this post was submitted on 30 Jun 2024
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Malicious Compliance

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People conforming to the letter, but not the spirit, of a request. For now, this includes text posts, images, videos and links. Please ensure that the “malicious compliance” aspect is apparent - if you’re making a text post, be sure to explain this part; if it’s an image/video/link, use the “Body” field to elaborate.

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Work from home (lemmy.world)
submitted 9 months ago by The_Picard_Maneuver@lemmy.world to c/maliciouscompliance@lemmy.world
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[–] Vaggumon@lemm.ee 35 points 9 months ago (3 children)

Wife was hired in 2014 for a position that was designed to be remote. They changed things in 2017 and tried to make her come into an office 2.5 hours away, 5 days a week. She's legally blind and doesn't drive, a fact they were fully aware of and had no issues with when they hired her. She tried to argue multiple times, and it just ended up going in circles with several managers getting pretty insulting to her. So, she quit, and eventually decided to contact a disability lawyer to inform the ex-employer she would be suing for discrimination, and ADA violations. Because they said some pretty stupid things in emails and voicemails. They ended up offering a nice sized settlement. She found another WFH job that paid 3x what she was making at the old place, with a higher level position and more closely fits her education. She's much happier with how things turned out for her. The position has been on various job sites for over 3 years and doesn't look like it's been filled since she quit, though I can't say that for sure.

[–] jelloeater85@lemmy.world 11 points 9 months ago (3 children)

They think we're cattle, but cattle won't eat the rich.

I have always told folks that I managed, that I'm nothing without them. Yea, I have a MBA as well, but man, are alot of those business folks short sighted to a fault. Like lack of empathy and foresight.

If your KPI's are based around having a knowledge worker in a chair in a room, your business should die.

Plain and simple.

[–] Texas_Hangover@lemm.ee 8 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Cattle will stampede if you piss them off enough.

[–] mitchty@lemmy.sdf.org 6 points 9 months ago

Cows will also chomp down on meat and little birds if given the opportunity. I grew up on a ranch herbivore doesn’t mean vegan like peeps seem to think it does. If they feel like they’re low on a nutrient and have opportunity they’ll nom on anything. No this isn’t pica either.

[–] pearsaltchocolatebar@discuss.online 6 points 9 months ago (3 children)

My boss is awesome. He realizes that his job is mostly to make sure we're able to do our jobs effectively. It really feels like I'm working with him, not for him, which is how it should be.

[–] scytale@lemm.ee 4 points 9 months ago

Same. My manager works in another country and he told me that it doesn’t matter where I work from because from his perspective I’m a remote employee wherever I sit.

[–] BCsven@lemmy.ca 2 points 9 months ago

Same, my manager contacts me a handful of times throughout the year, the rest of the time he trusts I'm doing what I am tasked to do. We had a company wide meeting at head office requiring travel for everyone, the schedule was on my kid's birthday. I conveyed that I would be missing the bday, and they shifted meeting a few days to accommodate. Not all corporations are heartless slave drivers

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[–] MonkRome@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

My sister in law is blind in one eye, but because she has one working eye she has no disability protection as far as I know. She still can't drive because she has no depth perception and it's very dangerous. It's made navigating going to work difficult over the years, often working the same place my brother did so he could drive her. Luckily her current employer works with her and lets her work from home. But a decade ago no one would have dreamed of letting her work from home.

[–] systemglitch@lemmy.world 8 points 9 months ago (2 children)

In Canada that would be labelled a legit disability without blinking an eye.

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[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Good

You should absolutely sue when your rights are violated. It is not ok for an employer to discriminate based on disability.

[–] sukhmel@programming.dev 4 points 9 months ago

I'm sure they don't even understand that it was a discrimination, judging by the fact that they went on and left a lot of evidence of their stupidity

[–] rikudou@lemmings.world 12 points 9 months ago (1 children)

It's sad that this is considered malicious at all. Seriously, either working from home is a risk for your company or it isn't, there's nothing in between.

[–] sunzu@kbin.run 4 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Well u see your employer reserves the right to always be right!

That's the benefit of being "leadership"

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[–] brax@sh.itjust.works 11 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Yup, my work pulled the same Bullshit. I can work from home and we all worked from home through COVID... But now suddenly I can't

So, there's been a few times where the power's gone out or something has happened that needs us at a remote location. They send the team home. The rest of the guys willingly go. I stay back and remind them that "gee, sorry. You guys have made it abundantly clear that I can't work from home. All those times I had to take personal time... So yeah, no. I'll just hang out here I guess until everything comes back up 🤷‍♂️"

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[–] whodatdair@lemmy.blahaj.zone 10 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Yup, they started to force me to drive to an office where none of the people I work with are, now that’s the only place I do work for them.

Used to think about and work on projects after hours if I found them interesting or realized a solution I hadn’t thought of. They’ve shown me they don’t care about my comfort, so I don’t feel the need to care about their problems either. The work will be there tomorrow.

They’re so divorced from reality that they think we’d just give up extra hours of our lives for commuting and keep up the same work output. Fuckin nope, going switch to doing the bare minimum it takes to keep you signing checks.

[–] damnthefilibuster@lemmy.world 10 points 9 months ago (1 children)

My SO was told to travel to office every day of the week, only to sit in zoom meetings because all of their team is elsewhere.

Reaaaal good use of everyone’s time and our non-renewable resources.

[–] EldritchFeminity@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 points 9 months ago (3 children)

Don't forget that it's also effectively a pay cut due to the added expenses and time lost in commuting. They should ask if the company is going to at least pay for the maintenance of the car if they aren't going to pay for the time spent commuting.

[–] snooggums@midwest.social 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Also the time spent getting ready for office appearances and prepping lunches (or the cost of buying lunches away from home).

[–] Ragnarok314159@sopuli.xyz 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

We are required to show up one day a week, but my employer usually buy breakfast and/or lunch. It’s a decent meal, not a shitty half slice of pizza.

None of us dress up. Not the bosses, the lawyer, no one. We sit in the conference room looking like it’s finals weeks. No one cares, and we get more done.

[–] neomachino@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 9 months ago

I do something similar, I'm on a dev team of 2 and a while back we started going in once a month for a "planning day" where we spend a couple hours in person planning out our month and spend the rest of the day talking to the teams who actually use our software to get feedback and ideas. At first the owner would take me and the other dev out for lunch but we've turned it into a whole office thing. So usually the whole offices shuts down for about 2 hours for a nice free lunch when we come in. One day a bunch of us went out for mini golf after lunch on the bosses dime. Another month a couple of us played old Xbox games and smoked cigs in the basement while we "brainstormed".

[–] brbposting@sh.itjust.works 1 points 9 months ago

“Here’s the invoice for the rental!”

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[–] MrShankles@reddthat.com 10 points 9 months ago

I work night shifts. My manager one time called me around 2pm to ask me something menial and waking me up (as I was still sleeping for my next shift at 7pm).

So naturally, I called him at 2AM when I was at work... because I had an "urgent" question about a work policy lol. He got the picture, and that shit never happened again

[–] Th4tGuyII@fedia.io 5 points 9 months ago (3 children)

It really saddens to me see how many managers out there treat their subordinates terribly, and then act surprised when their subordinates do the same - as though employees are meant to greatful for their terrible treatment

[–] ech@lemm.ee 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)
[–] brbposting@sh.itjust.works 4 points 9 months ago

Does ring true dunnit?

Sometimes people use "respect" to mean "treating someone like a person" and sometimes they use "respect" to mean "treating someone like an authority"

and sometimes people who are used to being treated like an authority say "if you won't respect me I won't respect you" and they mean "if you won't treat me like an authority I won't treat you like a person"

and they think they're being fair but they aren't, and it's not okay.

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[–] krnl386@lemmy.ca 3 points 9 months ago (3 children)

My guess is that some businesses get tax breaks from municipalities in exchange for filling office spaces with warm bodies. The idea is that people in office buildings support local businesses by buying lunch, and sometimes grabbing a pint after work.

I’m not trying to excuse this trend, in fact as an IT person myself I 100% agree with the sentiment, I’m just trying to share what I’ve been told.

[–] tinkling4938@lemmynsfw.com 4 points 9 months ago (1 children)

This is the excuse my employer gave. So I'm to take a pay cut (gas, wear and tear on my vehicle, loss of time to commute) so I can spend more money to prop up other businesses for a tax break that is likely to go into some rich ass C-levels bonus or shareholders pocket for cut costs?

Fuuuck that. Its just another way of picking the labor class clean to the bone.

[–] DrDickHandler@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago

Yes. That's exactly what is happening.

[–] gmtom@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Commercial realestste makes up a significant amount of rich people's investment portfolios. And if people stopped needing office space the property would devalue and those rich people would lose easy money.

So they have all collectively agreed to force their workers back to the office I order to keep the real estate values up and keep their investments positive.

[–] pelerinli@lemmy.world 1 points 9 months ago

Also rich can afford to have a investment in busy city areas while regular folk can get a house in urban areas at best. And work from home is leading people to the urban areas where rents are less.

[–] friend_of_satan@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago

It's even simpler than that: they leased the office space and have to continue to pay that lease or else pay an early termination fee. This is basically the sunk cost fallacy. But you are right that sometimes additionally they get tax breaks for certain office space, for instance the San Francisco mid-market tax break (AKA the Twitter tax break)

[–] jeanofthedead@sh.itjust.works 3 points 9 months ago (5 children)

I can’t believe people have work apps on their personal devices. Delete that shit!

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[–] FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

It's astonishing.

The capitalists know full well we're more productive working remotely, but their need for control has proven to be stronger than their insatiable greed anyway.

[–] AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Just more proof that cruelty is the point. They've known since the 70s that they'd be richer than they are if they would pay thriving wages and eliminate poverty. They want the suffering more than the money.

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[–] BilboBargains@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago (2 children)

We have to call their bluff from time to time and remind the management that without us, none of their shit works. When we down tools its not like they can pick them up and get the show back on the road.

[–] Taohumor@lemmy.world 1 points 9 months ago

Kinda sad this is what it comes down to that they can't be reasoned with like humans. I'd be looking for a new place to work.

[–] Asafum@feddit.nl 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

"I can grab any piece of shit off the street and replace you in 20 seconds." Is what most of them think when it comes to meat machine labor like myself. :(

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[–] olutukko@lemmy.world 2 points 9 months ago (3 children)

in my country you're not obligated to answer to anything work related after your work hours unless you're manager or superior or it is exliciptly said in work contract that you be on call.

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[–] deltreed@lemmy.world 1 points 9 months ago

"You are not allowed to work from home unless we want you working from home" is basically their slogan. It's so funny how these companies are ok with upper management working from home, or having remote locations in India where they work from home, or when it comes to working overtime/after hours from home. But, can't do it on a day to day basis. Horrible companies.

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