[KoolKat23]

Times change and so should companies. It's also not unreasonable for people to expect more from their job than a simple transaction.

Before COVID, most places operated without tools such as Microsoft Teams and an assumption that remote work is untested and unproven to work in their setting. This is now not the case, and people are rightly questioning why a return is necessary. They've proven they can make it work and that they know what works, but are unjustifiably being told otherwise by people that don't actually know what works.

When the internet goes down, why aren't people simply just sending faxes? An example of pride in their work: Imagine being asked to work for a week on a project and once completed, being told to delete it without consideration because management irrationally decided to go a different direction before considering your project, you'd be understandably upset even though you were paid to do it.

[xpe]

> It's also not unreasonable for people to expect more from their job than a simple transaction.

This. Finding the balance is challenging.

- It is often unhealthy to expect too much from work.

- most software/hardware tech employers ask employees to be more than contractors and to care more than just a paycheck

- at the same time we see corporate decisions that are largely shortsighted, and sometimes even self-defeating.

I don’t have a history of belonging to a union, nor promoting worker-owned cooperatives, but I am a student (so to speak) of public policy and history. To use political economy terminology, we often see misaligned incentives: people with a little technical experience, calling the shots on everything from where we work (office, remote, etc) to how we work (remember cubicles? They were better than open office for anyone like me.)

Software and hardware engineers have been a key differentiating factor for tremendous technological advancement and meteoric corporate growth. Why don’t we have more influence on how we work at the least?

One key aspect seems damning: could it be because for most of us, as we get successful, we don’t pay it forward? And where are the ‘politically active’ retired engineers? Many of us cash out and become investors ourselves. I suppose we get working on other interesting technical problems and treat the lack of workplace control as immutable? To some extent, I’ve seen the problem and it is us.

Or maybe the business world is structured so that being “just a worker” relegates you to a second class status. Maybe there’s no point in hoping even a group of 1,000 of the relatively wealthy of us (to throw out a number: let’s say we define that as having net worth over $2M in the USA) could’ve made a difference? But I know this isn’t true; I largely notice a gaping hole where collective organizing could be.

Of course, there’s plenty blame to go ‘round. Anyone who seeks venture-capital has to make a Faustian bargain, trading a blood infusion for improbable expectations of growth.

The tech industry has grown so rapidly, adding people at a breakneck pace, that maybe we don’t think of this as being important. New SW/HW hires at least get paid well, we tell ourselves, even if they don’t really get to shape or work places as much as we should.

Our negotiating power is not as strong as it once was, and it isn’t getting any better, in my view. Will we act? Soon? Ever?

[eropple]

You ask good questions. Historically, no, software craftspeople and technologists do not pay it forward. In my experience, my parents' generation of engineers were more of the "someday, I'll be that boot" variety. I see a little less of that in mine, but still plenty of it; that's how startups mostly operate today. But I have a little more hope for the next generation to mount more resistance to it.

There will always be toads, but there might be some people in there, too.

[marcosdumay]

> It is often unhealthy to expect too much from work.

There is a famous prayer where one asks to be strong enough to change the things one can, humble enough to not requiring the changes you can't, and wise enough to know the difference. I don't remember it literally, but should be easy to find.

Anyway, work from home just got promoted from something you can change into something you can. As it happened, the healthy thing changed from not expecting it into demanding it (if you want).

[theonlybutlet]

That's a great point, misaligned incentives. And I'd add to that misaligned goals.

The engineer who wants to deliver their project in return for their salary, in contrast to the sociable c-suite exec, who wants to cosplay the work environment of yesteryear.

This applies to the wider corporate world and not even just the tech industry but I understand it's relevance as this is HN.

[daveevad]

> Imagine being asked to work for a week on a project and once completed, being told to delete it without consideration because management irrationally decided to go a different direction before considering your project, you'd be understandably upset even though you were paid to do it.

The compensation is correlated with confusion.

[denton-scratch]

> When the internet goes down, why aren't people simply just sending faxes?

My phones are 1) a VOIPphone, and 2) a mobile device. The former relies on the internet; the latter can't send a FAX. PSTN is 90's technology, fewer and fewer people have a PSTN line.

[theonlybutlet]

So you kept up with the times. Good for you haha. I'm guessing there was some efficiency, simplicity in not going out and getting a PTSN line. Much like remote work, same results whilst cutting out inefficient offices and convoluted commutes.

[denton-scratch]

> some efficiency, simplicity in not going out and getting a PTSN line.

Yup - it was much cheaper, my previous phone connection was from a cable company, and I already had internet. And as it turns out, VOIP seems to be more reliable than PSTN. And my (boutique) ISP specializes in VOIP.

I wouldn't have even bothered with VOIP, and just relied on mobile telephony; but I don't trust mobile providers, and I wanted a landline-style local phone-number.

[hattmall]

>They've proven they can make it work and that they know what works

If that were the case there wouldn't be a push to return to the office. There is a difference between making it through an event like COVID vs making forward business progress. Certainly there's a place for remote work but the higher you go in management the more you see the holes remote work creates. Realistically, employees should push hard for return to office and then no work out of the office. The reality is that as the job market tightens the expectation is going to be in office AND work from home. Vacation days will morph into work from home days. An expectation to answer emails after hours is already turning into an expectation to be online and available for zoom calls much later than normal working hours.

[KoolKat23]

As part of the social contract, reasonable employees would agree with it if there were a solid case for it but this doesn't seem to be so. They're being offered ambiguous one liners such as the "making forward business progress" devoid of substance and which contrasts to actual measurable such as turnover, profits and other tangible measures that indicate otherwise (showing that remote work works).

I truly hope the line between leave and work doesn't blur.

[IntelMiner]

>If that were the case there wouldn't be a push to return to the office

You're missing the inherent power dynamics of owners versus employees

The C suites at the top down to middle (mangle) management want RTO because their goals align with real estate value and tax incentives

Mangelement want it because acting as vague wardens for a bunch of people tied to desks for no reason means their jobs have meaning