Jul. 18, 2022 "Why older CEOs hate letting employees work from home": Today I found this article by Gillian Tett on the Financial Post:
Earlier this summer, I moderated a dinner debate for the New York Stock Exchange with a clutch of esteemed U.S. chief executives. I expected an earnest discussion about inflation, supply chains and the war in Ukraine. But that’s not what I got.
After one CEO asked a question about the merits of hybrid work, the conversation suddenly became highly emotive. A show of hands revealed most CEOs disliked the policy of remote working. Another showed most were only getting their staff into the office for two days a week at best.
Their dilemma was painfully clear.
Should they force staff to return by threatening to fire them, as Elon Musk recently did at Tesla Inc.?
Strongly urge them to return, like Wall Street bosses such as David Solomon of Goldman Sachs Group Inc.?
Or take the same route as Tim Cook of Apple Inc., who initially demanded curbs on remote work but was forced to compromise after mass protests?
As the debate raged, it turned this economics dinner into something more like a communal corporate therapy session. “It’s the biggest single issue,” the boss of a Midwest industrial group forlornly admitted.
Last month, it happened again, this time while moderating a discussion with an earnest consultant from EY. We were supposed to debate macroeconomic issues but as soon as someone uttered the phrase “remote work,” the conversation was hijacked.
Once again, middle-aged executives said they wanted employees to return to the office.
On this occasion there were also younger workers present, and they were equally vehement that they wanted to work mostly from home. The only exception to this generational divide was one middle-aged software CEO, whose staff had always worked remotely.
The arguments were intense and driven by culture as much as logistics and economics.
As a family therapist might say, the debates showed the generations often “talk past each other.” The same words can mean very different things to people because their assumptions clash.
Take productivity. Workers like me who started their careers towards the end of the 20th century assumed offices were more “productive” than home.
“Going to work” was synonymous with “going to the office” and was defined in opposition to home, which was linked to time spent not working.
But for anthropologists, this mental split was an anomaly when set against most cultures throughout history. Today’s laptop-wielding workforce seems to underline this.
To them, being in an office can seem less productive since “you end up socializing and that stops you doing your job,” as one young banker told the EY debate.
To this, the older generation would retort that conversation is never a waste of time;
it fosters teamwork
and leads to the unplanned encounters that spark creativity,
not to mention the personal contact needed to manage people.
I was repeatedly told all this by the CEOs I was interviewing.
But digital natives grew up managing social relations in cyberspace as much as in the real world.
The latter does not always trump the former in their eyes; they think “managers just need to learn to manage remotely,” one said.
There is a third key point of tension: apprenticeships. Though the concept is most often associated with blue-collar work in the west, it also mattered for 20th-century white-collar professionals.
Today’s established lawyers, bankers, accountants or journalists usually learnt their craft by observing others and through immersion in an office.
This wasn’t just because they needed to acquire technical skills. The key issue was the transmission of culture.
Offices were where the younger generation learned to
network,
comport themselves at work,
manage their time
and so on.
In anthropologist-speak, the office was an environment where deeply ingrained rhythms were seamlessly conveyed and reproduced from one generation to another.
Today’s corporate leaders take it for granted that the culture transfer matters, hence the existence of summer internships.
But not everyone shares this view, especially when so much else is in flux and many of the older generation are struggling to make sense of an increasingly digital world.
It might prove to be a temporary clash. Another theme that emerged from these debates was that most older executives blithely assume it will be easier for them to put an end to remote work when the summer is over — and if a recession hits.
But this assumption may be misguided too; surveys from groups such as Gallup consistently show most people working from home today expect to continue to do so, most of the time. It is a fascinating moment to be a corporate anthropologist and a nightmare for those CEOs.
© 2022 The Financial Times Ltd.
Older CEOs hate letting employees work from home | Financial Post
It’s an experiment. Sometimes they succeed and sometimes they fail. We’ll find out in about 10 years. Make note of 2019 and keep asking “are we better off now?” My guess is everyone will be miserable but claim they’re happy. Kinda like today’s progressives. They claim they enjoy the ArriveCan app as an example.
I've read elsewhere that it is a jealousy deal, we were never able and why should you.
Jul. 20, 2022 "Older and younger bosses don't agree on remote work": Today I found this article by Matthew Boyle on BNN Bloomberg:
Bosses and workers rarely agree on what matters when it comes to the future of work. But there’s division even within the c-suite, particularly regarding the disparate treatment remote and in-office workers can face.
Younger executives cited those inequities as their top concern around flexible work arrangements,
but the same issue ranked dead last among their older counterparts,
according to the Future Forum, a research consortium backed by Slack Technologies Inc.
The group of about 100 older executives, most of whom were in their 50s, said
coordination of hybrid-work schedules was their top concern,
followed by productivity
and learning.
The 400 or so younger execs also fretted about
scheduling,
along with culture.
The research exposes a generational divide in which executives closer to retirement age, who’ve spent decades in offices and prefer to manage workers they can see in person,
differ from younger managers in their 30s and 40s, who are generally more accepting of hybrid arrangements and keen to make sure they benefit everyone.
Previous Future Forum surveys have found that women and minority workers are more likely than other groups to want to work from home,
adding to fears that the push to return to offices could exacerbate existing workplace inequalities.
“It’s troubling,” said Brian Elliott, a Slack executive who oversees the Future Forum research, which surveys more than 10,000 white-collar workers quarterly.
“The risk we run is that the older generation of executives is missing the fact that their diversity and inclusion goals and their future of work plans are tied together.”
Workers have been coming back into offices in recent months, but the mass migration that many expected last year hasn’t happened.
Significant numbers of white-collar employees have continued working from home while struggling with
childcare,
the grind of commuting
and worries about rising COVID-19 cases.
Office occupancy in 10 of the largest US business districts has been stuck below 50 per cent for the entire year, according to building-security firm Kastle Systems,
and bosses are loath to push workers back in a tight labor market.
Still, recession fears and a rash of hiring slowdowns everywhere from Apple Inc. to Goldman Sachs Group Inc. could provide bosses with more leverage to nudge workers back.
While that push and pull plays out, organizations need to put time and effort into crafting their flexible-work policies, which usually involve a good bit of trial and error.
The mismatch in expectations between the freedom employees crave and the amount of in-office time senior leaders want is the biggest challenge in adopting more flexible work models, according to research from the HR Policy Association, which represents employers.
But the gap between what workers want and what their employers are mandating continues to shrink, according to ongoing research from academics led by Nicholas Bloom of Stanford University.
For example, companies juggling remote and in-office workers often try to maintain a level playing field by insisting that if one employee has to dial into a meeting, then everyone does.
Teams that work together frequently agree on which days they will all be in the office for more collaborative projects,
and which times can be reserved for focused individual work.
Still, the phenomenon of “proximity bias,” whereby those who come into the office get ahead, persists.
Just being seen in the office can affect
performance evaluations,
promotions
and job security,
research from professors at the University of California, Davis and North Carolina University has found.
JPMorgan Chase & Co. chief Jamie Dimon is among the many Baby Boomer-generation executives who’ve argued that remote work is no substitute for the spontaneous idea generation that results from bumping into colleagues at the coffee machine.
Under-represented groups, though, “want flexibility in both where and when they work,” said Sheela Subramanian, a Slack executive and co-founder of the Future Forum.
Slack, which makes virtual collaboration software, benefits from a remote workforce.
Older and younger bosses don't agree on remote work - BNN Bloomberg
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