Some People Seem Determined To Waste Everyone’s Time

I work for a Spanish company. It’s been seven or eight years, and we know each other pretty well.

I’ve known and worked with the CTO (Chief Technology Officer) for like ten years now. He’s a cool guy who wants stuff done.

Even before 2020, the work-from-home policy was extremely relaxed — you do you, have things done by the time we need it, and we’re okay — so when the global health crisis came, the transition was as easy as it could get.

In fact, as a company, especially on the tech team, we embraced the opportunity and started hiring people from outside the city for a cheaper salary than in the city but, for those people, a higher salary than the one they could get without moving into the city. I even moved out of the city during that time.

Since [CTO] didn’t want to be a sales guy, the company hired a CEO in 2021, an Englishman who came highly recommended and was stationed in his rural house in the English countryside. He looked like a cool relaxed guy for a while.

Once the health crisis ended, [CEO] started pushing rather heavily for a return to office (RTO) for everyone. He made polls and sent lengthy emails to everyone about how this fostered relationships and whatnot.

[CEO] got really pushy, even complaining to [CTO] about it. Every time he came to Spain, people who lived around the city would go to the office, just to be there, so [CEO] was happy.

And then, one time, [CTO] decided that he had enough with the whole RTO mandate and [CEO] complaining.

On a random meeting of the tech team, [CTO] said:

CTO: “Okay. Next Tuesday, I want everyone in the office. If you live far away, book a train, drive, or whatever you have to do — I’ll pay — but be here.”

And so, we did. That Tuesday, every single member of the tech team, including people who took a two- or three-hour trip to get there, was in the office.

Guess who wasn’t there? Yeah, [CEO].

So, [CTO] took a picture and emailed it to [CEO] saying something along the lines of, “If you can’t lead by example, don’t push my people to do things that don’t work,” and we went to have a relaxing lunch and beers type of day.

Aftermath: the RTO mandate never came to fruition, [CEO] was out of the company a year later, and we closed the office since everyone works from home 100% of the time. To his dismay, [CTO] is now the CTO and acting CEO, and things are going smoothly.