OK, so I come in, 40 min commute one way, but it's OK.
Then I spend all day in meetings with bunch of folks who are not here, everyone is calling in.
Then I spend 40 minutes again going home.
The whole thing makes no sense, the higher up you go, the less of them are in the office.
I cannot do anything about it but it feels a little bit better after writing this. Sorry about the negative energy.
If you really want to fight RTO, then the most immediate and clearest way you can do so is this:
Do not submit your Voice+ survey.
Many of the higher level execs have probably minimum participation goals set in their performance goals. They care somewhat about a bad survey result. But not entering the survey at all directly targets their pay/bonuses. They might have thought that this performance goal was an easy "gimme" and when they see the low participation rate, they will freak out.
Outside of Germany, the survey is confidential, not anonymous. They will almost certainly know who did not fill out their survey. They will start demanding people fill out the survey not caring at all about the content.
If you are especially brave, you can then ask in writing if declining to enter the survey makes one "subject to discipline up to and including discharge, consistent with applicable laws" (use the same text as the nastygrams when they first moved to 3-days and then 4-days RTO).
@nb more like spontaneous flashes of te---r from other RTO disgruntled employees and management. Ford is a sick place.
These promised spontaneous flashes of inspiration from hallway chats never reach me when I to have to listen to coworkers explaining one another in detail their solar home devices or having a political debate while I am working on debugging a script or preparing a presentation under certain timing constraints. Actually I put the headphones on upon arrival an put them down before I leave. I wonder how they ever plan to hire new talents when they control them like children.
@cn Before the WFH started in 2020, that’s the way it was most days.
Companies spend a lot on office space they don’t need because most information workers rarely need to leave their desks.
(And anyone who thinks you can’t goof off all day in the office never worked there.)
@dn This theory works, to a point. What options does Ford even offer today? If you want a land yacht with built-in recalls you'll be set....
Think about it...if you're not driving into work, and putting miles on your vehicle, then why would u ever replace your vehicle? If u don't return to the office, Ford sales will dip.
@cm there are occupancy conditions on the Train Station tax break, the city obviously needs to offset that.
It does make sense. You drove, consumed fuel that you will now have to buy to replace. State raised gas tax Jan1 2026 which means more money in state coffers. Not to mention you probably bought a prepared lunch. Prepared food gets 6% sales tax. 5 days a week * 47 weeks (minus vacation, sick and holidays), and that adds up.
It's a money grab by state and local governments. Bill Jr is a shill for his liberal left-wing politician friends from the UM.
Sorry about the negative energy? As long as you’re not monitoring how long I take to have a sh-t in the office, we’re good.
If you are in meetings everyday, all day, in meetings, what exactly do you do for the company?
How did you manage before RTO?
Face it, the whole RTO mandate is most likely driven by the promissory notes thrust on Ford by Michigan state government. Hey Bill, you want to retain those awesome tax breaks on all your properties, you know like Annes Way? Then get your people back to the office. Did you notice that the 4 day RTO mandate began in Sept. 2025 and Michigan had that big gas tax increase ready to go on Jan. 1, 2025. Nah, that's just a coincidence. nothing to see here, move along...
Sounds good.
But first, you'll need to include, in this post, your time spent in bootlicking, butt-kissing and doing other things when RTO.
I'm in the same boat op. Love going into the office to have conference calls with folks in other countries and coworkers in other buildings. Oh wait, I guess I could spend 15 minutes on our walkable campus to get to whq, or maybe 3 hours to get to the lab since our shuttles dont run like they say they do
Of course, someone with an IQ of 60 would ask for this information. Understood.
It makes lots of sense if you can include, in this post, your time spent in shopping and doing other things when WFH.