Amy Coleman, Executive Vice President and Chief People Officer, shared the below communication with Microsoft employees this morning. How we work has forever changed. I remember starting at Microsoft in the late ‘90s, always in the office, no laptops, and primarily working with the people right down the hall. As technology evolved and our business expanded, we became...
What you just described was a horribly inefficient use of resources. You gained insight through idle banter. While everyone is in office that’s what middle managers would tend to handle. All this time they thought they were herding cats, turns out the cats just wanted to be home. Now people don’t know who to go to because the “yes” person isn’t in a cubicle you can just waltz over to. Middle management needs a massive paradigm shift if they want to stay relevant in a WFH situation. And that seems increasingly likely to be the direction businesses will go once they cut staff with these asinine RTO policies.
I like to think that genuine connection and collaborations aren’t… resources. I’m not some chit to be moved from one column to the next. The stuff you are talking about is part of being a human being. Could I maybe technically crap out 10% more lines of code if I’m a hermit working in a dank closet in my tiny apartment? Maybe. Is the newbie next time who doesn’t know what to do going to have any chance to grow and learn just from being part of things that happen organically? No.
What you just described was a horribly inefficient use of resources. You gained insight through idle banter. While everyone is in office that’s what middle managers would tend to handle. All this time they thought they were herding cats, turns out the cats just wanted to be home. Now people don’t know who to go to because the “yes” person isn’t in a cubicle you can just waltz over to. Middle management needs a massive paradigm shift if they want to stay relevant in a WFH situation. And that seems increasingly likely to be the direction businesses will go once they cut staff with these asinine RTO policies.
I like to think that genuine connection and collaborations aren’t… resources. I’m not some chit to be moved from one column to the next. The stuff you are talking about is part of being a human being. Could I maybe technically crap out 10% more lines of code if I’m a hermit working in a dank closet in my tiny apartment? Maybe. Is the newbie next time who doesn’t know what to do going to have any chance to grow and learn just from being part of things that happen organically? No.