Dave
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"It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future." Yogi Berra
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Post by Dave on May 23, 2022 1:36:04 GMT -8
Good morning. We’re starting this week with a little green in pre-market this morning. Let’s hope that it stays this way and continues to grow throughout the week. What to Expect in the Markets This Week
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Dave
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"It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future." Yogi Berra
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Post by Dave on May 23, 2022 1:49:37 GMT -8
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Dave
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"It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future." Yogi Berra
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Post by Dave on May 23, 2022 2:02:24 GMT -8
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Dave
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"It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future." Yogi Berra
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Post by Dave on May 23, 2022 2:26:08 GMT -8
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Post by playultimate on May 23, 2022 5:38:51 GMT -8
The danger that I see is if there is no longer a need for employees to be physically present then the people must compete with qualified people throughout the world and companies will not have to deal with physically bringing in employees from offshore and the associated government regulations. Basically, you have opened a Pandora’s Box of unintended consequences. Just a thought. This is basically a "The World is Flat" moment for intellectual labor. (albeit, this has been the case for support and programming for awhile). The primary beneficiaries of this moment would be those in industries that require personnel to be on-site.
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chinacat
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Post by chinacat on May 23, 2022 5:39:29 GMT -8
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mark
fire starter
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Post by mark on May 23, 2022 5:48:17 GMT -8
We already have to compete with qualified people around the world. That's how multinationals work, they have design/manufacturing/etc sites all over the world.
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chinacat
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Post by chinacat on May 23, 2022 7:35:38 GMT -8
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JDSoCal
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Post by JDSoCal on May 23, 2022 8:18:13 GMT -8
This WFH thing will stabilize, as all supply and demand ultimately does, assuming the governments can ever give up their beloved "emergency powers" (our King in California has not). And the best companies in the world will pay the appropriate premiums for the best of the best to actually show up at work. It's silly to assume the best employees want to sit at home in their PJ's. Those are not employees I'd want, and I'm sure Steve wouldn't want. By definition the best of the best want to come in and collaborate on world-changing products. If you don't want to come to work, you are simply not the best employee, regardless of whatever skills you might have. That's like saying this quarterback has the best arm and is the most accurate and makes the best reads in practice, but he always has some excuse not to play in the games. Useless!
I say, "bye Felicia!". The entitled will ultimately see themselves replaced. I, for one, really miss the classroom and can't wait to go back in fall...
Now, cue all the entitled telling me why they are special:
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Post by Lstream on May 23, 2022 10:56:01 GMT -8
I believe that many people think that work-from-home is just as good from the company’s perspective. And that nothing is lost. Not true. Especially where the creative process is needed. Like new product development. Anyone who think that scheduled Zoom meetings or messaging on Teams or Slack all day, replaces the ideation process that springs up when people are together are kidding themselves.
In my companies, some of our best thinking and ideas happened randomly and spontaneously when people happened to be together and were tossing around ideas. And were free to bring in other people who were a few steps away. This stuff would have never happened in todays world, where everything important gets scheduled over Zoom.
Same goes for team building like suddenly deciding to have lunch together. There is an entire human dimension to work that is going to disappear with this trend.
An anecdote. My son is a software engineer in Minneapolis. Decided that he wanted to give the whole big tech thing a try. One of the Silicon Valley big names just hired him. To work remote. He has been forced to work remote due to Covid. With a local company. Finds it kind of lonely and distant. He would much rather have an office to go to, but the compensation package is just too compelling to turn down. But that package is still lower than what these companies have to pay for workers in the valley.
This whole thing works both ways. If all the hot shots in the valley insist on throwing away one of their competitive advantages by insisting on working from home, then their employers can hire someone remote for less money. Anywhere in the world. And if I was running an engineering group there, then I would have no hesitation in looking for remote workers elsewhere.
One more thing - almost every big tech company in Silicon Valley is or soon will be implementing hiring freezes. Let’s see how all of this turns out when the supply/demand situation shifts towards the employer.
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Post by duckpins on May 23, 2022 11:35:49 GMT -8
This WFH thing will stabilize, as all supply and demand ultimately does, assuming the governments can ever give up their beloved "emergency powers" (our King in California has not). And the best companies in the world will pay the appropriate premiums for the best of the best to actually show up at work. It's silly to assume the best employees want to sit at home in their PJ's. Those are not employees I'd want, and I'm sure Steve wouldn't want. By definition the best of the best want to come in and collaborate on world-changing products. If you don't want to come to work, you are simply not the best employee, regardless of whatever skills you might have. That's like saying this quarterback has the best arm and is the most accurate and makes the best reads in practice, but he always has some excuse not to play in the games. Useless! I say, "bye Felicia!". The entitled will ultimately see themselves replaced. I, for one, really miss the classroom and can't wait to go back in fall... Now, cue all the entitled telling me why they are special: Having creative co workers and the interaction with them is a great time in life. Not sure if the same feelings and results can be generated by the isolation and a window to the internet. The future will tell.
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Post by hledgard on May 23, 2022 11:41:42 GMT -8
Really thoughtful post, Lstream !
There is another body of work on the idea of a 4-day work week. This does not mean you choose which 4 days. It is a company or agency that has a fixed 4 days to work (perhaps with 32 or even 35 hours).
This is a complex issue, but relates to the game.
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Dave
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"It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future." Yogi Berra
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Post by Dave on May 23, 2022 12:15:56 GMT -8
Wow, that’s a lot of green!
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Post by nwjade on May 23, 2022 12:34:15 GMT -8
I believe that many people think that work-from-home is just as good from the company’s perspective. And that nothing is lost. Not true. Especially where the creative process is needed. Like new product development. Anyone who think that scheduled Zoom meetings or messaging on Teams or Slack all day, replaces the ideation process that springs up when people are together are kidding themselves. In my companies, some of our best thinking and ideas happened randomly and spontaneously when people happened to be together and were tossing around ideas. And were free to bring in other people who were a few steps away. This stuff would have never happened in todays world, where everything important gets scheduled over Zoom. Same goes for team building like suddenly deciding to have lunch together. There is an entire human dimension to work that is going to disappear with this trend. An anecdote. My son is a software engineer in Minneapolis. Decided that he wanted to give the whole big tech thing a try. One of the Silicon Valley big names just hired him. To work remote. He has been forced to work remote due to Covid. With a local company. Finds it kind of lonely and distant. He would much rather have an office to go to, but the compensation package is just too compelling to turn down. But that package is still lower than what these companies have to pay for workers in the valley. This whole thing works both ways. If all the hot shots in the valley insist on throwing away one of their competitive advantages by insisting on working from home, then their employers can hire someone remote for less money. Anywhere in the world. And if I was running an engineering group there, then I would have no hesitation in looking for remote workers elsewhere. One more thing - almost every big tech company in Silicon Valley is or soon will be implementing hiring freezes. Let’s see how all of this turns out when the supply/demand situation shifts towards the employer. I'm a retired software engineer in Seattle and worked the last 10 years remote before retiring. The Seattle company I worked for was acquired by a Fortune 500 financial services company based out of Wisconsin 15 years prior to my start date of WFH. So this is way before the current work from home phenomenon accelerated by advances in tech and the pandemic. In my case corporate decided to scale down the Seattle offices in a big way and laid off most of customer services and near all of the 30 programming staff down to 3. I was one of the 3 remaining software people because no one had the knowledge to support the online/offline application I was responsible for. My situation was different with corporate acquiring companies for their clients and shutting down data centers but I agree with everything you said. I was part of a team when working from home just as I was part of many teams over the years when working from the office. There is no comparison, there is much more creativity, accomplishment and reward from working at the office (If you wanted to climb the corporate ladder at all it wasn't going to happen working from home that's for sure). During my 10 years of WFH I only received cost of living raises and that's it but I didn't care because of my investment in aapl. I was fine with drawing a paycheck, good health care and do my projects with no time clock and a weekly conference call status meeting with corporate and that's it. That is the context highly competitive corporations such as Apple want to avoid today and rightly so...
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ono
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Post by ono on May 23, 2022 12:51:21 GMT -8
One more thing - almost every big tech company in Silicon Valley is or soon will be implementing hiring freezes. Let’s see how all of this turns out when the supply/demand situation shifts towards the employer. Yes. And likely some layoffs. A lot of those “growthy” companies aren’t going to be growing. The scarcity of tech talent - may become a little less scarce. I hope Apple is picking off talented engineers from companies whose shares have been decimated and [with many hired in the last two years] whose RSUs are deep underwater. Offers loaded with AAPL RSU grants at these AAPL prices should be attractive. This is from approximately the third week of April, by Horace. I've not seen an update.
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Post by dc930 on May 23, 2022 13:51:57 GMT -8
I think my opinion of work from home has changed drastically over the past 3 years. On one hand, COIVD forced our company to be 100% remote for ~18 months and fortunately our systems were set up to be able to accommodate that. That's the rub though, the fact that a company can survive and actually excel with 18 months of zero in-person interaction is a bit of a head-fake. I believe that true company culture can only be built with regular in-person interaction. Fortunately, we had a strong foundation and were able to weather the storm. We are now transitioning into a full hybrid schedule and downsizing physical office space; optimized for in-person gatherings and collaboration.
I must admit being able to work at home with 2 children under the age of 4 has been a blessing and I think that effective companies will inevitably have to find that happy medium. I will never claim to have a job as demanding as Apple Engineer, but the 2-3 days in the office per week seems to strike a nice balance. I would not have thought so before the pandemic. But life changes and individuals and companies have to change with it.
Would I be a better employee being in the office 5 days a week now? Perhaps. But I would miss out on having breakfast with my kids and late afternoon walks to the playground. If the pandemic never happened, we would have been fine - likely seeking out a nanny or some other outside help, so I can't say for sure what would have happened. If I were single and in my 20's I would hate sitting at home all day. Now that I have a family that calculus has changed and avoiding the 30 minute commute a few times a week has real value to me.
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Post by Lstream on May 23, 2022 14:28:36 GMT -8
I get that there is value to the employee. After founding 3 companies in the tech space, I can’t help but look at this from the perspective of the guy who has his own money at risk. And shareholders who have risked their money too, and expect performance, including the best products possible. I think WFH severely impairs delivering those products. Along with impairing teamwork and building a closely bonded culture.
That culture helps people stick together when the going gets tough. And it aways does. How do you even read a room, when everyone is at the other end of a a data connection, in some little box on a screen? You don’t. I have been in countless staff meetings during difficult times, where I needed to surmise what people were thinking, and address what was bugging them. Where they had to have faith in me. Serious stuff. Or in situations where you know the shy employee has something valuable to say, but won’t unless you recognize that and draw it out of them. The only way that kind of situation works is live.
I don’t think I would even try starting a company with remote employees. It would feel like a huge disadvantage against any competitor who didn’t have that issue to deal with.
Replacing real human interaction with cold Zoom calls loses something significant in the work environment in my opinion.
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Post by zebrum on May 24, 2022 1:46:14 GMT -8
Snap -30% after hours, Tues will be ugly
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Dave
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"It's tough to make predictions, especially about the future." Yogi Berra
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Post by Dave on May 24, 2022 2:41:35 GMT -8
Let me add one more thing. Not all people are capable of handling the distractions of the home environment and be a productive employee. If their concentration is easily broken than WFH may not be the best environment as their priorities are being challenged moment by moment.
This has been a great discussion. Thanks
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mark
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Post by mark on May 24, 2022 5:48:01 GMT -8
I get that there is value to the employee. After founding 3 companies in the tech space, I can’t help but look at this from the perspective of the guy who has his own money at risk. And shareholders who have risked their money too, and expect performance, including the best products possible. I think WFH severely impairs delivering those products. Along with impairing teamwork and building a closely bonded culture. That culture helps people stick together when the going gets tough. And it aways does. How do you even read a room, when everyone is at the other end of a a data connection, in some little box on a screen? You don’t. I have been in countless staff meetings during difficult times, where I needed to surmise what people were thinking, and address what was bugging them. Where they had to have faith in me. Serious stuff. Or in situations where you know the shy employee has something valuable to say, but won’t unless you recognize that and draw it out of them. The only way that kind of situation works is live. I don’t think I would even try starting a company with remote employees. It would feel like a huge disadvantage against any competitor who didn’t have that issue to deal with. Replacing real human interaction with cold Zoom calls loses something significant in the work environment in my opinion. What about the shy employee that is much more comfortable communicating electronically (zoom, text, slack, whatever)? There were studies done a few years ago of gamers (teens and young adults) and one of the conclusions was that there is a class of people that are "different" online than in real-life, they are more engaging, more assertive, and generally better at what they do (interacting with others in this case). My feelings about WFH (after 2+ years of it) are mixed. It works well for some people, and for some types of work, but it doesn't work as well for others. I definitely miss the interaction with most of the folks at the office. But I also think that it isn't necessary for everyone to be in the office everyday. I suspect that we will evolve to a mixed style of working, sometimes from home, sometimes in the office, and for some people sometimes from elsewhere. I have a few colleagues that purchased a second home (seasonal, to be close to an elderly parent, etc) and have worked from there for a few months out of the year. I don't think starting a typical company (creating/making something and selling it) completely remote would work well. Except perhaps something like a pure contract programming company. And even that would probably gain something from an initial f2f period I have a friend who runs a software contract house in India and he finds benefit in going over there periodically to meet his people f2f (mostly his managers, not so much the individual programmers anymore).
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4aapl
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Post by 4aapl on May 24, 2022 11:28:48 GMT -8
My feelings about WFH (after 2+ years of it) are mixed. It works well for some people, and for some types of work, but it doesn't work as well for others. I definitely miss the interaction with most of the folks at the office. But I also think that it isn't necessary for everyone to be in the office everyday. I suspect that we will evolve to a mixed style of working, sometimes from home, sometimes in the office, and for some people sometimes from elsewhere. I have a few colleagues that purchased a second home (seasonal, to be close to an elderly parent, etc) and have worked from there for a few months out of the year. I don't think starting a typical company (creating/making something and selling it) completely remote would work well. Except perhaps something like a pure contract programming company. And even that would probably gain something from an initial f2f period I have a friend who runs a software contract house in India and he finds benefit in going over there periodically to meet his people f2f (mostly his managers, not so much the individual programmers anymore). That is the thing, that it works better for some people, and works better for some jobs. Being in the office 2-4 days per week would give the ability to work closely when needed, but give flexibility too. And there's that whole traffic thing. Even 15 years ago, that 8 mile commute from Apple would take 30 minutes on a Friday, enough that I could bike it in the same time. Free workout! The interesting thing about having to be onsite very often is that you mostly can't live somewhere else, and so it wouldn't likely change regional housing costs in a dramatic way. That said, we knew 3 families here in town where the dad would fly out for 4-5 days of work over 2-5 years, so some do it. And a co-worker at Apple moved up to Sacramento and at first would come down to Cupertino for a couple days every other week, staying with a friend. As I've said before, 10% of the people on our team worked 100% remote. ~3 were in a small company in CO that was bought out years/decade+ earlier. Another moved to Tucson. All 4 of them were Software Engineers, and might come out for a week a year. I forget the others at the moment, but it was ~12 in a ~120 person organization. Another had a place in Tahoe, and would work up here in the ski season so he could have plenty of time at what is now Palisades at Tahoe (1960 winter olympics, formerly known as Squaw Valley). On the "this wouldn't work with starting a typical company", it can depend a little. I was on a small 15 person startup where it was completely remote. 3 real benefits for the company were lower costs (I know I was underpaid compared to elsewhere, but the flexibility made it worthwhile though still low), timezone offset (the typical off-shore benefit of one person finishing up their day, another then having theirs, and stuff just magically happening before person 1 starts their next day), and the ability to find enough top employees in a niche field. This was creating a web-based IDE for a small functional programming language, using that language. This let them find developers who were passionate and knowledgable about the language, whereas finding enough employees in one physical location would have been difficult. Let's say that there were only 100 top notch people in AR around the globe, and Apple wanted to hire 20 of them. There should be some offer that Apple could make to get enough to move to the same place, or hire them away from local companies if there is already enough people locally. But if they are willing to have some work remote, it opens a lot of opportunities. That said, there are huge portions of Apple that are at least somewhat fungible. I think the hard part in scaling up over the past 20 years has been moving on from just the super-passionate and good/great employees, to just good/great employees. I know while I was there, some of the new hires just hadn't been on a Mac, much or at all. That's a whole different person that one who had been entrenched in the ecosystem for years/decades, along with the fight of the underdog, the whole David vs Goliath storyline. But that's just another challenge that Apple has managed to push through over the years. There's no perfect answer for every company, every job, or every person. But having some flexibility lets Apple retain or hire people that would otherwise leave or not be with the company. At the same time, giving some options to the masses can be helpful for both sides. It's happening. This is just the negotiating and slow moving stage, with Apple holding back from some negative feedback, but it probably also went hand in hand with the recent mask policy at 100 stores. Apple does want employees back on site more than they are currently required, but sometimes it takes small steps, especially it times where employees feel they have lots of other options, and available new hires are down.
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Dave
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Post by Dave on May 24, 2022 12:27:14 GMT -8
And I think that this is the key. 4aapl said: “Apple does want employees back on site more than they are currently required, but sometimes it takes small steps, especially it times where employees feel they have lots of other options, and available new hires are down.” It’s that supply and demand thing.
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4aapl
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Post by 4aapl on May 24, 2022 12:45:55 GMT -8
And I think that this is the key. 4aapl said: “Apple does want employees back on site more than they are currently required, but sometimes it takes small steps, especially it times where employees feel they have lots of other options, and available new hires are down.”It’s that supply and demand thing. That, and changeover on a large scale is tough to deal with. HR would have a guess, but it seems like 3-5% per year would be average, whereas 10-20% would be very disruptive and cause business problems.
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