Superwoman and Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer has sparked off a touchy debate
by her new rule that doesn't permit employees to work from home. If
not implicitly, Mayer has not-so-subtly implied that she thinks
employees working from home are largely goofing off and that they'd be
far more productive if they came to office everyday. God help those
thousands of employees, if Mayer is planning a work ethic based on her
own formidable standards. This is a woman who, after getting a
computer science degree, specialised in artificial intelligence, and
can take credit for Google's famous, unembellished homepage. She's
clearly not working for money; Mayer already has $300 million in the
bank and is in the Fortune list of top 20 tech people in the world.
But it's not her qualifications or illustrious career, rather the fact
that she took a two-week maternity leave, which makes me think that
Mayer's actually Supergirl, masquerading as one of us lesser mortals.
Naturally, she's not going to see any reason why people need more
flexibility in their work lives. But most of us are not like her who
can effortlessly raise kids and head a listed company while giving
quotes like: "I don't need much sleep".
The uncomfortable truth is: Mayer is right. Unless you really have a
Zen approach and you've trained yourself to switch gears remarkably
efficiently between household chores and making spreadsheets, working
from home is more like a Utopian fantasy that never quite works out.
Of course, I'm not talking about the rare and extremely motivated
sort, or somebody with the staggering talent of Leo Tolstoy (he was
writing while fighting as a soldier during the Crimean War). I'm
talking about the regular qualified employee with specific tasks and
deadlines. People argue that technology makes it possible for them to
work just as efficiently from anywhere, and while that's perfectly
true, work can't just be condensed into efficiency. It's as much about
bouncing off new and creative ideas with colleagues, coffee breaks and
no matter how pointless statistics says daily meetings are, they are
imperative to keep lines of communication between co-workers open.
Facetime and Skype are just not the same thing.
Maybe it's a little unfair to bracket every working-from-home employee
as a lucky goofball because people thrive under different work
conditions. I can only speak for myself and my work requires a lot of
self-motivation and distraction-free time. Working at home isn't for
me since I'm distracted even by the word distraction. On the days I'm
attempting to work at home, I end up watching Gossip Girl and trying
to find myself something interesting to eat. Before I know it, the
day's over and I'm feeling guilty and more than a little frustrated. I
find I achieve much more on days I go into my office and have some
entirely meaningless conversations with two colleagues.
But it's also true that many women drop out of the workforce because
of inflexible rules that require them to clock in daily. Juggling a
career with family responsibilities keeps getting harder. Eventually,
companies will have to arrive at a happy medium between working in the
office and from home. With the Earth's fledging natural resources, it
is very silly to insist that people waste petrol to commute an hour to
do what they could from home. I suspect a day is not far off when we
have permanent Skype on, and we can watch and have conversations with
colleagues in real time, a sort of virtual office, with large TV
screens, or such simulations much better than the ones currently
available. Technology will ensure we can almost physically be
together, while being apart. Till then, it's got to be innovation the
old-fashioned way: in conference rooms or cubicles.
FE
Showing posts with label yahoo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label yahoo. Show all posts
Wednesday, 6 March 2013
Tuesday, 26 February 2013
Yahoo abolishes work-at-home policy
Since Marissa Mayer became chief executive of Yahoo, she has been
working hard to get the Internet pioneer off its deathbed and make it
an innovator once again.
She started with free food and new smartphones for every employee,
borrowing from the playbook of Google, her employer until last year.
Now, though, Yahoo has made a surprise move: abolishing its
work-at-home policy and ordering everyone to work in the office.
A memo explaining the policy change, from the company's human
resources department, says face-to-face interaction among employees
fosters a more collaborative culture — a hallmark of Google's approach
to its business.
In trying to get back on track, Yahoo is taking on one of the
country's biggest workplace issues: whether the ability to work from
home, and other flexible arrangements, leads to greater productivity
or inhibits innovation and collaboration. Across the country,
companies like Aetna, Booz Allen Hamilton and Zappos.com are
confronting these trade-offs as they compete to attract and retain the
best employees.
Bank of America, for example, which had a popular program for working
remotely, decided late last year to require employees in certain roles
to come back to the office.
Employees, especially younger ones, expect to be able to work
remotely, analysts say. And over all the trend is toward greater
workplace flexibility.
Still, said John Challenger, chief executive of Challenger Gray &
Christmas, an outplacement and executive coaching firm, "A lot of
companies are afraid to let their workers work from home some of the
time or all of the time because they're afraid they'll lose control."
Studies show that people who work at home are significantly more
productive but less innovative, said John Sullivan, a professor of
management at San Francisco State University who runs a human resource
advisory firm.
"If you want innovation, then you need interaction," he said. "If you
want productivity, then you want people working from home."
Reflecting these tensions, Yahoo's policy change has unleashed a storm
of criticism from advocates for workplace flexibility who say it is a
retrograde approach, particularly for those who care for young
children or aging parents outside of work. Their dismay is heightened
by the fact that they hoped Ms Mayer, who became chief executive at 37
while pregnant with her first child, would make the business world
more hospitable for working parents.
"The irony is that she has broken the glass ceiling, but seems
unwilling for other women to lead a balanced life in which they care
for their families and still concentrate on developing their skills
and career," said Ruth Rosen, a professor emerita of women's history
at the University of California.
But not only women take advantage of workplace flexibility policies.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, nearly as many men
telecommute.
The bureau says 24 percent of employed Americans report working from
home at least some hours each week. And 63 percent of employers said
last year that they allowed employees to work remotely, up from 34
percent in 2005, according to a study by the Families and Work
Institute, a nonprofit group studying the changing work force.
During the recession, the institute expected employers to demand more
face time, but instead found that 12 percent increased workplace
flexibility, said Ellen Galinsky, its president and co-founder. She
attributed this to companies' desire to reduce real estate costs,
carbon footprints and commuting times.
Technologies developed in Silicon Valley, from video chat to instant
messaging, have made it possible for employees across America to work
remotely. Yet like Yahoo, many tech companies believe that working in
the same physical space drives innovation.
A Yahoo spokeswoman, Sara Gorman, declined to comment, saying only
that the company did not publicly discuss internal matters.
The company's memo, written by Jackie Reses, director of human
resources at Yahoo, and published on All Things D, a blog on digital
issues, said: "Some of the best decisions and insights come from
hallway and cafeteria discussions, meeting new people and impromptu
team meetings. Speed and quality are often sacrificed when we work
from home."
In part, the memo looks like an effort to bring a Google spirit to
Yahoo, said Colin Gillis, an analyst at BGC Partners who covers both
companies.
TOI
working hard to get the Internet pioneer off its deathbed and make it
an innovator once again.
She started with free food and new smartphones for every employee,
borrowing from the playbook of Google, her employer until last year.
Now, though, Yahoo has made a surprise move: abolishing its
work-at-home policy and ordering everyone to work in the office.
A memo explaining the policy change, from the company's human
resources department, says face-to-face interaction among employees
fosters a more collaborative culture — a hallmark of Google's approach
to its business.
In trying to get back on track, Yahoo is taking on one of the
country's biggest workplace issues: whether the ability to work from
home, and other flexible arrangements, leads to greater productivity
or inhibits innovation and collaboration. Across the country,
companies like Aetna, Booz Allen Hamilton and Zappos.com are
confronting these trade-offs as they compete to attract and retain the
best employees.
Bank of America, for example, which had a popular program for working
remotely, decided late last year to require employees in certain roles
to come back to the office.
Employees, especially younger ones, expect to be able to work
remotely, analysts say. And over all the trend is toward greater
workplace flexibility.
Still, said John Challenger, chief executive of Challenger Gray &
Christmas, an outplacement and executive coaching firm, "A lot of
companies are afraid to let their workers work from home some of the
time or all of the time because they're afraid they'll lose control."
Studies show that people who work at home are significantly more
productive but less innovative, said John Sullivan, a professor of
management at San Francisco State University who runs a human resource
advisory firm.
"If you want innovation, then you need interaction," he said. "If you
want productivity, then you want people working from home."
Reflecting these tensions, Yahoo's policy change has unleashed a storm
of criticism from advocates for workplace flexibility who say it is a
retrograde approach, particularly for those who care for young
children or aging parents outside of work. Their dismay is heightened
by the fact that they hoped Ms Mayer, who became chief executive at 37
while pregnant with her first child, would make the business world
more hospitable for working parents.
"The irony is that she has broken the glass ceiling, but seems
unwilling for other women to lead a balanced life in which they care
for their families and still concentrate on developing their skills
and career," said Ruth Rosen, a professor emerita of women's history
at the University of California.
But not only women take advantage of workplace flexibility policies.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, nearly as many men
telecommute.
The bureau says 24 percent of employed Americans report working from
home at least some hours each week. And 63 percent of employers said
last year that they allowed employees to work remotely, up from 34
percent in 2005, according to a study by the Families and Work
Institute, a nonprofit group studying the changing work force.
During the recession, the institute expected employers to demand more
face time, but instead found that 12 percent increased workplace
flexibility, said Ellen Galinsky, its president and co-founder. She
attributed this to companies' desire to reduce real estate costs,
carbon footprints and commuting times.
Technologies developed in Silicon Valley, from video chat to instant
messaging, have made it possible for employees across America to work
remotely. Yet like Yahoo, many tech companies believe that working in
the same physical space drives innovation.
A Yahoo spokeswoman, Sara Gorman, declined to comment, saying only
that the company did not publicly discuss internal matters.
The company's memo, written by Jackie Reses, director of human
resources at Yahoo, and published on All Things D, a blog on digital
issues, said: "Some of the best decisions and insights come from
hallway and cafeteria discussions, meeting new people and impromptu
team meetings. Speed and quality are often sacrificed when we work
from home."
In part, the memo looks like an effort to bring a Google spirit to
Yahoo, said Colin Gillis, an analyst at BGC Partners who covers both
companies.
TOI
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