This is exactly the problem with a lot of the RTO push.. We are more geographically spread out than ever, and companies usually have, at best, 1/2 the conferences rooms required to actually collaborate properly.

So in-office days are spent sitting in a big noisy open floor plan, wearing noise cancelling headphones trying to get work done.. in between producing lots of noise yourself on zoom.

The other having-it-both-ways I see from employers is that in the last 5.5 years of COVID most people I know have expanded their work days to take calls earlier and later for timezone alignment purposes. This was tenable to expand your work day 1-2 hours when you had no commute. Now they think they can get the extra hours out and force a commute.

My wife spends many of her in-office days dialing into 7:30/8am calls, heading into the office late enough to have tons of train delays, and rushing to meet the deadline to get the swipe in so it counts.

It's worse now, but complaints about offices as working spaces were constant pre-pandemic too. Complaining about it then made you seem a bit... wet.

But now the highest levels have brought the productivity benefits of RTO into their wheelhouse. So making the offices suitable also shouldn't be a responsibility punted to a relatively minor position.