I feel like this has been said to death. But the new 4:1 schedule seems unfair for lower to mid level employees especially those with families and child care.
Our salaries are not competitive or high enough, especially with a 3% raise in a time where costs are prohibitively high, to ask people to financially and personally adjust their life all in the name of “collaboration.” If there are employees who are having trouble collaborating without being in the office, address that problem as they obviously are lacking a work ethic or drive to communicate effectively.
If we go back 4:1, I can only see employee retention and morale not suffering if people who are at or below directors are offered increased compensation or more employee resources like a company car or gas card.
As an example, I personally have a lease. I leased that car based on a 3:2 hybrid schedule after calculating the miles. 4 days a week will 100% have me upside on my miles months if not a year before my lease is up. I’ve heard some people say to “move closer”. Well, I don’t get paid enough to move closer. Yet, while I’m told I’m an invaluable and integral part of my department, I have to entertain leaving the company as the commute time (especially lately), the pay, my car lease, and me seeing my children less are not worth what the company currently offers me.
We already have a wage gap issue in our country and more so in NJ, but many of your employees who are not directors don’t make enough to live close enough to the city they work in. It seems that the people making this decision don’t understand that or quite frankly don’t care.
I also saw a review on HR shooting down a salary but not a promotion. I have seen that happen numerous times where the department head could still not override what HR wanted. This seems to be another instance where it’s not what the employee wants. This seems like a “you don’t know what you want, we know what’s best for you” situation.
