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David Chisnall (*Now with 50% more sarcasm!*)It’s amazing how many LinkedIn posts say some variant of ‘remote work is bad because remote teams can’t do {thing remote teams have been doing successfully since IRC was the state of the art in communication for remote workers}’. And what they mean is ‘I don’t know how to manage remote teams’. It takes a special kind of arrogance to believe that just because you can’t do something that other people have been doing for decades, that thing is impossible.
kaveman@david_chisnall hee hee, clearly, that note to (your)self didnt work.
@kaveman No, I'm going to try harder. I went to sleep very grumpy last night after reading someone who used a misrepresentation of Mehrabian's 1967 study (which is totally unrelated to the claims that he made) to justify his idiocy. I'm going to try to be more disciplined about not reading it.
Sean 🤷♂️🤷♀️🤷@david_chisnall Thank you for framing this correctly. This has been banging around in my head for a while now and I couldn't put it into a coherent statement. Most of my attempts where just rants, which aren't super useful.
AterNox@david_chisnall Now though WFH is real real for all managers, where before it was more of a exception, now the lack of it is why some jobs go unfilled. We will see the tug of war as managers embrace the WFH and flexible hours that go along with vs the old school of warming seats.
unexpectedteapot@david_chisnall I think it is usually a form of control. A lot of meetings especially in the lower level of corporate aren't necessary at all. Their utility for the higher ups can and usually is mostly being able to exert pressure and intimidation. You can't have nearly as much of that in online meetings. The older folks aren't used to it and might be too scared from losing that form of control.
Anthony@[email protected] I very much dislike this genre of LinkedIn post. I pushed back against one once, using the LinkedIn-appropriate angle that we have globe-spanning supply chains that allow us to buy goods from almost anywhere in the world. Why not use the same connectivity to work with people all over the world? I even used LinkedIn language, like "securing talent" you'd have access to no other way.
The person had no real response to this. They waved their hands and said something vague about "company culture" or "this is just how I feel about it".
I came to believe these statements are not coming from a reasoned place. The people making them don't really know or care what remote teams can or can't do. They have some kind of prejudice about it, and it's the prejudice that's speaking.
The person had no real response to this. They waved their hands and said something vague about "company culture" or "this is just how I feel about it".
I came to believe these statements are not coming from a reasoned place. The people making them don't really know or care what remote teams can or can't do. They have some kind of prejudice about it, and it's the prejudice that's speaking.
Cybarbie@david_chisnall LinkedIn is not your friend.
SecretAntelope 🌈☕@david_chisnall
And yet somehow I'm still way more productive than I was in person... The bigger problem is making people log off who are remote so they don't overwork.
And yet somehow I'm still way more productive than I was in person... The bigger problem is making people log off who are remote so they don't overwork.
Reinis Lazda@david_chisnall That's an interesting take. As an organizational psychologist who has been following research for many years, or just anyone who applies logic can plausibly conclude that remote teams function in many ways differently from teams in-person. Therefore, there are definitely a lot of things that are a lot more difficult remotely than in person.
I'd wish for a world less centered on aggressive individual opinions but more on science and logic.
prozacchiwawa@david_chisnall businesses have spent the last 2 decades atomizing us to make us replaceable, promoting tools which punish organic behavior and whose core assumption is individual tasks and individual responsibility. clearly being alone, monitored and stressed will be way better when you also can't control the thermostat or the co2 level.
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@david_chisnall I was told that there are indeed studies that found out that wfh (slightly) decreased overall productivity. Not sure how they measured that. I know from myself that I'm less productive in the office (spending first half hour on adjusting your new workplace, as you don't have an assigned one, more physical meetings and worse equipment than at home and more noise), but I do know from some others (non IT, other company) that were essentially using their wfh day as the day to do their private stuff and only attend mandatory meetings.
For me, the health and well-being for full wfh is worth so much, that I might quit just for rto policy. So overall, "it depends".
For me, the health and well-being for full wfh is worth so much, that I might quit just for rto policy. So overall, "it depends".
@http It’s very hard to get apples-to-apples comparisons. If people are using working from home to do non-work things, this implies at least one out of:
- The company conflates attendance with productivity and so doesn’t notice when people aren’t working.
- The company doesn’t have a culture of trust and so people slack off as soon as they are not visible to their managers.
- The management is bad at motivation and so no one actually wants to do the work.
- The team is overworked and doesn’t have time for private stuff (in which case an extra non-working day is probably a bigger overall productivity boost than anything else you can do).
None of these is a sign of a healthy work culture. Similarly, when companies complain about lack of communication when people work from home, it’s usually a sign that they’re over-reliant on informal channels and that some people are excluded because they haven’t actively worked to ensure everyone has access to these channels.
Mikko KarvonenIt often also takes special kind of arrogance to get to the positions these people have. Unique qualifications.