I quit my job at UCLA when they required me to come back to in-person work — I can't imagine ever returning to an office (2024)

• Rhiannon Little-Surowski is a former DEI executive at UCLA.
• She quit her job in higher education because of return-to-office mandates.
• Little-Surowski writes that shifting to remote work was the best decision she's made.

I quit my job working at UCLA when they required that I start coming back into the office three days a week. I couldn't be happier with my choice to leave.

I started working as a student affairs officer in higher education two years after graduating from undergrad at a school I once attended. In 2020, when the pandemic hit, I started looking for other opportunities, mainly because I didn't want to have experience at just one campus.

I landed a gig at UCLA in March 2021 as manager of diversity and outreach initiatives within their Graduate Education division.I loved this job because I'm a huge proponent of DEI — making a positive impact on the lives of students, especially BIPOC university students, is the greatest, most fulfilling work I've ever done.

The job was also great because it was remote when I was hired, which was the main draw for me.

There were drawbacks, but the benefits of remote work outweighed the challenges

Remote work was a win-win for me. My husband had been running a small web development side business for many years, and I was able to help him focus on building it up and making some real estate investments — all while I'd still be able to make an impact in the lives of students, which is my favorite part of working in higher ed.

One drawback of working remotely was I didn't feel like I knew anybody because I hadn't met anyone in person. Everyone in my department had met each other in real life prior to the pandemic, so they all seemed to have friends at work except me. There were also way more emails I was expected to check constantly and Zoom meetings that I had to attend at the drop of a hat.

I have a home office, so I'd wake up and walk one of my daughters to school, then sit down for coffee and kick off my day with emails. I communicated with colleagues through Slack, email, and text throughout the day.

I had to keep myself on task, so I would use a Pomodoro timer to keep me focused. I would then take a break in the afternoon to eat lunch, play with my baby, and do some more work. Then I'd take another break to pick up my daughters from school.

After that, I'd get a bit more work done before starting dinner, way earlier than I normally would if I had to commute. All in all, I got the same amount of work done, if not more, because I used the time I would've spent commuting to get more done. Spending the extra time with my husband and kids was awesome.

I heard about the mandate on a Zoom call

I found out about UCLA's return-to-office mandates — that everyone had to work at least two days in the office every week — during a division-wide monthly Zoom meeting with leadership.

I felt stressed and anxious because I had moved out of state — from California to Michigan — under the assumption that the job would be remote indefinitely.

It was a pandemic move because we had bought a house in Michigan, and it was already in the works before I got the job. It was never explicitly made clear that I had to live in-state, and the school didn't know I moved.

I had no clue how I was going to get from Michigan to California and leave my two young children behind. I knew they'd be in good hands with my husband, but as a mom, it was still nerve-wracking to think about it.It also didn't seem feasible with kids to fly back and forth, and the cost seemed unfeasible, too.

Soon after we were notified to come into the office, I had to fly in since I was living out of state. My request that I come into the office four days a week, every other week (since I knew I'd have to fly) was approved. I flew in one day a week then back to Michigan after my workweek was finished.

I struggled to rationalize leadership's decision to bring everyone back into the office and didn't feel good about it. The students, for example, were not yet back on campus. Their return date was January 31, 2022, so not all classes had returned to in-person, and since we worked with graduate students, they weren't on traditional schedules.

We could also do our jobs just as effectively from home as we did in the office, some even better if they didn't have to interact with the public.

Ifinally decided to quit because I thought the RTO mandate was pointless

When I had my third daughter, that sealed the deal for me —I knew I had to quit. My husband and I were trying to make our own business work while I was still grinding to get to and from work every day, first flying, then, after moving back to California, driving.

I was graduating with my doctorate in May 2021, so we decided to move back to California at that time so I could participate in graduation and also so I could stop flying into LAevery week for work.

The funny thing is that I ended up with a similar, sometimeslonger commute than my flight while driving in California. I even started coming into the office twodays a week to lessen the commute, but it was all too much.

I realized that going to an office daily or even a couple of days a week — just to help an organization meet its goals while my goals, dreams, and family time are sacrificed — no longer made sense for me.

My quitting experience was gratifying. I was finally able to tell my boss that I was going to focus full time on the most important thing to me: my family. My time was better spent at home working on the family business (which is 100% remote) than spending hours sitting in traffic, flying on planes, and having to spend money on daycare.

Shifting to remote work has been the best decision I've ever made for myself and my family

If you're thinking about quitting, I recommend having a backup plan and some money saved up. I didn't do this and, in hindsight, I should've been applying for other jobs while saving money.

I do miss the benefits of having that full-time role, getting out of the house, and having colleagues to talk to. I was also more active when I worked on campus because I'd go for walks during my breaks.