

What It's Like To Work Future Style - yoavfr
http://hoppycow.com/2012/12/26/what-its-like-to-work-future-style/

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bunkat
'During Thanksgiving, I spent the week in St. Louis, working from Jared’s
parents’ kitchen counter for a few days.'

I think this is the worst aspect of working 'future style'. Since you can work
anywhere, there is no longer anyway to get away from work. Celebrating the
holidays with the family - perfect time to get some work done!

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jes5199
She didn't say she worked on Thanksgiving - she said she stayed in St Louis
longer than would be normally possible on a holiday. If I can work eight hour
days at my in-law's house rather than having to rush back across the country
to be in the office, then I get to stay longer. Best of both worlds.

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bunkat
But if she had gotten a phone call on Thanksgiving that something had broken
and needed to be fixed, she would have worked on Thanksgiving (we've all been
there). That was my point - since now we can be productive anywhere, we are
always available.

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AaronBBrown
I'm not sure that's exclusive to telecommuting. Having worked about half of my
career remotely, and the other half in an office, I wouldn't say that the
prevalence holiday/middle of the night calls is much different. Certainly,
this is more true of Operations work than say, Accounting.

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Expez
How is the salary at these remote-only places? Living just above the poverty
line* would mean a salary of ~$45k in Norway.

I would love to work at such a company--preferably one with a flat
organization structure--to get a glimpse of a possible future. But I'm not
entirely sure how it would make sense financially for either party.

*Using the EUs definition of relative poverty at 60% of the country's median income.

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JoeAltmaier
Great stuff, but typically she uses a cobbled-together list of apps to get the
job done.

I work at Sococo (helped start it). Its an integrated
voice/video/doc/presence/chat engine that really brings a group together -
like working in the same office, almost. I recommend it (because I want us to
succeed!) We also eat our own dog food - Sococo is distributed across 6 states
and 3 time zones. And it works great!

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asc76
This sounds in many ways very similar to my company we believe in the lean
startup philosophy. All members of our team work in different locations and we
are quite successful in doing so. At the end of the day, results are the only
thing that matters. If you don't pull your weight, it shows.

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bravura
I have no idea what this has to do with lean startup.

Lean startup is not about: technical efficiency, a distributed workforce, or
keeping your burn low.

"The Lean Startup relies on validated learning, scientific experimentation,
and iterative product releases to shorten product development cycles, measure
progress, and gain valuable customer feedback." (wikipedia)

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nobody_nowhere
Anyone have examples of a well-known, successful company which is fully
virtual like this?

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AaronBBrown
Basho, Github, and Percona immediately come to mind. Lots of other companies
(including my current home, ideeli) have distributed Tech departments with
employees all over the world.

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reinhardt
Still few and far between overall. Wondering when, if ever, it's going to be
"the year of telecommuting". Hopefully sooner than the year of Linux on the
desktop.

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sputknick
I like her comment about documenting what happens in meetings. Can anyone
recommend software to help with this? I currently just use Word files in a
folder, can someone recommend something better?

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Vitaly
workflowy.com

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sputknick
awesome, thanks for the heads up

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iamtherockstar
After working remotely for more than 5 years, I can say with confidence that
one of the best things you can do is not wear pants with an elastic waistband
more than once a week (i.e. stop working in your pajamas).

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AaronBBrown
I'm a big fan of pajama working. Just make sure to remember to put pants on
(or not stand up) during video conference calls.

