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WebMD forcing employees back to office. "We aren’t asking or negotiating at this point. We’re informing" (ody.sh)

submitted 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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This leaked today from inside webmd, the most bullshit corpo HR video I think I've ever seen.

To break down the obvious ones:

Employees who are obviously either drinking wayyy too much company koolaid or who know that their jobs will end if they aren't in this video
An extremely out of touch CEO who wants things back the old way without giving any concrete data proving that it's better beyond conjecture
A company with "internet" in the name who literally doesn't understand the concept of the internet
Threatening and bullying language to force people back in office.
and just a nice touch, the office is of course not near mass transit or anything and requires driving in
Did anyone notice they were all on green screen, kinda proving that there was no need for them to be in person?

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[+] [email protected] -121 points 10 months ago (48 children)

I agree the video is cringy AF, but I don't have a problem with the company demanding its employees return to working in the office rather than remotely. There are a whole host of tangible benefits (for both companies and employees) from coming into work and I don't see a problem with a company insisting on it. There are some industries and/or jobs in which remote work is probably fine, but most organizations benefit more from having people come into a shared workspace.

[–] [email protected] 52 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (24 children)

People always say there are tangible benefits, but then rarely ever give any actual evidence. (Note the CEO in the video said the exact same thing and then also did not provide any evidence backing it up, unless you count someone drawing a graph on a whiteboard in an "up" direction evidence)

Covid forced anyone who could work remotely to work remotely, and the economy went through the roof. Tech especially had some of their best years - ever.

I also want to call out that a lot of employees that were hired during the pandemic were hired out of region - in other states, across the country. Most "return to office" mandates are veiled layoffs hiding behind the need for employees to be in person for arbitrary reasons. By forcing them back in office they get to claim employees failed to show up for work, neglecting the whole "They work in Arizona and the job is in Tennessee" bit.

The brass tacks is that:

Employers pay sometimes by the decade to rent office space and are annoyed that it's sitting empty and
Bad managers don't know how to manage if they aren't micromanaging their employees. Good managers have no problem managing remotely.
It's an easy way to cut costs by forcing people working out of state to quit while claiming they were never fired.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 10 months ago (7 children)

As a manager, here are my observations. They're qualitative, not quantitative.

When my folks are working on something independently, most are more productive at home, as long as home has fewer distractions and not more. They don't get sucked into hallway chatter, there's no walking to conference rooms, etc.
When they're doing something collaborative, they're more productive at work. People will yell over the wall or drop by to ask things that they won't make a phone call for, or even an instant message. And the communication is better and faster in person.
Collaborative stuff isn't just more productive in person, it's better. People get into a riff of bouncing ideas back and forth and the end result is better.
In my opinion, the results aren't so stark that everyone needs to be in everyday. Productivity and quality is at least adequate when people are remote, and there are other benefits. Some of my people commute like an hour each way, so a 9 hour day becomes an 11 hour day, and that's a big difference. Some also do things like walk the dog at lunch, connect with their kids, and other things that improve their quality of life.
Most (but not all) of my people will choose to work from home when they have a choice. That being said, I've lost count of the number of times people have said something like "I'd forgotten how much I appreciate connecting with people in person to solve problems, or even just chat about the weekend." The balance might be in favor of work from home, but for most it's not all good.
I've noticed that when I'm on site, employees drop by to talk about things that they almost never do when one of us is home. Even though I personally also prefer working from home, I don't do it as much because I think being a manager is more effective when I'm there.
Overall, I think a hybrid arrangement makes the most sense for the work we do. You can debate what the right ratio of on site vs off is, but I think some in person collaboration mixed with some affordance for people working from home works best overall.

[+] [email protected] -14 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Thanks for the anecdotes.

Unfortunately in most sectors the data disagrees with whatever bullshit you decided to make up for the sake of argument.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago (1 children)

Wow, what an ass. I'm telling you my experience leading an organization. I said it was qualitative, not quantitative. What makes you accuse me of making shit up?

So give us the data if you have it.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

https://www.computerworld.com/article/3711386/why-return-to-office-mandates-fail.html

https://www.apollotechnical.com/working-from-home-productivity-statistics/

https://thehill.com/business/4110598-remote-employees-work-longer-and-harder-studies-show/amp/

Is that enough? Should I keep going?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

Did you actually read the articles you linked, or did you just search for ones with titles that seem to support your point of view?

That first one cites a number of studies that don't support your view. The first says that less that half of companies had higher productivity with remote employees. The second says a third of managers say productivity increased and 22% say it decreased. The third says it depends on the employee. There's one that says remote employees are happier, which no one is disputing. There's one that says hybrid gives a small benefit to productivity (which was my experience) while fully remote is a net negative, and so on.

Your second article mostly talks about working from home sometimes (e.g., "at least a few times a month") and my whole point was that hybrid seems to be best overall.

Your last one isn't data, it's mostly anecdotal, but the overall thrust is that employees work longer at home, which isn't the same as productivity and which I said in my comment.

None of these touch on my point that teams work more effectively and come up with better solutions when they work together in person. That's my experience over the last four years, and my employees tend to say the same thing.

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