What Barrett Kime’s boss said on the recent video call was straightforward. Could members of his team at NBCUniversal show up on the few days a week that they were actually expected to be in the office?Rebellion ensued. Mr. Kime, a senior creative director, took himself off mute. “I was talking about how it was insane to ask people to come in more often with Covid raging,” he recalled.Other employees then jumped in to share the reasons they didn’t want to go back to the office: child care, rising gas prices, Covid-19 rates. To Mr. Kime, it marked a new phase in their return-to-office conversations.“It’s kind of a Wizard of Oz thing,” Mr. Kime said. In other words, his team realized that there was no all-powerful being forcing their attendance; there was only a man behind a curtain (or …
