Overall, the analysis, released as a pre-print, found that RTO mandates did not improve a firm’s financial metrics, but they did decrease employee satisfaction.
Drilling down, the data indicated that RTO mandates were linked to firms with male CEOs who had greater power in the company. Here, power is measured as the CEO’s total compensation divided by the average total compensation paid to the four highest-paid executives in the firm.
This is an interesting metric. And the research outcome makes a lot of sense.
Also, RTO policies are garbage - but I’m stating the obvious.
RTO mandates make employees unhappy because I think they perceive it as a punitive measure. It’s not “We need you to be in the office because we have a big project in the coming weeks and we need everyone on board” instead it’s received as “We don’t believe you’re actually working anymore so now you have no choices left”.
The statements I’ve seen have been suggesting that corporations try to make remote workers feel like those who don’t come in are lazy and worthless and you need to prove your worth by being present. (See web MD RTO cringe) and the insults people suffer only go so far.
Imagine if you feel like you worked very hard through the pandemic and even through working remotely you were able to keep the ship afloat just to turn around and get spanked for it by your boss “Thanks but we really need you to get back to your REAL job and stop slacking off”, you would perceive the RTO mandates as injust punishment. All self respecting people reject injustice.
::Tinfoil hat:: This is by design and they want you to quit as they are done extracting value from you and firing you is harder than making you quit.
Reverse uno: return to the office, slack off completely, force them to fire you.
Become ungovernable.
I don’t even need to slack off, my coworkers will drain 50% of my time without me even trying to work less.