Threads like these are always one sided with people against RTO.

What I would really like to see is arguments from the other side. Can someone steelman RTO. Preferably with evidence, anecdotal or otherwise.

I think it would be hard to argue that working all together in an office - like before covid - isn't more productive. In-person meetings are easier. Whiteboarding and brainstorming is way easier. Spontaneous conversations are easier. Helping junior people is easier. People actually pay attention in meetings. You get to know colleagues better.

Have you ever had to "now click on the left... no, up a bit. No go back you were just there. It's the third one from th... I'll just paste the link in chat" when you were standing next to someone's desk? No.

The only benefits of working from home are:

1. No commute.

2. Can do life stuff (we finally have a solution to the dumb problem that shops etc. are only open when people are at work).

3. The company doesn't need to spend money on offices.

The first two are huge bonuses for employees, but the company doesn't give a shit about them. At best they care about paying for offices, but that's pretty minor (especially when they've already paid for them and they're sitting there empty).

I work a 2 in 3 out style schedule.

During the 3 days I wfh, I get the most work done. I can focus and organize my day around executing a plan.

During the 2 days I'm in the office, I can get answers from people much quicker. Some people (new hires in particular) don't know how to describe their problem, or they're just really bad at it. My solution to endless teams convos is to just say "I'll head over to your desk" and then we work it out in person.

I think working with people in person can be very powerful. Is it essential though? No. Most corps don't even bother though. And most managers are bad at management. Working entirely wfh requires good managers with actual project management skills. Most corps are unwilling to train or prioritize hiring for that.

I don’t know the reason, nor do I have proof of anything. But: to me this is a great time to consider Occam’s Razor.

Executives seem to (mostly) universally want people to RTO. Why would they?

They obviously have lots of data. If it was bad for productivity, why would they do it?

Answers seem to be things like “power trip” or “need to justify real estate”. I’m pretty sure most companies would save money by giving up their leases. Maybe they are all having power trips, but irrational behavior from leaders won’t win out in the long run.

My observation from my time is that, likely: some people are really good at getting stuff done at home. But most probably get less done. And I suspect the leaders find this in their data.

>Preferably with evidence

Sorry, can't do that. But my take is:

There is a part of the population that are opportunistic freeloaders. People who don't have intrinsic motivation to do their work but do it to avoid the consequences.

I think it's a pretty big part of the population! And I also think that, while managers are likely to have encountered them, reaching a software development role (and then choosing to spend your spare time commenting on HN) filters out a lot of them. So there is a mismatch where managers want to defend against the freeloaders while the employees commenting here can't accept the lack of trust inherent in the mandate and won't countenance the micro-management needed to prove that trust would be earned.

I think it also partly explains why we've failed to see remote companies gain a competitive advantage in hiring. They have adverse selection for active freeloaders.

With WFH the following things become very difficult and/or ineffective:

1. Onboarding and growing junior employees.

2. Managing/coordinating people

3. Doing/coming up with something innovative

4. Making sure an employee is not working another job in parallel

With RTO, companies try go get back the ability to do these things, at the expense of employees’ commute time

I personally feel home office makes jobs feel much more like jobs. You have no social relation to your coworkers and it's very hard to build one remotely. Most people barely communicate in zoom meetings beyond the minimum what is required of them.

Good office jobs can feel fun, building something with like minded people and building a social relationship at the same time with them.

Many people are not looking for that, many people just want a job that makes money and let's them log off at a set time. I personally don't enjoy that type of job and feel it's not sustainable over decades. I need some fun in my job.

Sure, I'm on both sides depending on the situation so I can help here.

"Collaboration" and "communication" are definitely issues, as employers state openly, but not for the reasons you think.

I worked in a fully remote company for the last three years, I selected people who I knew would be independently motivated and who knew how to communicate effectively in an async manner.

Yet, there were issues still in communication that would have been solved with being able to hear someones tone and body language. Little issues spiralled out of control- and lack of trust crept in when people were quietly doing work that had very small visibility (but was important).

I'm not saying remote work was the reason, but remote work exacerbated certain particular issues in this dimension- eventually the founders (who had lost trust) started laying off people they perceived as not important, despite them being fundamental to any future in which the project would be successful.

You'll also notice that the companies that care the most about RTO do not invest in communication in other ways, they'll probably use awful communication software like Teams, WebEx - or in marginally better cases: Zoom.. and since people don't like to interface with these tools (and they're poor even when you do): there can be a feeling of being out of the loop from upper management as they don't know what's going on.. they just see radio silence.

If people don't go into the offices, the company will not retain the office space and there will no longer be the option of doing so.

The other is too busy managing burnout to argue.

Under RTO new grads enjoy less competition because they’re willing to relocate