Work from home : maliciouscompliance

[–] Vaggumon@lemm.ee 127 points 3 months ago (23 children)

Wife was hired in 2014 for a position that was designed to be remote. They changed things in 2017 and tried to make her come into an office 2.5 hours away, 5 days a week. She's legally blind and doesn't drive, a fact they were fully aware of and had no issues with when they hired her. She tried to argue multiple times, and it just ended up going in circles with several managers getting pretty insulting to her. So, she quit, and eventually decided to contact a disability lawyer to inform the ex-employer she would be suing for discrimination, and ADA violations. Because they said some pretty stupid things in emails and voicemails. They ended up offering a nice sized settlement. She found another WFH job that paid 3x what she was making at the old place, with a higher level position and more closely fits her education. She's much happier with how things turned out for her. The position has been on various job sites for over 3 years and doesn't look like it's been filled since she quit, though I can't say that for sure.

[–] jelloeater85@lemmy.world 52 points 3 months ago (3 children)

They think we're cattle, but cattle won't eat the rich.

I have always told folks that I managed, that I'm nothing without them. Yea, I have a MBA as well, but man, are alot of those business folks short sighted to a fault. Like lack of empathy and foresight.

If your KPI's are based around having a knowledge worker in a chair in a room, your business should die.

Plain and simple.

[–] Texas_Hangover@lemm.ee 21 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Cattle will stampede if you piss them off enough.

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[–] pearsaltchocolatebar@discuss.online 20 points 3 months ago (2 children)

My boss is awesome. He realizes that his job is mostly to make sure we're able to do our jobs effectively. It really feels like I'm working with him, not for him, which is how it should be.

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[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 21 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Good

You should absolutely sue when your rights are violated. It is not ok for an employer to discriminate based on disability.

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[–] MrShankles@reddthat.com 125 points 3 months ago

I work night shifts. My manager one time called me around 2pm to ask me something menial and waking me up (as I was still sleeping for my next shift at 7pm).

So naturally, I called him at 2AM when I was at work... because I had an "urgent" question about a work policy lol. He got the picture, and that shit never happened again

[–] brax@sh.itjust.works 106 points 3 months ago (4 children)

Yup, my work pulled the same Bullshit. I can work from home and we all worked from home through COVID... But now suddenly I can't

So, there's been a few times where the power's gone out or something has happened that needs us at a remote location. They send the team home. The rest of the guys willingly go. I stay back and remind them that "gee, sorry. You guys have made it abundantly clear that I can't work from home. All those times I had to take personal time... So yeah, no. I'll just hang out here I guess until everything comes back up 🤷‍♂️"

[–] PunnyName@lemmy.world 22 points 3 months ago

Fuck yeah!

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[–] jeanofthedead@sh.itjust.works 93 points 3 months ago (8 children)

I can’t believe people have work apps on their personal devices. Delete that shit!

[–] icedterminal@lemmy.world 37 points 3 months ago (12 children)

No matter what app it is, if employers require one to be used on a smartphone, they are legally obligated to provide you with a work phone. If they refuse, they are legally obligated to provide reimbursement for your personal mobile plan. This can be as simple as $5 or $10 added monthly to a paycheck, or as detailed as actual usage down to the kilobyte.

Even if it's as simple as clocking in and out. If they won't provide a phone or reimburse, they must have some other method to complete the task. Whether it be a computer or paper. Failing that, they are not upholding the law of providing you tools necessary to complete your job. Which means if they terminate you for any of the above under "not able to do your job", it is retaliation for you requiring them to do their job. You could potentially win a suit against them.

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[–] Nibodhika@lemmy.world 21 points 3 months ago (3 children)

I have slack in it, because I don't like walking around with two phones, but I have it configured to stop notifying after hours. Also worth noting that I do have a phone from the company, it's just that I find it cumbersome to walk around with two phones.

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[–] stoy@lemmy.zip 16 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Right now I am on vacation, my work phone stays at home with an empty battery.

They still have my private number if it is an absolute disaster at work and they need my help, but untill sunday evening I won't even charge my work phone, let alone check it for messages/calls.

Work apps stay on the work phone, the ONLY exception to that rule I will ever make is work MFA apps.

But I'd sooner get a new separate phone for that if I don't get a company phone.

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[–] Digestive_Biscuit@feddit.uk 15 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I have two phones. A personal one and one provided by my company. I like being able to turn off my work phone when on holiday, etc and keep my personal life separate.

I do know a lot of people who sold their personal phones when given a work phone and use it for both. Saves some money I guess but no thanks.

I also know people who have two phones but install all the work apps on their personal phones to make it easier for them. No thanks!

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[–] BilboBargains@lemmy.world 79 points 3 months ago (5 children)

We have to call their bluff from time to time and remind the management that without us, none of their shit works. When we down tools its not like they can pick them up and get the show back on the road.

[–] Taohumor@lemmy.world 20 points 3 months ago

Kinda sad this is what it comes down to that they can't be reasoned with like humans. I'd be looking for a new place to work.

[–] Asafum@feddit.nl 19 points 3 months ago (2 children)

"I can grab any piece of shit off the street and replace you in 20 seconds." Is what most of them think when it comes to meat machine labor like myself. :(

[–] Soggy@lemmy.world 23 points 3 months ago

Individually? Maybe. That's why worker solidarity is important. Let the bastard replace the whole team while you're out front protesting shit pay and long hours.

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[–] olutukko@lemmy.world 70 points 3 months ago (1 children)

in my country you're not obligated to answer to anything work related after your work hours unless you're manager or superior or it is exliciptly said in work contract that you be on call.

[–] Squizzy@lemmy.world 21 points 3 months ago (3 children)

In my country you are on call and not paid for it, thats the workaround there.

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[–] krnl386@lemmy.ca 66 points 3 months ago (3 children)

My guess is that some businesses get tax breaks from municipalities in exchange for filling office spaces with warm bodies. The idea is that people in office buildings support local businesses by buying lunch, and sometimes grabbing a pint after work.

I’m not trying to excuse this trend, in fact as an IT person myself I 100% agree with the sentiment, I’m just trying to share what I’ve been told.

[–] tinkling4938@lemmynsfw.com 76 points 3 months ago (1 children)

This is the excuse my employer gave. So I'm to take a pay cut (gas, wear and tear on my vehicle, loss of time to commute) so I can spend more money to prop up other businesses for a tax break that is likely to go into some rich ass C-levels bonus or shareholders pocket for cut costs?

Fuuuck that. Its just another way of picking the labor class clean to the bone.

[–] DrDickHandler@lemmy.world 31 points 3 months ago (3 children)

Yes. That's exactly what is happening.

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[–] gmtom@lemmy.world 50 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Commercial realestste makes up a significant amount of rich people's investment portfolios. And if people stopped needing office space the property would devalue and those rich people would lose easy money.

So they have all collectively agreed to force their workers back to the office I order to keep the real estate values up and keep their investments positive.

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[–] friend_of_satan@lemmy.world 23 points 3 months ago

It's even simpler than that: they leased the office space and have to continue to pay that lease or else pay an early termination fee. This is basically the sunk cost fallacy. But you are right that sometimes additionally they get tax breaks for certain office space, for instance the San Francisco mid-market tax break (AKA the Twitter tax break)

[–] rikudou@lemmings.world 49 points 3 months ago (1 children)

It's sad that this is considered malicious at all. Seriously, either working from home is a risk for your company or it isn't, there's nothing in between.

[–] sunzu@kbin.run 19 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Well u see your employer reserves the right to always be right!

That's the benefit of being "leadership"

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[–] whodatdair@lemmy.blahaj.zone 44 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

Yup, they started to force me to drive to an office where none of the people I work with are, now that’s the only place I do work for them.

Used to think about and work on projects after hours if I found them interesting or realized a solution I hadn’t thought of. They’ve shown me they don’t care about my comfort, so I don’t feel the need to care about their problems either. The work will be there tomorrow.

They’re so divorced from reality that they think we’d just give up extra hours of our lives for commuting and keep up the same work output. Fuckin nope, going switch to doing the bare minimum it takes to keep you signing checks.

[–] damnthefilibuster@lemmy.world 42 points 3 months ago (1 children)

My SO was told to travel to office every day of the week, only to sit in zoom meetings because all of their team is elsewhere.

Reaaaal good use of everyone’s time and our non-renewable resources.

[–] EldritchFeminity@lemmy.blahaj.zone 34 points 3 months ago (6 children)

Don't forget that it's also effectively a pay cut due to the added expenses and time lost in commuting. They should ask if the company is going to at least pay for the maintenance of the car if they aren't going to pay for the time spent commuting.

[–] snooggums@midwest.social 13 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Also the time spent getting ready for office appearances and prepping lunches (or the cost of buying lunches away from home).

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[–] MystikIncarnate@lemmy.ca 36 points 3 months ago (3 children)

My previous workplace was like this. It didn't get to this point, I left before it got to the point of being told you're not allowed to wfh under any circumstances, but I was very confused why I needed to go to the office, to do my IT job, helping people with their computers remotely. I go to the office, to work remotely. Which doesn't make any sense at all.

What is special about the office that allows me to work better/faster/more effectively/whatever? Nobody could give me an answer. I can easily run the tools at home and work fine from there, but I'm not allowed.

My specialty is in network operations, if they want my work to 100% go through their equipment and firewalls and stuff, I can make that happen. With little effort, I can setup a system on a VLAN, and VPN that VLAN to work, blocking it from all other traffic apart from the VPN. It would be the only system on that VLAN (apart from the firewall/VPN device), ensuring no possibility of cross contamination between my equipment and theirs. They even had an openVPN host already configured, which they would only need to generate a connection file for, in order for me to get it working. I can then proxy 100% of my traffic through an office system and it would be identical to being present in the office, apart from me being physically there.

At home I have a dedicated room for my computer activities, where I can close the door and lock it if required, so I can remain undisturbed.

I made sure they understood all of this but they still wanted me in the office at least 4 days a week. I'm still not sure why.

I left that job, and my new job doesn't even have a physical office, so I'm permanently working from home.

[–] BlueMagma@sh.itjust.works 21 points 3 months ago (2 children)

They probably wanted to get rid of you. So instead of firing you, they imposed stupid rules to makes you leave on your own.

[–] MystikIncarnate@lemmy.ca 15 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Oh probably. From everything I saw it was impossible for me to meet their demands.

Partway through my employment I moved to a new home, after a few months my SO got a job. She doesn't have a license but needed to travel about 15 minutes to work (30m round trip). I was basically the only person who could, or would, help her get to work. I worked 9-5, her shift was 2:30 to 10:30.

For a while, my brother would drive her to work and I would drive her home, even that was stressful, because I'd wake up at 6:30 to shower and get ready to leave by 8AM so I can be at work for 9, then I had to stay up to bring her home, which she wasn't out at 10:30 promptly every day, so I'd frequently get home after 11:30. Going to bed at, or after midnight, to wake up by 6:30 AM, five days a week isn't fun, even at four days in the office per week, it was not great.

Thought-out this time I was asking for more wfh, since then I can at least sleep from midnight to 8 AM or so. They wouldn't budge.

My brother ended up having a medical issue that caused him to be unable to drive her to work, so I told my employer I had to work from home, since I have to take care of getting her both to, and from work, and that, at most, the situation would last around 10-12 months (she was working on her driver's license, and that's the minimum waiting/learning time for new drivers, before they can drive without a chaperone); I also informed them that I could attend the office once per week, since she had one weekday off per week as part of her shift rotation. They "compromised" by basically telling me to follow their schedule or be laid off. Their schedule was: in office every day from 9-1. Travel home between 1 and 2pm, and do what's needed to get my SO to work. Once I'm done that, I can work from home when I return from dropping her off (usually 2:30 or 3 PM to 5 PM or so... Whatever our quitting time was), with one day (her day off) fully in office, and one day fully from home. So 3 of 5 days was this insane in-office then drive home and finish at home thing, one day was fully remote, and one day was fully in office.

Needless to say, I burned out fast. Got a note from my doctor saying I was disabled (he didn't specify why, but if push came to shove it would be something mental health related, he never needed to AFAIK), and I wasn't able to work right now, and currently the recovery time needed was unknown. So I went on disability.

I also want to mention that through all the half day nonsense, they expected me to log 6.5 hours in their time tracking software, which is something I struggle with at the best of times. When I'm stressed, the first thing that suffers is my ability to correctly log and account for my time in any system. So I had 4 hours in the morning to work from the office on my "split days" (as I called them), plus, maybe 2.5 hours at most during my work from home time. Totalling 6.5 hours. I couldn't so much as take a shit or I would fall behind on my time tracking. Normally over an 8 hour shift, the 1.5 hours of missing time in the day would be for breaks/lunch. It's hard to take lunch when I'm barely able to make it home in an hour, and barely able to get to/from her work in 30 minutes. I usually work through lunch because I tend to have time where I have no idea what I was doing, so I can't really account for it in the time tracker. With the 1.5 hour block of driving in the middle of my day, plus all the distractions and unaccounted time I know I'll accrue from co-workers pulling me away from my work to ask asinine questions about things that don't have a presence in the time tracking system (all ticket based, and they would ask me about prospective projects that wouldn't have a ticket for months), I knew that what they were asking as an impossible task.

After I felt up to the task of returning to that insanity, instead of keeping my seat warm for me, they laid me off before I was set to return to work. I only felt up to it because it would have only been a matter of a few months before my SO was able to take her driver's test to be able to drive solo, and after 6 months of being off I wasn't suicidal from the stress anymore, but the bills were starting to pile up.

I was able to determine that they hired a new person in the same role I had, who was on probation at the time when I wanted to return.

I'll let you conclude what you want from that. I'll legally bound not to speak poorly of the company, or what happened after my layoff. Everything I've said here is simply the facts of the matter.

In any case, after some thought, I'm glad I don't work with people who would force me into that kind of position for a paycheque. I have a new job now and I'm slowly paying off any accumulated bills from my time disabled and/or laid off. The new company, as I believe I've mentioned, is entirely wfh, and I'm certain if I ended up in a similar spot, they would be vastly more empathetic to my plight. I'm even earning a small amount more per year, not enough to write home about, but it's still a bigger number than I was given at the last place. I'm happy where I am, and I'm largely not stressed, apart from the normal stresses of my job. I no longer need to pay for gas to get to the office, nor parking, since the previous job was located in a nearby city in the downtown area, with no free parking for employees, so I had to get paid public parking out of my own pocket. I estimate the change will save me around $6000/yr or more. On top of my small bump in pay, I should have a bit less than $10k/yr more money to myself. Right now all of that is sunk into repayments, but long term, its basically free money.

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[–] NegativeLookBehind@lemmy.world 34 points 3 months ago (14 children)

I refuse to install any work related software on my phone. Not only because I don’t want to be contacted after hours, but companies often “require” full read/write access on your device, so they can remotely wipe their data if you quit or get fired.

Fuck that.

[–] InternetUser2012@midwest.social 26 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I'm with you there. My previous employer wanted a bunch of their shit on my phone. I asked if they were supplying me with a work a phone, and they said no, you already have one. I said I do, and it's mine, and I'm not putting anything on it for work because work and home are going to be two different things. They gave me a work phone and then wanted to know why I turned it off in the parking lot before I even got into my car. I'm done working for the day sir.

[–] corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 13 points 3 months ago

wanted to know why I turned it off in the parking lot before I even got into my car. I'm done working for the day sir.

My co-worker locked his in his desk drawer when he went home for the night.

[–] Kit@lemmy.blahaj.zone 12 points 3 months ago (10 children)

No modern MDM solution allows a company to access your personal data on BYOD. That's why containerization of work profiles exist. Anything else would be a massive privacy scandal.

Company-owned devices, though, do have that level of access when MDM enrolled.

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[–] Desistance@lemmy.world 33 points 3 months ago

Malicious Compliance! The only way to go.

[–] deltreed@lemmy.world 30 points 3 months ago

"You are not allowed to work from home unless we want you working from home" is basically their slogan. It's so funny how these companies are ok with upper management working from home, or having remote locations in India where they work from home, or when it comes to working overtime/after hours from home. But, can't do it on a day to day basis. Horrible companies.

[–] ChillPenguin@lemmy.world 30 points 3 months ago

As some in IT. If my company ever does this. I'm doing the same thing. Genius play.

[–] xilona@lemmy.ml 26 points 3 months ago

Well done mate! 👏👏👏

[–] Th4tGuyII@fedia.io 23 points 3 months ago (9 children)

It really saddens to me see how many managers out there treat their subordinates terribly, and then act surprised when their subordinates do the same - as though employees are meant to greatful for their terrible treatment

[–] ech@lemm.ee 16 points 3 months ago (1 children)

https://files.catbox.moe/odekq1.jpg

[–] brbposting@sh.itjust.works 16 points 3 months ago

Does ring true dunnit?

Sometimes people use "respect" to mean "treating someone like a person" and sometimes they use "respect" to mean "treating someone like an authority"

and sometimes people who are used to being treated like an authority say "if you won't respect me I won't respect you" and they mean "if you won't treat me like an authority I won't treat you like a person"

and they think they're being fair but they aren't, and it's not okay.

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[–] masquenox@lemmy.world 20 points 3 months ago

Nicely done.

[–] FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world 17 points 3 months ago (3 children)

It's astonishing.

The capitalists know full well we're more productive working remotely, but their need for control has proven to be stronger than their insatiable greed anyway.

[–] AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world 12 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Just more proof that cruelty is the point. They've known since the 70s that they'd be richer than they are if they would pay thriving wages and eliminate poverty. They want the suffering more than the money.

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