I wrote previously on bringing your team back to the office.

Aaron Renn (you should follow him) makes an interesting point about remote work:

I've said this over and over again for years. Proving that you can do your job remotely is the first step to offshoring it. https://t.co/sPHuGReh6g

— Aaron M. Renn 🇺🇸 (@aaron_renn) June 1, 2021

Of course this is only one consideration among several. For a long time I have been keen to return to the office; I miss the productive and rewarding personal interaction with my local teammates (although my team is spread around the world). And until 2020, for a long time my employer expected software teams to be generally present in the office, recognizing the real benefits of face to face collaboration.

However, I really appreciate the affordances of remote work, and I would be glad to have a hybrid approach. My company is still silent on how and when teams will return to the office.

I found this fascinating:

Disconnect between workers and leaders about returning to the office

As ⁦@nntaleb⁩ says – most CEOs are actors. Covid is showing they have zero leadership ability in crisis https://t.co/HG21j280dk

— James Marsh (@JamesMarsh79) June 3, 2021

The linked article reveals quite a contradictory mess among employers. I think this proves Taleb’s point well. The whole system is a ball of anxiety in the sense that Edwin Friedman uses. Employees and especially employers are locked in an anxious state, and creating a corporate culture by soliciting employee engagement simply perpetuates this situation; anxiety is only amplified when it is solicited and coddled.

There are some truly impressive actors out there, but the crises of the past year have revealed the fear behind the mask. This kind of anxiety among leaders will metastasize if it is not done away with. Decisive leadership is willing to undergo a little short term pain for the sake of long term health.