employees 'work from home' till June 2021
October 21, 2020
https://www.asianet.in/science-and-tech/amazon-to-let-employees-work-from-home-till-june-2021.html

Amazon.com Inc told employees whose work can be done from home that they can do so until June, extending the timeline on a return to office due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

"Employees who work in a role that can effectively be done from home are welcome to do so until June 30, 2021", an Amazon spokeswoman said in an emailed statement on Tuesday, adding the guidance is applicable globally.
Amazon had earlier allowed that option until January.
Click to expand...

guest · Oct 22, 2020

Microsoft bumps back return-to-work target date by six months
Many Microsoft employees will work from home for at least six more months
October 22, 2020
https://www.windowscentral.com/microsoft-bumps-back-return-work-target-date-six-months

Microsoft initially set January 2021 as the earliest date that its U.S. offices would reopen. That date has now been bumped back by six months. According to a report by ZDNet, Microsoft moved the earliest date that U.S. offices might reopen to July 6, 2021.

The move is not surprising and falls in line with current health guidelines. Microsoft started recommending that employees work from home in March of this year. Even after offices in the U.S. reopen, many Microsoft employees will be able to continue to work from home part-time.
Details about Microsoft moving its date to reopen offices come from an internal email cited by ZDNet. According to the email, Microsoft states that U.S. offices will likely be in "Stage 6" on July 6, 2021.
Click to expand...

guest · Oct 26, 2020

Home working – the new normal for UK business?
A small but steadily growing group of the UK’s workforce is permanently home-based
October 26, 2020
https://www.itproportal.com/features/home-working-the-new-normal-for-uk-business/

A small but steadily growing group of the UK’s workforce is permanently home-based – according to UK government, the figure is around 1.8 million, compared to 800,000 a decade ago, with a further 2.7 million working in different locations, but from a home base, compared with around 28 million people who work away from their homes, in offices, shops and factories.

Despite this, the Institute of Leadership and Management (ILM) has described flexible working as ‘the new normal’, with an estimated 94 percent of UK employers offering some form of flexible working.
Although some sectors have started to return to a more usual routine, many office workers are still working from home, and are likely to for some time to come.
Click to expand...

Some technology companies have already said their teams can continue work from home permanently, and we’re also starting to see companies in other sectors, including financial services and consulting saying the same thing.
In addition, Matt Hancock, the UK’s Secretary of State for Health, has also suggested that employers should now always offer working from home as an option.
Click to expand...

guest · Oct 27, 2020

Reddit will allow employees to work from anywhere, going forward
October 27, 2020
https://techcrunch.com/2020/10/27/reddit-will-allow-employees-to-work-from-anywhere-going-forward/

Spurred on by the seemingly endless COVID-19 pandemic — and no doubt inspired by similar moves from companies like Twitter — Reddit today announced plans to offer its staff the opportunity to work remotely, going forward. The company announced the move in a blog post today, noting some practical exceptions to the rule, including those working facilities and IT support roles.

“Looking ahead,” Reddit writes, “we want to meet the needs of our employees so they can do their best work, especially in a time of uncertainty. And as we deliver on our mission of creating belonging for everyone in the world, we want Reddit to be positioned as a workforce that’s as diverse as its ecosystem of communities and users.”
The company says it will continue to offer the ability to work from its office (or a combination of remote and office work), though the physical spaces will be “reimagined” — a move that likely will be met with a mixed reception depending on what employees look for in an office space.
Click to expand...

The move also means Reddit will be rethinking salaries, offering salaries reserved for places with high cost of living like New York and San Francisco, regardless of the employee’s location.
Click to expand...

hawki · Oct 30, 2020

"With No Commute, Americans Simply Worked More During Coronavirus

Employees spent over 22 million extra hours on their primary job each workday

Working from home during the coronavirus pandemic, Americans saved 60 million hours in commute time each workday. They spent most of that working..."

[paywall]

https://www.wsj.com/articles/with-n...ly-worked-more-during-coronavirus-11604050200

guest · Nov 11, 2020

Remote work is ‘here to stay’ — even with a vaccine, says former IBM CEO
Investors are trying to gauge whether trends such as working from home will continue after a vaccine arrives
November 11, 2020
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/11/cov...rometty-says-remote-work-is-here-to-stay.html

Technology trends driven by the coronavirus pandemic — such as the shift to remote working — will continue after a vaccine becomes available, according to the former boss of IBM.

Ginni Rometty, who serves as IBM’s executive chairman after stepping down from the CEO role this year, predicted that digital technology will continue to transform the way businesses operate even as the world returns to some level of normality with the advent of a vaccine.
Major stocks that benefit from people staying at home due to the pandemic — like Zoom and Netflix — fall sharply following the news.

“I actually don’t think these technology trends are going to reverse themselves,” Rometty told CNBC anchor Karen Tso in an interview for CNBC’s East Tech West conference.
Click to expand...

She added that remote work is “here to stay” and will become part of a “hybrid” model of working that sees some people working in offices, while others stay at home.
Click to expand...

guest · Nov 12, 2020

Deutsche Bank proposes a 5% tax for people still working from home after the pandemic
November 12, 2020
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/12/deu...ent-tax-for-remote-workers-post-pandemic.html

A research team at Deutsche Bank proposed that people pay a 5% tax for the “privilege” of working from home, if they continue to do so after the pandemic, as this could subsidize income lost by lower-earners due to the coronavirus crisis.

Deutsche Bank thematic strategist Luke Templeman said in the investment bank’s Konzept research report, published Tuesday, that a tax on remote workers had been needed for years but “Covid has just made it obvious.”
Click to expand...

Working from home meant that many people were saving on everyday costs such as travel, lunch, clothes and cleaning, as well as possibly spending less on socializing. However, the report also said it meant remote workers were “contributing less to the infrastructure of the economy whilst still receiving its benefits.”

Templeman said remote workers should pay a levy post-pandemic “in order to smooth the transition process for those who have suddenly been displaced” by the coronavirus crisis.
He explained that the global economy was not set up to cope with people disconnecting from face-to-face society.
Remote workers tended to have higher than average incomes, Templeman said.
Click to expand...

reasonablePrivacy · Nov 13, 2020

mood said: ↑

Deutsche Bank proposes a 5% tax for people still working from home after the pandemic
November 12, 2020
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/12/deu...ent-tax-for-remote-workers-post-pandemic.html
Click to expand...

It's not privilege. People are social animals. Many people would like to return to office, but they are ordered to work remotely by their employer.
Working from home may save some money, but come on - you still need to take a shower everyday, wash hands, eat something, have clean clothes, have some physical activity to stay healthy. Are this smart-ass really thinking that all people working remotely are sitting in front of webcam naked? Too much porn Mr bankster. Not everybody working remotely are a sex worker.

hawki · Nov 13, 2020

"The home office of the future, previewed by Walter Cronkite on 'The 21st Century,' 1967."

video:

https://twitter.com/HumanoidHistory/status/1325549053908840449

guest · Nov 15, 2020

mood said: ↑

Deutsche Bank proposes a 5% tax for people still working from home after the pandemic
November 12, 2020
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/12/deu...ent-tax-for-remote-workers-post-pandemic.html
Click to expand...

Paying more tax to work from home? That could be the least of the troubles ahead
November 15, 2020
https://www.zdnet.com/article/payin...hat-could-be-the-least-of-the-troubles-ahead/

Working from home (WFH) is such a privilege that you should actually pay more for it: that was the premise of a report from Deutsche Bank economists, which has created something of a stir.

"For years we have needed a tax on remote workers -- COVID has just made it obvious. Quite simply, our economic system is not set up to cope with people who can disconnect themselves from face-to-face society," the report said.
The COVID-19 pandemic of 2020 has certainly accelerated the trend towards home working, with governments ordering workers to stay put where possible. When the lockdowns lift, it's unlikely that any return to the office will be full-time or for everyone.
Click to expand...

So it's most unlikely that a WFH tax would ever actually take off.
But that's not really the point; rather, the Deutsche Bank economists are pointing out that if the hundred-year-plus reign of the office is coming to an end, that's going to mean some big changes.

If WFH is here to stay -- and it is -- then we may see more people leave the big cities, deciding that a better work-life balance is now possible. But there's already a growing battle over what this means for wages.
What happens when staff can do the same job remotely from an area with a lower cost of living? Should they be paid less, even though they are doing the same job?
Click to expand...

Technology may help with some of this, just as Zoom and Microsoft Teams has kept people connected in recent months. But we'll need ever better, even more engaging tools if WFH is really going to work long-term.
Click to expand...

reasonablePrivacy · Nov 16, 2020

mood said: ↑

the Deutsche Bank economists are pointing out that if the hundred-year-plus reign of the office is coming to an end
Click to expand...

I don't believe that the office is coming to an end. There were many surveys in recent months that shown many employees are less productive working from home. Some people have bust in their productivity, but many are doing the same or worse. We should keep in mind that remote work is not a choice for many people at this moment: many were ordered, essentially forced by circumstances, to do work that way.

mood said: ↑

What happens when staff can do the same job remotely from an area with a lower cost of living? Should they be paid less, even though they are doing the same job?
Click to expand...

Pacta sunt servanda

guest · Nov 25, 2020

Square Enix will let employees work from home permanently
The new policy goes into effect starting in December
November 26, 2020
https://www.pcgamer.com/square-enix-will-let-employees-work-from-home-permanently/

By and large, the games industry's been having a tough ol' time adjusting to life under the Covid-19 pandemic. But shifting to remote work hasn't come without its upsides. Now, Japanese publisher Square Enix has announced that it plans to let employees work from home as a permanent option.

Speaking in an extremely corporate announcement post, Square Enix notes that this whole remote work lark may do more than than just keep employees from getting sick—and that starting December 1st, folks will be able to choose where they wish to work.

"Rather than utilizing work from home solely as a means of preventing infections during the current pandemic, the Company will establish it as a permanent and core program among the working styles it accommodates. In so doing, the Company hopes not only to create a flexible and diverse working environment, but also to further bolster productivity and help employees achieve the optimal work-life balance."
Click to expand...

Square Enix isn't alone, either. Back in October, Microsoft similarly announced that it was rethinking how it approached workspaces, noting that remote work should now be considered a new standard for most roles.
But it's good to see development open up in this way, a move towards accessibility for people who, for whatever reason, would rather not commute into a busy office five days a week.
Click to expand...

guest · Nov 30, 2020

mood said: ↑

Make remote work permanent? No way, say Bay Area leaders
October 17, 2020
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/make-remote-work-permanent-no-way-say-bay-area-leaders/ar-BB1a6B8Z
Click to expand...

Bay Area planners: Less remote work, more green commutes
MTC backs off work-from-home mandate
November 20, 2020
https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2020/11/20/bay-area-planners-less-remote-work-more-green-commutes/

After a barrage of criticism from Silicon Valley businesses and Bay Area mayors, Metropolitan Transportation Commission planners have backed off a requirement to have employees from big companies work from home three days a week.

A compromise plan approved unanimously by commissioners Friday calls for big companies to have 60 percent of their employees take sustainable commutes — by transit, bike or carpooling — by 2035. Regional planners are struggling to meet state-mandated cuts to greenhouse gas emissions by the middle of the next decade.

“The work from home mandate is gone,” said MTC commissioner Nick Josefowitz. The new proposal, he added, “is a lot more flexible. It doesn’t penalize people who walk and bike and take transit.”
Click to expand...

The proposal is a small section of the comprehensive report, Plan Bay Area 2050.
Lawmakers, mayors and the business community railed against the remote work mandate, saying it would undercut the Bay Area’s economy and encourage large companies to re-locate to cheaper regions.
Click to expand...

guest · Dec 10, 2020

Apple’s Cook Says Most Staff Won’t Return to Office Until June
CEO discusses work through pandemic in meeting with employees
December 11, 2020
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...-most-staff-won-t-return-to-office-until-june

Apple Inc. Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook shared new details on the company’s plan to return to the office during a virtual town hall meeting with employees on Thursday.

Cook said it “seems likely” that the majority of teams won’t be back before June 2021. The Cupertino, California-based technology giant has historically had an office-centric culture, but the CEO implied that the company’s success this year during the pandemic lockdown could enable more flexibility to work remotely in the future.
Click to expand...

“There’s no replacement for face-to-face collaboration, but we have also learned a great deal about how we can get our work done outside of the office without sacrificing productivity or results,” he told staff, according to people familiar with the comments.
Click to expand...

guest · Dec 14, 2020

Google delays return to office and eyes ‘flexible work week’
Google one of the first companies to ask its employees to work from home due to the pandemic
December 14, 2020
https://www.arabnews.com/node/1777031/media

Alphabet’s Google will allow its employees to work from home until September next year, extending the return to the office by a few months, the New York Times reported on Monday.

The company was also testing the idea of a “flexible workweek” once it is safe to return to the office, Chief Executive Officer Sundar Pichai told the company’s staff in an email on Sunday, according to the report.
Click to expand...

As part of the plan, Google’s employees would be expected to work at least three days a week in the office while working from home the other days, the newspaper report said.

“We are testing a hypothesis that a flexible work model will lead to greater productivity, collaboration, and well-being,” Pichai wrote in the email.
Click to expand...

New York Times: Google Delays Return to Office and Eyes ‘Flexible Work Week’

The Silicon Valley company now plans to have employees return to the office in September. It will be different when they get there.
Click to expand...

guest · Dec 14, 2020

Silicon Valley’s million dollar question: Does remote work kill innovation?
Engineers and experts agree that remote work is here to stay
December 13, 2020
https://www.mercurynews.com/2020/12...ar-question-does-remote-work-kill-innovation/

When the pandemic finally ends, entrepreneurs, engineers and experts agree that one thing is clear: Silicon Valley will never be the same.

The shift to out-of-the-office employment will permanently change the way work gets done in a region where the creation of world-changing ideas has long relied on face-to-face collaboration. But one giant uncertainty looms.

“Are you still as creative and is the feedback loop still as rich and fast over Zoom as it is in person? That’s the million-dollar question,” said Silicon Valley startup guru Steve Blank, who teaches at Stanford University and co-created a five-day course intended to help businesses of all types recover from the pandemic.
Still, in virtually every sector and position in the tech industry, people have learned that remote work can make innovation very, very hard.
Click to expand...

Prominent Silicon Valley venture capitalist Tim Draper sees significant but diminishing value in face-to-face work, and believes that as technology improves, more work will go remote. He and many others foresee a hybrid future for the Valley in which the type of work, type of company, and workers’ personal preferences determine who’s in the office — or even the Bay Area — and who isn’t.
Click to expand...

guest · Jan 1, 2021

After embracing remote work in 2020, companies face conflicts making it permanent
January 1, 2021
https://venturebeat.com/2021/01/01/...companies-face-conflicts-making-it-permanent/

Although the pandemic forced employees around the world to adopt makeshift remote work setups, a growing proportion of the workforce already spent at least part of their week working from home, while some businesses had embraced a “work-from-anywhere” philosophy from their inception.

Not everyone was happy about this work-culture shift though, and Netflix cofounder and co-CEO Reed Hastings has emerged as one of the most vocal opponents.

“If I had to guess, the five-day workweek will become four days in the office while one day is virtual from home,” he said, adding (somewhat tongue-in-cheek) that Netflix employees would be back in the office “12 hours after a vaccine was approved.”
Click to expand...

The pandemic will leave an indelible mark, but the workforce of the near future will probably be something of a hybrid affair.
The hybrid approach is likely to appeal most to larger, more established companies that are trying to find a middle ground between office-based and fully remote work.

They may struggle to achieve this initially, however, as they try to adapt offline processes to an online setting for a workforce spread across cities, states, and time zones.
Click to expand...

guest · Jul 15, 2021

Apple employees threaten to quit as company takes hard line stance on remote work
July 15, 2021
https://appleinsider.com/articles/2...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.

Citing an internal Slack thread, The Verge reports Apple employees are threatening to quit due to what they perceive as overly strict rules regarding remote work policies.
[...] 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.
Click to expand...

That request was flatly denied.
Apple's corporate ideology has long held that employee commingling is a vital ingredient to innovation.

Apple will apparently make exceptions for people with documented medical conditions, but acquiring that accommodation reportedly requires employees to confirm their status by releasing medical records to the company. The demand made some people uncomfortable, the report said.
Click to expand...

reasonablePrivacy · Jul 17, 2021

mood said: ↑

tearing down previously existing communication barriers
Click to expand...

While introducing new communication bottlenecks...

mood said: ↑

better work life balance
Click to expand...

Are you kidding me?

Last week people from 2 teams in office I work had an unofficial, spontaneous idea about work day from office. Almost all employees showed up at office. After business hours even more unofficially we have gone to a pub. It was great.

guest · Jul 20, 2021

Apple Delays Employees Return to Office Until October
July 20, 2021
https://www.iphonehacks.com/2021/07/apple-delays-employees-return-office-october.html

Apple has delayed the return of its employees to office from September to at least until October following the rising cases of Covid across the world. Apple has become the first tech giant in the US to delay the return of its employees to office.

Apple previously announced that it employees worldwide would be returning to office at least three days a week starting September. This was based on the globally declining cases of Covid and the vaccination rate. It stuck to the plan despite criticism from many employees who wanted the company to adopt a more flexible work from home approach.
Click to expand...

The Bloomberg report also notes that Apple is testing a hybrid in-store and work-from-home arrangement for its retail employees. This is because consumers might continue to prefer shopping online even after the pandemic ends.
All other tech giants like Google, Facebook, and Twitter have taken a more flexible approach and allowing their employees to work from home.

[Via Bloomberg]
Click to expand...

guest · Jul 28, 2021

Apple 'cracking down' on non-work Slack channels over staff remote work debate
July 28, 2021
https://appleinsider.com/articles/2...-slack-channels-over-staff-remote-work-debate

An internal Slack channel discussing Apple's remote working plans is under threat as the company is to enforce its rule limiting channels to specific project work.

Apple staff have already written two letters asking for more flexible remote working options — and Apple has postponed return to work until October.
However, internally, arguments are continuing among staff in a Slack channel. According to Zoe Schiffer of The Verge, staff are objecting to how the most recent letter proposed pay cuts for remote workers.
Click to expand...

The debate is reportedly taking place in an internal Slack channel with around 6,000 Apple staff. However, Schiffer says that this channel is now under threat.

"Apple also recently began cracking down on Slack channels that aren't directly related to work," she says. "The company bans channels 'for activities and hobbies' that aren't directly related to projects or part of official employee groups — but this wasn't always enforced, employees say."
Click to expand...

Log in or Sign up

COVID-19 set the remote work revolution on a fast track — is remote work here to stay?

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

hawki Registered Member

guest Guest

guest Guest

reasonablePrivacy Registered Member

hawki Registered Member

guest Guest

reasonablePrivacy Registered Member

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

reasonablePrivacy Registered Member

guest Guest

guest Guest

Log in or Sign up

COVID-19 set the remote work revolution on a fast track — is remote work here to stay?

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

hawki Registered Member

guest Guest

guest Guest

reasonablePrivacy Registered Member

hawki Registered Member

guest Guest

reasonablePrivacy Registered Member

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

guest Guest

reasonablePrivacy Registered Member

guest Guest

guest Guest

Useful Searches