White House asks Cabinet agencies to 'aggressively execute' return to in-person work

[In It to Win It]

White House asks Cabinet agencies to ‘aggressively execute’ return to in-person work

The White House is directing Cabinet agencies to bring federal workers back into the office more frequently in the coming months, according to an internal email obtained by CNN.

The email, sent to Cabinet secretaries by White House chief of staff Jeff Zients, cites the end of the Covid-19 public health emergency and the benefit of increased productivity from in-person work.

“This is a priority of the President – and I am looking to each of you to aggressively execute this shift in September and October,” the email reads.

The directive was first reported by Axios.

Ahead of the expiration of the public health emergency on May 11, the Biden administration issued guidance saying that the federal workforce needed to “substantially” increase in-person work. The White House Office of Management and Budget’s April guidance called on each department – which set their own work requirements for employees – to design and implement its own plans to promote more in-office work but stopped short of calling for any specific requirement.

House Republicans have taken aim at federal teleworking policy, passing the SHOW UP Act that would force agencies to reinstate pre-pandemic work policies.

[bamagal62]

1. I'm torn on this one.

Both my kids LOVE working from home. But, I feel that’s a lot of what’s causing San Francisco and other cities to implode. Businesses can’t survive if no one’s going to work and eating lunch or shopping while downtown. And, if tourists have nowhere to eat or shop, you lose that industry. I don’t think we want ghost towns. I love exploring different cities. But, if all the stores are boarded up, why go there? There has to be a way to strike a balance.

[uponit7771]

10. Workers save money and time working from home, in 20 yrs there's no doubt those who can

... work from home will have this as a default and that's where the more best workers are going to go.

City proper commerce can be brought back with using empty office space as living space.

Morning commutes are not popular for a multitude of reasons

[MichMan]

13. I guess that means the "best workers" don't work in any jobs that can't be done remotely

Manufacturing, retail, health care, education, public safety, farming, utilities.

If the "best workers" are those who can work remotely, what does that make those who can't?

[uponit7771]

49. Those who can't aren't included in the claim

[Hestia]

30. Can't retro fit bldg's from office to residential - wholly different construction type

It would be cheaper to demolish the office bldg and rebuild as residential. Plumbing and other issues come into play.

[uponit7771]

47. Unnnnn, where there's a will there's a way (video of office to residential process)

This process is not the exception

[meadowlander]

15. In the middle of a climate crisis, no reason to make people commute who don't need to commute.

[anarch]

43. I'm not; it's bullshit

yes, I'd agree that something needs to be done to alleviate the negative effects of remote work on some industries, but in my opinion the positive effects outweigh those negative ones, and forcing people to go back to commuting more or less needlessly (from the perspective of social utility) is not the way.

[uponit7771]

48. "more or less needlessly", +1 ... A manager doesn't need the other 3 senses to manage effectively ..

... and if they don't know what those other 3 senses they didn't need them most likely they weren't managing effectively anyway.

[Hortensis]

63. I'm not. :) Like you, it's a pragmatic decision first, not an

ideological one. It has to work for everyone. And government in particular has a duty to work well.

[CanonRay]

2. Bad move Joe

IMHO. It's what the corporate masters want but...

[area51]

54. +1 n/t

[TxGuitar]

55. Exactly. nt

[Sympthsical]

3. "increased productivity from in-person work"

LOL, whatever. Just, LOL. I get way more done at home than I ever do in an office. Why? Because no one's pointlessly bothering everyone else all day, scheduling meetings to make it look like we're doing something, and generally creating busy work. I mean, we're all there, so we might as well be doing something! That's the thinking.

This is about managers missing the oversight they had to bother and control their employees all day. And I say that as a management type.

Heaven forbid people who can find a better work/life balance while still doing their jobs effectively be allowed to keep whatever gains they made during a pandemic.

And that's not digging into the environmental gains we made by taking more commuters off the road. Who likes car exhaust!

This is some real dumb old school thinking. It's 2023. Move forward and change with the times and the technology.

This is just going to piss people off unnecessarily.

[Celerity]

9. +1

More bad idea Jeff Zients influence.

[Xolodno]

17. Or managers realizing they are not needed.

I've had a few easy projects that were straight forward only to be hijacked by a manager or director and become micro-managed for the only purpose for bragging rights to their superior. Worst part about it, I got knocked down during review time because I wasn't up to expectations when I already gave the sponsor of the project everything he/she wanted and then some. But they put in a bunch of useless fluff that had no purpose and made updating take a lot longer than needed. Being in an office with corporate politics makes everyone less efficient.

But with their reasoning, this Gen-X guy will say, "Ok Boomer".

[Sympthsical]

19. Precisely

Useless fluff to make people seem more important and integral to the job being done than they really are, which merely results in every process taking three times longer than it needs to. It's like your job becomes 50% actual work and 50% putting on a show so the people around you think you're doing a lot more than you actually are.

My fluff awareness really crystallized a few years ago. I was in a remote meeting. And by in a meeting, I mean I was standing in the Safeway produce section with an earbud in. There was nothing in that two hour scheduled call I needed to know, needed to hear, or needed to respond to. The entire thing could have been a two paragraph e-mail.

Two hours.

But bananas were on sale. So that time wasn't totally lost.

[Hugin]

29. +1

I am so glad you said exactly what was on my mind.

I will only add that 1/4 of global warming gases can be attributed to commuting and travel. For what, I ask you?

[TxGuitar]

56. This has more to do with corporate

not middle managers. It is about bowing to big name corporations. Has nothing to do with productivity, employee wellness, benefits of less commute....it all has to do with big money corporations and their empty offices. Let them eat cake, for once.

[Hugh_Lebowski]

4. This just burns a lotta extra carbon, Joe ... (nt)

[leftstreet]

5. Yes! We need more cars on the road!

jfc

score one for the commercial real estate industry, I guess

[intelpug]

6. Return to work

The HR and payroll departments at my job used to be just a walk up the stairs to get your questions answered in minutes. Now it's hours and sometime day's with this work from home business.''We are unavailable at the moment, please leave a message with your name and phone number and we will get back to you.'' Or after trying to make contact for a day or two you finally get '' You have reached the voice mail of John/Jane so and so.I will be away from my desk until the sixteenth of {any month } but if you need assistance you can go to our company website and blab blab blab ad nauseum,etc. Sorry but no sympathy here. It may have been a nessessary measure for a while but now it's just high time some people are required to get their asses back to work

[MichMan]

14. It is very demoralizing to those whose jobs can't be done at home.

Really divides the work force

[meadowlander]

20. People have a choice about where they work.

Some people love going in to work because they enjoy the social aspects of it. Some people love working outside. Some people like myself, are neurodiverse and can only concentrate in a specific type of environment (here's a hint, it's not an open plan office).

If people want to work from home, get a job that lets them work from home. Join the union and fight for the option if it's feasible. Don't force other people into an environment that doesn't work for them for "fairness".

I busted my ass and made sacrifices in high school and then I busted my ass and made sacrifices in college and then I busted my ass and made sacrifices in grad school and then I busted my ass and made sacrifices to pay off $80,000 in student loans specifically so that I could have the kind of job that would let me work at home some day. So sorry supermarket checkout kid and plumber who did not do those things, I'm not going to torture myself in an open plan office and commute two hours a day for no reason in the middle of a climate crisis to prevent you having a sad over how unfair it is that I can work from home.

We've all made choices and we can all make different ones if we're not happy about where they landed us. It's not an excuse to remove choice from people who actually need a different situation because other people (who are entirely capable of changing their own situation if they want to) are jealous.

[MichMan]

32. I'm specifically referring to jobs where the blue collar workers have to be there in person

Pretty hard to manufacture widgets in your living room. I worked in small to medium size manufacturing plants for the vast majority of my career. The only way there is any revenue at all is when customers buy our widgets. Therefore, the only employees that make the company revenues are those directly involved in manufacturing them. Everyone else is overhead and by definition, necessary, but non productive.

Departments like HR, Customer Service, Payroll, Accounting Quality and others are there to support manufacturing. It is demoralizing for people that are required to show up to work to run machines to have to place calls and leave voice mails just to find out what their vacation days left are, and why their check didn't seem right instead of just walking in and asking someone. Considering that for years, those same jobs did require people to work in person, and the vast majority hired in knowing that was expected and once did so willingly.

Of course, there are always some people that think their office job makes them elite and superior to people that they think are below them and not worth of their respect. The funny thing is that those same people often complain about how much is costs to hire someone to repair their vehicle, install a new air conditioner/furnace, or provide electrical or plumbing repairs.

[meadowlander]

38. Some people like going in to work. They chose their job with their eyes open

knowing that going in to work was part of the deal. Most people have a choice to do something else if they don't like that deal and weigh it up against different salaries, more education time and cost, having to move, having to do something unpleasant or massively stressful, etc.

I've worked at home full time for about three years and the majority of people I work with still choose to go in to the office some or most of the time because they like it. They like the social elements of it, they like getting out of the house, they don't have space to work at home comfortably, they find it easier to stay focused around other people doing a similar job, they're bucking for a promotion and want to network, etc.

People become doctors and nurses and paramedics and firefighters and HR bods and customer service reps because they like people and enjoy being around them. More power to them. They chose those jobs knowing that they couldn't be done from home.

For me, working in an open plan office was literal torture. So yes, I spent 30 years working my ass off with the primary objective of getting a job that would pay enough for me to live independently and be able to work from home. I gave up basically any social life for 20 years and the ability to buy a house or car before I was 40 and the chance to have kids because that was my priority in life.

I don't think my WFH office job makes me superior to anyone else, but neither do I think the work and sacrifice I put into getting it should be ignored in the name of "well if this college kid manning the front desk or this guy making widgets has to come in, I guess everyone has to come in, even if the job doesn't actually require it, or it's not fair".

I worked in a factory making ski poles to pay part of my way through college. It was fine. I enjoyed it. But I wanted to work from home more. So I made a choice to bust my ass for 30 years to put myself in a position so that I could. And there is no reason on earth why anyone else in the same position with the same priorities couldn't do the same thing if they wanted to instead of complaining about how unfair and demoralising it is.

[MichMan]

39. Similar to jobs that don't pay as much as they should, I suppose

People shouldn't complain about the low pay for jobs like teachers or social workers. If they wanted to make more money, they should just have done something else instead. Is that what you are saying?

[meadowlander]

40. They can unionise and fight for fair wages.

But don't become a teacher if you hate kids and then complain that your job forces you to work with kids when other people don't have to. Or say that it's unfair and demoralising that anyone else doesn't have to work with kids.

[TxGuitar]

57. RN of 40 years

This is Mrs TXGuitar- I worked for many years in hospital settings. Never once did I begrudge my work from home IT guy his ability to work from home. People that have jobs that require in-person office status know this going in. You can't work retail from home, healthcare from home, food service industry from home. So, no...I don't think anyone begrudges any one who can work from home.

[GenThePerservering]

16. Then they're not doing it right

and as for the employees, their asses are already at work.

This is the future.

[Oneironaut]

22. Do they not have instant messaging?

Sounds like an office stuck in the 90’s.

[meadowlander]

25. I know right?

If you have an employee and you need a response within an hour, set an expectation that you need a response within an hour. It's not like work from home can't be combined with core work hours and other ways of monitoring whether people are there or not (like Microsoft Teams which shows you who is online and when they last logged in). Flag your message urgent, put a deadline on it, and if the employee doesn't get back to you for days and doesn't have an out of office, that's a performance issue to take up with them.

Even in person, the person you were trying to chase could be at lunch or in a meeting. In-person workers take annual leave too. So you're not guaranteed an instant response in any case.

[MichMan]

33. I agree with this

Don't reply to an email or message within 30 minutes, then get fired for not doing your job per expectations. I had a job that required me to respond immediately to any quality issues in manufacturing. If not, a machine is either down or a good portion of the product would need to be scrapped. If I was working from home, the same expectation should apply.

[roamer65]

7. It's because the commercial real estate market is imploding.

As we speak.

As usual, all about money.

[TxGuitar]

58. Exactly

and to frame this as "workers need to come back" is misleading at the best. Can't the little guys win just once? Expect better out of Biden

[Mr.Bill]

8. In the San Francisco Bay Area

it's hurting the mass trasit systems. Ridership is way down and they have to either look at reducing service (which will lower ridership further in a downward spiral) or get more revenue somehow to prop things up until ridership increases. Right now they are looking a raising tolls on seven bridges by $1.50 for the next five years.

[Xolodno]

12. LOL! Get a HORSE!

Yeah, how did that go?

Transportation revolutions happen. Europe, China, Japan, etc. all understood the value of rail and bullet trains and instituted them, thus, dampening any massive highway system. When I went to Europe for a month on vacation, not once did I rent a car. There was plenty of public transportation and I used a cab a total of three times, one of them because of my own stupidity.

But have to ask, how are the freeways? If they are still crowded, then the problem is something else, not telecommuting. I was on the freeways here in SoCal during the week and weekend recently. Still way too many drivers.

[Sympthsical]

45. BART is always whining anyway

The Bay Area is a funny case. I have never - in my entire life - seen a public transportation system this mismanaged and yet with the stones to whine about everything all day everyday.

They think they're the New York subway system.

We have a train system that barely runs (a train per 20 mins on weekends and at night at best, assuming no delays). That's kind of expensive. That doesn't run overnight. That always has problems. With stations that are not in amazingly accessible locations.

All they do is ask for money. Constantly. Endlessly. WFH is just their latest thing.

And that's not even discussing AC Transit or Muni. "When does the bus/train come?" Whenever it wants! Could be in the next two minutes. Maybe you won't see the fucking thing for another hour. It's anyone's guess. Hope you didn't make any plans!

Uber and Lyft took off in San Francisco, because this god forsaken city needed them.

Sorry. I have thoughts about public transportation in the Bay Area. After moving here, I tried being reliant on public transportation. Then I realized I could almost never guarantee being at work on time unless I left very stupidly early everyday. Fuck it. Bought a car.

And yes, our highways are jam packed everyday.

Do not miss commuting.

[Dulcinea]

11. WFH is here to stay.

Or at least a hybrid WFH schedule. Maybe if wages had kept up with inflation, people might be more enthusiastic, but WFH saves a lot of people a lot of money. I know it's expensive to retrofit buildings to affordable living spaces, but it's what's needed.

[bamagal62]

18. Agree. But I also think the fabric

Of society needs interaction. It concerns me that we don’t have that with WFH. I honestly worry about my son whose first job happened right when covid hit and he’s only ever met his team virtually. They did not make any hires move to the headquarters. He doesn’t have an outlet to make friends because everyone on his team works from home. He’s in Minneapolis. My daughter is in NYC and they’ve said they must come into work. I think her environment is healthier, tbh. It pisses her off. But she’s making friends. So there’s definitely a trade off.

[Oneironaut]

24. Imo, there are no friends at the office.

Making “friends” at work is a great way to get stabbed in the back.

I’ve also seen cult-like corporate friend circles that are basically forced together with forced happy hours.

[TxGuitar]

59. Completely agree

work mates are work colleagues. Not there to make friends. Plenty of other avenues to meet like minded people.

[Arazi]

66. +1

[bamagal62]

21. So to add,

I think it’s great for those whose lives are established. But if you have new job in a new city, it can be depressing. And, you don’t have natural ways to meet people and make friends which is huge in your 20s.

[In It to Win It]

23. and I'm thinking for career advancement

If you're with an employer that you like and you want to seek further advancement within that entity, getting the boss to see you important. Face time with people that can put you in the right places is hugely important, especially in early stages of one's career. Can't be done from home.

[bamagal62]

35. This

[Tree Lady]

41. My daughter is a CPA just went back to office

but she wanted to, took a new job after 3 years at home. Money was same at both places. Said she got lonely. But what has changed is most offices are hybrid, they let you come in late and work late or less hours. My daughter was able to set up schedule to take kids to school before coming to work. And if she needs to stay home she can work from home. She told them on interview she goes few times a year to visit sister out of town and worked at her office remotely and they said that was okay.

Bosses now are more flexible and thats a good thing. Happy employees make for better productivity.

[BlueSpot]

26. If being physically present is necessary or important,

Pay more for it. I'm sure you'd find takers. Isn't that how capitalism is supposed to work?

[Hugin]

28. Very good point. n/t

[MichMan]

34. This

People working in person should get paid more than those working from home.

[anarch]

44. good point...and pay for the commute time too

even better, cover the cost of commuting entirely if people use public transportation rather than driving

[MichMan]

52. People that choose to live far from work deserve higher wages than those living closer?

[anarch]

61. I guess not--maybe require them to either work remote or live within a certain distance then?

Or put a cap on the amount of reasonable commute time that's covered?

I dunno...it just seems wrong to simply expect people to waste several hours of their day commuting if it's not truly necessary for whatever work they are doing, and not compensate them for it. Maybe just pay more in general for those jobs that actually require you to physically be at some specific location?

[MichMan]

67. I know whenever I hired into a job, it was my choice where I lived, not my employers

I commuted some longer distances to a couple jobs. I figured it was my decision where I lived, not for my employer to tell me I had to move closer.

[leftstreet]

53. +1

[MichMan]

68. If I'm an employer and I hired someone for an in person job in 2016

Let's say multiple employees accepted working in person daily, at an agreed upon salary, and did so willingly for a few years.

Now since they have decided they want to work from home, I need to give them a big wage increase to get them to come into the workplace every day to do the same job they hired in to do?

[Hugin]

27. "the benefit of increased productivity from in-person work"

This has yet to be proven, except if you are talking about the profits for those who own commercial real estate.

[ecstatic]

31. I'm sorry, but not everyone is fit to work from home

I've worked from home for the past 15 years but not everyone can do it effectively and efficiently. Unfortunately, a lot of agencies that I interact with have become ghost towns where nothing gets done and nobody is held accountable.

[bamagal62]

36. See. This is what I'm talking about.

It all depends on the circumstances. Luckily, my son has a great friend that lives one block away. And that was just pure luck. But if he did not have him he would be isolated. It’s not for everyone.

[orleans]

37. 2 things immediately come to mind

transportation carbon emissions
(that covid lockdown in 2020 made a positive difference for the earth/ environment... but fuck that--there is no climate crisis so get your asses back to the office! getting your work done is only part of it; they want to SEE that you're busy. oh, and go out and buy a sandwich at the local sandwich shop for lunch damnit!)

&

covid -- it's still out there but because it's officially over no one wears a fucking mask anymore (except for me and a handful of people on du)

[harumph]

42. This is a strategic defensive move on the part of the Biden Admin.

Think about it. Let me help you. Are remote workers easier to eliminate/downsize? In other words.... would having
a lot of workers working remotely maybe just maybe provide an excuse to reduce the agency budget? Hmmmmm....

[Hugin]

46. To be honest...

That's my take on it too. Although, yours is a plausible reason, I can think of several others. It could be a combination of those as well.

It really looks like a politically strategic move. Most of the agencies I know about have moved to regular on-site staffing for at least a year.

[SYFROYH]

51. Relationship development is more difficult, in my experience

When COVID hit, we all worked from home and met biweekly via Zoom. It was fine because we had intact relationships from our years of working together F2F.

But over the years and joining new work groups, I found it more difficult to establish relationships with new people or when I was the new person.

[TxGuitar]

60. I must be in the minority

I have zero desire to have anything other than a casual work relationship with anyone that i work with. I do not and have not ever considered work colleagues as friends.

[SYFROYH]

62. Im talking about collaborative working relationships.

Not friendships, per se.

[themaguffin]

64. Why not at least say hybrid? FFS.

[Hortensis]

65. This is not an ideological issue for me, but a functional one.

If government functions better with people on site, that's how it should be, paying wages that make people willing to work on site.

I worked at home for years with all degrees of autonomy and on site. Strictly my decision, with my acceptance of different sets of benefits and costs. I was ABLE to move to working at home because modern technology enabled it and because it worked for both institutions and me.

Speaking from personal experience and observation of some I knew, a lot of people are not suited to long-term remote work, and personal costs they never intended can pile up insidiously over years, including crippled skills and income advancement.

Btw, virtually all "office" work can be done from a recliner, and is. I've seen it.

Generally sedentary lives cost less and can be supported on lower incomes, and lots of people are very willing to be paid less to work from home, ultimately blighting many other aspects of their lives and lifestyles, extending through the retirement decades to the end.

[BannonsLiver]

69. This is another great example of how our POTUS is completely in touch with reality.

As opposed to those who are not. One of his best traits Imo.