Come to the office... any office!

[DrewG]

R0225180 ERP Engineer

Location Crawley/Belfast/Glasgow/Templecombe (Any Thales Site in the UK)

What's the point of being on-site if it can be ANY of their offices? Isn't the point of being onsite something to do with teamwork and water cooler chats? I don't think you'll get that say in the corner of your Crawly office while half the team is in Glasgow and the other half is in crawley.

[JustKeepSwimming]

Big boss man was screaming about workshy kids who have never done a hard day's work in their life, unlike him, who's daddy got him on a FTSE100 graduate scheme back in 1970s despite not having a degree or 2 o levels to rub together and worked hard to pester his daddy to call in favours with other executives to get a promotion after promotion. So we are going to pretend that we will abide by his hybrid working model, but not really.

Is how I read it.

[Fraidycat]

R0225180 ERP Engineer

Location Crawley/Belfast/Glasgow/Templecombe (Any Thales Site in the UK)

What's the point of being on-site if it can be ANY of their offices?

So they can keep an eye on you init. Just in case you are a slacker or are billing 3 gigs at the same time like the Green Bastard.

[DrewG]

So they can keep an eye on you init. Just in case you are a slacker or are billing 3 gigs at the same time like the Green Bastard.

If that green bastard isn't delivering, they can always get rid of him. This suggests it's not about productivity at all.

[JustKeepSwimming]

If that green bastard isn't delivering, they can always get rid of him. This suggests it's not about productivity at all.

Easiest way to prevent overemployment is mandate office days.

[WTFH]

R0225180 ERP Engineer

Location Crawley/Belfast/Glasgow/Templecombe (Any Thales Site in the UK)

What's the point of being on-site if it can be ANY of their offices? Isn't the point of being onsite something to do with teamwork and water cooler chats? I don't think you'll get that say in the corner of your Crawly office while half the team is in Glasgow and the other half is in crawley.

The point is that their Oracle upgrade project is quite large and they are trying to ensure that they get people who are based in the UK (not just claiming to be, while VPNing in from Indonesia or Portugal - as some here have done in the past), and who are focussed on the project, not juggling multiple time stealers. It also means that the sensitive data that may (or may not) be part of the project does not leave their physical network.

...at a guess.

It's not a job for someone who isn't up to it, or doesn't understand the basics.

[northernladuk]

R0225180 ERP Engineer

Location Crawley/Belfast/Glasgow/Templecombe (Any Thales Site in the UK)

What's the point of being on-site if it can be ANY of their offices? Isn't the point of being onsite something to do with teamwork and water cooler chats? I don't think you'll get that say in the corner of your Crawly office while half the team is in Glasgow and the other half is in crawley.

I'm on a large programme with multiple locations as well but as it touches all areas of the business and there are people to work with at all locations. Head office is the key and preferred but we've stakeholders in multiple places so any office will be useful to keep plugged in. Better to have the right resources plugging in at remote offices than the wrong ones at Head Office.

I'm in three days but am doing more by choice at the moment. There is no way any of us can deliver this from home due to the level of madness. Not one person on the programme (at my level and upwards) disagrees. Maybe down the levels to the doers they could have an argument otherwise but face to face, breakouts and all the old world stuff is about the only thing holding this one together so I think they've called it exactly right.

It's not a job for someone who isn't up to it, or doesn't understand the basics.

Exactly this. The role Im in had three interviews. Most would baulk at three interviews but they have to weedle out the standard people as they just wouldn't cut it. Yes I'm putting more time/stress in for the same money blah blah but it's what I enjoy and it's bloody hard but great fun. Suits some people, doesn't others. They want the right people it suits and location isn't the major deciding factor.

There is the fact Thales work in more secure areas than most clients and although the role isn't SC cleared it's not unexpected they'll be a little firmer than most.

Why not try put a positive spin on it and that the multiple sites is actually a benefit. I'd be willing to bet in the old days this would have been head office or lump it.. but they just won't get the right resources now.

[sreed]

You can’t beat the Public Sector for this kind of command-and-control box ticking nonsense.

Minister requires minimum occupancy levels (that will satisfy the Daily Mail) for those flashy city-centre ‘regional centres’ (leased from party donor offshore companies of course https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/t...fice-g8n7v8vb7 ) that the government signed up to on 25 year leases just before Covid. The current value of a 25 year lease on those office buildings is probably less than a third of what they paid for it in 2018-19, and dropping. Ironically, the whole estate consolidation exercise was meant as a cost-saving measure, along with filling some pockets along the way of course.

All of the above translates to job ads that require the staff to attend 1-3 days (depending on the level of box ticking required) per week at any office in 10+ different locations across the UK. Or 30+ if HMCTS. As we’re talking about a box ticking exercise here, “attend” is loosely defined.

I recently did a PS contract with one of these departments (2 days pw), everyone in the office was on team calls all day and I only ever had 2 f2f meetings with the manager during my 6-7 months there as she was based in an office that was 3 hours away and I told her I’m not visiting. The “team” was spread across the country from Belfast to Croydon.

[northernladuk]

You can’t beat the Public Sector for this kind of command-and-control box ticking nonsense.

Minister requires minimum occupancy levels (that will satisfy the Daily Mail) for those flashy city-centre ‘regional centres’ (leased from party donor offshore companies of course https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/t...fice-g8n7v8vb7 ) that the government signed up to on 25 year leases just before Covid. The current value of a 25 year lease on those office buildings is probably less than a third of what they paid for it in 2018-19, and dropping. Ironically, the whole estate consolidation exercise was meant as a cost-saving measure, along with filling some pockets along the way of course.

All of the above translates to job ads that require the staff to attend 1-3 days (depending on the level of box ticking required) per week at any office in 10+ different locations across the UK. Or 30+ if HMCTS. As we’re talking about a box ticking exercise here, “attend” is loosely defined.

I recently did a PS contract with one of these departments, everyone in the office was on team calls all day and I only ever had 2 f2f meetings with the manager during my 6-7 months there as she was based in an office that was 3 hours away and I told her I’m not visiting. The “team” was spread across the country from Belfast to Croydon.

Very interesting but it does say it's for Thales in the role. WTFH must also know the project for and it's its a large Oracle project that also changes things. So I don't think anyone disagrees with your point above, it's not a valid one for this thread.

[JustKeepSwimming]

it's not a valid one for this thread.

Yes it is. The thread is a discussion, well rant, about companies mandating office time without seemingly objective reasoning.