I'm a very long term software engineer and have found things have never been better - everyone's happier working remotely and definitely more productive.

Communication, virtually, isn't a hassle - it's what we do and generally unpaid wasted time commuting to and from and office just to be phyiscally in the same place is just pointless now and proven to be so.

(Let's not even get into how we can hire better talent from a wider area without worrying about said commuting or nonsensical relocation).

What I have seen, though, is a lot of managers who are going into offices now looking for something to do - presumably because the majority of their time was spent people watching and making sure developers are working.

Perhaps it's time for companies to realise that many managers can now be let go and the other need to be retrained into dealing with the 'new normal' ?