As someone who
has worked remotely, partially remotely, and most predominantly fully on-site,
I think I can offer a decent analysis of the differences and comparisons.
“… 72% of federal supervisors believe telework maintained
or improved productivity, and 84% of employees with telework options reported
higher job satisfaction.”
Return-to-office mandates have seemingly become the norm recently,
with Elon Musk and the Trump administration demanding it. State governments and
many companies are also returning to offices as the threat from COVID has
dwindled.
I recently heard
a story where a remote worker was found not to have logged in as required by
their company for two successive days. The issue was referred to HR to determine
whether or not they should be fired. Apparently, the person had a kid in the
emergency room or something like that and did not follow the proper procedures
of notifying their supervisor that they would not be logged in at work. At
issue is what is known as time theft.
It is true that time
management can be different when working remotely and there will be more breaks
or less continuity as we humans tend to multitask and tend to other things
while we are working. We can do that on-site at work as well but social conventions
and fear of being seen as a slacker help to keep one focused, for good or ill,
as some people do better work when they don’t feel forced into continuous busyness.
Many jobs are more
suited to remote work. Customer service jobs are often remote as they are strictly
communication-based. Lots of technical jobs requiring computer analysis and
data interpretation can be done most effectively remotely. I worked geosteering
horizontal wells in real-time on 12-hour shifts remotely while connected to the
drilling rig via a data portal where I could see the drilling parameters, mud
properties, log curves, and other data, all in real-time. Communication via frequent
regular email updates, texting, or phone calls to note changes in geology or
geological interpretation. In previous years I did the same job on-site at
wells and remotely during the off-work hours. Working remotely has many
advantages for the worker and the client. My first remote work was a part-time
job back in the late 90s analyzing geophysical well logs on microfilm and making
a database. I had found an old microfiche reader to do this and a computer. In
my work as a geologist and as an environmental specialist I have also done lots
of work in the field at various worksites, outdoors and indoors. Fieldwork requires
travel. Travel takes time and resources. Fieldwork can be seen as remote work or
at least partially remote work. Sometimes I worked with other people at sites
and sometimes alone. Hours can be flexible. You may be on site but not working.
In that case, you would expect to be paid for the time. If the same thing
happens when you are at home could go either way. You may be paid if the time
period was not too long and you had to monitor what is happening or your total
time may be cut, depending on the client.
Sometimes one can
get distracted while working remotely and at other times one can get less
productive. However, overall, from my experience the advantages outweigh the disadvantages,
especially for the employee, but also for the employer. The factors in favor of
the employee are led by not needing to commute. As someone who has spent over a
decade driving about an hour one way to work, up to 10 hours a week commuting.
I have also had jobs where I had to drive up to 9 hours to get to work. For most
of those, I got a per diem or mileage and travel expenses, which helped. On some
of those jobs, I was paid for driving time, on others not. Of course, one is not
paid nor expected to be paid for a normal daily commute to work. In any case,
not having to commute means less time on the road, less wear and tear on a
vehicle, saving money, saving time, and probably more sleep. Those are fantastic
benefits if you ask me!
When COVID hit
hard, the virtues and benefits of remote work were praised. Tech companies, in
particular, embraced it.
“There are some very clear benefits to remote work,"
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said at the time. "It lets us access talent pools
outside of traditional tech hubs in big cities — and that should help spread
economic opportunity much more widely around the country and world while also
helping us build a more diverse company.”
Zuckerberg also noted studies that suggested people would be
more productive working remotely. However, Zuckerberg changed his tune three
years later.
"People who work from home are not efficient and
engineers who come to the office get more work done," Zuckerberg said just
three years after his early remote work commentary.
Elon Musk went so far as to say that remote work is “morally
wrong.” His complaint was that many workers cannot work remotely due to the
nature of their work. Thus, to let anyone work remotely is unfair to them. Walmart
Chief People Officer Donna Morris noted:
"Our values and culture are strategic
differentiators for us as a company, and they are fostered by being together. We’ve
already seen the benefits of having more teams working together in person, and
today we are sharing another step that will help accelerate our momentum."
I guess for people who are conventional and believe in their
“company culture,” it is great to work in person together. For those of us who
are less conventional and more compelled to work because we must, and are less
interested in company culture and politics, the arguments for in-person work
are less compelling. My own view is that remote work is best in some cases,
hybrid work is best in many cases, and in-person work is required due to the
nature of many jobs but not so in others.
Idaho National Laboratory (INL) Director and Battelle Energy
Alliance President John Wagner recently ordered a directive for employees to return
to in-person work, in line with Trump’s recent executive order mandating all
government employees to return to in-person office work, which will require
many to move to different areas of the country and will likely result in many
people quitting. As well as uprooting many people the requirement will also
involve the government purchasing more office space for the workers. The
workers are given time to comply with the directive, which is expected to
affect about 6400 workers. INL spokeswoman Sarah Neumann asked whether the
directive is a response to Trump's executive order (which I would argue, it obviously
is) and noted:
“That hasn’t trickled down to the lab — that executive
order. My understanding is that this decision is being made just because our
lab director thinks it’s in the best interest of our employees and the lab as a
whole.”
I don’t really buy that, although the INL director is suggesting
that the change was not forced by Trump’s executive order but by his own
considerations:
“After careful consideration and in alignment with our
organizational goals, we believe that collaboration, innovation and a strong
sense of community are best fostered when we are physically present together.
While we recognize the advantages of hybrid and virtual work, we are confident
that the benefits of face-to-face interactions, spontaneous discussions, and
the synergy created by working side by side are crucial to our long-term
success.”
When Biden urged
a more modest return to office rule, requiring 60% in-person time, the result
was many people quitting, a 26% increase in resignations. Will the same happen
again? The Columbus Dispatch notes, regarding Governor Mike DeWine’s recent
order to end remote and hybrid options for most state employees by March 17:
“Data from the Office of Personnel Management further
underlines why flexible work arrangements matter.”
“According to that data, 72% of federal supervisors
believe telework maintained or improved productivity, and 84% of employees with
telework options reported higher job satisfaction.”\
The Dispatch also noted:
“The Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey supports this
conclusion, with 78% of participants crediting telework as a positive
contributor to work-life balance. These numbers show that well-structured
remote or hybrid arrangements can be a powerful tool for morale and efficiency,
rather than a hindrance.”
That certainly suggests that employees prefer remote and
hybrid work. We have Elon Musk bragging about working 120 weeks and sleeping on
air mattresses in government buildings (wow, he is so hardcore), very few people
desire such extremist approaches. Incidentally. I have had jobs where I worked over 24 hours straight on occasion, slept in my car, and had to do my business in the woods (not legal, but expected). Dr. Gleb Tsipursky, the CEO of the hybrid
work consultancy Disaster Avoidance Experts, who favors remote and hybrid work had
this to say:
“These flexible work options allowed employees to balance
professional and personal responsibilities more effectively, leading to
increased job satisfaction and higher productivity.”
“By abruptly ending these arrangements, DeWine risks
alienating a significant segment of the state workforce that has grown
accustomed to the flexibility that remote work offers. State agencies rely on
long-term institutional knowledge to manage complex tasks ranging from
technology modernization to policy implementation. The loss of such expertise
could lead to significant delays, operational backlogs, and ultimately a
decline in public confidence in government efficiency.”
“While the primary goal of DeWine’s back-to-office decree
is to maximize the utility of state resources and enhance public service
delivery, the potential drawbacks cannot be ignored.”
“A forced return to full-time in-person work will erode
employee morale, precipitate a wave of resignations, and ultimately undermine
the efficiency gains the policy aims to secure.”
He notes that much of the federal government’s complaints
about telework are focused on unused government office space. With return-to-office mandates, will that office space be filled or will people quit? With
many people expected to either take resignation severance or be fired, it seems
likely that the office space won’t be used and end up being sold off anyway.
Tsipursky noted
in a blog about telework:
“Beyond cost savings, telework has proven to be a
powerful tool for improving recruitment, retention, and employee satisfaction.
A November 2024 report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO)
evaluated federal telework programs and found that they have expanded talent
pools and reduced turnover. The IRS, for example, reported that telework
allowed it to attract skilled customer service representatives from areas far
beyond its physical office locations. Similarly, agencies such as U.S.
Citizenship and Immigration Services noted a significant increase in applicant
interest for roles offering telework flexibility. These findings align with
broader trends in the private sector, where hybrid work models have been shown
to increase employee engagement and reduce attrition.”
“The Republican push to dismantle telework is dangerous
for taxpayers. Proposals from DOGE to mandate a full return to the office,
framed as a cost-saving measure, are likely to have the opposite effect.
Federal salaries account for just 4.5% of the government’s $6.1 trillion annual
budget, and mass resignations triggered by rigid return-to-office policies
would create costly operational disruptions. Agencies such as the Department of
Homeland Security and the SSA rely on specialized expertise that cannot be
easily replaced. Recruiting and training new employees to fill these gaps would
impose significant costs on taxpayers, while reduced capacity would delay
critical services like processing veterans’ benefits or responding to disasters.”
“These inefficiencies would ripple across the economy,
affecting industries reliant on federal oversight. Delays in regulatory
approvals, audits, and infrastructure projects would create financial losses
for businesses and state governments alike. Meanwhile, taxpayers would bear the
burden of rebuilding government capacity after the exodus of experienced
federal workers. Instead of saving money, the elimination of telework would
increase the overall cost of government operations while undermining the quality
of public services.”
I have applied
for jobs for the State of Ohio and for Battelle, noting that the hybrid work
schedule would be the only way I could do it in many cases due to driving
distances. Thus, these directives directly affect me a bit too.
Addendum February 27, 2025
I just read a
great article on remote work by Josie Cox for Slate. It brings up some relevant
issues mostly in favor of remote work. A working paper by Harvard Business
School, the University of California, Los Angeles and Brown University noted
that many in the tech industry were willing to take significant pay cuts for the
ability to work hybrid or remote.
“Our findings indicate that, on average, individuals are
willing to forgo approximately 25% of total compensation for a job that is
otherwise identical but offers partially- or fully-remote work instead of being
fully in-person,” the scholars wrote.
Anthony Klotz, a
professor of organizational behavior at University College London’s School of
Management and the guy who coined the term ‘Great Resignation noted that
managers were basing RTO decisions on:
“…memos and announcements that use anecdotes and
observations rather than factual evidence to justify decisions. “Business
leaders certainly have the right to fly in the face of employee sentiment and
published evidence. That’s their prerogative,” said Klotz. “But if they want to
do so and still retain the trust of their employees, they have to offer a
compelling ‘why?’ And no one is doing that when it comes to RTO.”
“To be clear, if CEOs were paying attention to the body
of evidence on this topic that’s available and growing, they’d be hard pressed
to ignore one recurring conclusion. “Hybrid work is a win-win-win for employee
productivity, performance and retention,” wrote Nicholas Bloom, a Stanford
economist and one of the leading researchers on work-from-home policies, in
commenting on a paper published in June last year.”
“If managed right, letting employees work from home two
or three days a week still gets you the level of mentoring, culture-building
and innovation that you want,” Bloom added. “From an economic policymaking
standpoint, hybrid work is one of the few instances where there aren’t major
trade-offs with clear winners and clear losers. There are almost only winners.”
Cox goes on to
examine trust and the cost of trust, citing ideas in organizational psychology
and of people who study work. I thought this was well written. Thus, most of
that section is reproduced below. I can verify that feeling distrusted by your
supervisor is a horrible experience and conversely, feeling trusted is great. Also
mentioned is our sense of fairness. When people have options that are then used
to save time and resources they tend to feel grateful and treated fairly.
The cost of trust
Many of the people I spoke to about the push-pull of
company demands vs. worker desires mentioned — or at least alluded to — the
importance of trust. When there’s a disconnect between what companies and what
workers want, trust can quickly wane and this also can prove very expensive for
employers.
Klotz mentioned that one of the most robust findings in
organizational psychology is that people react more positively to decisions by
leaders (or less negatively, in the case of unpopular decisions) if these
decisions are accompanied by compelling evidence that the decision is both fair
and based on a sound business case.
So if employees understand and trust the rationale for a
CEO’s decision, they’re more likely to be able to get behind it. If they don’t,
any number of things could happen. They might quit. They might drag their feet.
Is a disgruntled in-office employee who feels like their boss doesn’t trust
them really a more valuable asset than a happy employee who feels trusted
enough to sometimes work from home?
On this note, Wes Adams, co-author of "Meaningful
Work," reminded me that “autonomy is one of the strongest predictors of
whether an employee deems their work to be meaningful or not. “For many
employees,” he said, “a rigid return-to-office policy signals a lack of trust
more than a commitment to culture.”
Zach Mercurio, author of an upcoming book called
"The Power of Mattering" and a senior honorary fellow at the Center
for Meaning and Purpose at Colorado State University, echoed this. Referring to
the research showing that workers are willing to forgo pay for not working in
the office every day, he noted that this is evidence of a “shift from
transactional to transformational relationships between workers and their
organizations.”
He added that the evolution of the world of work, and the
emergence of new avenues of income, has resulted in people having more choices
when it comes to where and how they want to make a living. “With more choice
comes more discernment, and with more discernment comes an increasing focus on
how people want to feel,” said Mercurio. “Simply exchanging wages and perks for
labor and motivation won’t work in this new market.”
In the end, even if CEOs aren’t currently doing the math
as it relates to their workplace policies, they may be forced to in the
not-too-distant future, said Zuhayeer Musa, co-founder of Levels.fyi, a website
that helps users compare compensation figures and that helped collect data for
the working paper on compensation.
References:
DeWine
is forcing workers back into the office. Expect massive resignations. Opinion
by Gleb Tsipursky. Columbus Dispatch. February 6, 2025. DeWine
is forcing workers back into the office. Expect massive resignations. | Opinion
Walmart
sends a hard-nosed message to employees. Jena Warburton. The Street. February
6, 2025. Walmart
sends a hard-nosed message to employees
INL
directs all 6,400 employees to return to work on-site. David Pace. East Idaho
News. February 6, 2025. INL
directs all 6,400 employees to return to work on-site
Killing
Telework Will Bleed Taxpayers Dry. Dr. Gleb Tsipursky. Disaster Avoidance
Experts. February 4, 2025. Killing
Telework Will Bleed Taxpayers Dry
Return to office: CEOs are ignoring the math. Shareholders will ultimately pay. Josie Cox. Salon. February 27, 2025. Return to office: CEOs are ignoring the math. Shareholders will ultimately pay
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