Is it just who the manager likes the most? Seriously, Walt said they aren't even auto-exempting people like me where it is unreasonable for us to drive into the office due to where we live. We know the percentage allocation is 18%. Has anyone seen concrete guidelines on what managers use to decide who goes in to office and who can stay home?
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My department is rejecting all exceptions. I live 2.5 hours from my local center and was rejected.
I understand that layoffs = bad press. But layoffs target the lowest performers, while this rto madness will push out the top performers who likely have the juice to land a new, remote role more easily. It is also crazy to me that they can hire a full time telecommuter, change their work location for no reason and will have no legal exposure. (I understand At Will employment but my job offer doesn't have any disclaimer about change of work location.)
@1onm+1nm9Ahxr yes. They are absolutely tightening down after the first pass. And the next exception round is in January. Not 6 months from October. Nobody is guaranteed to maintain their exemption.
@fgc+1nm9Ahxr LMAO
At least in my organization, they want to keep exceptions at an absolute bare minimum. Unless you are a life or death situation, they do not give a flying f—k about your exception request. I had a sympathetic and transparent manager who reviewed my exception (medical and family situation) but it was smacked down the moment it was presented to the next rung. They want attrition. You could be a full time caretaker of your sick parents and they would laugh in your face with meaningless platitudes about in person collaboration. They know that a good amount of people requesting exceptions don’t fall into their lazy gen z stereotype bucket they have on hand, and they don’t give a s—t. They want people gone without paying severance and they want people in the offices that they pay rent on or own. Best case scenario even for people that are blessed with a 6 month exception is 1 ride on the exception merry go round, then move closer or f—k right off.
2 Hours?!?!? That is just off the hook crazy. If that's the standard being used, congratulations Southeast Oklahoma City. You just became a suburb of Dallas. Who comes up this stuff?????
I was told there were 3 groupings
- People that were remote pre pandemic
- People that live too far away, I am not sure the exact criteria though but I thought I heard more than 2 hours from an office
- People hired as remote, post pandemic
Medical accommodations are not counted towards the 12% and 18%. Your Dr has to fill out an accommodations form, I have a condition and the specialist that treats me said they don't provide accommodation recommendations etc. I did some research and it's not uncommon foe doctors to do this as they are not ADA specialists. HR told me to check with my other doctors. So I think it's safe to say, it's not easy to get a legitimate medical accommodation approved to work remotely.
My thought is exceptions will only go to people nowhere near a service center and are consistently highly rated or otherwise considered mission critical.
The guidelines I've been told to follow are:
12% of your direct PL's can have an exception, rounded down
18% of your IC's can have an exception, rounded down
It's manager discretion who does and does not get an exception. Right now, at the MD level they're trying to pare down the requests. I've seen some numbers as has as 70-80% of an MD's staff have put in exception requests, so the lower level managers are being asked to rate whether someone is at high or low risk of leaving, and how critical they are to the team. Rack and stack your staff, and see if you get closer to the approved numbers that way.
I still have no idea who is going to be approved or not and Im moving across the country because leadership gave me the green light ages ago. Sucks to be me.
They are hoping people like you quit as it will save Schwab on layoff expenses.
Move closer to the office? Hmm. why not just offer relocation assistance to people who were hired as full time remote? It’s easier said than done to pack up a family, kids in school and sell a house into a market that much more expensive. Yes, let’s just pack up and incur all those costs for the company.
I live almost 2 hours away and was not granted an exception
Heard its a 90 minute commute from a service center.
Sure, I'll just go and buy a new house with a high interest rate loan, pack up my family, and move closer to an office that may be shutting down whenever EC feels like they want to stop paying rent. I'm just like EC; they pay people like me millions of dollars a year so this will be very easy for me. Oh and they might just lay us off anyway if this soft layoff with RTO doesn't save them enough money. Sounds like a plan!
Why not move closer to the office, I assume your employer pays you a salary ?