For what it's worth I find it the exact opposite. If I need 8+ hours of uninterrupted 'flow', nothing beats the office. My 'commute' (a 30 minute walk) clears my head, and really helps me switch into 'work mode'. Then I grab a desk in the designated quiet section of the office and I have a clean desk, no distractions and, since I'm in the quiet section, I can be reasonably sure I won't be disturbed all day. At work there is nothing to do but work. If I need something to eat or drink the office cafe will sort me out quickly and efficiently. I can stay in the office until I'm done, then walk away leaving work behind me both physically and metaphorically.
Don't get me wrong, I love working from home as well and never want to go back to the office full time, but home is full of distractions. Everything from cooking lunch, to deciding to quickly throw on a load of laundry to talking with daughter about her day when she comes home from school are all distractions I don't have att the office.
If I had to guess, other than most offices just absolutely sucking ass, this is the nation-wide crux of the entire debate:
> My 'commute' (a 30 minute walk)
Most Americans have a 30 minute drive at best, and state departments of transportation and the federal government are doing everything they possibly can to make sure more cars are sold, more highways are built, and lanes are widened because they'll be damned if someone is going to wake up with no car related debt and walk to work.
No state DOT is turning down a lane widening project, or a new highway build, or a "smart lane" because their jobs depend on it, even if it comes at the expense of us all. They really are not departments of transportation but just departments of highways and cars.
Recently I joined a community input/comment session regarding a $44 million "Smart Lane" here in Columbus. I learned two things:
1) These comment periods are a formality. A state's DOT will never turn down a big project.
2) The state DOTs are focused on metrics like maintaining existing commute times.
> No state DOT is turning down a lane widening project, or a new highway build, or a "smart lane" because their jobs depend on it, even if it comes at the expense of us all. They really are not departments of transportation but just departments of highways and cars.
My city in Kentucky at least has been making all sorts of headway on multiple major "road diet" projects. Many of those projects are probably more expensive in the short term and maybe even in the long term, so it seems good for business too.
These "Road Diets" are amazing: fewer lanes, dedicated turn lanes, dedicated curb space for parking (and plants!). Traffic is safer, oddly slower but ultimately faster (median speeds are down but throughput is higher and accidents generally fewer; all commute times are better than the multi-lane equivalent times despite cars moving individually slower on average; fewer stops and grid blocks).
To maintain fewer lanes at faster throughput, they seem to need a lot more concrete and lot more road painting and that keeps jobs employed.
I don't know how you sell Columbus on the idea, I barely know how we sold ourselves on the idea, and I do know how much controversy it has been for some of the earliest streets to get put on such a "road diet". (Businesses looking at the plans complained that they'd lose a lot of car traffic and thus a lot of business. Results were mostly the opposite: slower median speeds meant more awareness of local businesses people were passing by. More dedicated street parking meant more people actually stopping at businesses. Slower median speeds, with sidewalks more protected by street parking and other furniture, also meant more pedestrian foot traffic, because they felt safer, something once long thought vanished never to return for some of these streets.)
> No state DOT is turning down a lane widening project, or a new highway build, or a "smart lane" because their jobs depend on it, even if it comes at the expense of us all. They really are not departments of transportation but just departments of highways and cars.
I think states DOTs differ pretty widely. In Texas and I imagine Ohio, yeah they're very car oriented. But where I live, a lane widening project was just rejected because of how expensive it would be and instead they are using funding towards improving other transportation solutions that don't involve cars.
In the past CDOT has been heavily car and highway oriented, but that seems to be changing slowly. Maybe other states are also considering different options to cars.
Certainly there are differences, to your point. I don't think there's a huge difference though given that the US is so car-dominated. Good to hear CDOT rejected a highway expansion. We need more wins like that nationally.
The two worst work environments I've been in were an open office situation, where the noise and motion was far too intrusive for me to get anything done, and another place that had a strongly enforced "silence" rule. That was perhaps even worse. The office had no noise at all except for the incessant noise of typing.
I need something in between those two extremes, I think.
Different people have different homes, and different offices have different norms. My home is less distracting than the office, and the environment itself is much less stressful than the office. It seems weird for Google to force the decision instead of trusting employees to make the right choice for them.
I rented a quiet co-working space, instead of working from home or working at the office. That gave me the advantages of choosing my own work area, while still working remotely.
I struggle to work well from home, so renting my own nearby office worked really well for my productivity.
Later I also travelled (pre-COVID) and rented co-working spaces which had great benefits, and certainly bet working from a café or hotel.
This demonstrates the most important difference between In-Office fans and remoters: They ALWAYS have the best possible situations thinkable, far and away better than any average or median.
A 30 minute walking commute is INSANELY rare, as is a quiet section, as even is a office cafe. I'd be far less pissed about forced in-office work if I had any of those things.
It's not insanely rare, but it probably depends on the country. I've moved multiple times and worked in different countries; a 30 minute walk to the office has been quite common for me (or up to 20 minute bike).
The fact that talking to your daughter about her day when she comes home is a nuisance to you, which the office saves you from, is a very interesting detail
Where did I say it was a nuisance? I said it was a distraction. I love talking to my daughter after school, but that doesn't change the fact that my daughter coming home from school also effectively marks the end of that days 'flow'.
Don't get me wrong, I love working from home as well and never want to go back to the office full time, but home is full of distractions. Everything from cooking lunch, to deciding to quickly throw on a load of laundry to talking with daughter about her day when she comes home from school are all distractions I don't have att the office.