The woman, @kawaiiprincessv, posted about the situation to TikTok, writing: “Not even the HR manager who organized it came in.” The post has garnered over 760,000 views and sparked a passionate discussion about office culture. You can watch the full video here.
In her video, @kawaiiprincessv pans the camera to her computer screen to show a calendar invite for “Barefoot Fridays”—an in-office happy hour hosted from 4:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. on the first Friday of each month. Per the video’s text overlay, upper management likely created the event as an incentive to get @kawaiiprincessv and her colleagues, who all presumably work from home, back into the office. Unfortunately, it didn’t work.
After zooming in on the invite information, @kawaiiprincessv pans the camera to the upper right-hand corner of her screen, where the time reads 4:47 p.m. She then films the empty office to show that she’s alone.
Return to Work
Kevin Rooney, chief administrative officer at West Monroe, told Newsweek that there are various things managers can do to encourage a return to the office.
“People want to know their time in the office will be ‘worth it.’ One way to do that is to schedule events that bring them in, whether it’s a one-on-one lunch, a baby shower for a co-worker, a happy hour, or a team training or brainstorming session,” Rooney said.
“Managers can [also] help encourage in-office attendance by normalizing flexibility,” Rooney continued. “This means being flexible on your team member’s arrival times and departure times when working in the office, as well as where they might get their work done on the days they don’t come in.”
Rooney also said that, above all, managers “must lead by example.”
“The bottom line is that managers must lead by example and go into the office themselves. It’s one thing to ask your team to come in, but it’s another to be there with them,” Rooney said. “We’ve seen that when directors and managers are in the office, many younger and new-hire employees come in as well. [Of course], this isn’t a coincidence—these in-person interactions and face time are pivotal for building important relationships.”
Viewers React
However, many of @kawaiiprincessv’s viewers argued that company-wide events such as happy hours aren’t the best way to entice workers back into the office because they don’t care about “office culture.”
“Office culture is the biggest scam,” divinefelines said.
“Office culture is done. No one wants to be there,” Vanderhump agreed.
“‘Culture’ = trying to make it fun to distract you from the crappy pay and below-inflation pay raise, if any at all,” RedFlafInspector vented.
UrNavyWeak added: “The ‘culture’ here is you f**king pay me for the work I do. That’s it, that’s all.”
Newsweek has reached out to @kawaiiprincessv for comment, but it’s not the first time life at the office has gone viral.
In September, Redditors slammed a boss who told an employee via email to stop being sad at work.
Commenters bashed an employer that purportedly hid a labor law poster after employees started asking questions.
And a worker went viral after sharing that they got fired for refusing to work Sundays.
