UK chancellor: Getting back to the altar of corporate dreams (the office) will boost young folks' careers
- Reference: 1627995073
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2021/08/03/uk_chancellor_rishi_sunak_returning_to_office/
- Source link:
Talking to LinkedIn News – no, really – Rishi Sunak reflected on his own career, and observed that he would not have been able to build strong networking relationships had he been working from home.
Sunak, who was privately educated at elite fee-paying school Winchester College, said he'd been chatting to young people about how to get on in their careers.
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"I was telling them that the mentors I found when I first started my job I still talk to and they have been helpful to me even after we have gone in different ways. I doubt I would have had those strong relationships if I was doing my internship or my first bit of my career over [Microsoft] Teams and Zoom. That’s why I think for young people in particular being able to physically be in an office is valuable."
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Quite why the Chancellor singled out Teams and Zoom is unclear, we at The Reg are an equal opportunities discriminator and would like to point out to readers that other collaboration solutions are just as annoying.
It's also not certain which job Sunak was talking about. After leaving Lincoln College Oxford, where he was awarded a first in Politics, Philosophy and Economics, he had a brief internship with Conservative Party Campaign Headquarters before joining Goldman Sachs. The investment bank has also [4]spearheaded a return-to-the-office policy , although whether that move was influenced by its considerable commercial property portfolio is anyone's guess.
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Anyway, Sunak's argument seems to be that 30 seconds at the water cooler with the assistant vice president of product marketing will do for the average young person's career what his office networking did for his trajectory. After he left Goldman Sachs, he became a partner in a hedge fund and a director of investment firm Catamaran Ventures, [6]owned by his father-in-law , N R Narayana Murthy, billionaire founder of outsourcing giant Infosys.
His career as an MP began in 2014, and he became chancellor during the opening chapters of the pandemic. In that role, Sunak masterminded an Eat Out to Help Out scheme which [7]contributed to a second wave of COVID-19 in the UK , putting an end to the government's first effort at getting people to return to the office.
Sunak said that in this latest reopening the government was leaving the decision up to individual businesses as to whether they haul staff back into the office or not.
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"We've kind of stopped saying that people should actively work from home and have now left it up to businesses to figure out the right approach. In terms of a return to work... in keeping with everything else that we are doing, it's been gradual, it's cautious, it's careful, so there will be a gradual return back to the offices," he told LinkedIn News, the business networking site for bullshitters.
[9]This always-on culture we're in is awful. How do we stop it? Oh, sorry, hold on – just had another notification
[10]Pyjama bottoms crew, listen up: In 2022 we'll still be at home
[11]Hybrid working? Buckle in, there's no turning back as survey takers insist: You can't make us go back
[12]Does the boss want those 2 hours of your free time back? A study says fighting through crowds to office each day hurts productivity
[13]You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here. Fujitsu tells 80,000 of its Japan employees: From now on, you work remotely
In tech land, Cisco has become the latest big biz to talk about the big return to the office. It is experimenting with giving team leaders the freedom to decide how many staff will work on site and at what frequency.
Switchzilla said last week that [14]fewer than one in four staff anticipate working in the office.
Many tech vendors appear willing to be flexible in remote working policies, and those that have not been – [15]Facebook and [16]Apple – quickly climbed down due to a staff backlash or because of the virus coming back strong.
Maybe they realise the [17]daily commutes are a waste of time , or perhaps simply realise people working at home can work harder, for [18]better or worse . ®
Get our [19]Tech Resources
[1] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2YQloOzmrCAp64oWaTBZAngAAABY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YQloOzmrCAp64oWaTBZAngAAABY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33YQloOzmrCAp64oWaTBZAngAAABY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-56993886
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YQloOzmrCAp64oWaTBZAngAAABY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/nov/27/huge-wealth-of-sunaks-family-not-declared-in-ministerial-register
[7] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-56993886
[8] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33YQloOzmrCAp64oWaTBZAngAAABY&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2021/06/30/feature_always_on_culture_notifications/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2021/06/23/gartner_wfh_report/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2021/06/03/hybrid_working_survey/
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2021/04/26/commute_work_psychologist_study/
[13] https://www.theregister.com/2020/07/06/fujitsu_we_are_closing_50/
[14] https://www.theregister.com/2021/07/29/cisco_hybrid_work_great_experiment/
[15] https://www.theregister.com/2021/06/10/facebook_office_work/
[16] https://www.theregister.com/2021/06/03/apple_workers_office/
[17] https://www.theregister.com/2021/04/26/commute_work_psychologist_study/
[18] https://www.theregister.com/2020/10/16/work_life_balance/
[19] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
As a public sector person I quite like living & working in not-London. There should be more of it.
This thinly-veiled attempt by Sunak at protecting the interests of commercial landlords at the expense of workers and local communities can get in the sea though.
This comment hits the mark, Sunak is again talking rubbish and protecting the interest of big business not the careers of people he cares so little about.
Son of a billionnaire talks up watercooler networking
Son of a billionnaire seems to not notice that the peons don't get much of a chance to talk to the VP of sales and marketing, even if they are hanging around the watercooler together.
Son of a billionnaire also doesn't seem to realize that he could network in shorts and flip-flops around a swimming pool at one of the kind of parties the peons never, ever, get a chance to go to.
Son of a billionnaire, your "trajectory" has far less to do with who you talked to at the office, and far more to do with who your father is.
Re: Son of a billionnaire talks up watercooler networking
Right-on here, @Pascal - not quite sure what the haters are hating, unless it’s Rishi’s friends not liking “speaking truth to power”.
Re: Son of a billionnaire talks up watercooler networking
He's not the son of a billionnaire, he is married to the daughter of a billionaire. Sunak's parents are a doctor and pharmacist, who were certainly well-off enough to send him to private school but are unlikely to be anywhere near being billionaires. He was very well established in the world of finance and brown-nosing before he married into the billionaire family.
Re: Son of a billionnaire talks up watercooler networking
Yes, and it wasn't the watercooler he was hanging around to meet target daughter..
Certainly there are practical advantages to businesses for people to work in the office rather than at home.
Security of sensitive information can be more easily controlled.
It's easier for workers to communicate with each other.
So a return to the office will perhaps have to be considered by many workers, once the novel coronavirus has been absolutely eradicated so that there is no chance that such a move would increase its spread - and not before.
@John Savard
"once the novel coronavirus has been absolutely eradicated"
Thats impossible and not gonna happen. We will have to learn to live with it unfortunately but maybe vaccinate like we do for the flu. One of the big problems facing those countries heavily locked down and isolated is that rejoining the world will be so much more dangerous for them even after a vaccine
People are missing there has been a shift in peoples expectations, the workplace has changed and big business are going to have to suck it up to a certain degree.
On face value, he may have a point.
Except, when you actually look at what he's saying and what he is himself - a landlord - the very worst thing for his prospects are for offices to be downsized and no one paying the rent for his buildings.
Good advice.
"...said he'd been chatting to young people about how to get on in their careers."
Yes, be born to rich parents.
Re: Good advice.
And marry a rich woman with rich parents.
Re: Good advice.
And make sure he's not Matt Hancock.
Look at what hanging around the water cooler did for me, says son-in-law of billionaire Infosys founder
Well it obviously helped him to remove any last traces of humanity and understanding of professional ethics. I mean why else would you join the Conservatives Party?
Better dinner invites than the Libs or Labour?
"professional ethics"
His professional career was Goldman Sachs, a Stanford MBA and a couple of hedge funds (with an internship at Conservative Campaign Headquarters while he was at Oxford). Which one of those would you say would have given him an understanding of professional ethics that needed removing?
Cisco
Cisco has become the latest big biz to talk about the big return to the office.
Lets face it, if faces with using WebEx for all their meetings I can see why Cisco is thinking this whole remote working malarkey is bad.
Re: Cisco
To be fair, CISCO has always done its best to stop people working outside the office
Hmm
Worker interaction can make a difference to people. Not all of us like it or work that way but some people do.
Re: Hmm
>>>Not all of us like it or work that way
Lighthouse Keeper?
Re: Hmm
" Lighthouse Keeper? "
I thought that job paid too well considering it was just "light housekeeping" ...
Donors
Just Google:
Property donors provide one-quarter of funds given to Tory party
Property developers got caught with pants down and are desperate to get the cattle back to their buildings.
Now, is it appropriate for a Chancellor to manipulate young people like that?
The Office
In order to chat to the VP of Marketing around the Water Cooler, you have to be not only in the same office building as the said VP, but on the same floor, and have access to the same office area. When you are located in an office in Reading and Head Office is in central London, the chances of meeting the VP of marketing (or any other VP for that matter) are very remote, especially when the water cooler is in a secure office that the VP of marketing wouldn't be seen dead in. Or maybe Mr Sunak is talking to people like him - public school and Oxford educated PPE* graduates with lots of rich connections.
This is all of mere historic (/histrionic) interest for me, having retired.
*What exactly do they teach people in PPE? I mean there are loads of them in government, high up in the civil service, but none of them gets a good press in the Register, and from what Mr Sunak has just been reported as saying, they don't seem all that well acquainted with the world of work as experienced by us lesser mortals.
Re: The Office
I wanted to apply to read PPE, but then I found out it wasn't studying the code of seminal 80s BBC Micro game Purple People Eaters.
Re: The Office
Also VP unlikely is going to be drinking the "pleb" water.
Re: The Office
And if he wanted "water" he'd send his secretary out to get him an Evian.
Water fom a communcal fixture, no VP would be caught dead around such a thing.
Unless of course it was for a publicity shot.,After which he/she would have to gargle some Champagne and disinfect for an hour or so with a fine cognac to make sure that none of those plebian germs infected him/her...
freudian misread
I saw this:
"...government's first effort at getting people to return to the office..."
and read:
" governments first effort at getting rid of people ..."
Re: freudian misread
The first effort was sending people back to care homes without testing. How many properties this has released for rich party donors?
Er ...
Many years ago it was quite common to sort out development issues while chatting at the water cooler, or during a smoking break for that matter.
Unfortunately the efficiency of this practice was not generally understood by the numerous managers brachiating though the corporate tree.
It appears they believed that if the minions were talking they were not working, and that such issues could only be sorted out by endless scheduled meetings anyway.
Re: Er ...
I believe the correct terms are "agile" and "scrum".
Get back to the office Civil Servants! ....so we can then force you to relocate jobs up north!
Piss off Rishi.