✨ Return to Office Enters the Desperation Phase ✨
Di next stage of bring workers back to dem desks dey involve incentives like 💲$10 to di charity wey dem like — and consequences like poor performance evaluations if dem nor show up.
Manny Medina, di chief executive of one Seattle-based artificial intelligence sales company, nor mind to dey repeat himself. E dey come with di territory, afta all. E come dey handy dis year as im dey face di same question over and over again.
Wait, so why you want us back for office?
Di engineers bin remind am of di wahala wey dem dey face for road. Di workers wey get pikin remind am of school pickup times. Mr. Medina reply with arguments wey e don repeat so tey e don turn personal mantras: Being near each other dey improve di work. Mr. Medina bin see di three years of remote-plus-office work as one experiment. Im takeaway na say ideas dey flow well well for di noise of office.
“You fit interrupt each other without being rude wen you dey person,” Mr. Medina yan. E company, Outreach, don start to dey work on hybrid basis. “For Zoom conversation, you gats wait make person finish before you fit yan.”
For millions of office workers, e don be three years of make-dem-show-up work plans — dem go call people make dem come, but dem nor really mean am, everybody just dey work from wherever dem like. Now, for di umpteenth time, businesses don ready to take am serious. Dem don call workers back to office dis spring and summer: Disney yan make e be four days a week, Amazon yan three days (wey make di corporate workers do walkout), Meta and Lyft don set deadline for September for plenty of dia workers. Others don come up with new tactics to make sure say dem workers show up for office. Google, wey don ask make most workers show for office three days a week, don yan say dem go consider absences from office wen dem dey do performance reviews, and dem go check badge records to identify people wey dey always absent, yan Ryan Lamont, one company spokesman.
Google workers go dey allowed to work remotely only on very rare occasions. “We want make Googlers connect and collaborate for person, so we go limit remote work to only exceptional cases,” Mr. Lamont talk.
Dis new policies dey come as di business leaders don accept say hybrid work na permanent reality, with just over one quarter of full workdays for di country dey happen for house, and offices still dey half-full compared to before di pandemic. (Though di 50 percent occupancy metric combine Tuesdays and Wednesdays wey dey busy, with Fridays wey dey quiet.) Salesforce, di business software giant, don yan say for ten days, dem go donate 💲$10 to charity on behalf of any worker wey show for office (or for workers wey work remotely and attend company events). One spokesperson talk say e normal for di company to find moments to “do well and do good.” But some workers fit see am as change for style, as di company previous workplace plans bin talk say dem fit fully or partially work remotely forever. (Di company still yan say dis remain di case.)
“Immersion for workspace nor dey limited to just desk for our Towers,” di company write for memo wey dem send for February 2021. “Di 9-to-5 workday don kpai.”
For one recent Monday for Salesforce Tower for New York, activities full di 41-storey building wey dey look over Bryant Park. Workers dey dia desks and conference rooms, some people bin come from San Francisco for di company A.I.-focused day. For di lounge for di top floor, workers line up make dem fit buy coffee, while di catering team dey prepare shrimp tacos for one office event wey go happun dat week.
Di company animal mascots dey scatter for di office. Brandy di fox represent marketing. Astro di astronaut dey sit for one piano for di 41st floor lounge. Codey di bear dey stand guard near di developers.
Na di impromptu nature of in-person interaction dey sweet pass — for example, I bin dey for office and one person from Chicago bin dey for San Francisco office — “Oh, you get time make we gist and hold meeting about one strategy wey we dey roll out?” Nathalie Scardino, wey be Salesforce global head of talent strategy talk. “As high-tech company, you gats dey change to meet di needs of di business and customers.”
E nor too often wey di whole white-collar business world enta one impromptu experiment — executives dey try figure out how to make decisions wey fit cost millions of dollars, while employees dey try build relationships and seek advice from mentors while dey close to dia dirty laundry.
And for di last three years, some office decisions don turn to parents wey dey try set rules for unruly house: “Do dis.” “Why?” “Because I talk am.” But now some business leaders talk say di results of di remote work experiment don show. Dem strongly believe say dem need make people show for office sometimes. Afta months of layoffs, especially for tech industry, di next business moves na serious matter.
“When di economy dey good, executives go think say ‘I go like make people show for office but e nor too bad because I get margin of error,'” Mark Ein, chairman of Kastle, one security company wey turn pandemic celebrity talk. “Now wey things don tough, dem want make dem hold their people for office.”
DocuSign, wey get over 6,500 workers wey dey different parts of di world, become one example of di back-and-forth on top plans to return to office. Di company bin hope say workers go return for office for May 2020, then August 2020, then October 2021, then January 2022. But di plans bin spoil.
But dis month, most of di company workers finally show for office. Since February, executives don evaluate every role for di company and decide say roughly 70 percent na hybrid, wey mean say people go dey office and remote, 30 percent go dey fully remote, and less than 1 percent go dey fully for office. Jennifer Christie, di company new chief people officer, don answer many questions wey workers dey ask wey dem dey worry.
“Dis matter fit dey cause serious argument,” she talk, and she talk say she see dis summer as one period wey dem go do experiment to evaluate which part of dia hybrid plan need change. “We dey run water through pipes wey never get water for long time. So where e go leak, we go see.”
But she add say di leaders of DocuSign don ready, say make dem stop di long talk on top how to bring people back to office, make dem start to act. “We go fit debate am forever, we fit dey wonder forever on top wetin go happun, but di best way for us to know how dis thing go affect our culture, productivity, and collaboration na to just start to dey do am.”
E don dey long period wey people don dey plan on top return to office, and di shift wey companies don make towards strong deadlines don catch some recruiters by surprise. Jasmine Silver, wey dey run one recruitment firm wey dey specialize for mothers wey wan come back to work, talk say for di last few months, many of her clients don suddenly switch from fully remote to either hybrid or fully in-office work. Di change fit shock workers wey don move far from office or workers wey don get used to new work-from-home routine.
And psychologists talk say e good make people fit express dia frustrations.
“Wetin fit look like complain na for many cases na request for understanding,” Tracy Maylett, one organizational psychologist yan. “When you dey look at change, di people wey dey quiet na di most dangerous, because you nor know wetin dey dia mind. You nor go fit address dia concerns.”
Di period of anxiety for office fit also dey temporary, based on di companies wey don don settle for dia hybrid routine. For example, Asana, one productivity software company, don ask workers say make dem come office at least on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays from 2022.
For months, return to office (R.T.O.) na di big topic for office conversation. Everybody get question, and dem dey direct all di questions to Anna Binder, di head of human resources.
“Before we R.T.O. – I like say na so e enta Webster Dictionary – e dey topic of conversation because R.T.O. bin dey theoretical, and di time wey pandemic go finish bin dey theoretical,” Ms. Binder talk. “Most people don show, return, and dey here. Some people don try am, come decide say ‘e nor dey for me,’ and dem comot.”
Now, Ms. Binder add, di matter nor dey come up again. Return to office nor dey hypothetical again. Na reality. And dem get plenty oda things wey dem fit discuss.
“Person for my team just recently fall in love, she show for office one day and na so e be, ‘Wetin dey do you?'” Ms. Binder yan. “She jus blush and talk say, ‘My whole life don change.’ To share dat moment with another human being — e bin really emotional.”
As businesses strive to strike the right balance between remote work and in-person collaboration, the return to the office is entering a new phase. While companies are implementing incentives and consequences to encourage employees to come back, the reality of hybrid work remains a permanent fixture. As employees adapt to the changing landscape, only time will tell how this transition will impact productivity, culture, and collaboration in the long run.
NOW IN ENGLISH
😫💼 Return to Office Enters the Desperation Phase
The next stage of getting workers back at their desks includes incentives like $10 to the charity of their choice — and consequences like poor performance evaluations if they don’t make the trek in. 💰🔀
Manny Medina, the chief executive of a Seattle-based artificial intelligence sales company, doesn’t mind repeating himself. It comes with the territory, after all. That tolerance proved convenient this year as he faced the same question innumerable times.
Wait, so why was it you wanted us back in the office? 🤔
The engineers reminded him of their commutes. The working parents reminded him of school pickup times. Mr. Medina replied with arguments he has delineated so often that they have come to feel like personal mantras: Being near each other makes the work better. Mr. Medina approached three years of mushy remote-plus-office work as an experiment. His takeaway was that ideas bubble up more organically in the clamor of the office. 💡💼
“You can interrupt each other without being rude when you’re in person,” said Mr. Medina, whose company, Outreach, is now in the office on a hybrid basis. “In a Zoom conversation, you have to let somebody finish their thought.” 💬🖥️
For tens of millions of office workers, it’s been three years of scattershot plans for returning to in-person work — summoning people in, not really meaning it, everybody pretty much working wherever they pleased. Now, for the umpteenth time, businesses are ready to get serious. 💼🕒
A wave of companies called workers back to the office this spring and summer: Disney said four days a week, Amazon swung with three (prompting a walkout from corporate workers), Meta and Lyft are aiming for September deadlines for many of their employees. Others devised new tactics to ensure their return-to-office policies stuck. Google, which has asked most workers to be in the office three days a week, announced that performance reviews could take into account lengthy unexplained absences from the office, and badge records could be reviewed to identify those consistent absences, said Ryan Lamont, a company spokesman. 💼📆
Google employees will be granted the ability to work remotely only on an extremely rare basis. “We want to see Googlers connecting and collaborating in person, so we’re limiting remote work to exception only,” Mr. Lamont said. 💻❌
These new policies come as business leaders accept that hybrid work is a permanent reality, with just over a quarter of full workdays in the country now done at home, and offices still at half their prepandemic occupancy. (Though that 50 percent occupancy metric combines Tuesdays and Wednesdays, when offices are bustling, with Fridays, when they tend to be ghost towns.) 💼🏢🏠
Salesforce, the business software behemoth, announced that for a 10-day period, it will give a $10 charitable donation per day on behalf of any employee who comes into the office (or for remote employees who attend company events). A spokeswoman said it was only natural the company would want to find moments for “doing well and doing good.” But to some employees, it might feel like a tonal shift, given that the company’s previous workplace plans were announced with fanfare for a future in which much of its staff could be fully or partially remote forever. (The company emphasized that this remains the case.) 💼💰🌟
“An immersive workspace is no longer limited to a desk in our Towers,” the company wrote in a February 2021 memo. “The 9-to-5 workday is dead.” 💼⏰☠️
It was very much alive on a recent Monday at Salesforce Tower in New York, as a hum of activity filled the 41-story building looming over Bryant Park. Desks and conference rooms were filled with employees, some of them visiting from San Francisco for the company’s A.I.-focused day. In the top-floor lounge, workers stood in line waiting for coffee, as Salesforce’s catering team prepared shrimp tacos for an office event that week. 🏢🗽🌆
Scattered throughout the office were the company’s animal mascots. Brandy the fox represents marketing. Astro the astronaut sat behind a piano in the 41st floor lounge. Codey the bear stood guard near the developers. 🦊🚀🐻
“It’s the impromptu-ness of in-person — so for example, I was at the office and there was somebody from Chicago, she was in the San Francisco office — ‘Oh do you have time to go and chat and have a meeting about a strategy that we’re rolling out?’” said Nathalie Scardino, Salesforce’s global head of talent strategy. “Inevitably, as a high-tech company, you have to keep changing to meet the needs of the business, of the customer.” 💬🌍💼
It’s not often that the entire white-collar business world gets thrown into an impromptu experiment — executives left to discern how to make multimillion-dollar decisions in between bursts of “you’re on mute,” employees figuring out how to forge friendships and nudge mentors for advice while sitting next to piles of their laundry. 👔🧑💼💻
And for the last three years, some office decision-making has come to feel like parents scrambling to impose rules on an unruly home: “Do this.” “Why?” “Because I said so.” But now some business leaders say that the results of their remote work experiment are in. They feel emphatically that they need some in-person time. After months of layoffs, especially in tech, their next business moves feel particularly consequential. 💼🏢💡
“When the economy was warm, executives thought, ‘I’d really like to have people back but it’s OK because I have this margin of error,’” said Mark Ein, chairman of Kastle, the security firm whose “back to work barometer” made it a pandemic celebrity. “Now that things are tougher, they want to hunker down and have their people in the office.” 💼📈
DocuSign, which has more than 6,500 employees spread across the globe, became a poster child for the lurching back-and-forth over return-to-office planning. The company had hoped to call employees back in May 2020, then August 2020, then October 2021, then January 2022. Then the plans disintegrated altogether. 💼🌍🗓️
But this month, much of the company finally came back to the office. Since February, executives have evaluated every role at the company and decided roughly 70 percent were hybrid, meaning people would be partly in the office and partly remote, 30 percent were fully remote and under 1 percent were fully in the office. Jennifer Christie, the company’s new chief people officer, absorbed dozens of questions from concerned employees. 💼🏢🤝
“This can be a very polarizing subject,” she said, adding that she views this summer as a period of experimentation in which she and other company leaders will evaluate what parts of their hybrid plan need changing. “We’re running water through pipes that haven’t had water run through them in a long time. So where are there going to be leaks?” 💦🚰
But Docusign’s leaders were ready, she added, to stop talking about how to get people back in the office and start making their plans real. “We could debate it forever, we could speculate about what’s going to happen forever, but the best way for us to understand how this will impact our culture and productivity and collaboration is to just start doing it.” 💼👥💪
It’s been a long period of choose-your-own-adventure style workplace planning, and the shift companies have made toward firmer deadlines has taken some recruiters by surprise. Jasmine Silver, who runs a recruitment firm specializing in mothers hoping to re-enter the workforce, found that in the last few months, many of her clients transitioned abruptly from fully remote to either hybrid or entirely in-office work. The transition was jarring for some workers, especially those who had moved far from their offices, or had become attached to new work-from-home habits. 💼🕒🚶♀️
And it’s healthy for people to be able to express those frustrations, psychologists said.
“What appears to be a grumbling or complaint is in many cases a request for understanding,” said Tracy Maylett, an organizational psychologist. “When you look at change, the most dangerous people are people who are quiet, because you don’t know what they’re thinking. You can’t address their concerns.” 💆♀️💬🧑⚕️
The period of hand-wringing also tends to be temporary, judging by those companies now settled in their hybrid routines. Asana, for example, the productivity software firm, asked employees to come in at least on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays starting in 2022.
For months, return to office, or R.T.O., was a big topic of office conversation. Everybody had questions, and they were all directed toward Anna Binder, the head of human resources. 💼🗣️📅
“Before we R.T.O.’d — I love that that’s now in the Webster Dictionary — it was a topic of conversation because R.T.O. was theoretical, and being on the other side of the pandemic was theoretical,” Ms. Binder said. “Most people came, returned and are here. Some people tried it, decided, ‘It’s not for me,’ and they left.”
Now, Ms. Binder continued, the issue doesn’t really come up. Return to office isn’t a hypothetical scenario. It’s their reality. And they have so much else to talk about. 💼🏢💬
“Somebody on my team just recently fell in love with somebody, and she came in one day and it was like, ‘What is going on with you?’” Ms. Binder said. “She got so red, and she was like, ‘My whole life has changed.’ To share that moment with another human being — it was really emotional.” 💑💖
