“It’s ONLY 6 days a month” is the biggest corporate bait-and-switch 🎭
Anybody else watching people defend State Farm’s return-to-office push by saying “it’s only 6 days a month” like that’s where this ends?
That’s phase 1. Corporate America has been running the same playbook everywhere:
“Just a few days for collaboration”
“We’ll stay flexible”
“Culture matters”
“More in-person opportunities”
Suddenly badge tracking, mandatory anchor days, and management breathing down your neck because your Teams dot went yellow for 4 minutes.
State Farm literally already signaled the direction this is heading. Multiple reports this year quoted leadership saying hybrid employees will “be together more in the future” while consolidating employees into office campuses because they have “too much office space.”
Translation:
“We spent money on buildings and now we need bodies in chairs.”
Meanwhile employees proved for YEARS they could do the job remotely. Claims. Medical. IT. Underwriting. Customer support. People hit metrics from home while:
saving thousands in commuting costs
being more available for family
avoiding burnout
avoiding 2 hours a day evaporating on highways
actually having work-life balance
Even industry reporting during and after COVID acknowledged remote work improved productivity, flexibility, employee engagement, and reduced overhead costs.
But suddenly we’re supposed to believe innovation only happens under fluorescent lighting while hearing Chad loudly microwave fish at 11:14 AM and Sheryl clipping her toenails at her desk.
And let’s stop pretending this is about “collaboration.” Half the time people come into the office just to sit on Teams calls with coworkers in different states anyway. The office becomes a very expensive Zoom background.
The funniest part? Companies spent years bragging about hybrid flexibility in recruiting. State Farm literally promoted hybrid work as a benefit, talking about employees working from home “approximately 75% of the time.”
Now the tone everywhere is:
“Business needs may change.” 🤡🤡🤡
People see the writing on the wall. Employees aren’t naive. Six days becomes TEN. TEN becomes 75%-100% for “core collaboration weeks.” Then suddenly promotions favor office visibility. Then remote workers quietly disappear through attrition.
There are already employee discussions openly calling this “quiet layoffs” and forced attrition without severance.
The wildest part is leadership acts shocked when morale tanks afterward. 😃🤡
Remote work was NEVER the issue
Middle management just got addicted to seeing humans in chairs again so they can feel powerful and corporate needed butts in chairs for these ugly buildings they are paying a lot of money for☕️