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walkitoutI, of course, have been doing mail order since before web mail order was a Thing. (Obligatory brag about having first shopped at Amazon on Dec 22 1995.) Shame-y fashion remarks in person (when I commented to an office-mate who really hated me that I ordered clothes online, she said, it shows) and on television (when Cordelia snarks at Willow about the softer side of sears) do not phase me one tiny bit, and yet, for the last several years I have made a point of buying clothes in person when possible. I tell people I shop at the Middle Aged Mom Store, by which I mean Kohl’s, but if I have ever placed an online order with Kohl’s before today, it has left no record of same in my password manager.
Anyway. I broke down today, and just ordered a bunch of clothes on Kohl’s. My t-shirts needed a refresh.
I was partly inspired by my walking partner. She has a depth of commitment to in person, paper book shopping that I find heroic. She got most of the way through her TBR pile, before finally, within the last week and a half, breaking down and figuring out how to order online. It took her a few tries to get through the billing information entry process, but she did it, as near as I can tell, all by herself and she has been gleefully making up for lost weekend book shopping trips nearly every day since she got it working.
My friend J. is convinced that teleworking will be taken away Once Again, and Helaine Olen agrees with him:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/05/20/telecommuting-is-not-future/
“the employer will likely remember that money spent on real estate is often money well spent.
Online communications can lead to misunderstandings and bad feelings — anyone who has spent much time on social media knows that humor and tone are easy things to misinterpret. There are serendipitous benefits to in-person collaboration that no number of Zoom meetings or Slack channels can replicate. A number of companies — Yahoo and Bank of America come to mind — rescinded telecommuting privileges in the recent past, claiming the practice was detrimental to corporate teamwork.
There is also the psychological pull of keeping workers in the same places as the boss. Employers frequently see themselves as better able to monitor and control their employees when they are actually on the premises.”
I think that hits the high points.
I sort of was susceptible to this theory (it saddened me, but seemed almost depressingly plausible) until my Priestess’ local office was closed permanently. When I learned that the cost per employee of that office per month was north of a grand, I about fell out of my chair.
For a grand per employee per month, we can identify the people who take offense too readily and run them through some Zoom HR training to get the fuck over themselves, and we will have recorded evidence of the people who are incredibly offensive to use as a basis for firing their asses for cause. Monitoring features available with telework will replace the bosses who think of themselves as better able to do their job in person (and honestly, most of them were not justifying their cost anyway).
Serendipitous benefits to in-person collaboration are an interesting angle, tho. Like the NYT opinion piece about how we will miss the social aspects of the office when we do not have it any more, it has a strong whiff of tail wagging the dog. Can you put a price tag on serendipitous benefits? How does it compare to the known costs?
Adoption curves are a favorite thing for me to contemplate. Early adopters are ... not the kind of people you can build a stable business on. The next rank back is a great start, but if you are going to become an Iconic Brand in the 21st Century, you are going to need more than that elite few with the money to afford the more promising wild hares their crazy early adopter friends pursued and abandoned in favor of the Next New Thing. You need someone or something to force the vast middle to take the leap: FOMO, embarrassment of being the last person in their group to switch AGAIN, spousal / parental threats, the carrot of connection to grandkiddies.
I think we will be adding the pandemic to the list of things that force people over that hump. I watched my walking partner place order after order after order for books online. She had NEVER done that before May 2020. [ETA: And she is not shopping on the Zon, I might add.]
Anyway. I broke down today, and just ordered a bunch of clothes on Kohl’s. My t-shirts needed a refresh.
I was partly inspired by my walking partner. She has a depth of commitment to in person, paper book shopping that I find heroic. She got most of the way through her TBR pile, before finally, within the last week and a half, breaking down and figuring out how to order online. It took her a few tries to get through the billing information entry process, but she did it, as near as I can tell, all by herself and she has been gleefully making up for lost weekend book shopping trips nearly every day since she got it working.
My friend J. is convinced that teleworking will be taken away Once Again, and Helaine Olen agrees with him:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/05/20/telecommuting-is-not-future/
“the employer will likely remember that money spent on real estate is often money well spent.
Online communications can lead to misunderstandings and bad feelings — anyone who has spent much time on social media knows that humor and tone are easy things to misinterpret. There are serendipitous benefits to in-person collaboration that no number of Zoom meetings or Slack channels can replicate. A number of companies — Yahoo and Bank of America come to mind — rescinded telecommuting privileges in the recent past, claiming the practice was detrimental to corporate teamwork.
There is also the psychological pull of keeping workers in the same places as the boss. Employers frequently see themselves as better able to monitor and control their employees when they are actually on the premises.”
I think that hits the high points.
I sort of was susceptible to this theory (it saddened me, but seemed almost depressingly plausible) until my Priestess’ local office was closed permanently. When I learned that the cost per employee of that office per month was north of a grand, I about fell out of my chair.
For a grand per employee per month, we can identify the people who take offense too readily and run them through some Zoom HR training to get the fuck over themselves, and we will have recorded evidence of the people who are incredibly offensive to use as a basis for firing their asses for cause. Monitoring features available with telework will replace the bosses who think of themselves as better able to do their job in person (and honestly, most of them were not justifying their cost anyway).
Serendipitous benefits to in-person collaboration are an interesting angle, tho. Like the NYT opinion piece about how we will miss the social aspects of the office when we do not have it any more, it has a strong whiff of tail wagging the dog. Can you put a price tag on serendipitous benefits? How does it compare to the known costs?
Adoption curves are a favorite thing for me to contemplate. Early adopters are ... not the kind of people you can build a stable business on. The next rank back is a great start, but if you are going to become an Iconic Brand in the 21st Century, you are going to need more than that elite few with the money to afford the more promising wild hares their crazy early adopter friends pursued and abandoned in favor of the Next New Thing. You need someone or something to force the vast middle to take the leap: FOMO, embarrassment of being the last person in their group to switch AGAIN, spousal / parental threats, the carrot of connection to grandkiddies.
I think we will be adding the pandemic to the list of things that force people over that hump. I watched my walking partner place order after order after order for books online. She had NEVER done that before May 2020. [ETA: And she is not shopping on the Zon, I might add.]
no subject
Date: 2020-05-22 09:24 pm (UTC)