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If you live outside a certain radius from your job, you might have some tax
break or other. But that'd be a heluva long commute to qualify.
For sales and travelling techs, that's another story.
I think the corporate push toward-or-away-from telecommuting depends a lot
on the company's current leasing situation.
If they have a favorable lease (good rates, etc.) with lots of time left,
there's likely less pressure to permit/encourage telecommuting.
If the lease is due and rates are high, it's much more attractive to keep
the effective head-count (that is getting the work done) while reducing
physical bums-in-seats.
The floor space can be diminished drastically, along with utilities and
services. You can stay in a lower-rent neighborhood for less, or you can
move to upscale corporate digs, for the same amount of money (when you need
less space).
After a few years of this trend, once it has become the norm, owners of
office space will clue to the fact that a software company with a majority
of work-from-homes is not a big profit center, since the biggest remaining
tenant footprint is lab space, which demands the bulk of air-conditioning.
Most tenants pay their own utility fees, but many buildings have
whole-building central AC, not individual AC units per tenant.
In some buildings, there'll be a trend toward putting a separate multi-ton
AC unit on the roof for each tenant. Those would be one-and-two-storey
buildings, mostly, where tenant footprint corresponds to a section of roof
overhead.
In other buildings, where that's not feasible (multi-storey towers), rents
and fees will have to rise generally (if demand permits).
Techwriters work for software companies or hardware-and-software companies,
who are not already accustomed to virtualization will need to become aware
and comfortable. There might be other issues, as well. For example, I
maintain some systems with our product installed at the company office, in
order to document the product. Certain aspects don't currently work over
VPN, meaning that I must commute to the office every-so-often to press a
couple of buttons and view something on a little screen, before returning
home. Or I have to call in, and hope to catch an in-office employee in a
good mood to go to my cubicle and press buttons for me.
On Mon, Feb 25, 2013 at 1:29 PM, Cardimon, Craig <ccardimon -at- m-s-g -dot- com>wrote:
> I doubt the price of gas matters that much. From what I've read, those are
> considered the costs you pay for having a job. It costs money to work.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Porrello, Leonard [mailto:lporrello -at- illumina -dot- com]
> Sent: Monday, February 25, 2013 1:06 PM
> To: Cardimon, Craig; 'Janoff, Steven'; 'TECHWR-L'
> Subject: RE: Yahoo!'s telecommute policy
>
> It'll be an interesting experiment. With ever increasing fuel costs, we'll
> have to keep an eye on how long it lasts.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Cardimon, Craig [mailto:ccardimon -at- M-S-G -dot- com]
> Sent: Monday, February 25, 2013 9:58 AM
> To: Porrello, Leonard; 'Janoff, Steven'; 'TECHWR-L'
> Subject: RE: Yahoo!'s telecommute policy
>
> The opinions on Forbes that I have read are in favor of Mayer. The
> business side of things wants everyone under the same roof, apparently.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: techwr-l-bounces+ccardimon=m-s-g -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com [mailto:
> techwr-l-bounces+ccardimon=m-s-g -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On Behalf Of
> Porrello, Leonard
> Sent: Monday, February 25, 2013 12:38 PM
> To: Janoff, Steven; 'TECHWR-L'
> Subject: RE: Yahoo!'s telecommute policy
>
> For her sake, I hope that her job will love her as well as her child
> (would have). And should she live to be a ripe old age, perhaps her former
> reports will gather around her deathbed to reminisce with her about all of
> the great times at work.
>
> For what it's worth, in many (all?) Western European countries, both
> father and mother get equal leave when they have (through birth or
> adoption) a child. In Austria, where I lived, it was six months with pay
> and an additional six months without (or with significantly reduced) pay.
> Last I checked, Austria was weathering the recession just fine.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: techwr-l-bounces+lporrello=illumina -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com [mailto:
> techwr-l-bounces+lporrello=illumina -dot- com -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com] On Behalf Of
> Janoff, Steven
> Sent: Monday, February 25, 2013 9:04 AM
> To: 'TECHWR-L'
> Subject: RE: Yahoo!'s telecommute policy
>
> I'd be inclined to reserve judgment until seeing the results. Maybe she's
> on to something. Telecommuting is a boon in these times but there's
> something to be said for everybody being in proximity. We're all workers
> here not CEOs, so of course we want what's best for workers. But I'm
> interested to see if she can turn the company around. I've hated Yahoo for
> the longest time but I admit I do like their new front page -- nice design.
> I'm hoping she can do the job.
>
> Steve
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: On Behalf Of Keith Hood
> Sent: Monday, February 25, 2013 8:35 AM
> To: Cardimon, Craig; 'Anne Robotti'; 'TECHWR-L'
> Subject: Yahoo!'s telecommute policy (was Re: Telecommuting ( was: Do as I
> say, not as I do ))
>
> Irony squared and cubed. The CEO of a 21st century electronic company
> which makes money by enabling people to find things and take actions over
> the internet, insisting on enforcing a process control model straight out
> of the 1940s.
>
> I think it's likely that she is doing this because she is <i>hoping</i> it
> will cause a lot of people to jump ship. She got the job by promising
> she'd make the company's margins better. One way to make the numbers look
> better is to cut the head count. This way she gets the same effect as a
> mass layoff without the bad publicity that a mass layoff would cause.
> There will be some badmouthing from workers, of course, but it won't be the
> same scope and this way of downsizing is less likely to get the stock
> analysts worked up.
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