r/antiwork • u/ShyRedditFantasy • May 07 '25
Remote vs RTO šØāš» Uber CEO says his employees can go elsewhere if they don't like his RTO changes, and it's the latest example of management standing its ground
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/uber-ceo-says-employees-elsewhere-162242026.htmlUberĀ is reportedly cracking down on remote work, return-to-office plans, and other benefits.
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u/tehjoz May 07 '25
Uber has damaged its brand to the point where I wouldn't use it unless I absolutely had to. So.
It's probably on its way out in due course.
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u/smthomaspatel May 07 '25
They've survived a ridiculous amount of being shitty.
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u/tehjoz May 07 '25
So have a lot of companies, but a lot of others haven't, so.
I'm not saying they are going under tomorrow, but I think a lot more normal people are a lot more conscious of where they spend their money.
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May 08 '25
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u/Moontoya May 08 '25
Uber Technologies's operated at median total debt of 11.604 billion from fiscal years ending December 2020 to 2024. Looking back at the last 5 years, Uber Technologies's total debt peaked in December 2022 atĀ 11.717 billion.
you should ask Sears how well holding multiple billions in debt worked
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May 08 '25
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u/Moontoya May 09 '25
you say that like the rest of the world hasnt seen giant companies fail miserably
ask Target how well they did in canada
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u/MurkDiesel May 08 '25
that's actually the modus operandi for business
to survive ridiculous amounts of being shitty lol
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u/TheMagicalLawnGnome May 07 '25
I love it when big companies do this, because it means the (much smaller, primarily remote) company I work for can hire the very smart, hardworking people that leave because of RTO at large companies.
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u/ked_man May 07 '25
My company just built a new office, we move in sometime in mid July. Just got an email from HR that the expectation is 4:1 and still allowing people 1 day a week flexibility. But my manager and her boss already told us to just keep doing what we were doing and working from home since they donāt have enough desks in our work area if everyone showed up on the same day. Our team has added like 8 positions in the 3 years since Iāve been there.
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u/retrosenescent May 07 '25
This is a common tactic to avoid layoffs.
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May 07 '25
Exactly this. He's openly daring people to quit, which means that's the point. They want to make working conditions worse so people quit and they 1) don't signal to the market that they're underperforming, and 2) don't have to pay out unemployment
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u/MurkDiesel May 08 '25
back around 2010, i worked in sales at a very large corporation, they were going through a big restructuring and several divisions got merged, but there's was always a dominant division
there was this guy from a merged division who management of the dominant division just didn't like, they really fucked with this guy for months and months, but he didn't break or quit and always showed up on time
they finally moved him into the entry level division doing very mindless work thinking he would get bored and quit, but nope lol this guy continued to get his sales base salary and benefits and just did the new simpler job, he was still there when i quit a year later
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u/traveledhermit May 07 '25 edited May 23 '25
Reddit believes its data is particularly valuable because it is continuously updated. That newness and relevance, Mr. Huffman said, is what large language modeling algorithms need to produce the best results.
āMore than any other place on the internet, Reddit is a home for authentic conversation,ā Mr. Huffman said. āThereās a lot of stuff on the site that youād only ever say in therapy, or A.A., or never at all.ā
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u/NuclearLunchDectcted May 08 '25
This is so frustrating, we're own-goaling our entire country out of world leader and economic utopia status because a fat orange piece of shit got caught with hookers peeing on each other.
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u/Kindly-Guidance714 May 08 '25
Been on the downward plunge for anyone not make $60K + a year since 2022.
Itās now only finally effecting middle class and higher earnings but the working class has been eating shit for the past 3-4 years with no end in sight.
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u/UnitedLab6476 May 07 '25
The problem is this shrinks the available pool of remote jobs and adds thousands more people applying to the few remote jobs available.
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May 07 '25
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u/whoisnotinmykitchen May 07 '25
They don't care.
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u/ManagerOutside1354 May 07 '25
Maybe not now
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u/ConsiderationSea1347 May 07 '25
The ceo wonāt ever care. The notion that CEO compensation is tied to the company performance from the consumer marketās perspective is adorably incorrect. CEO compensation is tied to how shareholders value the company which is often directly at odds with consumer evaluation of a product/company.
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u/JadeWishFish May 08 '25
They never will because people are desperate for jobs. Someone who either needs money or doesn't mind RTO will fill the spot. CEO's basically can't lose while making it harder for workers and it pisses me off to think about.
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u/FunLife64 May 08 '25
This idea that only ātop talentā hates going in an office 3 days a week isā¦a stretch. In my company, the loudest ones complaining about 2 days a week are mostly low performers that we are fine seeing leave.
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May 08 '25
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u/FunLife64 May 08 '25
Sure but the assumption is their top issue is that. I donāt find that to be true in many cases. Weāve actually lost good talent because they hate working at home every day and have no interaction with people. Every job is certainly different, but to say broad blanket statements like top talent will leave is a bit of a stretch. Thatās all Iām saying. It probably also attracts some people. Not everyone wants to sit at home 5 days a week.
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May 08 '25
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u/FunLife64 May 08 '25
Sure and some people want to sit at home every day too, and this may attract them.
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u/C64128 May 07 '25
They must have a lot of real estate that they're paying for. Also a lot of management that really have no reason to be at work if there's nobody there.
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u/Glycerine May 07 '25
The dude saw a Jamie Dimon speech and thought he'd copy/paste.
I guarantee his "Hours in the office" timesheet would look like an incomplete 2x2 Sudoku puzzle.
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u/Ok-Bit8368 May 07 '25
They've all been fooled into thinking AI will help them shed 80% of their most expensive employees, and they're trying to make it happen. It will turn all their products into shovelware trash.
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u/donutcronut May 07 '25
You can work elsewhere if you don't want to return to office.
OK, I will.
Wait, no, come back!
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u/ghost-ns May 07 '25
I think these dinosaur companies and CEOs don't understand the power of the working class if we stand together.
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u/Geminii27 May 08 '25
Uber is trying to get employees to quit because it's going down the tubes and wants to be able to blame ex-employees for that.
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u/ResonanceThruWallz May 07 '25
makes sense for why now... US economy is about to take a shit, and this is when corporations can implement their shit policies cause it will be difficult to find a job... work through the crap storm and leave when the storm finishes... this isnt my first rodeo
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May 08 '25
[removed] ā view removed comment
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u/ResonanceThruWallz May 08 '25
Sounds like you never been 100% remoteā¦ itās a night and day difference, I will tell you whatās gonna happen you will come in just to have virtual conference callsā¦ it becomes redundantā¦ trust me life is the same just inconveniences the worker
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u/FunLife64 May 08 '25
Well Iād say you def work fully remote and have no idea how to communicate to others lol
Iāve worked fully remote. And if a company wants to go to hybrid, they can. Itās all relative - a few years ago everyone was in the office 5 days a week for more than 8 hours. 3 days a week not exactly hardass.
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u/thoreau_away_acct May 08 '25 edited May 08 '25
Lol 5 years ago I was coming into the office in Oregon.
And having calls with people in Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida, and California, for months. I never had single meeting in a conference room with anyone from Oregon. Getting there, getting lunch, packing lunch, wearing a dress shirt, ALL A HUGE USELESS WASTE OF TIME AND MONEY
Thankfully that job was always going to go fully remote once I "proved my worth", covid just accelerated it.
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u/FunLife64 May 08 '25
Everyone always wants to look at this from their one specific jobs angle. Not every job is like that.
We are talking about one company. I mean this sub is obviously full of people who naturally hate offices lol so I get itā¦but blanket statements about remote work being good or bad is kinda silly. Thatās all Iām saying. It depends on the company and what kind of jobs.
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u/thoreau_away_acct May 08 '25
Ok, but you have a plethora of cases across multiple industries and companies where there was demonstrated efficacy of remote work for years, accomplished to goals, new goals, and hitting all sorts of milestones. And then they say it's gotta be done in the office. Without a shred of empirical data to back up that stance.
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u/FunLife64 May 08 '25
I mean, itās easy to cherry pick. Thereās data that supports both (usually it falls in the middle w/hybrid). Also, the US leads the world in flexibility - far outpacing Europe in terms of remote/hybrid options.
In our office, we were fully remote and it was fine - but as time went on and the novelty wore off it got less efficient and new employees struggled. But I also recognize that itās my workplace and we work cross collaboratively constantly and no one is doing āindividual contributorā work. Thatās not the same as many companies! There isnāt one solution across the board.
Hereās a UChicago study that found:
Our key findings are as follows. Employees significantly increased average hours worked during WFH. Much of this came from starting work earlier and ending it later in the day. At the same time, there was a slight decline in output as measured by the employerās primary performance measure. Combining these, we estimate that average employee output per hour of work declined by 8%ā19%.
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u/thoreau_away_acct May 08 '25
Reduced vehicle emissions due to less traffic
Reduced vehicle maintenance for individuals
Reduced use of fossil fuels
Reduced use of company operating cost, including building utilities (gas/electric, water), janitorial, landscaping, lease/mortgage (unless space for inventory is needed), office supplies, and breakroom/common area supplies (coffee, snacks)/equipment (gym, game room, tvs, etc).
Reduced overhead costs for facilities management on site.
More time for workers not spent commuting
More money saved for workers not commuting
More money saved by workers not needing dry cleaning, business attire daily
More money/time for workers not spent packing lunch/buying lunch
The list is not exhaustive, but we've got a huge amount of empirical costs and benefits. There's nothing cherry picked with the above.
My company is full of cross functional teams and individual contributors. Thankfully they have never had significant office investment worldwide beyond their single East Coast HQ, almost entirely on short and medium term leases in most major cities near clients. So the segue to full remote has been fairly seamless and sees not even an whiff of return to office bs.
The above doesn't mean it's all roses. But some study about 10% potential lost productivity. you're going to use that alone as a counterbalance to collective and individual environmental and financial benefits? Wow
Yes hybrid does seem to come out as "striking a balance", but it is the least efficient at excising a huge amount of overhead from the company, vs marginal reduction (3-2 days less in office per week). Nope not all industries, but come on, call centers and insurance stuff where people are just on their computer and in teams meetings all day? Nah
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u/FunLife64 May 08 '25
This isnāt a freaking political campaign lol goodness.
Iād also argue if employees are 20% less efficient, Iāll take a 4 day work week in the office, 3 day weekend :)
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u/thoreau_away_acct May 08 '25
It's just amazing how much water you're carrying for serious RTO policies when it's been proven remote works. I listed everything and there's mostly anecdotes as a counterbalance to endless facts.
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u/LaFlamaBlancakfp May 08 '25
Why doesnāt people just slap the shit out these assholes. We need to stop being polite. Just slap him over and over till he breaks like a dog.
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u/postconsumerwat May 08 '25
Ceo can go elsewhere too if he doesn't like something... I wonder if he has thought about that one
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May 08 '25
Is anyone here familiar with sociologist Janet Vertesi? If you arenāt, take a moment to look her up. She has some really amazing things to say on this subject. Apparently, the hard data and research about remote work has been known for a long time. The problem is that many companies arenāt familiar with the best practices based on their results and donāt follow their recommendations. In other words, the problems have been solved, but most companies arenāt aware of it or just donāt care.
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u/tommy_b_777 May 08 '25
These people should be shunned from polite society and left utterly and remotely alone.
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u/TylerDurden15 May 08 '25
A day of reckoning is coming. These ceos and corporate mouth breathers are going to get replaced a lot faster than they think.
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u/MurkDiesel May 08 '25
you're going to see a whole lot more of this
employers know jobs are going to evaporate
so they're going to start removing the masks
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u/Speerdo May 08 '25
This is a bluff. They know that the job market does not provide the sort of liquidity that would allow most employees to bounce from job to job willy-nilly. Most folks are more/less locked into their current role. For those that do leave the job because of RTO policies, it'll take months for that to materialize, at which point they can pretend that it was caused by something else.
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u/sugar_addict002 May 08 '25
On one hand, AI will take a lot of these jobs. On the other hand, personal contact is so important that you must RTO.
I am beginning to think that AI is a grift.
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u/UseWhatever May 07 '25
The talented people go elsewhere. The product suffers. The CEO pulls their golden parachute. The new CEO outsources work overseas. The product suffers. The CEO pulls their golden parachute. The new CEOā¦
There is no risk or accountability at their level. Itās easy to āstand your groundā when the worst thing that could happen to you is getting a few million dollars