AlistairMackenzie

AlistairMackenzie t1_jdmuiph wrote

I worked at least three days in the office before the pandemic and at home a couple of days a week or sometimes more. We closed a lot of our smaller offices over time and let people work from home full time. We were agnostic about whether people should WFH or come into the office. We started doing that around 2006.

Just before the pandemic we had a new CIO who decided everyone needed to be in the office at least three days a week which meant that people had a choice to move near an office or get laid off. Most took the layoff. I retired before the pandemic so I don’t know whether they still want people in the office, the CIO didn’t last long. I had team members all over the US and could have cared less whether they were in the office. I had no clue where they were and couldn’t do hallway conversations with them. As long as I could reach them via IM or phone easily it didn’t matter.

Virtually everything was coordinated remotely. As a manager I had to make sure I did regular 1-1’s and team meetings to keep everybody in sync at little more formally. Telling everyone to come in the office unless they need to be there to actually do stuff seems lazy and dumb.

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AlistairMackenzie t1_j1r15o7 wrote

That's kind of weird but my AT&T phone also wasn't able to connect over the weekend. It was fixed when I rebooted it. I suspect AT&T had some sort of problem and lost track of the phones on their network. It might work if you turn on airplane mode and then turn it off. It'll search for the cell network and reconnect.

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AlistairMackenzie t1_j1qdh58 wrote

I think Elon should give him the job. They share so many of the same values; massive egos, knowledge of late ‘90’s internet technologies, and grievance against any sort of efforts to hold their genius accountable. I hear Elon is asking CEO candidates to put their life savings into Twitter. Shiva is dumb enough to actually do that. He’s perfect. It has the advantage he’d have to move to California and we wouldn’t need to see him anymore. Come in folks, we need to make this a trending thing.

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AlistairMackenzie t1_ixy0b67 wrote

My mother's side of the family came from Nova Scotia and PEI around 1900. There was a large community from Nova Scotia and PEI in Quincy, originally to work in the granite quarries and then later at the Fore River Ship Yard. Most of the immigration stopped around World War II. I don't think they were too sentimental about Nova Scotia back then, though. From what I heard it was kind of a grim place without a lot of economic opportunity.

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AlistairMackenzie t1_irerrqi wrote

In Massachusetts you have to renew your auto’s registration every other year. Partly that’s so they can make sure you’re insured and partly it’s bureaucracy. You also have to have an annual safety inspection and pay an annual excise tax on the nominal value of the car.

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