Dell cracks down on hybrid working again — computing giant is going to start color-coding employees to show who is coming back to the office
Hybrid workers are once again under threat from Dell
Dell cracks down on hybrid workers — will start color-coding employees to show who is coming back to the office
- Thread starter RBH
- Start date
I'm sorry but once you gave us the option to work from home you can't put that genie back in the bottle!!!!
This is commonplace and at least Dell is trying to be transparent w/ employees about how they are being evaluated.
Doing it this way also makes it universal, meaning that lower-level managers are getting scored just like their direct reports are.
edit: I agree that colors like it's some twisted game of Candyland is silly, but at least its easy to understand where you're at and telling people otherwise does them zero favors.
Doing it this way also makes it universal, meaning that lower-level managers are getting scored just like their direct reports are.
edit: I agree that colors like it's some twisted game of Candyland is silly, but at least its easy to understand where you're at and telling people otherwise does them zero favors.
My job backed off after about 3 months of full time back in the office. They never could justify why we had to go back, and it hurt workers morale a lot. Before the pandemic, they spent so much time and money to switch to open office ( not because it makes work better, it's been proven it makes things worse, but because it allows to put more workers in smaller spaces), and that requieres the exact same infrastructure for remote work. Can't unring that bell.
Yeah, this smells like a pretty clear situation where they hope as many people as possible would just be "encouraged to resign".
Going through pretty much the same thing at my job. They made us start coming back to the office 2 days per week back in February. They don't really have a good reason for it, other than "Do it because we said so."
They say that they're also tracking badge swipes and monitoring Internet traffic, but I highly doubt they're actually doing that. If they were, then several people in my group would have been reprimanded by now, myself included. And yeah, morale is shot to complete shit. My group's jobs really do not require one bit of in-person collaboration, so there is no point to this.
Using RTW as a stealth layoff maneuver is some braindead management bullshit. Because the employees you lose FIRST in that situation are your top performers or have the most in demand skills. That's who can find a new job the quickest. So now the morale of your workforce just took a huge hit not only because of taking away their WFH options, but because everyone else's job just got harder.
I work at a school…I'm staff not an educator, but even we get to work from home during the summer as long as it doesn't affect our productivity. The reasoning to return from home is so idiotic in many scenarios.
I have a rare situation that allows me to be mostly WFH for my company, not many people outside the coworkers I communicate directly with daily even know about it. I was at an on-site department specific training and was talking to a higher up at a happy hour and told him about my WFH and he was like "woah that's cool, we really should be letting more do that. Our department there is no direct need to be in one place".
Was nice to see that not all 50+ y/o managers are against the concept.
Was nice to see that not all 50+ y/o managers are against the concept.
And the reality is probably that while in the office, people sit at their desks all day with headphones on so that no one bothers them and all of their meetings are done via Teams/Slack/etc
"We're going to label the remote employees with a pink label. Please note also that everyone will receive a digital "slip" in their email with regards to staff reduction.
Remember team, we're all in this together. Dell is a family company that consistently demonstrates that it values the folks who's hard work makesmy bonus our company so profitable!"
Remember team, we're all in this together. Dell is a family company that consistently demonstrates that it values the folks who's hard work makes
Yep.just fire those that do not wish to comply and hire new people at lower pay .Win win for them and their bottom line.
At our place they haven't rolled out anything obvious, but it's been pretty passed down that promotions to more visible roles like Technical Leader or Principal Engineer would go much easier if you came in on the two RTO days a week. Never been a problem for me, and I'll freely admit the exposure I get from just being in the office and able to talk to people has helped me advance. One thing of note is that the color-coding is really more of an internal reporting.
I 1000% get those that like to WFH. It's just not for me.
I 1000% get those that like to WFH. It's just not for me.
I mean, you should probably be tracking things like vpn access. But not so you can fire people or rank them, just so you have that information on hand and can better assist when IT issues inevitably come up.
Lots of white collar "knowledge" jobs should remain wfh. This whole forced office return is so stupid.
Lots of white collar "knowledge" jobs should remain wfh. This whole forced office return is so stupid.
It's funny to see execs come up with excuses on how it improves efficiency etc...as if the past few years didn't happen and they didn't make any profits.
If it worked then, when the system wasn't in place and had to be built from scratch, it's going to work now after the system's been in place for years.
My company's excuse for hybrid is "team building" and "training". I'll give them the 2nd one as it IS easier to learn if there's someone to answer you immediately rather than having to ask and wait. But in the grand scheme of things it's not a big deal, beside shadowing is easier on teams as you screen share than it is physically.
Maybe Dell should question why no one wants to go back into the office that they feel they need to take such extreme measures to force people to come in.
and if you're managing teams split across 6 different countries and the client is in a 7th country - its hybrid already regardless of whether each location has everyone sat around the same desk in each country
My company realized this and decided to scale down their real estate. Unfortunately, this also came with the downside of them choosing a smaller new building and turning it into a co-working space where employees are no longer allowed to personalize their workspaces and have to physically bring everything to and from the office every time they come in, meaning the in-office experience for local staff is now 1000% worse.
It's completely irrelevant for me personally as I live literally 1,000 miles from the office and if they try to force me to return I'll quit on the spot - and they know that, I'm not moving cross-country again - but it sucks for people in my org who have to work the hybrid model.
Even if it is not official policy it is just a no brainer. I just started at a new company 2 months ago and I come in most days to match my boss. I clearly have been overperforming her expectations and basically told me as such that if you aren't coming in a lot it is going to hamper employee's getting promoted. Out of sight out of mind.
We are a hybrid mix right now, but I also have the ability to take a light rail downtown so it is not a lot of skin off of my back. I recognize not everyone has that ability but don't be shocked when you might be passed over by someone who goes in more.
You realize those real estate requirements are on contracts that are not easily canceled or in the case of ownership easily sold?
sure but across millions of companies, thousands will be renewed/renegotiated every month.
This. At the very least people will get a chance to start preparing their resumes and shit to find other work. Shit, they probably already are at this point.
and you know it takes an act of various gods to talk to some in custormer service lol
There's something funny about a tech company that makes products that would arguably sell and thrive in a world where remote work is more embraced, making equipment that specializes in remotely connecting people across the globe, only to then say that in-person connections are critical
Think of how much money it's going to cost them to track employee presence and use this color coding system vs just shutting the fuck up and letting them do what they want. Hell, how much did it cost them to form that business jargon word salad about value differentiation to spin "office space is expensive yall" into sounding serious?
Clown shoes.
Clown shoes.
My company, supposedly a modern workplace in a modern, progressive industry, is using all the tricks in the book to limit wfh options. They're doing their best to force us to come to the office daily and it gets everybody pissed off and kills morale. Unfortunately it seems to be a wider trend, bosses need to feel they're in control and apparently working from home is bad for collaboration. Which is bullshit, but they don't care.