Republicans attacking Biden's as yet unnamed nominee as unqualified aren't trying to block her so much as use the nomination as a platform for portraying Black advancement, no matter how individualized, as anti-white persecution https://t.co/tqBhpH2YOt
— Adam Serwer ?? (@AdamSerwer) February 2, 2022
Strong support for @POTUS' approach to SCOTUS nomination: pic.twitter.com/zymYDIMJxg
— Ronald Klain (@WHCOS) February 2, 2022
Repubs: But… a BLACK… WOMAN. How can we possibly know enough to trust her?
FastCompany published a top 10 worst anti-remote piece ever by a panicked professor from GWU. His core citation? A black man who was an assistant principal remotely in RI while being a principal in DC, two jobs that he did *INCREDIBLY* well.https://t.co/x54eSjnemU pic.twitter.com/kXBrr392D0
— Ed Zitron (@edzitron) February 2, 2022
It is unsurprising that a crusty old white professor would vilify a black guy for "breaking a code" by doing two jobs that specifically help young people, particularly people of color. And it's the only example of someone doing two jobs remotely he found.https://t.co/x54eSjnemU pic.twitter.com/HuibkIUtP7
— Ed Zitron (@edzitron) February 2, 2022
Paying a worker does not grant you a right to their loyalty. Loyalty is earned, and you earn it as a company by treating them well. If you need to keep people in an office to "make them loyal," you are abusing them into submission, and are a scumbag.https://t.co/x54eSjnemU pic.twitter.com/YAhzaDF6Zk
— Ed Zitron (@edzitron) February 3, 2022
The big corporate freakout right now is "proximity bias"- that those who are in the office will be treated better than remote workers. The solution is knowing what workers do and evaluating their output – but they'd rather just have you back in the office.https://t.co/uJug3bcHTm pic.twitter.com/zjv2uS9YN5
— Ed Zitron (@edzitron) January 26, 2022
"Proximity bias" is a threat – it is a statement to workers, especially women and people of color, that if you don't come to the office you will be left behind. Diplomacy and appearance are simply more important than profits to some executives.https://t.co/uJug3bcHTm pic.twitter.com/67SSBkc1b9
— Ed Zitron (@edzitron) January 26, 2022
Quiet part loud, as usual from Tailgunner Ted:
MisterForkbeard
“Proximity Bias” is a real thing for promotion and advancement, and always has been. If you get less face-time or visibility with management or upper management, they’re less likely to know who you are, more likely to push back on promotion, etc. It’s the same reason why someone who does really solid work and prevents a lot of problems doesn’t get the same recognition as another person who normally is okay but fixes one blazing tire fire gets a lot more recognition.
We used to warn people about this 4 or 5 years ago if they wanted to go full remote. They could, but it could slow down their careers through this side effect. We tried to cover the gap through better metrics and making sure their names are brought up, but there was still a measurable drag on some people.
Baud
Regardless of whether I’m at home or in the office, I’m forced to deal with anti-Baud bias every day.
Mike in Pasadena
“racist, disingenuous, blowhards. . .” A phrase I must remember. I would have used assholes in place of blowhards but the original is better in many ways.
Baud
I believe excessive proximity bias is what got Zucker fired from CNN.
West of the Rockies
When I was in academia, I knew an IT guy who was full-time at the local community college and the local university. Also knew someone with full-time teaching loads (4-5 classes at each school depending on course hours). I will say that I wondered how effective they could be. But a remote administrative job might be a different situation.
Danielx
@Baud:
Tsk…you are a very cynical person.
Almost Retired
@Baud: Exactly. Zucker should have listened to Jeffrey Toobin: “Dude, there are alternatives to workplace affairs….”
mrmoshpotato
Didn’t think it was possible, but that comic makes Shithead Ted’s face even more disgusting.
UncleEbeneezer
Serwer is right. Alot of the time racist actions (like clutching pearls over “qualified” Black women) aren’t aimed at short term results, they are aimed at long term reinforcement of Anti-Blackness/Misogynoir (Racism + Misogyny).
MisterForkbeard
@Baud: How does the Baud 2024 campaign feel about excessive proximity bias? And does your policy address whether the presence of pants has an impact?
lowtechcyclist
Thinking about that principal: how many people have had to work two jobs just to survive, because you can’t live on 40 hours of minimum wage work per week?
They do it because they have to; this guy’s doing it because he can, and can do it well.
Bet that professor has never complained about people working two jobs because they can’t survive otherwise.
MisterForkbeard
@UncleEbeneezer: I’m not sure they’re deliberately “aimed” in any case. It’s just people being racist and railing against black people getting any kind of recognition or achievement.
I don’t think it’s done in long-term service to racism. It’s just (generally white) people being assholes in the moment, but throughout their whole lives.
Exceptions made for people like Cruz, who are deliberately fanning this.
MisterForkbeard
@lowtechcyclist: But don’t you see? By taking this other job simultaneously, he’s depriving another teacher of work! God knows we have way too many educators, right?
The Moar You Know
I already knew this about our CEO, but thanks for clarifying.
Mike in NC
Cancun Cruz still dreams of sitting in the Oval Office some day. It’s nice to dream, Ted! But it will never happen.
WaterGirl
@Almost Retired: I haven’t followed this story closely.
Is my understanding correct? That he was fired not for having the relationship, but because he didn’t disclose it?
They both worked for CNN, right? Was the other party in the relationship also fired?
Or is there some suggestion of bias/wrongdoing in reporting on his part?
gratuitous
When the Biden administration put out their list of 13 Black women they were considering for the Supreme Court, you could hear the little squib-like pops of conservative brain gaskets going off all over the place. Thirteen?! That’s going to overwork the racist and sexist stops on the Mighty Republican Wurlitzer! They were prepared to handle only three or four nominees, but having to do oppo on all 13 is too much like work.
UncleEbeneezer
@MisterForkbeard: True. I think it’s a subconscious thing. So yes, not something they are consciously doing for a specific purpose, but it does have long term effects that reinforce power structures (whether they realize it or not) and protect their interests of white privilege. If it didn’t have that effect, they probably would have abandoned the behavior by now.
Almost Retired
@WaterGirl: Yup, CNN policy requires disclosure of personal relationships between a supervisor and a subordinate – a not uncommon policy. We used to call them “love contracts” in the employment law world.
Baud
@MisterForkbeard:
As a believer in freedom, I believe the wearing of pants should be personal choice rather than a government mandate.
Hoodie
@MisterForkbeard: Depending on the nature of the job and the organization, there can be legit reasons for wanting people to appear at the office. There are also some people who are more productive working at the office than they would be home, but that can vary from person to person – some are more productive remotely. However, I wonder if some of this is because some the folks who make a point of being in the office tend to define themselves in terms of their work and feel like people who want to work remotely are somehow rejecting them personally and questioning their priorities, even if those priorities don’t necessarily benefit the organization. In other words, you’re dissing them by not wanting to hang out with them and making them look like idiots for staying so long in the office. You see this in orgs that claim to operate the business “like a family” and have a bit of an us vs. them mentality.
Baud
@gratuitous:
“I want a black woman on the Supreme Court. Just not those 13 black women.”
opiejeanne
@MisterForkbeard: I knew the pants question would come up.
Brachiator
@MisterForkbeard:
Isn’t this the same thing as “long-term service to racism?” It is directed at black people.
scav
a) apparently, it’s only uniquely American to juggle (at least?) three jobs. Or something.
b) ohh, it may be possible that the removal of flobalobs current one job may be getting to the exciting part of the scree slope…..
FelonyGovt
We need a Supreme Court that is more representative of the variety of Americans. It starts with Black women. Atheists, LGBTQ folks, AAPI Americans, Native Americans. Why should the Supreme Court be majority white and religious.
topclimber
@Baud: How about a kilt? It might save some of those 3 votes you lose ever 20XX because of your bare ass virtue signalling. Remember, 3 out of 11 is a lot.
The Dangerman
I read this morning that the Trucker Fuckers in Ottawa had a GoFundMe for 10M. Damn. I need to do something really stupid and hope I can
fleece the ignorant rubesget wide support for my cause.I need more coffee apparently; seems to me that getting jabbed or getting tested isn’t unreasonable. I’m so tired of these assholes.
VOR
@MisterForkbeard: I couldn’t agree more. I worked remotely for a long time, well before COVID. The phrase “out of sight, out of mind” applies. You don’t hear the water cooler conversations. You don’t have the random meetings with people in other groups. Meetings are held in a room with you as the only one on the phone so you don’t get to provide input because you can’t break into the conversation. COVID leveled the playing field for me and allowed more input, not less. On the positive side, working remote allowed more personal flexibility which was good for my family situation.
DogDawgDamn
Adam Serwer is 100% right.
Republicans want any pro-black advancement to be viewed as automatically anti-white. It’s zero sum bullshit, because they have no support among black population and don’t have to mollify that community. Pure cynicism.
jonas
Biden’s critics may have a point. Look at how many unqualified hacks got onto the SCOTUS in recent years because Republican presidents arbitrarily restricted themselves to nominating anti-abortion originalists.
Parfigliano
@mrmoshpotato: Someone should ask “shithead Ted” about the number of Catholics on the Court in comparison to the US population. Watch his head explode.
Gin & Tonic
@Baud: Get rid of the shoe mandate and you’ve got my vote.
Annie
I prefer doing my work in my office, and I’m very eager to return to my office. Here’s why:
I’m sure this is partly because I have an easy commute via public transit and don’t have kids who need to be transported to school, playdates, sports etc. But that doesn’t make my feeling about my own situation any less real.
My agency will probably continue with a hybrid office-home arrangement. But I’m hoping to be in the office 3 days a week eventually.
Brachiator
@MisterForkbeard:
Work life is sometimes unfair, but not always for pernicious reasons.
Some companies have found that remote work can succeed. Maybe some regulation is needed. I don’t know. But companies have to decide how to deal with this and how to deal with how to better identify and promote workers.
In related matters, schools need to come up with ways to make remote learning/teaching more effective.
WaterGirl
@Almost Retired: Interesting. So she, as the subordinate, didn’t get in trouble for non-disclosure?
I would have thought both parties would be held responsible
edit: But I thought this had to do with not disclosing it while there was reporting about the NJ governor?
dnfree
@WaterGirl: if you’re in charge and having an affair with a close subordinate, and don’t disclose it to the board or whoever is in charge, think of all the things that could happen. Your affair partner could be given bonuses or promotions that you recommend to the board without disclosing the relationship. Or if things go wrong, your affair partner could extort such benefits from you by threatening to tell the board.
Actually, when I was on the school board in a small Illinois city, I encountered this situation twice, where a high-level administrator was having an affair with a subordinate, resulting in decisions that seemed curious until the facts came out. We didn’t have a policy mandating disclosure, though. Didn’t know we needed one.
dnfree
In the survey cited by Ron Klein, does it seem strange that more Democrats, of any age, support such an appointment than black voters?
WaterGirl
@dnfree: Oh, I’m not suggesting that there aren’t reasons why those relationships need to be disclosed, but it seems like as a subordinate I could blackmail the guy above me who dumped me.
It seems really odd to me that both parties aren’t held responsible for non-disclosure. That’s the part I don’t get.
scav
@dnfree: Not necessarily. More of them have to deal with the actual sharp pointy end of constantly being accused of being an affirmative action hire.
dnfree
@dnfree: and I should have added that in my school board example, all parties (two situations) were married, so disclosure would have been complicated. In the CNN situation, both were divorced.
Old School
@dnfree: I would suspect there is a split between Black Republicans and Black Democrats in that the support is based mainly on that Biden is the one making the selection
Edit: And perhaps a dose of misogyny.
sdhays
@WaterGirl: As a matter of policy, I expect there’s a (fairly reasonable) assumption that the person with the higher rank makes the decision not to disclose, and the subordinate follows their lead.
West of the Rockies
@Baud:
Would they be okay with Diamond or Silk on the bench or Candace Owens?
dnfree
@WaterGirl: No. Reporting mentioned the Cuomo situation, but the violation of the reporting rule didn’t have anything to do with it. The coincidence was just two incidents having something to do with sex at CNN.
Brachiator
@Annie:
Totally understandable reasons for preferring in office work, especially this one:
This is hard to duplicate/make up for with remote work.
Great list.
WaterGirl
@sdhays: Yeah, I wondered about that. But by holding both responsible for disclosing, it seems that would aid the subordinate by giving them the power to say “but we HAVE to disclose, I could lose my job if I don’t.”
WaterGirl
@dnfree: Lazy reporting? Unthinkable. :-)
dnfree
@Annie: I 100% agree. I liked to work at my workplace and be at home at my house. I’m not a multitasker, so I wasn’t someone who could go toss in a load of laundry and then go back to working. My brain doesn’t function like that.
And there’s so much learned from people in casual conversation about projects, sometimes even that the person you’re talking to has already done something similar for a different project.
Geminid
@dnfree: Not neccesarily. The category “Black voters” had a larger “Don’t Know/No Opinion” number than that for “Democrats.” And not all Black voters are Democrats.
Anyway, that’s White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain. Who still hasn’t called me.
Leto
@The Dangerman: It’s been flagged, paused, and “under review”. For the time being, no more grifter money.
Danielx
Having difficulty working up sympathy for Brother Zucker, I don’t imagine he’ll be walking around with holes in his shoes.
Ruckus
I’ve had 3 separate careers in my life as well as a segment in the military.
I agree with the premise that if you aren’t under thumb you are far less noticed. I use under thumb rather than in the workplace simply because only one of those careers was a job that could done/required me to be out of the office. The other two were workplace dependent. They were machine work – you have to be at the machine at least most of the time, and a retail business that really wasn’t a business if no one was there. If I still owned that retail business I have no idea how that would have existed in a Covid climate. I would likely have closed it up or lost it.
There are many jobs that can not be done off site. I doubt seriously that in this day and age any office work could not be done remote. The career that I had in professional sports, I traveled tens of thousands of miles a year – not in the office. In this day and age I could have done every in office task from home, including creating and publishing the rule books every year. The only thing I actually needed to be in the office for was taking the picture for my credential, and that was 5-10 minutes a year. Today I would just take a photo with my phone.
tom
I have worked remotely for almost 10 years now, and I will never go back to the office. I blogged about it here, but the tl;dr:
However, in my experience hybrid workplaces, where some people are remote and others are in the office, don’t work. A few years ago I was managing a team who worked in our San Francisco office, while I was working remotely from my home in Ann Arbor. This did not work. I was out of a lot of conversations, and my manager had a tendency to meet with my team and make decisions without me. That was on him, but it was still a problem. It’s better, I think, if everyone is remote, or if everyone is in the office. than having a hybrid team.
ETA: I know that many jobs can’t be remote, and that many people prefer to work in an office, as some commentators said above. I completely get that, and you should work wherever you feel most comfortable. For me, that’s remote.
Kay
They have to hold some of these people accountable for this. It really can’t go unpunished.
Imagine if this were a city council candidate who proposed bringing in police to create an investigation into election tampering. The risk of not prosecuting this is much more broad and profound than just the President. There are thousands of elections every year. We can’t have smaller stakes elections with rules and the big job with no rules. It’s a travesty. Let’s hope they’re not Too Big To Jail because if they are there is no reason any candidate shouldn’t try this shit.
Brachiator
@gratuitous:
This is one of those stories where more substantive issues get thrown out in favor of bullshit narratives. A butter emails story.
A president could say he wanted to appoint a woman and “no problem.”
A president could select a candidate from a list compiled by the Federalist Society or some other right wing organization and again, “no problem.” Issues of possible bias or lack of qualification are not even considered.
Biden should just ignore all this noise and proceed.
James E Powell
I put the percentage of racist, disingenuous blowhards at about 35% of the American population.
Almost Retired
@WaterGirl: As a practical matter, I’ve noticed that the subordinate is not disciplined for non-disclosure. To do so enables the subordinate to claim the relationship was coercive and not entirely consensual, and that insisting on disclosure could have resulted in retaliation from the boss/paramour. The subordinate will lawyer up if fired or disciplined. As a long-time employment lawyer, I can tell you that failed workplace romances helped put my sons through college.
Ruckus
@Brachiator:
I wonder if the companies that actually saw the value in working from home tried to make it work, searching for problems and solutions, rather than reasons to not allow it.
As others have said or thought, the structure of working and of being home are often 2 completely different things and really do need to be separate and not everyone is capable or able to do that. I’ve owned 2 companies for over 1/3 of my life, and I had to learn early to leave work at work, and home at home no matter what, because if you don’t it consumes you. And BTW this is not the easiest thing to learn and practice. The navy may have helped a bit. living on a ship 24/7, plus working on the ship any time necessary and at odd hours, you have to learn to separate out your time from the navy’s. Or go insane.
Leto
@Kay: This was something Adam Schiff was discussing last night which didn’t leave a lot of us with a good feeling. DoJ is the one to do all the prosecution, but as all the lawyers here say: the wheel turns slow. They have three years, or till the end of whatever appropriate statute, to get it done. Fingers crossed and all. Ofc I say three years/end of statute but if Repubs do take back the House and/or Senate in the midterms, idk what type of roadblocks they’ll be able to deploy to further stymie any DoJ investigations.
JMG
In re: Remote work
When I was a sportswriter, my paper was a hybrid workplace, as all newspapers have been at least since the telegraph was invented. It was the way things had always been.
When I left sportswriting for an electronic publishing firm, at first it was all in the office, as the founder/CEO had a distaste for remote work based on the company being totally based in his home in its formative years. But eventually the firm grew so large so fast remote work was introduced for many employees, including me, just so the company wouldn’t have to keep buying/leasing more office space. The founder had the grace to admit to the employees that he’d been wrong and remote work increased productivity for the company.
Ruckus
@Brachiator:
I hope he can ignore them – without standing in front of the WH and flipping them off – with both hands.
Sure Lurkalot
@jonas:
Look at how many unqualified hacks got onto the SCOTUS in recent years because Republican presidents arbitrarily restricted themselves to nominating anti-abortion originalists.
Would that it were just SCOTUS. Hundreds of young god botherers were appointed to all court levels and will be “with us” for decades.
Redshift
@Annie: Yeah, I think the key is that no one has a problem with people choosing to go back to the office (if it’s safe), the issue is with workplaces that demand everyone go back to the office without regard for how people think they can work best. (Often because of executives who are “more comfortable” with it because it’s always been that way, and care about seeing people working.)
Leto
@Ruckus: He’ll flip them off in aviators, while speeding away in his electric F150, big grin the entire time.
Ruckus
@James E Powell:
Sounds about right for any medium to large population.
Now if you leave disingenuous blowhards out of the description I’d bet your percentage is a bit low.
I wonder if there is any population of any size that has few to no racists in it. History is replete with examples of racism of various causes and I’ve never seen one population that is exempt.
Redshift
@West of the Rockies:
Of course, now (and maybe then) academia relies heavily on adjuncts who commonly work at several different colleges to try to assemble a living wage. I doubt we’ll see much moaning about “loyalty” in that arena, since it would only highlight how little there is in the other direction.
Ruckus
@Leto:
HA!
A wonderful picture…..
Geminid
@tom: A customer of mine was a fairly accomplished corporate consultant and still keeps up with that world. He told me a year ago that lessons learned in the pandemic would cause a decline in brick and mortar corporate headquarters. For one thing, he said, companies could see how the practice of aggregating management employees in a location led to time wasted preparing for and participating in unnecessary meetings.
Sure Lurkalot
@Geminid: I wonder what your astute customer’s views are on how meetings have changed since the advent of smartphones and laptops. That’s when I went from disliking meetings to hating them with the heat of a million suns.
Redshift
@Brachiator:
Depends on the field (software in my case.) I still miss the general socialization at the office, but as things have progressed during the pandemic, I’ve been pleasantly surprised at how we’ve gotten better at having “this cool thing I learned about”/”this might be useful for something in the future” discussions on Slack. There are some ways it doesn’t work as well, certainly, but there are advantages — it doesn’t rely just happening to be in the right place at the right time, there’s less of an imbalance between talkative and quiet people (as well as people who just take longer to formulate a response), etc.
JustRuss
I don’t really see why this is a problem management has to “solve”. We all make personal choices that affect our careers (got kids?), working from home is just one more. Not everyone wants to be–or, mathematically speaking, can be–on the fast track to the top. There’s lots of people in the office who just put in their 40 and live their lives. Why not let them do that at home?
That said, I’ve been working sorta-remotely for 18 months, my office is on-site but removed from the rest of my team. I do miss out on a lot, they’re not great about using the communication tools we have to keep me in the loop. If I weren’t looking at retiring soon it would be bother me. On the other hand, I love the autonomy it provides.
lollipopguild
@Baud: Baud2024-Just say no to pants!
PJ
@JustRuss: There’s no such thing as “just put in their 40 and live their lives”, at least at places I’ve worked. If the people who decide who gets advanced and who doesn’t aren’t seeing you and engaging with you, it doesn’t matter how much more efficient you are or how much better you are than others at the job – you won’t get promoted, you won’t get the better assignments, and you will be the first in line to lose your position. You could be the slowest, most obtuse person, but if you show up before the boss and leave after the boss, you will get to keep your job and you are more likely to advance.
Almost Retired
@JustRuss: Totally agree with this observation about the potential value of a hybrid workplace to many employees, and I am in the same position as you and feel the same way. On the one hand, I miss the daily interactions with the other attorneys in my old suite. But I don’t miss wearing pants, and I get more done at home. FWIW, my former suite mates said that they get more done when I’m at home as well.
mrmoshpotato
@WaterGirl: How’s your snow situation?
Redshift
@MisterForkbeard:
I’ve been a remote worker at places where I was one of a handful and I completely agree with this, but I’ll be interested to see if there’s critical mass of remote workers where this fades as an issue. If there are a lot of people whose “face time” is on zoom rather than in person, and more of the people getting mentioned prominently are people they don’t see, that may make a difference.
It’ll also be interesting to see if companies that are completely remote or extremely remote-friendly start having an edge in hiring. (I heard this morning that we have an interview candidate for my team who’s leaving a Large Tech Company because they’re going to make him go back to the office.)
All of this applies only to fields/industries where that’s possible, of course. /privilege
WaterGirl
@Almost Retired: Will no one think of the lawyers? :-)
West of the Rockies
@Redshift:
Boy, you got that right! Individual department chairs were better than others, but job security, institutional loyalty towards adjuncts, and administrative transparency were on very short supply.
Dog Dawg Damn
@Ruckus: great conversation everyone. I’m changing employers to a local employer with a hybrid model. The fully remote lifestyle has taken its toll on my mental and physical health and I feel like I don’t learn nearly as much in isolation. Often feel like I’m on Mars—I have never met anyone I work with in person.
That said- I don’t think employers have really done the work to make either situation work. And we are lacking some basic tools. For instance, I do not have a plug-in that tracks my meeting hours per days and surfaces that to me when a new invite comes in. (Warning: you already have 5 hours of meetings!). Employees still do not write emails (they love chat, which doesn’t work well, and then meetings to resolve what the chat inevitably cannot ).
Lots of room for growth and I hope in my next job I’m able to set boundaries and reclaim my life from work.
WaterGirl
@mrmoshpotato: Lots of snow! Lots of shoveling the front deck and the area in the back yard where the pups do their business.
I never shovel the driveway unless there’s too much snow for my CRV to plow through. So far, so good, there. But it’s still snowing so I may have to look for someone to plow if the snow ends up not passing the CRV test.
How about you?
Redshift
@JustRuss:
Because “people who want to work at home” do not map one-to-one with “people doing it because they want more family time and aren’t interested in promotions.” It’s a management problem because they should want to be promoting the people who are interested in those jobs and can do them best, not assuming everyone who is working remotely is not in that category, or worse, not including them in that (and who knows what else) because they just forget to think about them.
narya
I’ve actually completely changed my mind on remote/in-office work. I used to hate working from home–I didn’t have a good setup (I still had a desktop computer at work, didn’t have monitors at home, and am completely unwilling to use my own computer for work), and I really wanted the separation between home and work. I’ve not worked in the office since March 2020, so nearly two years, and do NOT want to go back. (If I do need to do so, I will request a dual setup at work so I can be at home at least part of the time.) The thing that has made it work for me is that I have pretty hard boundaries: the desk is in a specific spot, it’s only for work, and I step away/log out at 5:00. I also wear “work clothes” for work and change out of them at the end of the day. And I’m close to retirement (less than 1.5 years, I hope), so . . . I’m angling to not go back to the office at all. I’m also lucky–no kids, I live alone–but I really appreciate being able to avoid the (short!) commute to work, etc.
catclub
I would say that once you reflexively decide you will oppose Biden’s nomination as ‘ur doing it rong’, then the mode of opposition is ‘whatever seems to work best’. and this is it.
Dog Dawg Damn
@PJ: so true. This has some really bad downstream effects in a remote world. Since the people who want to be seen constantly can only be seen in a meeting, they are often creating unnecessary meetings to get that precious visibility. I think remote work can be less efficient for this reason, and I’ve noticed it’s much more difficult to transition to remote than it is to start remote at a new job
catclub
more white bias.
Brachiator
@Ruckus:
Some of this is new and companies are trying to make adjustments. Sometimes we want instant solutions.
My nephew works for a big ass corporate main office and they are now mandating remote work as a reaction to the pandemic. They are trying to make it work since they seem to value their employees. We will see what happens.
At my former company, some staff, including sales people, would work from home two or three days a week. One of the main bosses would also work from home. Things ran fine. The IT people were very nimble at dealing with any connection issues that might occur, which was one of the biggest issues.
I have been doing remote work for three years now. I found that there are people who prefer this type of work, a kind of remote community, and they have tips that they pass along about home office setups, best headsets, etc.
There are other small adjustments that the company makes to accommodate remote work.
Not ex military, but I have had a home office before, and have developed a routine and a discipline for this. Basically, I don’t work for time I am not paid for. Emails sent after my work time are ignored until the next business day. But I am also not trying to climb a promotion ladder, so this also makes it easier to rebuff unnecessary claims on my time.
mrmoshpotato
@WaterGirl: We probably got 4″ inches over a couple days up north. Nothing crazy, but still boots weather because of the damn slush.
Brachiator
@Redshift:
RE: This is hard to duplicate/make up for with remote work.
One company I worked for that uses many remote worker had a Skype channel called “Water Color” for informal conversations and a way for people to get to know one another.
Also as I noted earlier, I have found that there are people who prefer and look for remote work. They think about the office differently, have different expectations.
dnfree
About 40 years ago, so practically forever in IT terms, I was working for a consulting company on a project at a huge corporation’s factory. We had weekly reports and constant oversight by the engineers of the local factory and the huge corporation.
Also working at the factory was an IT person from the huge corporation, installing their new payroll system. He went from facility to facility, spending about three months at each. We’d see him come in late, leave early, playing (primitive) computer games. Finally we asked him in the break room how he could get away with that, and he said oh, the installation of the new system took two weeks at most—he just told his bosses it took three months. That was my first exposure to “working” remotely.
More like 20 years ago, at another huge company, we hired a guy with what appeared to be a stellar background to work remotely. He worked in office with us to get familiar with the system and then came his first week of working from home. Our boss had a call with him on Thursday and his answers didn’t seem to reflect much progress. They checked his logins, and there hadn’t been any until that morning, No code had been changed all week. He was soon gone.
We also had people who did excellent work remotely, but it does require keeping tabs on employees.
WaterGirl
@mrmoshpotato: No slush at all here – we are still in the pristine white phase. (Gray slush is the worst.)
The snow here is over the top of my boots. Little Henry would be buried in the snow if I weren’t shoveling his “bathroom”.
Uncle Cosmo
He might. For a little while. Until POTUS walks in. Then he’ll stand. If he knows what’s good for him. As Josiah Bartlet famously remarked, “In this building, when the President stands, nobody sits.“
Geminid
@Sure Lurkalot: I just hear about this stuff. My business meetings are almost all face to face, and typically involve placement of peonies, etc. Or what to prune. I sometimes hand in a drawing of a patio on quarter inch graph paper.
Peale
Barring some kind new variant, I’ll be returning to the office 1 day per week starting in March 15, which is the 2 year anniversary of WFH for me. (Well, 2 + 2 days). My boss doesn’t work in the region, so I have no reason to show up. But I do want to get back in the habit of being presentable during the day and chit chatting. Unfortunately, I’ll have to get used to not having an assigned desk or regular set of faces to greet each day.
WFH I think has hurt the junior staff and those in need of mentorship quite a bit. We may find that this experience will have some add on affects of overcoming unconscious bias in promotions and assignments, but I think that is going to be offset by the isolation of senior managers from campus hires.
Baud
@Geminid:
I misread that.
Gravenstone
Wasn’t it one of the Bush’s who actually complimented a woman who told them about having to work three jobs? I vaguely recall the Bush idiot (interchangeable) thought it represented a fantastic opportunity for the woman.
Gravenstone
I eagerly anticipate reading where one or more of the grifters with access to that GoFundMe account strips it bare and vamooses.
Starfish
Remote work is going to change things in interesting ways.
My spouse’s place of work (he has been remote for a long time) is shuttering its offices in the most expensive regions.
Some people moved to more rural regions, so the pressure to stay in a high cost of living area is not there, unless your job wants to change your pay based on where you live.
Some people are taking their big California dollars to build nice houses in the middle of nowhere. I hope this brings money to small communities, and the small communities start to realize that hating on taxes is not just helping that one business owner in your town, but all sorts of coastal liberals who have moved into their town.
Office leases are typically multi-year. My company has much more office space than we are using, and we are spread out in many states now.
Ruckus
@Dog Dawg Damn:
As I said my work life has been both in workplace and out. But I am a rather independent person, have worked alone and in a 90 person company and worked/lived on a 300 person ship in the navy. I’ve had, my entire working life, differing situations, operating machines that in some instances were as big as my apt and in some where my office was a cell phone at an event. (Very early at that job it was a pager and an ATT phone card – pre cell phones, which I got as soon as they were practical, somewhere around 1995.) I count this a great way to see different working environments. That 90 person company was the one that I traveled and worked from a cell phone for about 8-9 months a year, and I had a cubical for the rest of the time. Was told one time that I was in the top 5% of renters at Hertz, I rented so often and for so much time a year.
Part of my all my full time jobs (and one of the part time ones) have been solving problems as they come up, no matter how small/big or expensive or inexpensive. This is something that a lot of people rarely or never see and for me it has made a big difference in independence and how to look at work. I’ve known a number of people that very rarely or never got to that level of decision making and it does effect how you look at work. For example, I once made a buying decision for a new machine in less than 5 minutes after first seeing/knowing of the machine. It cost $256,000. One of the best decisions I’ve ever made. Without the history of my working situations I would never have been able to do that.
Brachiator
The best part of remote work is not having to wear clothes. I don’t do Zoom. //
I kid. But my morning commute is to the kitchen to get a breakfast snack. Then home office in comfortable clothes. I might shave if I have a Zoom meeting.
You could not drag me back to an office.
gvg
I preferred working from home and got more done. I was mad they made us come back way too soon. I did miss the chatting with fellow employees which I still don’t have because I stay away in my office due to the pandemic still happening.
I hate the commute time waste.
What I heard when I came back was that other people had more problems. Most people don’t live alone, and their work setups were often much worse than mine. If spouse and 1 or more kids is also forced to be home, computer access, bandwidth and even enough desklike surfaces shortages are a problem. So is quite and privacy for confidential work rules. Chairs that didn’t kill backs were a problem. It turned out that some coworkers were very unproductive and managers couldn’t tell if it was real problems or just goofing off. They apparently decided the problems were widespread enough to make everyone come back, Then they didn’t have to risk lawsuits if they only made the unproductive come back.
It turns out that Covid didn’t equal a real good test of how remote on purpose and by choice would work. I suspect that will come but not till this is really over. Proximity bias is real. I didn’t get a bunch of issues solved until due to a bunch of retirements I was working directly under the Assistant director who became the director. It didn’t last but 6 months but I got things I needed for years after that. He told me he hadn’t even really known what I did till he had to supervise it.
Cameron
I thought Proximity Bias was a character in a James Bond movie. Perhaps I was mistaken.
Avalune
I like a hybrid model of work – in the office a couple days and at home a few days.
At Home: I have a nicer chair. I have a nicer desk. I have a nicer set up in general. My headphones don’t suck. My coffee is better. I can have a nice little coffee/donut break with my husband. I don’t have to fight traffic. I can throw some laundry in when I need to stand up to get away from said desk. The weather just about doesn’t matter. I can control the temperature in the room. There is no annoying pinging noise that sounds like a bomb countdown. No mice. I’m not catching the cold you got from your kids. I don’t have to listen to a bunch of people’s conversations wishing they’d take it somewhere else or shut it and consequently, I can focus more easily. We’ve actually gotten really good at utilizing teams to crowd source information when we’re dealing with something outside our expertise – so instead of just 1 or 2 colleagues, I have the teams at both campuses available. If work is slow because the work I do ebbs and flows – I can monitor it while doing some personal errands (like bill pay) instead of having to come up with ways to “look busy”.
That said – I do like to collab in person and see people at the actual location sometimes (though lets be real, we’re all sitting around bullshitting more than working on those days). Interacting directly with the students is nice. Less opportunity for someone to misread my tone or whatever, as in emails. So a mix of both modalities is great.
germy
“Once all the old racists die out we’ll usher in a new era of tolerance and liberalism…”
Brachiator
@gvg:
One of the good things about remote work is that I don’t have to watch people goof off.
I once worked for a company where some of the bosses would spend hours talking to other managers about football. They would also play video games on their desktops.
burnspbesq
The dirty little secret that no white man wants to talk about: at any given time, there are several dozen people who are qualified for the Supreme Court, and even after centuries of discrimination in law school admissions and law firm hiring, a MAJORITY of them are women and/or minorities. Every person about whom there has been speculation is in that pool.
You know the white guys are desperate when they’re talking up Sri Srinivasan, who they hate, as a preferred alternative.
Judge Jackson from the D.C. Circuit would be my pick, but if Biden wants to shiv Lindsey Graham by nominating an African-American woman from South Carolina, so be it.
Peale
@gvg: Yep. before COVID I had only worked from home occasionally – like when I needed to wait around for a plumber or a package. On those days, I just worked from my sofa with the laptop on my lap. I had a desk but I never used it. I didn’t have a chair. One of the best things I did was buy extra lighting and a chair I could sit in all day. I know a lot of coworkers who were assigned to dining room tables who complained of back issues. When it was obvious that this would go on for at least a year, they allowed people to come in and haul away desk chair.
Brachiator
@Cameron:
Great name for a Bond Babe.
“My name is Proximity Bias”
“How nice. Come closer.”
Peale
Yep. This is probably why suddenly proximity bias has become a concern. The owners of white collar worker suburban office parks are getting a bit nervous, let alone the owners of 80 story downtown buildings.
WaterGirl
@germy: 6 “children”? More like 6 white children. No, make that 6 white juveniles.
If these were 6 black “juveniles” the courts would be calling them a gang and pushing for them to be tried as adults.
Sometimes the world just makes me sick.
Cameron
@germy:”There’s seven people dead on a South Dakota farm/Somewhere in the distance, there’s seven new people born.”
Elizabelle
@Baud: Margaret Sullivan had an excellent column (natch) in today’s WaPost.
Jeff Zucker’s legacy is defined by his promotion of Donald Trump
I take no small pleasure in Zucker’s fall. Next up: Zuckerberg, please. Another odious executive.
germy
@WaterGirl:
Toddlers, really.
/
Baud
@burnspbesq:
Graham, for what I’m sure are purely political reasons unique to South Carolina, supports the S.C. judge under consideration.
(He may also have said good things about Judge Jackson. I can’t recall.)
Brachiator
@burnspbesq:
Judge Jackson would be great, but all the top potential candidates I have read about are good.
I would love it if Justice Thomas or another GOP Justice stepped down, and see Biden nominate another black woman.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Almost Retired: Back when I worked for the Evil Oil Company(hereafter referred to as EOC), they actually encouraged employee relationships, even in the same department. The one exception was that you could not have a romantic relationship with a direct(or even an indirect) report. That would get you fired quickly.
ETA: A good example of this was my supervisor when I was a paralegal, he had a relationship with the supervisor of the secretaries/word processing group, she later became my supervisor after I moved to the IT group. They later married.
Almost Retired
@?BillinGlendaleCA: A major oil company encouraging in-house romantic relationships? mmmmmm, as a plaintiff-side employment lawyer, I am involuntarily drooling…..
germy
@Brachiator:
I suspect Justice Thomas will never step down. Spite keeps him in his job. He’ll never give us the satisfaction.
Almost Retired
@?BillinGlendaleCA: To be fair, when I started dating the woman who I eventually married, she was my boss. So it’s definitely a “do as I say, not as I do” situation. Different times. I should have sued her.
Miss Bianca
@Parfigliano:
Heh heh heh. I like the way you think!
West of the Rockies
@germy:
Seems like a fairly sophisticated effort on behalf of these “children”.
Miss Bianca
@dnfree: I like ’em both. For example, today when there’s six inches of unplowed snow on my miles-high mountain driveway and the temperature is sub-zero, I am supremely grateful to be able to do parts of my job remotely. On the other hand, there are certain things that just happen organically if I am present in any of my offices (technically, I have three, at the moment) that comes as a result of personal interactions, even if what I’m actually *doing* at work is just sitting on my ass at my desk reading Balloon Juice.
SiubhanDuinne
@Almost Retired:
Just like the Obamas!
Sure Lurkalot
@Brachiator:
An up and comer (now CFO) at a company I worked at would peruse cars to purchase on his laptop during meetings. The fellow had upwards of 6 cars at any one time and changed them out often. It seemed the more cars he bought, the more he moved up in the company, the more money he made to buy more cars.
germy
@West of the Rockies:
Maybe they’re from Lake Wobegon. All those children are above average.
Miss Bianca
@Almost Retired:
Oh myyyyyy….I feel bad about my initial impulse to burst out laughing at this!
Steeplejack
@WaterGirl, @WaterGirl:
This discussion is maddening. “Zucker resigned [not fired] because of failure to disclose relationship” is the equivalent of “Politician resigns to spend more time with his family.” That’s just the flimsy cover story in front of the story behind the story.
It appears that Zucker’s relationship was an “open secret”—even the fembots at Fox News were tut-tutting about it (in safe hindsight, of course)—so presumably the powers at NBC could have pulled the trigger at any time. Why now?
From yesterday, right here on this very blog.
Et seq.:
Matthew Belloni:
Chris Cuomo may be preparing to sue NBC for wrongful termination (?) on the grounds that “Zucker told me it was okay to help my brother—he encouraged me, even.” In any case, a lot of unseemly stuff is likely to come out that could damage NBC’s reputation as a legitimate news organization.
Or, hell, it could just be that someone very powerful wanted Zucker gone and this was the stick that was used. But the whole “Ooh, he didn’t disclose a relationship that everyone knew he was having” discussion is just so much sawdust-sawing. IMHO, of course.
Miss Bianca
@Almost Retired:
Et tu? What hath Baud wrought?
Jay
@WaterGirl:
quite often, Corporate hand waves away the “non-disclosure” part as long as the Supervisor/Employee part of the relationship is severed, often through one of the persons either quitting, or transferring out of the reporting chain.
Workplace relationships are not uncommon, as “we” often spend more time at work with our co-workers than our families.
Steeplejack
@Baud:
“I’ll give you my pants when you pry them from my cold, dead haunches.”
Cacti
The Republicans are having a really hard time hiding their pointy white hoods on this issue.
PJ
@burnspbesq: There are no qualifications to be a Supreme Court justice. Amy Coney Barrett and Brett Kavanagh were appointed to the Supreme Court without having any significant litigation background or legal skills in general – they were party hacks.
?BillinGlendaleCA
When I worked at EOC, a co-worker had this in her office.
Cacti
@PJ: Yep. Both were just groomed by the Federalist Society judicial appointment machine.
CaseyL
I love WFH, unreservedly. I can sleep late, work in my jammies, not deal with a commute (though now that light rail has reached my area, the commute is a breeze), and play with the kitties all day. Plus get stuff done around the house if I need to.
On the negative side, I have become much more sedentary over the last two years. I make an effort to get out and about when the weather is good, but when it isn’t (like this time of year) I turn into a bump on a log. Also, I have to say, seeing how most of the human species (and, in particular, USAians) have behaved as if “Biggest Asshole In The World” is a contest worth winning… I’m perfectly happy not interacting with random strangers.
Note that I don’t mind going into the office, and it is really nice to see colleagues. But I just prefer WFH.
Cameron
@Steeplejack: Get off your dead ass?
Miss Bianca
@Peale:
That’s my at-home office situation as well!
Bill Arnold
@Peale:
Yep. There is a lot of scummy unethical money in commercial real estate, some of which is (whom are) pushing back-to-the-office narratives, often with obsolete (and bad) social science justifications.
(If it were offices with personal offices, with doors, OK, might be forgivable. )
This from the piece linked in that twitter thread:
The Hypocrisy Of The Two-Job Panic (Ed Zitron, 2022/02/02)
Pretty much; management often wants as close to slave relationships with their employees as they can get away with.
In a previous recent job (just barely pre-COVID), in an open plan office, the manager wanted “butts in seats” because his manager wanted “butts in seats”. The entire team was on both sides (and the end) of a long desk island, but the morning scrums were via a teleconferencing system (Cisco WebEx, that was, Zoom-like), usually with everyone within 20 feet of each other, with everyone on mute unless they were talking. (Toxic work environment for some people; almost killed me; took many months to repair the mental damage.)
With other islands nearby doing the same, or loud phone tech support. Average span of concentration (until after 5:00; a lot of work done after 5:00 because possible to focus.) was like 10-15 seconds.
trollhattan
Strange goings on in Baja Dakota.
When your Republican governor is too extreme for your Republican legislature….
PJ
@Steeplejack: 1) ATT is spinning off Warner, which includes CNN, prior to the “merger” (i.e. fire sale) to Discovery. Zucker’s affair, a serious ethical violation and possibility for liability, would have to be disclosed in the merger/sale documentation if he wasn’t fired (and if it wasn’t disclosed it would come up in due diligence if it were such an open secret). And who knows whether someone at Discovery or ATT wanted Zucker gone for other reasons, which may include
2) the fact that CNN’s rating apparently have plummeted since they can’t promote Trump anymore:
https://nypost.com/2022/01/12/cnn-sees-ratings-dive-by-90-from-2021-coverage/
lowtechcyclist
Actually, I’m in the opposite situation. I work for a Federal agency, and in a cost-saving move, GSA decided (shortly before the pandemic) to move a smaller agency into part of our space.
I don’t know if the smaller agency has moved in yet, but in the meantime, my agency decided in late 2020 that, since we were all working remotely anyway, we could continue doing that for another two years or more while they reworked the remaining space to shoehorn us all into it. So we have no choice in the meantime but to work remotely.
By the time we can move back into the building, I’ll have been working from home for three years, and I’ll be less than a year from retirement.
While there are pluses and minuses on both sides, frankly I’d have liked to be back in my cube (which no longer exists) once I was fully vaccinated last spring, mostly because I had a good workspace there, while my workspace at home is totally inadequate. Tiny desk (already overloaded with personal and HOA papers), room for only one monitor (had two at the office), it’s just hard to stay organized.
But at this point, after two years without a commute and a third year coming, my habits have changed and it’s hard to imagine that I’ll want to change my routine to drive into the office just for the last several months of my career. And I wonder how many of the people I’d like to be able to see again at the office will be there anyway. (I don’t see how they can say permanent full-time telework isn’t an option after forcing it on us for three years nonstop, though they’re talking as if the decision to allow that hasn’t yet been made. But if it’s an option, my guess is a LOT of people will stay home.)
trollhattan
@Miss Bianca: Baud 2024 offers complete liberation.
catclub
They still are.
realbtl
C’mon Baud has been coddled (coddled get your mind out of the gutter) for over 50 years.
No Shirt, no shoes, no service.
catclub
@Steeplejack: you keep interchanging NBC and CNN. I am confused.
Ruckus
@germy:
“Once all the old racists die out we’ll usher in a new era of tolerance and liberalism…”
Is that a quote from someone who lives in northern Montana and whose nearest neighbor is 260 miles away?
Sure Lurkalot
Great thread everyone, thoughtful reasons to prefer onsite, WFH and hybrid.
I retired before COVID, but prior I had a hybrid job. I had a small but nice office downtown with a paid parking space 24/7 that was sweet, state of the art equipment, lovely wall art and flowers. Asshole boss but he was out of the country half the time. WFH was great too, dedicated room, decently equipped, across from the laundry.
I found I worked onsite on nice weather days to go out to lunch or do something after hours…that justified the hour or so in my car both ways. Otherwise, it was nice and cozy at home on snowy days and I could weave in chores.
Individual circumstances and tastes, proclivities and social needs tend to define what works best for each individual. That there are options now..I think a good thing.
Ruckus
@germy:
He will lay/fall down one day though. It may not be soon enough for many of us but still, it’s only a lifetime appointment.
Ruckus
@Miss Bianca:
Oh myyyyyy….I feel bad about my initial impulse to burst out laughing at this!
Why?
………
I didn’t.
Ruckus
@PJ:
they were party hacks
Still are….
Eggbert
That op-ed writer is James R. Bailey who is identified as a “professor of leadership development.”
That title alone tell you all you need to know about this suck-up.
Ruckus
@catclub:
Great minds think alike……..
Steeplejack
@PJ:
Good points.
JustRuss
We had a Slack channel called Water Cooler, it was great. Lots of fun, and a good way to connect with coworkers. Then a couple asshats got into a tiff and management shut it down.
Another episode of Nice Things and Why We Can’t Have Them.
PJ
@Steeplejack:
@PJ: Also, Zucker and Gollust were apparently advising Andrew Cuomo throughout the pandemic, at the same time they were having him do exclusive televized chats with his brother:
https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/jeff-zucker-cnn-investigation-affair-cuomo-1294608/
JML
I’m currently in the hybrid mode: working from home 3 days a week, in the office 2…but I expect that to end in the next month or two, because my boss is in a bit of a control freak mode and wants everyone where he can see them. he’s also a people person who would rather do everything FTF at all times. (He’s also on his way out; retiring at the end of the FY)
I would love to continue my current model: skipping the commute is wonderful, and I have a good set up at home where I can kind of contain work to the home office. I do like coming into the office a couple of days a week to interact with people in the 3D world; I get better feedback on my projects when I can walk the mockups around to people over sending them a pdf file. but there’s no real reason for me to be in the office every day other than management wanting people where they can see them. I’ve worked more than a few jobs full-time from home, and I didn’t love it: the isolation can drag a bit and it can be hard to maintain work-life separation when the work is always kind of around. but having a separate workspace has helped that a LOT for me.
I also work at a university, and the senior leadership definitely is of the opinion “we’re different” than corporate when it comes to remote work, and they generally do not favor it. Even when we showed that we were delivering better service to students through better utilization of remote tools…they still live in constant fear of not having an office open for the walk-in. (and then it’s “well, it’s not fair to have some people remote and others coming in”) but a lot of it is simply about control: the people in power want their workers where they can see them.
At my workplace, they were forced into piloting a long-term WFH model for IT because otherwise they were simply going to lose too many of their employees to other shops. I suspect they’re going to try very hard not to roll it out for other areas of campus and pretend it’s only applicable to IT.
Steeplejack
@catclub:
Sorry, mental flub. It’s CNN.
Ohio Mom
@West of the Rockies: I wonder how old they are, the linked article doesn’t say. I could imagine teenagers having the skill sets needed to pull this off.
If you can put aside the nature of what they did, it’s very impressive. They worked well together as a group, they had good follow-through, were discrete. If only they used their talents for good.
Steeplejack
@Ohio Mom:
I think “children” is a term of art in stories like this, meaning “non-adult.” Maybe “juveniles” would have been better. Or maybe the authorities haven’t released any information at all about ages, so the reporting has to remain vague for now.
Steeplejack
Just read a story in the Post about the best barbecue places in the DMV, and now I’ve got a raging Q-hunger. Three of the places are very close to me. Might have to schedule an expedition.
debbie
@Ohio Mom:
At what age does a child become a juvenile? ?
debbie
@trollhattan:
Maybe not. Maybe they’re intentionally stymieing her because she’s snubbed them a few too many times in her drive to stardom. //
Kay
CISNational does programs revolving around low income public schools- not to replace the school, but in addition to it.
I feel like MacKenzie Scott’s donations are designed around making the other billionaires look egotistical, controlling and self promoting. They’re really different.
WaterGirl
@Steeplejack: As soon as you click on the “children” story, it says juveniles. So they clearly know they are juveniles, but they are downplaying this as coming from “children”.
it’s awful and irresponsible.
Miss Bianca
@Steeplejack:
Well, it was nice knowing you. Oh, you mean *Bar-B-Q*! Not conspiracy theories!
WereBear
I had worked myself up to a hybrid situation with two days a week at home, but it was emphasized as a “privilege.”
I finally lobbied for a quieter room where the writers were because this open plan office doesn’t work for anyone.
Steeplejack
Noah Schachtman: Further developments in the Zucker case:
(This tweet has a quote from the Rolling Stone article.)
Steeplejack
@WaterGirl:
“Juveniles” appears just in the headline, which is typically not written by the story’s author. I don’t know that you can impute sinister intent at this point.
HeleninEire
@SiubhanDuinne: Oh good catch. I had forgotten about that!!
Steeplejack
@Miss Bianca:
Q-hunger, not Q-thirst!
One of the places is very close to me, like two miles, so I’m feeling the pull. I used to go there a lot when it was owned by different people, but they retired and sold it to the current owners a few years ago (pre-COVID). I tried it a few times and thought the quality had gone way down. It was the second outpost for a popular place in Alexandria (Smoking Kow). So maybe they’ve gotten their act together now. There are a lot of barbecue places in the greater DMV, so getting a spot on the Post list is a big deal.
On the other hand, another of the top places is only about half a mile farther away than that, and there are a couple that are very close to the Trader Joe’s where I pick up my friend most Saturdays after her shift. An embarrassment of riches!
ETA: The Smoking Kow rating is for the operation as a whole, and I don’t think the article mentioned which location the reviewer ate at. So maybe the one near me is still the neglected stepchild. Worth checking out, though.
brantl
@Brachiator: Thomas will die in the job. He’ll never retire.
Ohio Mom
@Steeplejack: Also, the linked article is from the BBC and this could be a case of the English having a slightly different version of our shared language. I can’t see why the BBC would want to downplay this crime, maybe if this was from a paper from Little Backwards Town, Alabama.
I did a little googling and it looks like juvenile means under 18, at least in US law. If only Kay was here, this is her bailiwick.
brantl
@debbie: 11
HinTN
@Baud: We’ll get to gauge that sort next week when her nomination to the Circuit Court proceeds in the Judiciary Committee.
Miss Bianca
@Steeplejack: Just read that Rolling Stone article and all I got to say is: Damn, Skippy.
HinTN
@West of the Rockies: It was asserted that they are “tech savvy” but that’s a long way from conspiring to make these calls.
WaterGirl
@Miss Bianca: That was my first thought, too! “WTF?” was my second thought.
Third was realizing he meant BBQ. I have never see it called just “Q” before. Maybe that’s a Steep-ism. :-)
WaterGirl
@WereBear: Wait, what? Are you referring to the before times? Or did you get a new job and I missed it?
lowtechcyclist
@Steeplejack: Had to read that piece from the bottom up! You’d think they could have mentioned up front what town each BBQ place was in, because if it’s on the other side of the DC megalopolis, I’m not going to keep reading.
But some are at least not too far off my beaten path, so I’ll have to give ’em a try. One of them’s just off the east end of the Bay Bridge, which might be the easiest one for me to get to, even if I have to pay bridge toll.
Steeplejack (phone)
@lowtechcyclist:
I do the same thing with the Post food stories—check where the restaurant is—because there are some areas I’m just not likely to get to. Mostly I look for what’s on the NoVA side, of course.
I did mark that Bay Bridge place as a possibility for a stop on the way to Rehoboth Beach. There was a barbecue place a little east of there where I got great takeout a couple of times, but it disappeared. The rich tapestry of the restaurant life cycle.
Original Lee
@West of the Rockies: Late to the thread, but reasonably alert and intelligent young people know how to find info on the internet. I don’t doubt that there are how-tos for each step out there. Although I have to admit I’m not predisposed to doubt technical sophistication by children, as my son set up a Minecraft server on my husband’s spare desktop computer at the age of 8.
Soprano2
@Annie: I do not want to work remotely. I want separation between my job and the rest of my life. I’m so tired of this “worship” of remote work, and the assumption everyone wants to do it. The office is not evil, and Zoom meetings suck. Sometimes I think people with their camera off aren’t even really there. I think the people who are most enthusiastic about working at home hated the social aspect of being in the office and hate being around people in general.