Marissa Mayer is killing telecommuting, and that’s a good thing

http://venturebeat.com/2013/02/28/mariss...WLtGxBX.99

The CEO of Yahoo has ended a policy of telecommuting and insists Yahoo employees get into the office. The following is from the linked article.

"Women graduate college at a higher rate than men, and women earn more money than men. Until there are kids. Then women slow down. By choice. Women tend to start slowing down at work around age 28 in order to be done having kids by the time they are 35. Generation Y women are well aware of this, and the pattern is so ubiquitous that business schools unofficially let women in earlier than men because women need to finish working at full-capacity so early in their career.

Which means the top performers at work are mostly men. But it’s not a gender thing, it’s a time thing. That’s what Marissa Mayer is saying: Don’t think about coming to my company unless you’ll give everything for your job.

Mayer is not saying parenting is bad. She is saying she doesn’t want to work with hands-on parents. But look at the CEOs of any Fortune 500 company: They rarely meet anyone who is a hands-on parent aside from their spouse. Hands-on parents don’t exist at the top of the Fortune 500."
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I find it interesting that a woman CEO implemented this policy and this article written by a woman is actually cheering her. The majority of the comments were mostly negative of the move and the wording in the article, and not just from women. A lot of the men were equally vocal in opposition. I like working from home as much as anyone. But if elimination of it gives men a leg up, then I can't help but like it. In the wording of the article it says "If you want to be a top player, then get a stay at home spouse or two nannies". Basically something like "Work like the boys or fuck off"

I would think that this move need be watched by men. I hadn't really been cheering for this woman, Mayer, but I never cheer for any women doing anything, especially in the position as a CEO. I want them all to fail miserably.

But if this works out, that Yahoo gets revived, and the idea gets around that it was because people need to be together in a pressure cooker to become creative and feed off of each other and it causes companies to consider the fact that women don't want to work that way, then maybe it works in favor of men. This is the first article I have ever read, especially one written by a woman, that actually said Men make more money because they work harder. Sort of blows a hole in the whole Pay Gap whine from the all-gurl chorus.

I have worked in intense start up type environments and I truly believe that it takes that pressure cooker, that you have periods of time where you have to stay at it for 24-30 hours straight, and this intensity of thought, eating and drinking the subject for massive hours on end leads to great insight and breakthroughs.

And in a lot of places I have worked, you can set your watch by the women heading for the door. You almost never attend a meeting after 3 pm where that woman isn't "remote" and you know she's picking up her kids, cooking, shitting around in the house, but she has that laptop on and maybe she sends out an email with a 6:42 time stamp so everyone knows she's putting in the hours. When there was a deliverable to be completed, when the rubber had to meet the road, when no one could leave until the thing was done, guess what the sex of employees that were actually there was? If I ever saw a woman in the office that late I would ask "Do you have car trouble?"

So up until now, the men just had to look the other way, knowing it was going on, but never dare to actually say anything.

So watch this Yahoo thing and I'm still torn over whether to cheer for that Mayer woman or hope she falls on her face.

Quote: (03-05-2013 06:04 AM)Mark Minter Wrote:  

Which means the top performers at work are mostly men. But it’s not a gender thing, it’s a time thing.

There is alot of debate about the statistics comparing men and women's pay. Statistics can be a hard thing to nail down when comparing different populations. At least that is what I used to think.

Until - here on the forum - I saw a graph which showed men earn more than women because in many jobs that are mostly commision based - the men make more sales than the women.

It is such an obvious point really. Yet I had never seen it made until a few days ago right here on the forum.

And I agree with Mark. The Yahoo thing is really interesting. This sort of thinking can only (for now) be espoused by a woman. If a man said shit like this he would be accused of sexism and lack of compassion to female needs.

So with that in mind. I want her to succeed since it will help push the debate forward.

I see her crashing Yahoo into a brick wall. Though to be fair it was headed there anyway.

All the WhooHaa when she was hired as CEO despite being pregnant started things off very badly. Focusing on media bites that are not going to make one iota of difference to the path Yahoo was/is on.

Is it really too much to expect multi-millionaire executive women to understand that they have essentially nothing at all in common with the average working woman? Their money and position insulates them to an astonishing degree. To use their own circumstances to draw conclusions on how to treat female employees in general is ridiculous. Not only are they not on the same playing field. They are not even playing the same game.

Though to be fair I don't think this is necessarily a bad idea. A lot of people, especially women, are going to abuse working from home arrangements. If you want a salary, as opposed to being paid mainly on commission, physical presence in the workplace is a reasonable expectation.

Quote:Quote:

Don’t think about coming to my company unless you’ll give everything for your job.

Don't work here unless you're willing to sell your soul and be a drone.

Quote:Quote:

I have worked in intense start up type environments and I truly believe that it takes that pressure cooker, that you have periods of time where you have to stay at it for 24-30 hours straight, and this intensity of thought, eating and drinking the subject for massive hours on end leads to great insight and breakthroughs.

We pay a competitive salary but you're expected to work 60-80 hours a week.


I think I'm done with the corporate thing. It's an empty soulless existence.

Quote: (03-05-2013 06:04 AM)Mark Minter Wrote:  

So watch this Yahoo thing and I'm still torn over whether to cheer for that Mayer woman or hope she falls on her face.

Why not both?

Cheer if this makes headway in the interests of men.

Rejoice when she eventually falls flat on her face because she's a woman.

I'm right with you, buddy.

Wald

I worked many years as a paralegal, both as a permanent employee and a temp. One of the first things you're asked when interviewing is are you open to overtime, as there may be lots of it, and sometimes it will be required. Women always say yes, no problem, absolutely. However, when paras are asked to stay late, guess who's always there working the hours? THE MEN. Or women will say, "I can only stay until such and such time, because I have plans, blah, blah, blah." It's the men that are always doing the heavy lifting.

I hope this fails. I like working from home since it cuts out all the bullshit annoyances I get when working at the office. Last thing I need is other businesses copying this because it supposedly worked. I'm betting it won't but business has all sorts of random micro and macro factors that can hide poor corporate strategies.

I read somewhere that her decision to bring in the telecommuters was based on the VPN logs so it was data driven and not based on her gut feeling that telecommuters were slacking. On the other hand she built a nursery in her office so her attempts to empathize with the situation the common working woman is in are probably not going well.

Quote: (03-05-2013 06:35 PM)Ensam Wrote:  

I read somewhere that her decision to bring in the telecommuters was based on the VPN logs so it was data driven and not based on her gut feeling that telecommuters were slacking. On the other hand she built a nursery in her office so her attempts to empathize with the situation the common working woman is in are probably not going well.

Im not sure that's a good productivity measure. I guess from what you're saying that they're measuring time logged in. But doesn't mean its effective time. I can spend all day easily in meetings and talking with random co-workers which ends up with me doing almost dick for work.

I'd have to believe there are certain circumstances where working from home would still be allowed. If someone is out sick, yet still able to get in some work and their input was needed in the office, they should be able to log in from home.

I don't believe Yahoo is still in business. How are they making money?

Quote: (03-05-2013 06:04 AM)Mark Minter Wrote:  

I have worked in intense start up type environments and I truly believe that it takes that pressure cooker, that you have periods of time where you have to stay at it for 24-30 hours straight, and this intensity of thought, eating and drinking the subject for massive hours on end leads to great insight and breakthroughs.

I can't believe Mark Minter is one of the soulless corporate drones. I'm sorry but I would much rather have the comfortable lower salary lifestyle than be an on call 24/7 slave for a corporation that doesn't care about me.

@jammer - he said intense start up type environments. how does that translate into souless corporate drone ?

start-ups are filled with people coming together on a project and putting in the hours, days, weekends to reach success. it's extremely dynamic.

so don't talk shit. go take the lower salary, go work for the government or a not for profit, leave the competitive fields (start-ups/ high level sales/ deal-making ) to the people who are willing to put in the 24/7.

news flash the corporation doesn't care about anybody. that's why you work your ass off and hustle them HARDER then they hustle you.

the skills and training i got in fortune 500 is what's helping me kick ass in my entrepreneurial venture.

I like it. Working from home seems like you can't keep accurate tabs on your employees' productivity. All the people complaining sound lazy to me. Sure, I'd like to work from home. Hell, I would let my work know I'd work really productively from a beach paradise too..really clears the mind. yeah whatever, get to work drones!

I like how people assume more hours = more work done. My roommate is in a tech start up and even he admits there's a lot of dead time when he works 12-14 hours a day and many times weekends. He even found out that working from home increased his productivity yet still prefers working in the office since he likes talking with people whom i believe are killing his productivity. http://www.inc.com/jessica-stillman/why-...eless.html

You can't be that productive when you're working so many hours that you're sleeping on the desk or in the bathroom. My roommate got caught sleeping through investor calls and got bitched out hard. I've also known friends to make all sorts of stupid mistakes because they are just too fucking tired. That doesn't even begin to talk about the overall lifestyle here.

When I worked in a F500 firm, we spent on average 2-3 hours a day on useless meetings. I calculated the cost one day and they were blowing about 30-40k a meeting pulling out 100-200 workers for 2-3 hours to talk about meaningless bullshit each day. People got pissed at me when I started to show up to these meetings with my laptop so i could fucking do my work that was still due. When I had enough credibility, I just ditched them. And at later point, worked from home. Each reduction of BS, lead to more work being done. People who went all the meetings all stayed until 7PM-8PM. Fact is if you can't clock out on most days at 4PM-5PM, you're not being that productive.

Also another thing that no one mentions is that some managers know that people who work from home are scared about how people see them so they overcompensate by doing even more work than they would in the office.

But, it doesn't surprise me the corporate people prefer employees in the office though, that's kind of the standard corporate view. I usually have to bust my ass the first 3 months on site to gain the trust to do the work from home later.

Quote: (03-05-2013 07:08 PM)Roosh Wrote:  

I don't believe Yahoo is still in business. How are they making money?

A couple of things they do actually make money. The news and finance sections are actually money makers. In addition, they are the dominate market leader in auction sites in some Asian markets, e.g. Japan. It's enough to keep them going it seems.

Quote: (03-05-2013 07:08 PM)Roosh Wrote:  

I don't believe Yahoo is still in business. How are they making money?

AOL still is, too.

It goes to show that if you're first to market with something huge, it will take a lot of idiots many years to finally bring it down.

Quote: (03-05-2013 08:55 PM)cibo Wrote:  

<snip>

These are all good points.

Serious question (maybe for another thread?):

How many hours do you guys actually work at your jobs?

Not how many hours your'e there. I mean straight-up, getting shit done work?

Most of my friends in corporations maybe work 2 hours a day. Maybe. Sometimes they don't seem to work at all. The rest of the time is spent on long lunches, cruising the web, goofing off, etc.

Hell, any blogger will tell you that his traffic falls off a cliff on Saturday and Sunday. If it weren't for corporate America, most bloggers wouldn't even have an audience.

Every single (childless) working woman I know loves going to the office and hates doing her job remotely. They all claim to "miss the people" when working from home. These are the very same people who they complain about all night to their boyfriends/ husbands. To a lot of women offices are glorified sheep herds/ playplaces where they can get their gossip, catfight and social validation fixes.

Quote:the economist Wrote:

But tethering the Yahoos to their stalls in the company’s offices does not seem like the right way to go about boosting their output. Plenty of evidence suggests that letting employees work from home is good for productivity. It allows them to use their time more efficiently and to spend more time with their families and less fuming in traffic jams or squashed on trains. It can reduce companies’ costs. Cisco claimed in 2009 that it was saving $277m a year by allowing its people to telecommute. A study by researchers at Stanford and Beijing Universities of a large Chinese travel company compared the performance of employees allowed to work from home with those who were stuck in the office: among the home-workers, job satisfaction rose, staff turnover fell by half and productivity went up by 13%. Hardly surprising, since a lot of people don’t seem to work while they are at work: last year J.C. Penney, an American retailer, discovered that a third of its headquarters’ bandwidth was taken up by employees watching YouTube videos.

http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21...t-solution

The other thought I had is I wouldn't be surprised if she brings everyone back in, lays 3/4 of them off in 6 months, and then lets the remaining productive employees go back to telecommuting if they want.

Best Buy just made a similar announcement, but they also stated that they weren't COMPLETELY eliminating telecommuting. They'll make decisions on it case-by-case. Just like at Yahoo, there may be circumstances that warrant someone working from home on occasion.

Quote: (03-05-2013 09:21 PM)MikeCF Wrote:  

Quote: (03-05-2013 08:55 PM)cibo Wrote:  

<snip>

These are all good points.

Serious question (maybe for another thread?):

How many hours do you guys actually work at your jobs?

Not how many hours your'e there. I mean straight-up, getting shit done work?

Most of my friends in corporations maybe work 2 hours a day. Maybe. Sometimes they don't seem to work at all. The rest of the time is spent on long lunches, cruising the web, goofing off, etc.

Hell, any blogger will tell you that his traffic falls off a cliff on Saturday and Sunday. If it weren't for corporate America, most bloggers wouldn't even have an audience.

I think it goes something like this:

8-9 turn on computer and wait for email to come up
9-10 get coffee
10-11 talk to co-workers about some non work related stiff
11-12 do work
12-130 lunch
130-3 browse internet
3-4 do work
4-5 shut down computer pretend to be stressed out

Quote: (03-05-2013 01:34 PM)Timoteo Wrote:  

I worked many years as a paralegal, both as a permanent employee and a temp. One of the first things you're asked when interviewing is are you open to overtime, as there may be lots of it, and sometimes it will be required. Women always say yes, no problem, absolutely. However, when paras are asked to stay late, guess who's always there working the hours? THE MEN. Or women will say, "I can only stay until such and such time, because I have plans, blah, blah, blah." It's the men that are always doing the heavy lifting.

As a wider point to consider when it comes to game and female/male interactions, a steadfast rule is that you can preface any sentence a woman says with the words, "When it suits me."

When it suits me..."Sure I'll work overtime!"
When it suits me..."I'd never cheat on my bf"
When it suits me..."I want to raise my kids!"
When it suits me..."I don't need a man"
When it suits me... "I'm independent"

etc.

Quote: (03-05-2013 09:21 PM)MikeCF Wrote:  

...

Most of my friends in corporations maybe work 2 hours a day. Maybe. Sometimes they don't seem to work at all. The rest of the time is spent on long lunches, cruising the web, goofing off, etc.

...

Never worked at someone else's startup, so can't say how much people actually work at the bigger startup companies, but have worked many corporate gigs in many different companies. I'd say your figure of 2 hours actual work per day is in the ballpark. If you are anywhere below Director level and can't compress your job into 2-3 hours of actual work per day after 3 to 6 months on the job, I'm sorry, but you suck at your job. Obviously there are exceptions (e.g assembly line workers), but most office type positions should be able to be pared down to 2-3 hours.