Microsoft is Letting Some Employees Work From Home Permanently (theverge.com) 42
Microsoft is allowing some of its employees to work from home permanently. From a report: While the vast majority of Microsoft employees are still working from home during the ongoing pandemic, the software maker has unveiled "hybrid workplace" guidance internally to allow for far greater flexibility once US offices eventually reopen. The Verge has received Microsoft's internal guidance, and it outlines the company's flexible working plans for the future. Microsoft will now allow employees to work from home freely for less than 50 percent of their working week, or for managers to approve permanent remote work. Employees who opt for the permanent remote work option will give up their assigned office space, but still have options to use touchdown space available at Microsoft's offices. "The COVID-19 pandemic has challenged all of us to think, live, and work in new ways," says Kathleen Hogan, Microsoft's chief people officer, in a note to employees. "We will offer as much flexibility as possible to support individual workstyles, while balancing business needs, and ensuring we live our culture."
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Yeah, Scott Hanselman [hanselman.com] has been doing this forever. Anybody who pays attention to his blog/podcast knows that this has been a long standing thing at Microsoft.
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It depends very much on the person, their role, and their manager. I'd wager you don't hear much from employees who get/have to come to the office most days when there isn't a plague going on.
Microsoft has long had a strong preference for butts in chairs in offices, sometimes requiring an act of god in order to get approval to work remotely.
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The one place I don't see much impact is in Redmond itself. They are still building new offices there.
Of course. If you are hiring people to WFH, you certainly wouldn't do it in a high-salary high-cost place like Redmond.
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Why not? If the people you're hiring are there, you have to. WFH allows you to slow your building growth though - seeing as commercial rents are dropping as companies downsize their office space
One thing, and this is from when I visited their Redmond campus and of the part I saw, it seems
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Coronavirus has really helped companies see the benefits of having almost all staff out of the office though, not just a few. And not just in terms of boosted productivity for those lucky enough to have a decent home office, but also improvements to health and even engineering. For example I've found that having to keep my development environment highly portable rather than just on one machine helps route out any issues long before some other engineer complains that it doesn't build right in their environme
How will management adapt? (Score:5, Insightful)
If there is one good thing coming out of Corona: it is making many organizations fundamentally re-think the way they work. Working from home is a no-brainer for many people: if you're a self-starter who takes responsibility for your work and won't slack off - why not? You have more flexibility in your life, you don't have to commute, you don't have to waste time listening to water-cooler stories - working from home is great. Of course, there are other types of employees who really need the structure of an office. Without that structure, and that distance from their home-life, they wouldn't actually get anything done.
This becomes a challenge for management. They need to support the self-starters, and avoid putting them at any sort of disadvantage for not having "face time". In fact, the self-starters may well be the best employees. This means, though, that many of the classic management tools don't work anymore. You can't just peek in Dilbert's cubicle to see if he's surfing, or working, or on his 23rd coffee break. Management has to become more results-oriented, less meeting-oriented, and far less face-time oriented.
There are a lot of managers who will be unable to adapt. There were already a lot of lousy managers, and this work-from-home will magnify their flaws.
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...Working from home is a no-brainer for many people: if you're a self-starter who takes responsibility for your work and won't slack off - why not? You have more flexibility in your life, you don't have to commute, you don't have to waste time listening to water-cooler stories - working from home is great. Of course, there are other types of employees who really need the structure of an office. Without that structure, and that distance from their home-life, they wouldn't actually get anything done.
Perhaps companies should stop hiring children then.
This becomes a challenge for management.
No, this becomes a problem for micromanagement, which the 21st Century has no room for anymore. If "many" people know how to adult at a job regardless of location, then teach those who seemingly can't.
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Perhaps companies should stop hiring children then.
People's needs are different than mine? That must make them inferior children because I am the supreme example of the best in humanity
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Perhaps companies should stop hiring children then.
People's needs are different than mine? That must make them inferior children because I am the supreme example of the best in humanity
Adult priorities are different than yours. Yeah, I needed constant work supervision; when my age ended in "teen". If the majority of adults can work remotely just fine, then perhaps it is the immature who need to learn to focus and prioritize their employer for a few hours a day. If you have the kind of job that can be done remotely, then chances are you need a basic office setup and space, not a pressurized chamber with air-lock. And it's a work environment. How many of those had video game cafes, sle
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Yes, thanks for doubling down on "if people aren't like me, then they are children" mentality.
Speaking of doubling down, perhaps when you grow up you'll have a valid response to my claim.
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Yes, thanks for doubling down on "if people aren't like me, then they are children" mentality.
Speaking of doubling down, perhaps when you grow up you'll have a valid response to my claim.
There are people, that aren't exactly like you, yet are still adults. How about that?
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Most people slack off at work anyway. At least at home they can be more productive, doing stuff they need to do instead of trying to cram it into their free time and making them more stressed out.
Anyway slacking off is underrated. Particularly for engineers and anyone doing a creative or innovative job. Time to let thoughts wonder and time for the brain to be idle between intense sessions has major benefits.
Also I've read about many things that then came in handy at work on Slashdot and various other sites.
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I concur.
I solved a particularly challenging coding problem the other day by going and shaving and putting a load of laundry in. I just needed to reset my brain and do something else, and there was a solution.
When you are doing a job that requires any amount of creativity or innovation, there are times when it just doesn't flow, and sitting there longer isn't going to make it any better. Being able to stop bashing your head against a brick wall and go do something else is generally required.
With WFH, that's
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Also doing the insane location-based-pay BS (Score:3)
Microsoft has explicitly said workers can work from anywhere, but will adjust your pay based on location!? Again, WTF!?!?
This is going to cause really weird real-estate market effects with people looking for "cheater" locations where MS has misestimated their stupid weird iron-law-of-wages adjustment. Or simply cheating the system, which would be 100% worthy of applause if it can be done without also cheating on your taxes.
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I've been trying to think really hard about why companies are doing this madness, and I think I've finally come up with a good reason - they want to ratchet wages down in a controlled manner to avoid unneccessary staff turnover rather than abruptly dropping them to what they rationally should be (competitive wages for a job of that skill level in Bumfuq, Nebraska).
They'll decrease the wages of anyone who moves away, maintain the wages of anyone who doesn't, and simply reduce or stop hiring people who live i
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Re: Already being gamed (Score:2)
No, pretty easy. You define them as part-year residents and have them indicate how much of their working time was in that state. Itâ(TM)s a pain in the butt for them, of course, but thatâ(TM)s not really what the tax board cares about.
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I would also guess it is entirely one way too. If you move to an area where they consider the cost of living to be cheaper, they'll cut your wages. But if you live in a cheap area and move to an area with a higher cost of living, they aren't going to do the reverse and increase your wages.
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True, but not on paper. On paper, they'll freely offer to increase wages for people who move to more expensive areas. In practice, if they don't see you as a "rock star," things might soon become uncomfortable at the company for people who move to more expensive areas. Suddenly decreasing performance reviews, crappy work assignments, being first in line for any layoffs, that sort of thing. And people from expensive areas who apply for jobs won't have much luck.
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One your employer doesn't have an official workspace for you, you are able to deduct the cost of the extra bedroom or what not used as an office. My recently retired mom did that for 25 years, twas nice for her taxes.
Re: Aka "free offices"! (Score:2)
Ah, right, Americans have extra rooms.
Because they have space.
Just imagine Europe as one big New York. Two rooms in a city is a luxury, usually. :/
in any case, I did not mean to call everyone a moron. At least not for this. Or voting for any of the two big parties... definitely. But not for this.
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Note, however, that unreimbursed expenses attributable to the trade or business of being an employee, including those of maintaining a home office, are no longer deductible as a miscellaneous itemized deduction due to the suspension of such deductions by Sec. 67(g), for tax years 2018 through 2025, as added by the legislation known as the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), P.L. 115-97. This means that employees who work from home are no longer entitled to claim an itemized deduction for home office expenses, even if the employer requires the employee to maintain a home office. If clients have lost this valuable tax break, they also may wish to encourage their employer to set up an accountable plan (see "Start or Review an Accountable Plan," JofA, Feb. 2020).
'Permanent' = until we change our mind (Score:3)
This is corporate America. A verbal contract is worth the paper it's written on.
CUTTING salaries (Score:1)
Milton (Score:2)
"Microsoft is Letting Some Employees Work From Home Permanently"
Yes, but are they paying them anymore?