Okay... who is buying the GRM HQ?

ddavidv said:

Williamsport isn't exactly a tourist destination. It is, however, close to many miles of wonderful roads, many of them dirt. STPR rally happens not far away. 

This has nothing to do with GRM HQ. Just flexing my local knowledge muscle.

Unless you happen to schedule an event during the Little League World Series. Don't do that...

The PA College of Technology is also located there, which has a pretty good automotive restoration program. 

Agree - a lot of great driving roads in that area.

(We routed one of the America's British Reliability Runs through Williamsport a few years ago).

Good luck on the office sale. My company has been working on reducing office space since the change to WFH.

Mr_Asa said:

I was hoping they'd move to a bigger facility in order to host guest builders.

This week: Gumby shows you how to stack dimes! 

Upcoming: AngryCorvair shows you how to build a proper M/R car.  Date TBD.

GRM like alot of companies have quickly come to realize that with less expensive/smaller real estate you can invest in other portions of business.  Additionally by being a more remote work force you have a larger talent pool (national or even global depending on your business) to select employees from.  

good luck with the sale and thank you for continuing to offer such a great product and community.  

In reply to ClearWaterMS :

Thank you for the kind words. I can't speak for the whole staff, but I've personally been surprised by how productive working from home has been thus far–you can't beat the commute.

Yeah I'll agree with Colin. It's cool being able to look out my office window and see a duck.

Of course sometimes I see a duck IN my office, too, so maybe it isn't all that special after all. 

Stil, it's nice having green outside your window and not pavement.

My son has worked from home for 3 years.  Company sees lower overhead and more productive, happy employees.  They sold the office in NYC.

Now a new CEO wants then in 1-2 days/week, some have to travel from Va & Md.  Now with a kid, 8 hr days plus 5 hours travel time - he's polishing up the resume.

Why mess with happy people?  Congrats to the Staff.

In reply to JG Pasterjak :

Yup.

914Driver said:

My son has worked from home for 3 years.  Company sees lower overhead and more productive, happy employees.  They sold the office in NYC.

Now a new CEO wants then in 1-2 days/week, some have to travel from Va & Md.  Now with a kid, 8 hr days plus 5 hours travel time - he's polishing up the resume.

Why mess with happy people?  Congrats to the Staff.

unless it's a really small company, why is the CEO worried about "where people work" shouldn't they be more worried about executive level things?  Likely the reason the old CEO is out is not because of staff's choosen work location.  

I'm on the opposite side of the spectrum from most of the staff - I did not do well working from home. I was productive but felt a little bit caged and isolated. I benefit from getting out of the house and having a dedicated workspace with face-to-face collaboration. So I was glad to go back to my little work hole and am excited for the new office building. :) 

I do miss being able to cook in my kitchen during lunch break though. I made some elaborate meals during quarantine.

In reply to Nicole Suddard :

At your next review demand a full kitchen in the new office. 

In reply to Stampie :

If subscriptions start coming with a T-shirt AND a cookie you'll know what happened.

Nicole Suddard said:

In reply to Stampie :

If subscriptions start coming with a T-shirt AND a cookie you'll know what happened.

it better not be oatmeal raisin... They are a tease because they look like chocolate chip cookies but taste like health food disguised in butter and sugar. 

In for GRM branded cookies.

Chocolate -chocolate  chip , soft.

Glazed sugar, crunchy.

Bite size for easy  eating in the car!

In reply to ClearWaterMS :

I have a job where there is no reason why I should be in the office but my employer won't inch off of 2 remote days a week. They even moved me from my own office to a shared space. It's ridiculous, why they need me to drive 1/2 hour each way during rush hour when they need the space. I have had 3 employers coming across a year and they are losing people like flys because the are anti-remote. 

Anyways congratulations GRM on being nimble and adapting to the times.

What I'm seeing in my customers is a great many WFH people love it but there's a sizeable minority that need that separation from the home life. I could see a CEO who likes the separation wondering what the berk is wrong with these employees that don't want to come back. 

In reply to Gearheadotaku (Forum Supporter) :

And for the holidays, Gingerbread Honda Elements

ClearWaterMS said:

Nicole Suddard said:

In reply to Stampie :

If subscriptions start coming with a T-shirt AND a cookie you'll know what happened.

it better not be oatmeal raisin... They are a tease because they look like chocolate chip cookies but taste like health food disguised in butter and sugar. 

i'll take them.  Oatmeal raisin cookies are my weakness, especially if they are soft and doughy and have just a little bit of flouration on the outside.

Will the new space have a nap room?

This hits close to home. I used to work in Field Support for a defense company, and for 99% of our stuff, we could work from home. The company line was always "no." Then Covid hit and suddenly it was okay. Part way through the lockdown, we all received an email from the CEO saying how surprised he was at well things continued to operate.

Then companies decided that Covid was over and ordered everyone back into the office. The reason given was that things work better face-to-face, which of course came from management. I think they were feeling dangerously close to being redundant without being able to walk from cube to cube asking how things are. My favorite remark was "Feel free to contact me about any issues you may have", implying that we needed their permission. I think management also missed attending endless meetings where they could get by without needing to actually do anything.

Anyway, the company started losing people, especially younger employees leaving for firms advertising WFH... imagine that. The company dug in its heels, with the President even saying, "we're here to produce, not to work in leisure." Talk about a disconnect. Eventually, they bled enough workforce that they were dragged kicking and screaming into the new world, "generously" granting two days per week WFH, announced as if they came up with the idea.

Covid was a big turning point for Corporate America, the ground shifting beneath their feet, yet many had the delusion that everything would return to how it was before. Meanwhile, the younger workforce had already fully embraced the new reality, expecting and demanding WFH, yet companies just covered their ears and eyes.

Our company found itself on shaky ground financially due to losing so many people that for the first time ever in their 60-yr history, offered early retirement, which I took. I certainly do NOT miss the daily 1.5 hour commute.

It really depends upon the business. My "day" job was always remote as we are spread out across the country, but I live close enough to DC to have had to go in one a week. It got pretty stupid to drive in two hours each way just to sit on Teams meetings with the rest of the remote workers. Covid forced everyone home, the company did not skip a beat and the offices will now be shut down at least for the DC sales office. 

Agree that remote is not the same as how you can collaborate in person, but the realities of the work force., cost of homes (meaning long commutes) and that people expect the option now, is changing minds in many organizations. 

I'm now remote since there isn't a commutable middle ground for my team spread from Chicago to Cincinatti to New York, with frequent collaborators in Jacksonville, Milwaukee, and Orlando. 

I won't give up the time required for a commute more than 2 days a week unless it is a bikeable and preferably walkable distance. 

 So on a personal level I do not like the work from home. While I like/work better with face to face interaction the most significant reason is boundaries. 

I once worked in an industry where managers had no clue about work life balance. True story: employee is going into labor and the manager is asking "are you sure you're in labor?" My home life is mine and I don't want work intruding............ever. You pay me to do a job (like a plumber or painter) that doesn't give you unfettered access to me.

On a professional level: I supervise 10 people, 3 of them need nothing, 3 of them work OK from home and the other 4 you have to stay after if they are working from home. While I will concede the 30% that work well are more or less being punished at some level. 

Here's the rub there are a lot of competent/good employees out there but finding really great employees is difficult. It's a lot like a good spouse/partner; most of the great ones are already taken. 

End of the day it comes down to what works best overall of the organization.

I've been working from home for decades. Company had an office back in the late '80's, mostly used it as storage for parts and shelves of paper service and parts manuals. Technology marched on, manuals became available on CD's, we got pagers, then cell phones, then Blackberries, now iPhones and laptops. Wherever we are is our "virtual office", parts get shipped direct from warehouse to site, all we do is take service calls.

No daily commute (which is good, because I do NOT "do" traffic, or rush hour). The Covid lockdown didn't affect us at all - other than when we drive to service calls, there was a lot less traffic.

So much about an office environment that is so unneeded - so many meetings that could be emails, management that doesn't produce any thing but more meetings, etc.  

We should note that today's technology makes working from home easier/possible. I can't imagine doing this in the days of 35mm film, 3.5-inch floppies and dial-up internet. 

Well did the headquarters get purchased??