Federal Employees WFH? WTF?

[Ron Scott]

I’ve heard a variety of stats on all this but I generally understand that, post-COVID, about 25% of Federal employees go to work inside an office, although some employees represented by a union have negotiated to come in only 1 day per month, and some of those come in on back-to-back successive days…and then aren’t seen for about 2 months.

As a taxpayer WFH for the government is WTF (to me personally). I know YMMV and I’m not trying to convince anyone of the value of back to office vs. WFH.

But: Does POTUS have the authority in the Constitution force federal employees back to work at the office?

[wenchsenior]

It's going to vary a lot by position. My husband works at his office about half time, but he's incredibly more productive at home (high level research scientist). There are just a lot of distractions/interruptions in his work flow during a regular 'day at the office' that make him less productive there.

Obviously for some things he has to be there, and for some positions with the feds you would need to be at a work station all the time.

[sonofsven]

If your job is to answer the phone, do paperwork, etc why would you need to go to an office building to do this?

[economista]

This absolutely varies by agency and position. Some positions require people to physically be in the office every day while others are mostly admin and are actually more productive at home. That is why tracking productivity by a range of metrics is very important. For the agency I work at, pre-covid we generally had everyone in the office 3 days per week and most people worked from home 2 days per week. It was usually M+F at home and then everyone in the office in the middle of the week. Then during covid we were all at home full time and our agency's overall productivity actually increased! I am personally much more productive on work from home days. For the past few years our agency has required all employees to be in the office 2 days per pay period, so essentially 1 day per week.

The President can issue an executive order about anything he wants, and it will impact all of the executive branch agencies. However, he can't issue executive orders that violate the contracts / HR Rules / union agreements. I know a lot of people were worried about a future executive order that would fire everyone in the agency and our head of HR sent out an email saying that would be illegal. Career federal employees have job protections in place and the president can't just issue an EO that fires you without cause.

I work at an agency that works very closely will all of the other agencies (from all 3 branches of government) and every single agency I have interacted with over the past few months is worried about a return to office mandate. I personally live 1 mile away from my office so I don't really care one way or the other, but for some agencies it is a big deal. Many of them have decreased their office space because they only had a portion of their workforce in the office on any given day, in an attempt to decrease their rent payments. Now if everyone comes back in they have nowhere to put them!

[economista]

I hit post too soon. If you are looking to cut costs in the federal government, one way to do it would be to take all of the agencies or departments that showed the same productivity or productivity gains during the covid WFH period and make them permanently WFH. Then you can decrease the size of their offices, or get rid of them altogether, and save a fortune on real estate costs.

Of course you can't do this with public facing offices, but a lot of the admin positions that support the public facing offices could be totally remote.

[GuitarStv]

In my life, the people I've found who were most opposed to employees working from home have invariably been managers who sucked at their jobs.  This sort can only determine if work is being done by seeing asses in seats.  If you have a good grasp of the work your employees are doing then WFH usually results in happier people doing more/better work.  It's really a win-win.

[GilesMM]

The new department of cost cutting or whatever it is called will no doubt reduce such benefits and sack staff.

[Ron Scott]

So to answer my own question—to try to—I do think POTUS has the authority to require BTO.

[economista]

So to answer my own question—to try to—I do think POTUS has the authority to require BTO.

Yes. But I do think there will be a lot of pushback. As it is, my agency is having a hell of a time trying to backfill open positions because we required 1 time per week in the office. We have done so many rounds of hiring where we send an offer letter and then the person we hired is like, "I have to go into the office? Never mind. I'll stay in the private sector".

[Phenix]

Federal employee in the DoD here.

Currently, our telework posture is in the office 2 days a week and any classified meetings that involve multiple parties are intended to be scheduled during those days. People who live in the classified world are in office full time and have been in office full time since COVID began.

The legislation that is currently being shopped around is nothing more than a way to reduce the workforce. Unfortunately, it's going to force out high-performers and leave the people who have no other option.

[Ron Scott]

Federal employee in the DoD here.

The legislation that is currently being shopped around is nothing more than a way to reduce the workforce. Unfortunately, it's going to force out high-performers and leave the people who have no other option.

Why do people think BTO requires congress to pass some kind of legislation?

[MrGreen]

My sister is a Navy civilian. About a year ago, they got a new commander that wanted everyone to return to the office part-time. Their entire organization had been tracking metrics all during the pandemic and had solid data that overall performance significantly improved when everyone went home. Didn't matter though because one old man felt "the office environment" was important. Gotta love outdated thinking and dogma!

[Archipelago]

Wife is a therapist at a rural VA medical center working a hybrid schedule. Since COVID many clients have preferred virtual appointments because many live 1.5-2 hours each way. Therapy is ideally better in person, but a lot of veterans simply don't have the time for a long drive each week for therapy.

Another issue is that the facility rotates employees in hybrid positions because there isn't enough office space if everyone were to come in for work each day.

I think what's happening is the government is trying to use RTO mandates to encourage people to quit and thus reduce the number of employees. I don't think it would work at my wife's particular VAMC & profession. Even if it did, we live 10 minutes from the VAMC and she isn't going to quit over it.

[NorCal]

What is your source for these numbers?  I find them highly questionable.  The federal workforce is about 3 million people in total, although about 700k of those are part timers.

775k (~25%) work for the military.  While maybe there's some HQ jobs that can be done remote, the vast majority is in person work.  At least in the Army there was nearly nothing that could be done remotely outside of the occasional online education.  Even my college friend that works in Coast Guard HQ got sent back to the office full time after working from home during Covid.

The next largest agency is the VA at ~430k employees (15% of the total).  This is mostly staffing at VA hospitals.  I don't know many hospital employees that can work from home, although maybe some admin staff can. 

Next up is Homeland Security at 212k (7% of the total).  I don't know if you consider TSA agents to be "at the office", or how you classify the FBI, CIA, DEA, etc.  But I doubt many are working from their couch. 

Those three groups make up nearly 50% of federal employment, with mostly in-person type work.  So how exactly are you getting to only 25% of the federal workforce comes into the office?

[Sailor Sam]

As a taxpayer WFH for the government is WTF (to me personally). I know YMMV and I’m not trying to convince anyone of the value of back to office vs. WFH.

As a government worker, I find it bizarre that you care. Like…why?

[Telecaster]

Those three groups make up nearly 50% of federal employment, with mostly in-person type work.  So how exactly are you getting to only 25% of the federal workforce comes into the office?

Trump and Musk have been spouting figures along these lines, which as you point out are clearly implausible if you understand what the federal government actually does but these types of outlandish claims are red meat for their MAGA base who are not much interested in fact checking. 

Post-COVID, most federal workers have never worked from home, and those who can work remotely, almost all have a 50% in office requirement.

[markbike528CBX]

My sister is a Navy civilian. About a year ago, they got a new commander that wanted everyone to return to the office part-time. Their entire organization had been tracking metrics all during the pandemic and had solid data that overall performance significantly improved when everyone went home. Didn't matter though because one old man felt "the office environment" was important. Gotta love outdated thinking and dogma!

I had an "one old man" experience in a slightly different way.
I worked at a DOD cleanup site (Hanford) and was part of a group (which had been in useful existence for over 40 years) that often answer chemistry-related questions ie, WTF IS that weird stuff we found?
So when a new-to-us former Admiral was horrified, horrified by the job description "we take unusual samples and answer questions", and said "procedure compliance is mandatory", we just stayed silent, and never heard of the guy ever again.
Who did he think developed test plans and procedures? 
Did he think that all procedures followed forth, fully formed from some god-like source (Naval Reactors)?

Federal employee in the DoD here.

The legislation that is currently being shopped around is nothing more than a way to reduce the workforce. Unfortunately, it's going to force out high-performers and leave the people who have no other option.

Why do people think BTO requires congress to pass some kind of legislation?

It doesn't require legislation, the head exec can do most anything to the executive branch and sometimes beyond (Japanese-American concentration camps WWII).
However, legislation is knee-jerk forcing of the executive to do something.
I concur that it is a Reduction In Force measure, and will tend to force out those who have a choice.   
I've said so directly on a Facebook post by our local Congresscritter.

[Phenix]

Federal employee in the DoD here.

The legislation that is currently being shopped around is nothing more than a way to reduce the workforce. Unfortunately, it's going to force out high-performers and leave the people who have no other option.

Why do people think BTO requires congress to pass some kind of legislation?

It doesn't require legislation, the head exec can do most anything to the executive branch and sometimes beyond (Japanese-American concentration camps WWII).
However, legislation is knee-jerk forcing of the executive to do something.
I concur that it is a Reduction In Force measure, and will tend to force out those who have a choice.   
I've said so directly on a Facebook post by our local Congresscritter.

You're absolutely right. It's more about getting pressure from the public than the actual need for it to occur. Anybody in the chain of command could say come back to the office and we would do it, but that hasn't happened yet. Telework is also great for when you have doctors appointments or one of the kids are sick. Our doctors & dentists are in the opposite direction of my workplace. Teleworking allows me to take off minimal time but in a back to office situation, I'll be taking at least a half day every time we have appointments to go to. Lastly, telework cuts down on sick people coming into the office and getting others sick.

[Ron Scott]

Federal employee in the DoD here.

The legislation that is currently being shopped around is nothing more than a way to reduce the workforce. Unfortunately, it's going to force out high-performers and leave the people who have no other option.

Why do people think BTO requires congress to pass some kind of legislation?

It doesn't require legislation, the head exec can do most anything to the executive branch and sometimes beyond (Japanese-American concentration camps WWII).
However, legislation is knee-jerk forcing of the executive to do something.
I concur that it is a Reduction In Force measure, and will tend to force out those who have a choice.   
I've said so directly on a Facebook post by our local Congresscritter.

You're absolutely right. It's more about getting pressure from the public than the actual need for it to occur. Anybody in the chain of command could say come back to the office and we would do it, but that hasn't happened yet. Telework is also great for when you have doctors appointments or one of the kids are sick. Our doctors & dentists are in the opposite direction of my workplace. Teleworking allows me to take off minimal time but in a back to office situation, I'll be taking at least a half day every time we have appointments to go to. Lastly, telework cuts down on sick people coming into the office and getting others sick.

I’m not convinced return to office orders are simply a tool for RIFs. Some might use it this way but in the current US political landscape, wholesale termination of entire departments and agencies may be on the table instead—and some of it might be justified regardless of political affiliation.

I am not against WFH either. For jobs that don’t benefit from normal social interaction and camaraderie why should we pay for office space? Why not hire people from LCOL areas and pay them less? But a lot of jobs aren’t like that…

[NorCal]

@Ron Scott Are you actually willing to provide your source for the seemingly made up numbers used to start the thread?

Can we at least base the discussion on some type of real facts of who is working from home and why it deserves our outrage?

[GilesMM]

@Ron Scott Are you actually willing to provide your source for the seemingly made up numbers used to start the thread?

Can we at least base the discussion on some type of real facts of who is working from home and why it deserves our outrage?

A study was published in May.


https://oversight.house.gov/release/hearing-wrap-up-the-biden-administrations-enhanced-telework-for-bureaucrats-jeopardizes-agency-missions-and-critical-services-to-the-american-people/

[bacchi]

@Ron Scott Are you actually willing to provide your source for the seemingly made up numbers used to start the thread?

Can we at least base the discussion on some type of real facts of who is working from home and why it deserves our outrage?

A study was published in May.


https://oversight.house.gov/release/hearing-wrap-up-the-biden-administrations-enhanced-telework-for-bureaucrats-jeopardizes-agency-missions-and-critical-services-to-the-american-people/

The only thing that's a study of is partisan politics.

Lol. Comer heads the Committee.

[GuitarStv]

@Ron Scott Are you actually willing to provide your source for the seemingly made up numbers used to start the thread?

Can we at least base the discussion on some type of real facts of who is working from home and why it deserves our outrage?

A study was published in May.


https://oversight.house.gov/release/hearing-wrap-up-the-biden-administrations-enhanced-telework-for-bureaucrats-jeopardizes-agency-missions-and-critical-services-to-the-american-people/

The only thing that's a study of is partisan politics.

Lol. Comer heads the Committee.

Hahaha . . . agreed.  I mean, the hearing itself was titled 'The Stay-at-Home Federal Workforce: Another Biden-Harris Legacy'.  Jesus.

[lhamo]

The language used in that report is deliberately incendiary.  It repeatedly states that federal employees "do not show up to work."  What it should more accurately say is "do not physically report daily to a single federal office location."

I used to work on USG contracts with state department employees.  My Program Officer was responsible for programs across a wide swath of Asia.  12-13 hour time differences between DC and Beijing meant that our regular teleconferences (mostly done via Skype -- this was 2008-2015 in the pre-Zoom days) were ALWAYS going to be during non-work hours for somebody.  These calls would be between 1-3 hours long.  Sometimes they were early morning Beijing/evening DC time (our collective preference -- I was an early riser and Program Officer was the opposite), more rarely they would be early morning DC time/evening Beijing time.  I actually preferred to take the calls in the office (small kids at home who could be distracting if they woke up), and would taxi in (at my own expense) to get there by 6-7am.  Program Office often was still at the office at that time, but sometimes we would have a later call starting at 9-10pm her time and by then she was calling from home.

Was this not showing up for work? 

Was it not showing up to work when she traveled to Asia to meet with program staff in person once a year? 

Was it not showing up to work when I travelled to DC to manage grantee orientations once a year?

Was it not showing up to work when I read through stacks of 100+ grant applications at home a couple of times a year, because there was no way I could concentrate in the office?

Work can be done in many different settings.  Demanding everybody be butt in seat like every job is a factory line assembling widgets is ridiculous.

[the_hobbitish]

I don't understand the anger at people who WFH or the assumption that it mean USA isn't getting what it's paying for from workers. The argument that it's better for the actual product/mission is very job specific. As long as an office can show they're doing a good job from home then why does anyone care?

It seems like it's more about control and jealously than anything else.

My brother is civilian DOD and his department increased productivity when they shifted to WFH. They've been warned if productivity decreases then they'll be require to RTO.

I get why DC wants everyone to RTO - there's a lot of businesses that make money on workers and commuters (office space, restaurants, parking garages etc). The city gets to make money off of lower quality of life and increased expenses for office workers.

[Ron Scott]

I don't understand the anger at people who WFH or the assumption that it mean USA isn't getting what it's paying for from workers. The argument that it's better for the actual product/mission is very job specific. As long as an office can show they're doing a good job from home then why does anyone care?

I’m not sure there’s a general anger at people who WFH at all. If they like it and can do it, go for it! As a taxpayer, I’m surprised there’s so much of it in the federal government but I don’t blame the employees for it.

Ultimately tho, the management of a place has the P&L responsibility and if they decide the business can run better when people are physically together, then that’s a different story.

Businesses are not some kind of democracy where there’s a WFH vote. Making a profit (or some significant accomplishments) year after year is hard work and management needs the flexibility without being second guessed on something like this.

[nedwin]

Isn't POTUS the OG WFH job?  Like all the way back to the beginning?  Seems like a lot of whining over "For me but not for thee."

[NorCal]

@Ron Scott Are you actually willing to provide your source for the seemingly made up numbers used to start the thread?

Can we at least base the discussion on some type of real facts of who is working from home and why it deserves our outrage?

A study was published in May.


https://oversight.house.gov/release/hearing-wrap-up-the-biden-administrations-enhanced-telework-for-bureaucrats-jeopardizes-agency-missions-and-critical-services-to-the-american-people/

That's just comical.

They're blaming long wait times on WFH without actually linking any of the issues they're complaining about to WFH.

The EXACT SAME legislators that have gone to great lengths to under fund the IRS (and complained bitterly when the Inflation Reduction Act added IRS funding) are the ones complaining about long wait times when calling the IRS.

If @Ron Scott or anyone else can actually provide factual information about who is working from home and why it is impacting their performance, I'd be happy to discuss. 

This just remains a made up issue until then.

[waltworks]

Man, just wait for the wait times for someone to figure out your paperwork at the VA/IRS/etc when they lose all their competent employees.

I mean, if you want to get the best bang for your buck, the first thing to do is measure what you're getting. I have no personal knowledge about whether WFH gets more work done but intuitively it seems like for most jobs where it's possible, it should (no commuting time, no officemates distracting you over coffee, etc). Unless someone is pointing to studies saying that WFH is making employees less efficient, forcing everyone to go back to the office seems stupid at best, and stupid and vindictive at worst.

I've worked for the DOE (Energy, not Education) and there were plenty of people who didn't accomplish jack most of the time (this was 20 years ago, before WFH was a thing at all). I have a hard time imagining most of them doing less work at home. I have also worked in private industry where most people did almost nothing, so it's not just a gov't thing.

Want an efficient gov't? Figure out how to measure productivity and then follow the data. But that's not what we'll do, probably.

-W

[markbike528CBX]

Are members of Congress actually butts-in-seats for 8+ hours a day for 5+ days a week?
Our guy is jetting around a significant portion of the time. 

To be fair, it is a big district, over 13,600 square miles 35,260 km².
That is bigger than many countries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_dependencies_by_area
even some you may have heard of.. Belgium, Israel, Haiti, Jamaica, Armenia, etc.

[JLee]

Are members of Congress actually butts-in-seats for 8+ hours a day for 5+ days a week?
Our guy is jetting around a significant portion of the time. 

To be fair, it is a big district, over 13,600 square miles 35,260 km².
That is bigger than many countries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_dependencies_by_area
even some you may have heard of.. Belgium, Israel, Haiti, Jamaica, Armenia, etc.

haha.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/heres-congress-works/story?id=24810354

[Sailor Sam]

I don't understand the anger at people who WFH or the assumption that it mean USA isn't getting what it's paying for from workers. The argument that it's better for the actual product/mission is very job specific. As long as an office can show they're doing a good job from home then why does anyone care?

I’m not sure there’s a general anger at people who WFH at all. If they like it and can do it, go for it! As a taxpayer, I’m surprised there’s so much of it in the federal government but I don’t blame the employees for it.

Ultimately tho, the management of a place has the P&L responsibility and if they decide the business can run better when people are physically together, then that’s a different story.

Businesses are not some kind of democracy where there’s a WFH vote. Making a profit (or some significant accomplishments) year after year is hard work and management needs the flexibility without being second guessed on something like this.

But bro, diggity. The government doesn’t do profit and loss. We do service. We ensure domestic tranquility and provide for the common defense, and you have such a contempt for us.

Or are you railing against WFH in general, and stuffing it under the popularity of ragging on government workers? What is your deal?

[Ron Scott]

I don't understand the anger at people who WFH or the assumption that it mean USA isn't getting what it's paying for from workers. The argument that it's better for the actual product/mission is very job specific. As long as an office can show they're doing a good job from home then why does anyone care?

I’m not sure there’s a general anger at people who WFH at all. If they like it and can do it, go for it! As a taxpayer, I’m surprised there’s so much of it in the federal government but I don’t blame the employees for it.

Ultimately tho, the management of a place has the P&L responsibility and if they decide the business can run better when people are physically together, then that’s a different story.

Businesses are not some kind of democracy where there’s a WFH vote. Making a profit (or some significant accomplishments) year after year is hard work and management needs the flexibility without being second guessed on something like this.

But bro, diggity. The government doesn’t do profit and loss. We do service. We ensure domestic tranquility and provide for the common defense, and you have such a contempt for us.

Or are you railing against WFH in general, and stuffing it under the popularity of ragging on government workers? What is your deal?

There’s no contempt in my discussion and I see no problem conflating the challenges managers face in private and public enterprises.

If management teams assess their future operations and feel the organization would perform better with employees in office, they should just do it. The authority they have to coordinate work should be commensurate with their responsibility to ensure it’s done well.

All things being equal I think for most jobs having workers engaging naturally in an office or plant setting yields benefits beyond the daily completion of individual job tasks and as a taxpayer I’d hope government management would feel the same.

If you take that as contempt you don’t understand the meaning of the word.

[JLee]

I don't understand the anger at people who WFH or the assumption that it mean USA isn't getting what it's paying for from workers. The argument that it's better for the actual product/mission is very job specific. As long as an office can show they're doing a good job from home then why does anyone care?

I’m not sure there’s a general anger at people who WFH at all. If they like it and can do it, go for it! As a taxpayer, I’m surprised there’s so much of it in the federal government but I don’t blame the employees for it.

Ultimately tho, the management of a place has the P&L responsibility and if they decide the business can run better when people are physically together, then that’s a different story.

Businesses are not some kind of democracy where there’s a WFH vote. Making a profit (or some significant accomplishments) year after year is hard work and management needs the flexibility without being second guessed on something like this.

But bro, diggity. The government doesn’t do profit and loss. We do service. We ensure domestic tranquility and provide for the common defense, and you have such a contempt for us.

Or are you railing against WFH in general, and stuffing it under the popularity of ragging on government workers? What is your deal?

There’s no contempt in my discussion and I see no problem conflating the challenges managers face in private and public enterprises.

If management teams assess their future operations and feel the organization would perform better with employees in office, they should just do it. The authority they have to coordinate work should be commensurate with their responsibility to ensure it’s done well.

All things being equal I think for most jobs having workers engaging naturally in an office or plant setting yields benefits beyond the daily completion of individual job tasks and as a taxpayer I’d hope government management would feel the same.

If you take that as contempt you don’t understand the meaning of the word.

What does your constantly re-stated position as "a taxpayer" have to do with anything?

There are plenty of studies out there about productivity. We don't need to rely on what some manager "feels" like to quantify if it's good or bad.

[Ron Scott]

I don't understand the anger at people who WFH or the assumption that it mean USA isn't getting what it's paying for from workers. The argument that it's better for the actual product/mission is very job specific. As long as an office can show they're doing a good job from home then why does anyone care?

I’m not sure there’s a general anger at people who WFH at all. If they like it and can do it, go for it! As a taxpayer, I’m surprised there’s so much of it in the federal government but I don’t blame the employees for it.

Ultimately tho, the management of a place has the P&L responsibility and if they decide the business can run better when people are physically together, then that’s a different story.

Businesses are not some kind of democracy where there’s a WFH vote. Making a profit (or some significant accomplishments) year after year is hard work and management needs the flexibility without being second guessed on something like this.

But bro, diggity. The government doesn’t do profit and loss. We do service. We ensure domestic tranquility and provide for the common defense, and you have such a contempt for us.

Or are you railing against WFH in general, and stuffing it under the popularity of ragging on government workers? What is your deal?

There’s no contempt in my discussion and I see no problem conflating the challenges managers face in private and public enterprises.

If management teams assess their future operations and feel the organization would perform better with employees in office, they should just do it. The authority they have to coordinate work should be commensurate with their responsibility to ensure it’s done well.

All things being equal I think for most jobs having workers engaging naturally in an office or plant setting yields benefits beyond the daily completion of individual job tasks and as a taxpayer I’d hope government management would feel the same.

If you take that as contempt you don’t understand the meaning of the word.

What does your constantly re-stated position as "a taxpayer" have to do with anything?

There are plenty of studies out there about productivity. We don't need to rely on what some manager "feels" like to quantify if it's good or bad.

As a taxpayer—and citizen—I have a vested interest. The “studies” yield results that vary by type of work. (This kind of research often ends on the note: “Well…it depends.”) If I couldn’t trust a manager to make the determination I’d fire the manager.

[GuitarStv]

Isn't every person in the US a taxpayer?  If you live in the country then you pay taxes of some sort, be they income, investment, sales, property, etc.  It seems like a meaningless term because it applies to every adult in the country.

[Sailor Sam]

I don't understand the anger at people who WFH or the assumption that it mean USA isn't getting what it's paying for from workers. The argument that it's better for the actual product/mission is very job specific. As long as an office can show they're doing a good job from home then why does anyone care?

I’m not sure there’s a general anger at people who WFH at all. If they like it and can do it, go for it! As a taxpayer, I’m surprised there’s so much of it in the federal government but I don’t blame the employees for it.

Ultimately tho, the management of a place has the P&L responsibility and if they decide the business can run better when people are physically together, then that’s a different story.

Businesses are not some kind of democracy where there’s a WFH vote. Making a profit (or some significant accomplishments) year after year is hard work and management needs the flexibility without being second guessed on something like this.

But bro, diggity. The government doesn’t do profit and loss. We do service. We ensure domestic tranquility and provide for the common defense, and you have such a contempt for us.

Or are you railing against WFH in general, and stuffing it under the popularity of ragging on government workers? What is your deal?

There’s no contempt in my discussion and I see no problem conflating the challenges managers face in private and public enterprises.

If management teams assess their future operations and feel the organization would perform better with employees in office, they should just do it. The authority they have to coordinate work should be commensurate with their responsibility to ensure it’s done well.

All things being equal I think for most jobs having workers engaging naturally in an office or plant setting yields benefits beyond the daily completion of individual job tasks and as a taxpayer I’d hope government management would feel the same.

If you take that as contempt you don’t understand the meaning of the word.

That does help clarify your argument. You're railing on work from home in general, with an emphasis on the laziness of the government worker who just need to be taken in hand by their benevolent managers. Cool. Cool cool cool.

Subtext. It's subtext. I can pick up on it because I read a metric craptonne of Xena fanfiction in the 90's and 00's. Like a shark in the water. ;P

[the_hobbitish]

I think government management shouldn't base anything on feeling. They should base it on knowledge of their particular service, quantifiable metrics of performance, and worker job satisfaction. Employee happiness shouldn't overrule not providing a standard of service, but it also shouldn't be ignored.

If performance metrics are being met and service is at an equally high standard, what benefits is being in person yielding that should matter more than than worker preference?

[markbike528CBX]

Are members of Congress actually butts-in-seats for 8+ hours a day for 5+ days a week?
Our guy is jetting around a significant portion of the time. 

To be fair, it is a big district, over 13,600 square miles 35,260 km².
That is bigger than many countries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_and_dependencies_by_area
even some you may have heard of.. Belgium, Israel, Haiti, Jamaica, Armenia, etc.

haha.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/heres-congress-works/story?id=24810354

Edit: based on the above post, I nominate myself for a Rory Award in the category "The Most Gratuitous Use Of The Word 'Belgium' "
(Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy , Life. The Universe and Everything)

[Wolfpack Mustachian]

I don't understand the anger at people who WFH or the assumption that it mean USA isn't getting what it's paying for from workers. The argument that it's better for the actual product/mission is very job specific. As long as an office can show they're doing a good job from home then why does anyone care?

I’m not sure there’s a general anger at people who WFH at all. If they like it and can do it, go for it! As a taxpayer, I’m surprised there’s so much of it in the federal government but I don’t blame the employees for it.

Ultimately tho, the management of a place has the P&L responsibility and if they decide the business can run better when people are physically together, then that’s a different story.

Businesses are not some kind of democracy where there’s a WFH vote. Making a profit (or some significant accomplishments) year after year is hard work and management needs the flexibility without being second guessed on something like this.

But bro, diggity. The government doesn’t do profit and loss. We do service. We ensure domestic tranquility and provide for the common defense, and you have such a contempt for us.

Or are you railing against WFH in general, and stuffing it under the popularity of ragging on government workers? What is your deal?

There’s no contempt in my discussion and I see no problem conflating the challenges managers face in private and public enterprises.

If management teams assess their future operations and feel the organization would perform better with employees in office, they should just do it. The authority they have to coordinate work should be commensurate with their responsibility to ensure it’s done well.

All things being equal I think for most jobs having workers engaging naturally in an office or plant setting yields benefits beyond the daily completion of individual job tasks and as a taxpayer I’d hope government management would feel the same.

If you take that as contempt you don’t understand the meaning of the word.

You started off the conversation asking about the POTUS could mandate RTO. Now you say that managers should do it if they think it's best. Even that doesn't seem to be what you're arguing. You seem to be arguing that managers should be able to implement RTO.

To argue that management at any level shouldn't be allowed to RTO their people is a silly and not really worthwhile thing to argue. I'm not aware of any legal protections that prevent management from mandating RTO in general.

However you're using that but then also implying that management knows best about RTO, and you do it without any actual evidence that that's the case. I believe that you have years of corporate work experience. I can't imagine your anecdotal experience of the workplace has lead you to believe that managers are always or even often correct in their managerial decisions.

[partgypsy]

Who works in the office and how much is dictated by our jobs, and how we can best do our jobs. Also since COVID many of the office spaces are dual shared with people with opposite schedules. The admin staff come in 5 days a week. Some are situated in clinics or patient facing. The rest of us are pretty much 50%. But there are some remote workers, and faculty with very complex schedules (work both the university or academic med center and the VA, with combination of academic positions or a blend of clinical and academic.) I know for sure we are going to lose high demand and high producing staff if we demand everyone sit in allocated desk space vs best organize their time to meet their many commitments. Again this whole thing reminds me of, a clueless son of the original owner, who doesn't know what is going on or how to manage, so spends time managing top down with petty rules. The people who know best are the people like immediate directors who know their mission and their workforce and works with them to achieve their best..not making arbitrary rules to piss on people, just bc they can. I can go back to work ft. But we have remote employees who are just as good who live FT in other states. Why fuck with people's livelihoods? Shits and giggles? It reminds me of the famous Sagan quote, do we want the people to run the government, or the government to run the people? https://motleybytes.com/w/Carl_Sagan_quotes/Science_Thinking
 

[waltworks]

Anecdata, incoming!

I have some personal friends who are patent examiners. USPTO has been WFH almost exclusively since the pandemic, and I believe they no longer even have the capacity to provide offices to everyone if they wanted to. Patent examiners just sit at a computer all day - it's a job that is tailor made for remote work, basically.

But, presto change-o! As of last week, everyone has to report to the main offices in VA. Not even the satellite offices, the main office. Where there aren't enough desks or chairs or space.

My friends are super smart and capable and while I've never observed them working in person, they're not available to hang out in the middle of the day all the time or anything, so I'm guessing they work hard and do at least a passable job. The kind of employees you definitely want to keep around if you want to get anything done.

They're both probably going to quit/retire early. I imagine that will happen with a lot of USPTO examiners, since it's hard to sell your house and move across the country to a place you never lived or worked, just so you can keep sitting in front of a computer and doing the same thing.

So, anyway, it'll be hard to get a patent soon (or at the very least, your application will take decades to process or something). What a great way to encourage innovation!

WFH should be the default for any IT or white collar job and managers should need a damn good reason to have people come into an office, IMO.

-W

[Fomerly known as something]

Since it was brought into the conversation.  “Well I pay your salary” is always my favorite line when some citizen is upset that I’m following law and procedure and not doing what they “want me to do.”  I also pay my own salary and likely pay more to it than you do sir.

I’m more mad about the waste of my rental car last week when I was on TDY than WFH employees. I had to get it just in case it was needed, costing me an extra 30 minutes of free to the government time from me plus the cost of the car and $350 in parking where it sat the entire time it did not move from the hotel parking lot because it wasn’t needed.

[Cassie]

Haven’t all federal workers been told that they must come back to the office?  I find it ridiculous since studies have shown that people get more work done at home because of less distractions.

[Ron Scott]

…studies have shown that people get more work done at home because of less distractions.

Depends on the kind of work.

I closed an office for about 100 people once and productivity went up quite a bit because “nobody bothers me”. It was great for the business since we reduced headcount as retirements happened. But these people were responsible for proofing and editing reports written by field inspectors. They needed real skills, but I could count their output and they could operate independently very well. I got them together quarterly for a full day meeting after we closed the office and everyone was happy.

I had another group, product developers, I’d never let WFH. The synergy and impromptu nature of their interactions contributed to their creativity and overall productivity. And I got to pop in on discussions all the time to help or act as a sounding board. Togetherness can be powerful!

i personally think WFH is a winner when done properly and can really reduce costs for companies. But it’s not one size fits all.

[dandarc]

Haven’t all federal workers been told that they must come back to the office?  I find it ridiculous since studies have shown that people get more work done at home because of less distractions.

Not to mention a fair amount never had offices to report to in the first place.

[Just Joe]

Anecdata: The federal worker we know has been ordered back into the office. They took the job and bought a house with the assurance that it would be WFH most of the time with occasional meetings within a couple of hours drive time of home. And it was for a long time. WFH has been a good fit for them.

Now they are faced with an 1+ hour commute downtown from their suburb. So - 10+ hours per week commuting, plus depreciation, gas and maintenance. Meanwhile their spouse is also doing the same commute to a different employer with just enough schedule difference that they can't ride together. So another 10+ hours commuting plus depreciation, gas and maintenance. Oh - and risk - the risk of all that driving year 'round.

Wondering if this will lead to another address change for the sake of a job. They've moved alot.

From our perspective its madness b/c DW and I have not moved much, our commute is ~10 minutes and we carpool. We've lived in the same town for nearly 30 years. We've chose the LCOL option with moderate income jobs all this time. We're fine. Slow and steady. We live quiet and comfortable lives.

We don't talk politics with them but we know they voted for Trump b/c liberals no good. Yes, a bit of red state schadenfreude b/c it appears yet again another example of people are voting against their own interests.

Next up farmer friend will probably tell me about fewer available (or the end of) farming subsidies. I'm sure I'll hear about that.

[NorCal]

Whether WFH is a good thing, bad thing, or necessary thing depends the nature of the work, team, and organizational goals.  It works for some groups and not others. 

It's always a management call (both public or private sector) on what will suit their organization best.  Management sometimes makes bad decisions.  Yet they always have a goal of making their organization function in the most effective way possible.

What sets this executive order apart is not the WFH aspect.  It is the underlying motivation.  The goal is to make government employees less effective and less able to do their jobs.  Because that's exactly what MAGA wants. 

[waltworks]

Maybe we need to hit rock bottom before we can make intelligent policy in this country again. Hopefully the pendulum swings will be less extreme at some point, I really don't want to live on a commune or something in 4 years after everyone is sick of MAGA when food costs 5 times what it used to and nobody can build a house because there aren't any workers.

-W

[Dave1442397]

Management sometimes makes bad decisions.  Yet they always have a goal of making their organization function in the most effective way possible.

Based on experience, I have to disagree with that. What management really wants is to look good, be around long enough to maximize their income, then jump to the next job while leaving the previous company in tatters.

My company recently spent millions having McKinsey consultants dream up a reorg plan. We're half way through implementation, and the McKinsey 'expert' just quit or got fired - we're not sure which it was. On the face of it, the plan seems to be to get as many people as possible to quit so they don't have to pay severance, and outsource as many jobs as possible to India.

What this means for the company ten years down the road remains to be seen, but I'll be eating popcorn and watching from the sidelines by then. I already see problems, such as people doing their jobs to satisfy metrics rather than doing things properly. A standard response to a trouble ticket is "If we don't hear back from you we'll close this ticket", usually sent in the middle of the night US time, and the ticket is closed by the time you get the message. Wow, look at all the tickets they closed!