Dear All, Working from home and flexi-time were buzz words till last year. IT companies tried to introduce this in India, but it seems that it is not going well. Recently Yahoo has taken back the policy on this.
Please read What does Yahoo's work from home ban mean for Indian cos - Economic Times
I personally think that for such concepts, the individual needs very professional. In India, there is a tendency of being carried away from the company goal if such options are given. There are cases where people abuse the policies. Again all well in Europe and the US will not always work in India.
good insight.
Regards,
From India, Pune
124Please read What does Yahoo's work from home ban mean for Indian cos - Economic Times
I personally think that for such concepts, the individual needs very professional. In India, there is a tendency of being carried away from the company goal if such options are given. There are cases where people abuse the policies. Again all well in Europe and the US will not always work in India.
good insight.
Regards,
From India, Pune
Dear Mr Vinod Bidwaik,
The news is little old. Ms Marissa Mayer, CEO of the company took this decision in the last week itself. In USA there was lot of outrage on this decision.
You have written that "Working from home and flexi time were buzz words till last year. IT companies tried to introduce this in India, but it seems that it is not going well."
Who knows whether it is going well or not? There is no comparative study to show that the productivity has declined by working from home.
For certain section of industry "work from home" suits well. This is not only because of the nature of the work but employees were happy because instead of spending time in traffic, they could spend time either at home or for office work. Secondly, real estate prices are sky rocketing in India. Against this backdrop "work from home" was boon to some companies. It has become major cost cutting tool. In fact company none less than MphasisS had once declared that their real estate utilisation rate was 1:1.2 They wanted to raise it to 1:1.33
In most of the IT companies today anything from 10% to 30% employees are working from home.
Coming to Yahoo's decision. I have been tracking this company for the last 2-3 years. First and foremost, this company has lost race with Google long ago. The second race it lost when the company's board did not allow takeover from Google or Microsoft. Both the companies were ready to offer share price of US$ 30-35. Yahoo board declined. Within a year stock fell down to US$ 10.
The second trouble with Yahoo was frequent changes in their CEOs. In the last four years we have seen as many CEOs.
The next trouble with this company is lack of strategic foresight. The kind of diversification that Google did, that even Yahoo also could have done. But then they did not do it. For sticking to the same business, they are paying the price of getting sidelined.
Ms Marissa Mayer has come from Google, the only company she served for years together. She knew it well that Google does not bother whether employee works from office or from home. Now her decision is landmark but how far it succeeds in making Yahoo innovative that remains to be seen. Today, challenges in front of her are diversification and innovation. By making people to work from office, will she be able to bring these two factors in Yahoo? As of now there is resentment among Yahoos for telling them to work from office. Hope this tide of resentment recedes soon. Else it may turn counter-productive also.
Lastly, you have written that "I personally think that for such concepts, the individual needs very professional." Yes all the companies who do this like Yahoo, IBM, Google etc are quite professional no doubt. What Ms Mayer has done was for the entire globe and not just for India and it would be unfair to single out India.
Now about India. Today large number of recruitment companies in India are using this model to curtail the cost. Just last Saturday, someone from Pune told me that xxx runs recruitment company wherein he has 34 recruiters who work from home!
Far from work from home, future offices will be not only paperless but virtual too. People will work only in factories, hospitals, hotels etc where their presence is mandatory. Others are just going to vanish from their offices!
Dinesh V Divekar
From India, Bangalore
The news is little old. Ms Marissa Mayer, CEO of the company took this decision in the last week itself. In USA there was lot of outrage on this decision.
You have written that "Working from home and flexi time were buzz words till last year. IT companies tried to introduce this in India, but it seems that it is not going well."
Who knows whether it is going well or not? There is no comparative study to show that the productivity has declined by working from home.
For certain section of industry "work from home" suits well. This is not only because of the nature of the work but employees were happy because instead of spending time in traffic, they could spend time either at home or for office work. Secondly, real estate prices are sky rocketing in India. Against this backdrop "work from home" was boon to some companies. It has become major cost cutting tool. In fact company none less than MphasisS had once declared that their real estate utilisation rate was 1:1.2 They wanted to raise it to 1:1.33
In most of the IT companies today anything from 10% to 30% employees are working from home.
Coming to Yahoo's decision. I have been tracking this company for the last 2-3 years. First and foremost, this company has lost race with Google long ago. The second race it lost when the company's board did not allow takeover from Google or Microsoft. Both the companies were ready to offer share price of US$ 30-35. Yahoo board declined. Within a year stock fell down to US$ 10.
The second trouble with Yahoo was frequent changes in their CEOs. In the last four years we have seen as many CEOs.
The next trouble with this company is lack of strategic foresight. The kind of diversification that Google did, that even Yahoo also could have done. But then they did not do it. For sticking to the same business, they are paying the price of getting sidelined.
Ms Marissa Mayer has come from Google, the only company she served for years together. She knew it well that Google does not bother whether employee works from office or from home. Now her decision is landmark but how far it succeeds in making Yahoo innovative that remains to be seen. Today, challenges in front of her are diversification and innovation. By making people to work from office, will she be able to bring these two factors in Yahoo? As of now there is resentment among Yahoos for telling them to work from office. Hope this tide of resentment recedes soon. Else it may turn counter-productive also.
Lastly, you have written that "I personally think that for such concepts, the individual needs very professional." Yes all the companies who do this like Yahoo, IBM, Google etc are quite professional no doubt. What Ms Mayer has done was for the entire globe and not just for India and it would be unfair to single out India.
Now about India. Today large number of recruitment companies in India are using this model to curtail the cost. Just last Saturday, someone from Pune told me that xxx runs recruitment company wherein he has 34 recruiters who work from home!
Far from work from home, future offices will be not only paperless but virtual too. People will work only in factories, hospitals, hotels etc where their presence is mandatory. Others are just going to vanish from their offices!
Dinesh V Divekar
From India, Bangalore
Dear Dinesh
I agree with you.
One swallow does not make a summer. It is again one of the mistakes that Yahoo is committing; unless it really makes face-to-face interaction and team spirit more meaningful and productive by making the workplace as exciting and innovative as that of Google or Facebook.
Yahoo was once at the top; and since then it has been sliding down. Search, Mail and Chat were once its top products. Google made Internet search synonymous with itself.. That should have made yahoo see red. But they kept being complacent and then Gmail became another word for emails.
Their most engaging product and the forerunner of social networking sites was the Yahoo chat.
They could have made this hugely engaging activity as the Mother of All Networking site. Imagine the possibility of adding or knowing someone in one's 'Yahoobook' immediately after having a very engaging, encouraging chat with someone. The idea of looking at someone's profile after knowing the person, first hand, through voice and video chat. In fact this complete functionality is not available even today, at any one particular site. In FB one sends or receives invites from strangers; and knowing them takes time; what with the plethora of "shared" pics and thoughts; none reflect the real person. To indulge in messaging to know one person, would just be a waste of time and effort.
Yahoo neither built upon its core competencies; nor adopted any diversification esp. forward integration to social networking or e-commerce.
In my opinion, its a classic example of a static, adamant, stubborn organization that could not put its supremacy to good use.
Will the new diktak by its new CEO confirm this ??
I would be very happy to be proved wrong.
Warm regards.
From India, Delhi
I agree with you.
One swallow does not make a summer. It is again one of the mistakes that Yahoo is committing; unless it really makes face-to-face interaction and team spirit more meaningful and productive by making the workplace as exciting and innovative as that of Google or Facebook.
Yahoo was once at the top; and since then it has been sliding down. Search, Mail and Chat were once its top products. Google made Internet search synonymous with itself.. That should have made yahoo see red. But they kept being complacent and then Gmail became another word for emails.
Their most engaging product and the forerunner of social networking sites was the Yahoo chat.
They could have made this hugely engaging activity as the Mother of All Networking site. Imagine the possibility of adding or knowing someone in one's 'Yahoobook' immediately after having a very engaging, encouraging chat with someone. The idea of looking at someone's profile after knowing the person, first hand, through voice and video chat. In fact this complete functionality is not available even today, at any one particular site. In FB one sends or receives invites from strangers; and knowing them takes time; what with the plethora of "shared" pics and thoughts; none reflect the real person. To indulge in messaging to know one person, would just be a waste of time and effort.
Yahoo neither built upon its core competencies; nor adopted any diversification esp. forward integration to social networking or e-commerce.
In my opinion, its a classic example of a static, adamant, stubborn organization that could not put its supremacy to good use.
Will the new diktak by its new CEO confirm this ??
I would be very happy to be proved wrong.
Warm regards.
From India, Delhi
Dear All Can you please let me know the company names that provides this facility of work from home, I am into MIS profile.
From India, Mumbai
From India, Mumbai
I rather have few questions than an answer to this. Was there no supervision designed and risk mitigation planned when 'Work-From-Home' was implemented at Yahoo? How did the performance review worked, all this while? What about audit to this process? What were the steps taken when deviations were found in the delivery?
If these things were not in place or even tried to be restored, before taking the benefit away, who is to be questioned? Employees or their leaders?
We had a discussion on how to curb a misuse on 'Work-From-Home' . The focus remained on making the employees accountable and mitigate risk than to withdraw the benefit.
What happens when Work-From-Home policy is misused
From India, Mumbai
If these things were not in place or even tried to be restored, before taking the benefit away, who is to be questioned? Employees or their leaders?
We had a discussion on how to curb a misuse on 'Work-From-Home' . The focus remained on making the employees accountable and mitigate risk than to withdraw the benefit.
What happens when Work-From-Home policy is misused
From India, Mumbai
I was truly astonished to know about this decision. I totally concur with (Cite Contribution). What kind of gap analysis did they take up in order to arrive at this reasoning. If the work assigned to the employee is being done in-time with quality, whether working-from home or office becomes immaterial. It's important to accept one's accountability and work towards it :)
From India, Bangalore
From India, Bangalore
Dear (Cite Contribution),
Debates are raging on CEO of Yahoo, Ms Marissa Mayer's decision to ban "work from home" across the globe. However, I would like to clarify here few things. Why companies give facility of "work from home"? It is because it suits everybody. The reasons are as below:
a) It helps employees in maintaining work-life balance as no unnecessary wastage of time in commuting to office.
b) At home one is always relaxed
c) It is a major cost cutting tool for companies. It saves company's cost on power, water, office space, crèche, and so on
d) Lastly, it is not a "process" but it is a provision or facility. As long as deliverables are met, from where employees work that does not matter.
As of now this is only a decision and we can assess it's efficacy only after a year or later. To draw a conclusion that "work from home" has failed would be a too sweeping statement. In Marathi, there is a proverb "Suta varun swarga gathane" (its loose meaning is drawing conclusion by logical overreach). There is absolutely no guarantee that taking cue from Ms Mayer, other software companies will follow suit.
When a CEO and that too of the stature of company like Yahoo takes a decision to ban work from home, it should not be seen from the point of deliverables and KRA etc. This is applicable up to the level of Project Manager and that is all. Ms Mayer's major challenge is to give reasonable value to the shareholders' money. After taking over she did not make significant gain as such but then she could elevate confidence of the of the investors and arrested the downhill of the share value. This in itself is major achievement.
The major challenge of Yahoo is lack of innovation. Somewhere in 2007 two major companies, Google and Apple entered into telecom segment and all of a sudden changed the rules of the game. A change was so comprehensive that it questioned the very existence of companies like Yahoo, Microsoft, Dell, HP, Nokia etc. None of the company is in position to compete with Apple or Google. Though ruled the roost at one time, business pundits question existence of Microsoft after five years.
This is a classic example of leadership's obsession with vision. While setting the eyes beyond horizon, also have a feel of the ground beneath you. What is the use of having eyes on horizon if all of sudden ground starts shaky?
Today, Yahoo's major challenge is to show innovation into some segment. Most of the sectors are already taken over by Google. Where will it go? Search engine is no longer a potent source of revenue. Against Google's share of 66%, Yahoo stands at just 6%
When Ms Marissa Mayer took a decision, she wanted to improve the people to people interaction. She wanted that question or challenge should come from the colleagues. As of now Yahoos are just doing what they are told to do. For software professionals job, work from home is enough. However, it appears that Ms Mayer wanted a big churning of ideas and she believes that it can come from personal interaction hence this decision.
In my training on "Strategy", I use case study of Yahoo. Anyway, I am thankful to Ms Mayer because of her new and strange decision yet another leaf has been added.
Ok...
Dinesh V Divekar
From India, Bangalore
Debates are raging on CEO of Yahoo, Ms Marissa Mayer's decision to ban "work from home" across the globe. However, I would like to clarify here few things. Why companies give facility of "work from home"? It is because it suits everybody. The reasons are as below:
a) It helps employees in maintaining work-life balance as no unnecessary wastage of time in commuting to office.
b) At home one is always relaxed
c) It is a major cost cutting tool for companies. It saves company's cost on power, water, office space, crèche, and so on
d) Lastly, it is not a "process" but it is a provision or facility. As long as deliverables are met, from where employees work that does not matter.
As of now this is only a decision and we can assess it's efficacy only after a year or later. To draw a conclusion that "work from home" has failed would be a too sweeping statement. In Marathi, there is a proverb "Suta varun swarga gathane" (its loose meaning is drawing conclusion by logical overreach). There is absolutely no guarantee that taking cue from Ms Mayer, other software companies will follow suit.
When a CEO and that too of the stature of company like Yahoo takes a decision to ban work from home, it should not be seen from the point of deliverables and KRA etc. This is applicable up to the level of Project Manager and that is all. Ms Mayer's major challenge is to give reasonable value to the shareholders' money. After taking over she did not make significant gain as such but then she could elevate confidence of the of the investors and arrested the downhill of the share value. This in itself is major achievement.
The major challenge of Yahoo is lack of innovation. Somewhere in 2007 two major companies, Google and Apple entered into telecom segment and all of a sudden changed the rules of the game. A change was so comprehensive that it questioned the very existence of companies like Yahoo, Microsoft, Dell, HP, Nokia etc. None of the company is in position to compete with Apple or Google. Though ruled the roost at one time, business pundits question existence of Microsoft after five years.
This is a classic example of leadership's obsession with vision. While setting the eyes beyond horizon, also have a feel of the ground beneath you. What is the use of having eyes on horizon if all of sudden ground starts shaky?
Today, Yahoo's major challenge is to show innovation into some segment. Most of the sectors are already taken over by Google. Where will it go? Search engine is no longer a potent source of revenue. Against Google's share of 66%, Yahoo stands at just 6%
When Ms Marissa Mayer took a decision, she wanted to improve the people to people interaction. She wanted that question or challenge should come from the colleagues. As of now Yahoos are just doing what they are told to do. For software professionals job, work from home is enough. However, it appears that Ms Mayer wanted a big churning of ideas and she believes that it can come from personal interaction hence this decision.
In my training on "Strategy", I use case study of Yahoo. Anyway, I am thankful to Ms Mayer because of her new and strange decision yet another leaf has been added.
Ok...
Dinesh V Divekar
From India, Bangalore
Dear friends,
In the latest issue of "Economist", there is article on the subject. You may click here to read the article. It its free web resource and you do not have to subscribe the online edition of the magazine.
Incidentally, the article also contains views that I mentioned in my above two posts. Especially, I request you to go through the last paragraph of the article.
Thanks,
DVD
From India, Bangalore
In the latest issue of "Economist", there is article on the subject. You may click here to read the article. It its free web resource and you do not have to subscribe the online edition of the magazine.
Incidentally, the article also contains views that I mentioned in my above two posts. Especially, I request you to go through the last paragraph of the article.
Thanks,
DVD
From India, Bangalore
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