i'm skeptical of any study that concludes anyone would rather deal with all the bullshit of working in the office rather than wfh

no one goes to work for the "community," which can also be gotten literally anywhere other than work

sounds like something corporate slavedriving senior executives decided they wanted a "study" on to prove people want to work in the office

I'm childless and all I can say is fuck community.

Not everyone hates life like you do. I hang out with co-workers all the time. Kept relationships will after I'm done.

According to my kids, candies are the most logical place to get most your nutritions from. Where else could you get so many calories?

If most of your time at work is spent socializing, couldn't you cut your work time and build your community elsewhere?

If most of your time at work you spent on honest hard-work working, how much community are you really building?

Cut you calories. Life doesn't happen at work.

It would be logical to work less and get our own community. A lot of people work hard all their lives and die soon after retirement. That's not logical.

Not everyone hates life like you do

They're not distinguishing "remote work" from "working from home" which are two entirely different things. There are whole communities of remote workers who meet and work together around the world. I guarantee you that remote working men who take advantage of these kinds of environments have a better sense of community than men who are forced to go sit in a cubicle with a group of people like the cast of The Office with less sense of humor.

I’m not going to deny that some people enjoy going to work and enjoy interacting with their coworkers, but this feels like it’s missing the forest for the trees. What about the affects commuting has on one’s civic engagement in their actual community?

“There’s a simple rule of thumb: Every ten minutes of commuting results in ten per cent fewer social connections. Commuting is connected to social isolation, which causes unhappiness.”
https://archive.ph/2020.02.27-211238/https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2007/04/16/there-and-back-again

That sounds amazing

They miss the sense of community because we no longer have 3rd places to hang out. For those unaware:

The Great Places Erased by Suburbia (the Third Place)
https://yewtu.be/watch?v=VvdQ381K5xg
https://youtu.be/VvdQ381K5xg

In office, I'm a chatty bitch. I have a habit of maybe over-socializing. For sure, my productivity goes down in the office. Oh, and people listen to me just as much WFH as they did in the office when it comes to work stuff.

At home, I can just turn on some music and focus on what I need to get done. I can work on my 20+ jira points I have every god damn sprint. Meetings (ad-hoc or planned) already cause delays for me and I'm already working to much (the highest so far, has been a 16-hour day).

I don't miss the 'sense of community' because there isn't one. Plus, most of my co-workers live in different states, and many in different countries. There's no in-person collaboration even if I'm in the office. It's still everything done over chat/video call.

My company, like so many others, went back on everything they said about WFH. They used to say how great it was because they could find talent from anywhere instead of being arbitrarily constrained by location. Like, obviously, the best talent doesn't just happen to live next to you. Then it moved to hybrid, for those all important in-person, face-to-face collabs and synergy and all the other bullshit LinkedIn BS you can spew. And now, they're doing RTO full on and even shaming those who work from home or would want to. Full-on bully tactics in meetings too. Even started shaming the upper mgmt, because their excuse was "well, other companies are doing it" so I hit back with the "if other companies were committing fraud, would we?" a spin on the "well if everyone else was jumping off a bridge, would you" I grew up hearing all the time. I actually brought that up in a corporate meeting, they never responded, so I'm taking that as a yes.... yes they would and will, so long as they figure they can get away with it (or the penalties don't outweigh the profits).

And then I find out Tim Walz (Minnesota Governor) is also for RTO... so I emailed his office, letting him know just how utterly disappointed in him I was, and to not expect my vote ever again.

Sorry, I'll get off my soapbox. I'm just truly passionate about this. WFH, I'm far less miserable on a day-to-day basis. Working in the office, I was in multiple car accidents going to and from work (none of which I caused). I've been in exactly 0 since WFH. No longer spending 1-2 hours a day just traveling, so I can work remotely, in an office. If I ever win the lotto, I'll be rich enough I could run for president and one of my pillars would be pushing businesses to utilize WFH if the position can do that. Fewer cars on roads, means less congestion for those who have to be onsite. There should be a noticeable decrease in vehicle-related accidents and fatalities.

Pretty much. It's feels like someone complaining that they won the lottery.

Dude you need to up your life a bit. Dontchathink?

I'm sorry to hear this.
What makes you say this?

During the pandemic my partner stayed inside for about a month, I was the only person she interacted with. I kept going to work because I was an "essential" worker (not really), so I kinda envied her, but by the end of that month she was going a bit crazy.

‍️ I can make friends at work just fine

I've always thought that researchers should plot outcomes against commute times.

My oldest has no children and works fully remote.

When the pandemic started, his company decided to have everyone work from home. They very quickly discovered that they were just as productive, and the owner decided it made sense to dump their office space.

A group of employees decided to go on vacation together, while still working. Since they are all remote, they didn't actually have to work from home. They got an Airbnb with good Internet, worked during the day, and saw the sites and had fun together after work.

If you're remote and you miss that sense of community, reach out to your coworkers and ask them if they want to hang out after work. It's possible they don't and you'll be disappointed. It's also possible that they feel the same way but didn't know they could do something about it.

Either you'll be the hero that saved everyone from their solitary existence, or you'll have to accept that they don't want to hang out with you.

Dude what? It was a great show!

Eh, I became a stay at home mom over the pandemic, and while I've never worked in an office, but on the shop floor, I do miss the shenanigans. But its almost like a trauma bond, where its like, hey, we're all stuck here, best make the nest of it and try snd have fun while we are here.

I'm fully isolated now, and at this point terrified of crowds, when i never was before.

Not arguing at all people who can work remotely shouldn't, they should, for a litter or reasons. But I do miss my coworkers from my employee owned factory where culture was held in high standard. Im also not arguing this should be the only place one finds community, I'm only saying, for a person like me, it helped sometimes to joke around on the new guy or collectively bitch about issues at work or hear other folks problems and offer advice or help when I could.

We socialized outside of work too. I can't get invited to a party, or a wedding, or anything if I literally don't know anyone. I've only ever known how to make friends in structured environments. But that's wierdo me.