Leaked Zoom all-hands: CEO says employees must return to offices because they can’t be as innovative or get to know each other on Zoom::Zoom CEO Eric Yuan discussed the benefits of in-person work in a leaked meeting.

      • ipkpjersi@lemmy.ml
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        23
        ·
        1 year ago

        you have to reserve a conference room to take a zoom meeting (all meetings).

        Work in an office, they said. It will be easier for meetings, they said.

        It’s crazy how shortsighted and dumb companies are.

        • bitsplease@lemmy.ml
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          11
          ·
          1 year ago

          It’s not that they’re shortsighted and dumb (well, many are, but that’s not why they’re spouting this BS), they know those reasons are full of shit, they just need some excuse that sounds better than “we signed a 4 year lease and so we’re going to make that your problem” or “the CEO is getting lonely and misses being able to walk around the office among all his minions”

        • KevonLooney@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          8
          ·
          1 year ago

          True. Even with like 20 - 30 meeting rooms there are always people posted up in all of them. Even if you reserve a desk or room, someone will be there.

          Their excuse is usually “I reserved a different one but someone’s in that one now.” So you have to take someone else’s, and they inevitably interrupt your meeting. At the beginning of this chain of room theft is probably an executive who doesn’t even know how to sign up for a room.

          Being at home is like 3x better now. I don’t care about free coffee or food. I buy exactly what I want at the supermarket.

      • chakan2@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        15
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        1 year ago

        Meeting in person is never easier unless you are terrible at technology…which most leadership is.

        Someone is always late, someone is always loud and dominates the meeting, and 55 minutes of the 60 minutes in a given meeting is unimportant.

        This is purely a move to save corporate real estate and CEO egos.

    • kshade@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      11
      ·
      edit-2
      1 year ago

      Yeah, it’s really weird seeing these blanket statements from the CEO of Zoom, of all things.

      I’ve grown up with ICQ, IRC and forums, later worked with a very distributed, international volunteer team and made connections just fine, even though we barely used voice chat (it was still the Skype days) and nobody ever actually saw me or knew my real name.

      Those people and connections weren’t somehow less real to me than the superficial, safety-first chit-chat you sometimes get into at work. This obviously isn’t everybody’s experience, but maybe, just maybe, the CEO should “get” this instead of being out of touch with what he’s selling.

      Maybe he was left on read one time too many.

    • aidan@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      13
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      1 year ago

      Eh, for certain people they definitely are less productive online(unfortunately including me), but I’m sure some others are more productive online.

      • Kittenstix@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        19
        ·
        1 year ago

        I think the issue is the one-size-fits-all mentality, it leaves no room for each person to do what works best for them.

        My wife’s company only rents one of the 4 floors it used to, for those who wanted to return to offices and it’s worked out perfectly, they maintain a space for necessary in office meetings, a place for presentations while only paying a fraction of their old lease.

        • limelight79@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          4
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          We’ve been work-from-home since the pandemic kicked off, so about 3.5 years now. They’re working on renovating our office building (and shrinking the footprint we occupy in it), so we’re going to be work-from-home until at least the spring, at which time we’ll have to report a max of one time per week. Supposedly a remote work policy is under development as well, which is what I’m hoping for.

          I will say, though, I went to an in-person strategy session for a club I’m in back in May. No zoom at all. What I had forgotten was the hallway conversations, the discussions over dinner, and being able to collaborate like that. It was much easier to talk to my counterparts in the club and see how they were addressing issues, for example. I softened my stance on the full work-from-home idea after that - for certain things, like brainstorming, an in-person meeting is hard to beat. But, our day-to-day work, including the quarterly meetings where we pass motions to revise the club bylaws - those can be (and still are) done virtually.

      • seitanic@lemmy.sdf.org
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        12
        ·
        1 year ago

        That’s why they should give people the option to work from home. You can choose which one is best for you.

        • aidan@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          arrow-down
          5
          ·
          1 year ago

          I much prefer to work from home, but I am admittedly less productive. That was my point. I choose to work from home given the choice, but would be less productive.

      • Azzu@lemm.ee
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        1 year ago

        The question for me is, is maximizing productivity the most important thing?

        • seitanic@lemmy.sdf.org
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          1 year ago

          I think you have to have a good work-life balance. If you are only focused on maximizing productivity, you risk burnout. I’m not a manager, but I’ve certainly seen burnout lots of times.

    • LaunchesKayaks@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      10
      ·
      1 year ago

      My coworkers and I are constantly sending each other jokes and memes when any of us are work from home. Sometimes the official company chat will just be everyone communicating through gifs.

      • Echo Dot@feddit.uk
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        5
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        1 year ago

        It’s incredibly rare anyone actually uses the Team’s chat for actual work purposes. If I need to talk to someone for work purposes I usually send passive aggressive emails.

        They’ve just added to the bottom of that email signatures.

        [Company name], certified a great pace to work 2023 - 2024

        We’re just wondering who certified that, the general consensus is that it’s probably BS.

        • LaunchesKayaks@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          1 year ago

          My company has 11 people, so Teams is the easiest way for us to communicate other than just talking across the room or walking 10 feet to a different room lol

        • seitanic@lemmy.sdf.org
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          1 year ago

          It all depends on company culture. The last contract I worked was 100% virtual, and the chat channels were all business, all the time. I don’t think I saw a single meme the whole 8 months I worked there.