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VictoriaF's avatar

Thank you, Tomas, for another great article. Here are some observations from my work experience at a large incumbent company and a government agency.

(1) Knowledge workers hate cubicles but, inexplicably, cubicles have become the norm. Telework is great for escaping the cubicle environment where people use speakerphones and raise their voices in "shouting matches" with concurrent users of speakerphones.

(2) Knowledge work is difficult to measure, and knowledge workers frequently resort to appalling tricks such as writing documents that are too long and creating PowerPoint slides that have too many irrelevant graphics and "eye charts" instead of clear summaries.

(3) Managers [in large incumbent companies] don't know how to rate knowledge work. Their main heuristics are: (a) whether an employee comes in early and leaves late, (b) the gross volume of an employee's products (documents, PowerPoints), and (c) whether a manager (or his boss) likes this employee.

(4) When I teleworked one day a week, I was required to be continuously connected to a chat and respond immediately. This state of constant readiness has largely depleted the advantages of escaping the commute and the cubicle.

(5) Hybrid solutions seem optimal, BUT they are usually more complex and carry a large overhead. As you wrote in the article, a hybrid worker can't move to a low-cost-of-living area. Coordinating meetings and deliverables of hybrid workers is more difficult than having either "office" or "remote" employees. Managing, rating, and promoting hybrid employees is more difficult. For example, an employee who comes to the office on the same days as her manager does gains some privileges due to subconscious sense of connection.

Victoria

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Yuval Gronau's avatar

A thought-provoking article, but I think it is a bit one-sided as it doesn't discuss several factors in favor of working from the office:

1) Employees need socialization and like leaving home (at least from time to time).

2) Long-term productivity such as creativity and integration of complex projects may be less effective when working remotely.

3) When working remotely, employees miss the exchange of ideas that takes place in corridor/water-cooler/cafeteria informal meetings.

4) It's harder to build a company culture when employees are remote. Remote employees may be less attached to the company and more prone to hopping between jobs.

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