Of all the things that changed in corporate culture, I’m most happy for two things:
For one, Covid killed dead the notion that being in-person for many jobs was really necessary. I work in IT, and I cannot tell you how many people fought the notion of remote work, tooth and claw. The data didn’t matter, the facts didn’t matter - they wanted to see you at a desk. Ideally in an “open plan” or in a cube, not in an office where you could shut the fucking door and get things done. They would tell everyone they are a “thought worker” and then set up an environment where being able to concentrate was next to impossible.
Even worse, after the Cult Of Agile (Scrum) came along, it was not only management fighting you on remote work, it was brainless drones that had adopted the Cult of Agile as meaning you must be in-person to “collaborate”, even doing forced pair programming and by Gawd, you had better be in-person for the ceremonies, because that was what the Church of Scrum required. Even better was stupid performative stuff like everyone having to actually, literally, stand up at their desks, even if everyone involved could already all see each other and “the whiteboard”. 🙄 So, even at a time when nearly every company had set up the capability of using VPN to remote into work, along came a process that had, among its core adherents, a dictate that explicitly prohibited being remote. Thanks, Agilistas!
The other that has died a long slow death, and Covid probably would have killed that if it wasn’t already mostly dead already - ridiculous dress codes, especially ones involving ties for men.
As much as I hate and loathe brainless adoption of processes like the Church of Scrum, I absolutely hated the idea of having to wear a suit to do something like IT. Thankfully, it was kind of withering by the time I entered the workforce, depending on the company. But the idiotic uniform of wearing at least a pair of khakis, dress shoes and a collared shirt stuck around for way too fucking long at some places.
Of all the things that changed in corporate culture, I’m most happy for two things:
Even worse, after the Cult Of Agile (Scrum) came along, it was not only management fighting you on remote work, it was brainless drones that had adopted the Cult of Agile as meaning you must be in-person to “collaborate”, even doing forced pair programming and by Gawd, you had better be in-person for the ceremonies, because that was what the Church of Scrum required. Even better was stupid performative stuff like everyone having to actually, literally, stand up at their desks, even if everyone involved could already all see each other and “the whiteboard”. 🙄 So, even at a time when nearly every company had set up the capability of using VPN to remote into work, along came a process that had, among its core adherents, a dictate that explicitly prohibited being remote. Thanks, Agilistas!
As much as I hate and loathe brainless adoption of processes like the Church of Scrum, I absolutely hated the idea of having to wear a suit to do something like IT. Thankfully, it was kind of withering by the time I entered the workforce, depending on the company. But the idiotic uniform of wearing at least a pair of khakis, dress shoes and a collared shirt stuck around for way too fucking long at some places.