‘Workers don’t want toys or free food, they want a higher quality of life’: The Great Resistance is here — companies struggle to get workers back to the office

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The Great Resistance is here — companies struggle to get workers back to the office ‘I’m very outspoken about my desire to never work in an office again,’ one worker says

Amy Faust Liggayu, 32, a market-research project manager based in Tinley Park, Ill., mother of a 7-month-old son, never imagined she would have a life where she could spend five days a week with him, while also working full time. But that was before March 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic forced offices across the country to tell their employees to work from home.

Amid these efforts, Faust Liggayu counts herself among the Great Resistance. “I’m very outspoken about my desire to never work in an office again,” she said. “The quality of life is so much better when you can cut out that commute or spend your lunch break with your family.” She would often not arrive home until 6:30 p.m. if she left the office at 5 p.m. Those were precious hours lost with her son.

Faust Liggayu said her breakup with her former employer was respectful and without animosity. She had worked at that previous job from 2017 to March 2022, and it was a small team. But the standoff between some employees and their companies has not always been so free of drama. Apple, for one, has suffered at least one high-profile resignation as a result.

“This shift from the traditional 9-to-5, office-based model cannot be undone and has long-term implications for the jobs market,” the report said. “As companies — and employees — re-evaluate their approach to the workforce, it is clear that having a flexible approach is key, as there are advantages and drawbacks to both exclusively, whether fully remote or fully in office.”

“The resistance is there when employees do not see the point in coming in,” Bloom said. “If you have to force somebody to come to the office it is not in their interests to come in. To avoid forcing people you need to make it benefit them to come in. That means setting up typically two or three days a week of office time on anchor days when everyone comes in.”

It’s obviously not a one-size-fits-all question, even for those who have had the luxury of working from home. “For me, in the mental-health counseling field, I can see both sides,” said Ken Steinbach, a Portland, Ore.,-based counselor. “There is a special connection when we are in the same space together face to face, and I would love to be able to connect that way again.”

“Once they realize that some of the rich interactions they used to have in the office have faded, they start to wonder if they might be missing something important,” he added. “And as their broader networks shrink — the ones that expose them to creative new ways of thinking outside of their main work stream — their performance can suffer.

 

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Quantanamo Quentin has blind spot in this article: safety. Rampant disease spread makes “anchor days” code for employer enforced superspreader events. How about a paragraph on making an office environment safe, or how long covid is killing productivity. Maybe people know what’s hazardous

MrStockBot show me $SPY options volume

I will take free food 😂

Fire them then. Easy fix

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