Thread regarding Bank of America layoffs

Pre-pandemic drove solid hour in rush hour traffic to sit in a very tiny cubicle in a dirty, dusty office to work via phone with clients 5 states away. Low-life creep-a-zoid manager sat 3 states away, rarely visited. Daily pleasantries of hello/goodbye to co-workers, rare team meetings in-person. I would do my job and go home for yet another solid hour in rush hour traffic. When local main freeway to work was under construction for 6 months, I asked for a temporary hybrid work arrangement and was denied. It was taking me 1.5-2+ hours to get to the office. All my supporting bank employees - analysts, support personnel, etc. - could work from home whenever they wanted. So much for work-life balance or flexible work arrangements.

Just because someone is in the office doesn’t mean they will make connections. If you have any kind of social skills you should be able to connect in any setting. The office would probably be worse because people pick and choose who to connect with which would make the quiet ones feel even more isolated. The internship program suffered because this bank doesn’t seem to know how to change with the times. If the world became completely virtual this bank would fail miserably. Here’s a suggestion, create a virtual internship program!

What I don’t get about being in the office is that you’re stuck with finding the best talent within a 50-mile radius, maybe less. When you open it up to remote work, you get to pick the best talent in the country. So many great, qualified candidates who won’t even apply because they aren’t located near an office.

This whole idea of "you must be face to face to succeed" is nonsense. I have not met any of my past 6 managers in person because they've all been based in other cities. We've all succeeded quite well.

"That accountant must go to the restaurant, they must bring in the business travelers.”
~NYC Mayor "Party All The Time With Celebrities" Adams

https://nypost.com/2022/04/28/mayor-adams-slow-return-to-offices-will-hurt-economic-recovery/amp/

Opportunities need to be provided to network with interns. As a heavily seasoned employee I have one recent intern turned employee who became my go to for bouncing ideas off of and learning of the latest software development tools. I have never met this person physically nor need to.

That's actually bad for the younger workers. Creating those connections and networking is important in your early career. As much as everyone wants remote work we've created a bunch of people isolated from each other. Internships have really struggled. I think we did our interns a big disservice during the pandemic, not because they were remote but because BOA has never had a great program and the pandemic made it worse.

I manage a lot of our software developers and the entry level folks know almost no one and are basically treated as invisible. Many of them never turn on cameras, have made no connections with anyone, and aren't performing very well.

I know everyone wants to work from home but I think it's a very self-centered and narrow view of their career.

On the other hand, BOA is doing a completely awful RTO. If you can find a company doing a worse job than us trying to bring people back and more awful messaging around it please name them because I can't find it.

You forgot 1 thing. We work for BOA. They do not listen to reason. They do not care about employee morale or retention.

I'm not waiting around.