I don't think that return-to-office is driven by executives, I think it's driven by owners. They simply have a religious belief that a slave you can't see is an indolent slave.
They think that WFH is an "obvious" inefficiency that they can pull back from and be rewarded with "free" productivity. The scare quotes around "free" are because they know that returning to work is done at the worker's expense rather than the company's, so they're running literally no risk even if it doesn't improve a thing.
Return-to-work is essentially giving everyone a pay cut based on an ideologically-based wager that it might help the bottom line. It's gambling for yourself, staked with employees' personal time and money, because you can.
They think that WFH is an "obvious" inefficiency that they can pull back from and be rewarded with "free" productivity. The scare quotes around "free" are because they know that returning to work is done at the worker's expense rather than the company's, so they're running literally no risk even if it doesn't improve a thing.
Return-to-work is essentially giving everyone a pay cut based on an ideologically-based wager that it might help the bottom line. It's gambling for yourself, staked with employees' personal time and money, because you can.