The thing is that there is no arrangement that works for everyone. Sure, those who just want a physical office space instead of their home will probably be ok collaborating remotely, but the others want to collaborate in person, and that requires everyone to be at the same place. Flexible conditions which make everyone happy is going to the office to spend large amount of time on video calls in cramped call booth - nothing too happy about that, whichever side of the debate you're on.
I don't understand why this argument (which is a popular one) makes sense. It's symmetrical. RTO folks want their colleagues in the office. WFH folks don't want to not have to do this. It would be obviously absurd if I criticized WFH on the basis that its proponents are trying to force their preferences on others.
I think RTO folks tend to care more for everyone on the team
to be in the office at least part of the time, whereas WFH folks tend to care less if their team colleagues are in the office or also WFH. So I don’t think it’s quite symmetrical. It’s better if the split is outside team boundaries, or between different companies.
It reduces commute time.
- This saves environmental and energy costs
- It increases worker productivity because now they commute time is recovered
- Commute time was not accounted for in contracts, and was a cost of doing business. It is no longer the case.
A common complaint is that Coordination costs have increased. However Data is missing for this. Further, Coordination activities are achievable online. Competitive firms will adapt and thrive. Bad firms will and should die.
Other benefits:
- Less money is spent on rent, Especially in high rent locations. This means that more money is available for R&D, or to give to shareholders
- Rent Money is now distributed across geographies - and will favor regions with lower costs of living. This spreads talent and wealth broadly, increasing chances for entrepreneurship and new businesses to flourish in those locations
WFH was considered infeasible, but COVID provided hard evidence not only was it feasible, it was feasible at scale.
The data has been updated, so our position has changed. Expanding the economic pie makes us all better off. WFH is probably one of the more interesting economic revolutions we will see in the developed world.
