
Remote working – Bringing sanity to mind and lessons worth learning - danielkempe
https://blog.quuu.co/lessons-worth-learning-from-remote-workers/
======
burlesona
Both Remote work and office work can be really great for certain people at
certain times.

When I was younger I was full-time remote for more than five years, and at the
time I enjoyed it. There was some difficulty separating work from life when it
all happened in one apartment, but overall it was a good fit.

Then I had kids, and that distinction became much harder. Little children have
a really hard time understanding that mom or dad is right there in the other
room but can’t play now. At that point moving to an office job became a really
nice change.

As a hiring manager, what I’ve found is that there aren’t so many people who
truly want to work from home all the time. Rather, what most people want is
flexibility and compromise. For example:

\- “I want to work from home on Tuesdays and Thursdays so I can easily pick my
kids up from pre-school over my lunch break.”

\- “I want to live in (insert almost any city here) where I grew up and have
roots, but there aren’t many good jobs.” Or the similar variation, “I want to
live in (place that is very cheap or pretty or both)...”

\- “My wife and I want to be able to visit both sides of our family that live
far away, and the logistics would be a lot easier if I could work remotely for
a week here and there to make that work, rather than need 3 extra weeks of
vacation.”

The best thing about remote is that all that flexibility and freedom is just
built into the job, and in my experience it’s easier to find a full-remote job
than an office job with comparable flexibility. The downside is you don’t get
the fun and energizing environment of working with neat, smart people in
person, nor the work/life separation that many people find very helpful.

I think most people’s stated preference just reflects which one of those is
more important to them in their present circumstances.

~~~
brogrammernot
This times a hundred thousand percent. I’m battling this hard right now at my
workplace, some of my developers live a good 45 min drive from work and that’s
just insane to ask them to be in their car for 7.5 hours/week.

So what did I do? I went “against” the company policy and had each of my team
members work at least 1 day a week from home, now they’re up to 2-3 days
depending on the week (humorous part is during the summer they’re in the
office more cause it’s more quiet than home cause their kids are out for the
summer lol)

So we’re still a “work from office” company but I run our team how I want and
surprise - zero attrition in 3 years on my team, we meet most of our
commitments, developer happiness/engagement is up on my team, our time to
first response for production issues is great and all because of a mutual
understanding that regardless of the “rules” I’ll take care of my guys/gals.

~~~
jimmydddd
The down side is that this can have bad effects on company wide morale. My
wife's company has a strict no remote work policy. But one or two managers go
against the company policy like you have, and let their dept. work remote from
time to time.

It's great for them, but it kills morale in the rest of the company as people
in my wife's department kill themselves to come in day after day (despite
good/bad weather, missing personal commitments, etc), while they notice empty
desks in the dept. down the hall. Makes for some miserable workers.

~~~
bpyne
Has the company looked at which departments need to be on-premise and then let
the other ones have flexibility? If the departments who work remotely now and
then are meeting the company's goals, it seems like a model to follow.

~~~
jimmydddd
No they have not. And yes, it would seem to be a good model to follow. But
they are not interested in looking into it. I guess eventually they will be
forced to look into a remote policy due to attrition, but sadly, they will
probably be able to hold out for a few years more before doing so.

------
breatheoften
I just started a new remote position. I worked remotely in previous job as
well and discovered then that working from home is not actually a good thing
for me. I eventually worked exclusively from coffee shops but this isn’t
exactly the best way to work everyday — expensive, drink LOTS of coffee, and
coffee shops generally make it harder to find flow state, not impossible but
just harder.

That previous job was contract work for an enterprise — not super inspiring,
lots of structural annoyances in the team that created barriers to getting
things done, and team a setup that didn’t quite put remote workers on the same
level as the inhouse team members. Even with all the annoyances I found when
working from home I had a lot of trouble “stopping” — it felt like I was
always at work.

Switching to the coffee shops was definitely better, but with my role on new
team (startup and fully remote team — it’s aweskme!) I decided to try out a
coworking space. Got a reserved desk at a WeWork walking distance from home
and really like the experience so far! Short walk to work, sort of a community
feeling at the office (well haven’t made any friends Yet but it at least seems
possible to), master of my own space, and whenever I want I can choose to work
from a coffee shop or wherever seems convenient ...

Best of all worlds so far!

~~~
ilikehurdles
I want to be at a coworking space, but WeWork is pricey for my situation. A
hot desk (not reserved) at my local WeWork is over $4k a year. If that cost
were subsidized by my company I might use it, but it's a significant salary
hit otherwise. Additionally, it's still a very loud workspace to work in. Even
with daily food/drink costs, I spend well under that at the coffee shop.

~~~
a_crowbar
Libraries are pretty underrated working environments. Generally quiet, and
many have conferencing or study rooms for reservations

~~~
soapboxrocket
I work from libraries a lot, when I'm at home and when I'm on the road. My
biggest disappointment is usually in university libraries because their
internet tends to be more locked down then a community library, but hey it's
their network.

------
PopeDotNinja
The problem with remote work is working for a team that hasn't committed to
making remote work tenable. It's too easy to miss out on whiteboard sessions &
hallway conversations, and resentment by people who don't like making special
accommodations for remote workers definitely happens.

~~~
maxxxxx
In general the recommendation is that it’s best to have everyone remote. Mixed
teams usually don’t work well.

~~~
arethuza
I work in a company where there is a mix between people who are always in the
office, some who work 2 or 3 days at home (like me) and others who are mostly
remote.

Seems to work pretty well - so it's certainly possible.

~~~
Klathmon
Personally, while I wouldn't say that mixed teams "don't work", they are much
harder. Specifically for management.

The managers need to enforce that all meetings have to include remote workers.
And I mean _ALL_ meetings should include them, or at least give them the
option of joining in. Managers need to avoid falling in the trap of "I didn't
talk to them today so they didn't do anything", even subconsciously. Managers
need to make sure that no decisions are made informally in an office without
giving a chance to remote workers on the teams from having input or knowing
they happened. Managers need to make sure that in-office people know how to
use and work with the remote work tools, and remote workers need to be held to
the same standards (no one-on-one calls and decisions without including all
the in-office people, not just the one they are talking to at the moment).

It's not impossible by any means, I even work in a situation like that myself
right now where about half the team is remote, and half is in the office. But
having worked in fully remote teams and fully in-office teams before, I will
say that it's much easier when it's not mixed.

One really kind of "unique" setup I have at a current job is an always-on zoom
"meeting room" where team members will stay in all day sometimes (often any
time we aren't working on something individually or deep in a problem). It
really bridges the remote/office gap really well, because just like in an
office any of us can just unmute and ask a quick question about something,
kind of like leaning back to ask someone a question at another desk in an
office.

~~~
arethuza
Yeah - we have all the gear for making sure remote access to meetings works
really well (cameras, screens, hand held wireless microphones etc).

------
kaiju0
The number one request by a huge margin was put forward. Then the first thing
mentioned is the dangers of remote work. Seems an odd tack to take.

That being said I really like remote work. But you have to be proactive in
your role to be successful. I've found the main danger to be manager changes.

The previous manager accepted and worked with remote personnel. The new one
does not like it so they create a situation. Then solve it by canceling the
remote program. I'm pretty sure this is where most of the negativity comes
from.

~~~
sailfast
Manager changes are often indicative of what I perceive to be the biggest
issue: cultural attitudes towards people that are not in the office.

If the organization understands that you're a full participant and they don't
blink when you say you're remote, that's great and will lead to success.

If, however, you're perceived to be tele-shirking or "wink wink remote
working" because of the company culture it will be a big issue. I would say
this could be resolved by some focused in-person time to talk about norms and
how to collaborate and share success, but it takes a good manager to do this.
If the manager wants butts in seats and remote is not a company-wide norm,
then that may be what you're left with, unfortunately.

~~~
iamatworknow
Going through this myself right now. I joined my company as just the third
developer on the team almost a decade ago, working directly under the owner. A
year ago when we were up to ~15 developers I decided to move to a different
state and go full remote, with the owner's blessing. Since then two more
layers of management were inserted between me and the owner and communication
has all but broken down.

I like the company and I like working remotely, but it may be time for a
change soon because of this.

------
ChuckNorris89
Please tell that to the European employers.

Most, especially in the German speaking part of Europe, are still run like
factories, barely have flexible working hours and don't even want to hear
about remote work as managers prefer having a close eye on employees at all
time.

~~~
granshaw
Lol no need to look all the way at Europe even. In the US not a single one of
the big techs hires remotely still, and this I believe is a big barrier to the
spread of remote hiring (“if google doesn’t hire remote, there must be some
good reason - so we’re not gonna do it either!”)

~~~
ddffre
There is a small company named 'Elasticsearch' were most of the workers are
remote workers since I don't think they even have offices.

~~~
jakear
GitLab is also known for being all-remote.

~~~
dsumenkovic
That's true! Here's some more info about it
[https://about.gitlab.com/company/culture/all-
remote/](https://about.gitlab.com/company/culture/all-remote/)

------
mattferderer
Working remote is great but still requires a quality company for it to be
enjoyable.

Meetings should be treated like everyone is remote. If people attend from
their desk, these tend to work out better & you avoid unintentional things
that make it difficult for remote employees to attend.

Having the majority of conversations done via e-mail or a chat tool & properly
documented in something like OneNote or Evernote or a project management tool
goes a long way in keeping everyone on the same page as well. This is good for
non-remote teams as well.

Allowing flexibility in time & location goes a long way in making happy
employees in my experience. It shows you trust them to get the work done.
Sure, some people will abuse it but those aren't people you want on your team
anyways.

As stated by others, being a remote worker doesn't mean you need to be a
hermit either. There are tons of ways to still go out & socialize with people.
Even on remote teams, I still find a good chunk of my day is socializing via
video chat meetings where someone is bound to go off topic. People also login
early & chat about life.

~~~
pmiller2
Which “things that make it unintentionally difficult to attend” meetings for
remote people are you referring to?

~~~
darkandbrooding
I won't presume to answer for the OP, but my (remote conference attendance)
pet peeves include: I have printed out important information (but forgotten to
email it); let me use the whiteboard that is mounted on the same wall as the
camera to illustrate a concept; I will speak exactly loud enough so that only
people in the room can here me; I will use the free tier of some conferencing
service, and start the call fifteen minutes early so that the connection drops
halfway through the meeting.

~~~
mattferderer
Well said. The biggest offenders are usually companies & not the remote
employees. I am in a great spot where I don't experience these today but the
most frequent I've seen are:

Poor microphones set up around the conference room that make it hard to hear
everyone.

No webcam at all or a bad webcam setup that doesn't allow the remote attendees
to see the gestures people make.

Multiple people talking at the same time, but having very quiet conversations.

Using a whiteboard, a projector or showing a screen by turning your computer
around but not making it visible to remote attendees.

* Basically doing things that the remote people can't participate in.

------
eequah9L
I suspect that asking about "experiencing negative aftereffects of remote
work" just means that people who think that their work life sucks and happen
to be remotees are going to say "yes". I want to see the numbers for "negative
aftereffects of on-site work".

------
marktangotango
I personally haven’t experienced any of these issues with remote work, but
then I had many years of experience before my first remote position, as senior
and often lead. I was the type to seldom seek help, but was often the one
sought out for help. My theory is the more one is accostomed to working on
their own, even in an office, the easier it is to work fully remote
successfully. Has anyone else experienced this?

~~~
maxxxxx
I agree that remote work needs a certain personality type. You need to be self
sufficient but also be willing to reach out proactively when you have problems
and not keep struggling in silence as I have seen before. This is a difficult
balance for some people.

As far as depression and anxiety goes I get that from my current job sitting
in a cube with constant noise and interruption. I feel it’s starting to really
impact my mental health negatively.

In the end i don’t think remote work is for everybody. Some people will thrive
with it and some people will thrive in an office. It’s good to know which you
are.

~~~
zzzcpan
> You need to be self sufficient but also be willing to reach out proactively
> when you have problems

It's not that different from sitting in a cube, at least for software
development. It's just threshold when something becomes a problem to reach out
for help is higher for remote work, since it takes a bit more effort to
communicate. You do a bit more so you have something to show and to discuss,
not try to reach out for every little thing.

~~~
maxxxxx
When I worked remotely there were people that were incredibly needy and every
10 minutes asked me about stuff they could easily have gotten from a web
search and others got bogged down for weeks with issues that could be resolved
in five minutes.

I always felt that good remote workers are very mature, communicate well and
are respectful of others . I guess that applies to office work too but remote
amplifies this.

~~~
pault
I believe remote work amplifies everything. Inefficiencies, poor organization,
bad documentation, poor communication, poor work ethic. Any stresses start to
form cracks when taken out of the office environment. The upside is all of the
things that a successful remote team requires are the things that you should
be doing anyway.

------
jmkni
I have learned the hard way that I am not good at remote work.

I recognize that I'm in the minority here, but I actually _need_ to get up,
have a shower, leave my flat and go into an office with people for my mental
health.

I have zero issue with other people working remotely, in fact I envy them.

~~~
qwerty123456aa
Sounds like your only social life is from work.

~~~
jmkni
It's not even that, it's like I mentally have trouble kick-starting my day
without going through that routine of having a shower, brushing my teeth,
leaving the flat. When WFH, some days I am no further along at 3pm than I was
at 9pm, then come the deadlines.

Definitely something I wish I had figured out years earlier.

~~~
theNJR
It is beyond critical that you keep your routine! Remote or not. Wake up, gym,
shower, etc.

------
gedy
A lot of the comments seem to be about remote work as some preference or
something; the biggest driver I’ve seen though, however, is that housing is
unaffordable near the office. Remote work makes housing more affordable for
many folks. It also seems like it skews towards older folks, likely due to
having families and children needing more room and better schools.

~~~
elindbe2
But on the other hand you have to wonder about the greater social implications
down the line. The invention of the car was great at first. It allowed people
to get where they wanted to go faster. But as it was adopted more and more
heavily, we ended up with traffic and sprawl that mean people have to spend
more of their time commuting than before.

I wonder if something analogous would happen with remote work. If more
companies go the remote route, wouldn't we expect them to favor employees in
cheap locations that will accept less pay for the same work? And if that's the
case, wouldn't more and more families be forced out of more expensive
locations, even those who could afford to live there before? In other words,
remote work has the possibility to exacerbate the very problems that it seeks
to fix.

~~~
ZeroFries
If there was less demand for expensive areas, the market would adjust and they
would become less expensive. The overall effect would be an averaging effect
on real estate prices as cheaper areas became more expensive and expensive
areas cheaper.

~~~
elindbe2
But it seems quite possible that incomes could fall faster than demand given
there are other factors influencing demand like foreign buyers. And the money
saved by employers would make many already rich people significantly richer.
Perhaps the nice areas of the country would just become a playground for the
rich (more so than they already are) while everyone else is in dystopian
exurbs and suburbs.

------
ken
With virtually no tech companies offering private offices any more, this isn't
surprising. Companies won't give employees what they need, so employees are
hacking the system to find a way to get it anyway.

One of the first steps given here for remote work is to "set-up or find a
space that lets you stay productive", which will enable you to "Stay focused
on tasks and be able to fully disconnect whenever required". Sound familiar?

That's what private office advocates have been saying for years. The only
difference is that companies refuse to allow this within the walls of the
company. I'm surprised the companies aren't also pushing to have these people
reclassified as independent contractors and not employees.

------
cracauer
I wonder how much of this doesn't actually have to do with the home, but
rather office conditions:

\- open seating and/or highly sound-reflective surfaces

\- unfixable A/C and/or drafts and/or allergens

\- all methods of transportation to the place where the office is are
unsupported (e.g. Cambridge, MA)

\- jerks cruising the office

\- unwanted attention not or only pretentiously connected to work

~~~
kwhitefoot
That can all easily be fixed. I'm currently working on a short term job at
Statnett in Oslo. The office is all open plan but there are loads of small
sound proofed rooms of various sizes that you can use for a work conversation.
It's frowned upon to have a long or loud conversation at your desk. You just
pick up your laptop and go to a little conference room. Some are just big
enough for three people but they all have a big screen and conferencing tools.

Each floor also has an area where you can relax with a cup of tea or coffee
and read the newspaper.

Desks are all motorised so you can adjust the height and use them standing if
you like, the desks are not personal although those who work most of the time
in the office do use the same desk all the time.

The environment is quiet, the temperature is pleasant, there are automatic
blinds on the windows shut out the sun when it is too strong.

For me it works really well. If I have a meeting then I go in early, find a
desk and work, go to the meeting, back to the desk and do some work, then
finish the day just as though it was an ordinary office day.

But I agree, there are plenty of places (I've worked in some) where all of
your negative office conditions apply.

~~~
joncrane
Sidetrack: do you know how hard/easy is it for a United Statesian to get a job
in Norway? It's kind of a dream of mine to live and work in Norway for a
while.

~~~
kwhitefoot
Assuming that you can find an employer who needs your expertise then I don't
think it should be especially difficult. At least it should be easier than it
was when I moved here in January 1986 when I had to provide the Norwegian
Embassy in London with a stack of documentation proving that the company that
was going to employ me had tried for six months to find a Norwegian who could
do the job and failed before they would issue a work permit.

Anyway, Norway is a very transparent society with a well integrated government
web site so you should be able to find the details here:
[https://www.udi.no/en/want-to-apply/work-
immigration/](https://www.udi.no/en/want-to-apply/work-immigration/)

------
badatshipping
The biggest benefit of remote work is that it directly rewards productivity.
At an office if you finish your work early you can’t just go home; you’re
expected to do more work. With remote work, if you finish in 2 hours what
takes other people your rank 8, you can stockpile commits and just take the
day off.

~~~
rofo1
I don't like your reasoning. I think it's selfish. You can always help out for
the duration that you are paid for, regardless of tempo. There's almost always
work to be done - cleaning up code, commenting, refactoring, documentation
(api/sdk usage, help), cleaning up tasks, responding to e-mails, and so on.

I don't think it's fair that you idle while someone is paying for your time.

Someone, at the end, organized this so you can work remotely. Someone is
taking care of you financially, at the end. The least you can do is do what
you have agreed/promised/been contracted to do.

------
ilaksh
I think it's worth mentioning how remote work makes society more sustainable.

The energy usage and CO2 output for commuting versus using the internet is
dramatically in favor of remote work.

In fact, if we are concerned with those things, I believe that commuting every
day for jobs that can be done online should be illegal.

------
blueyes
I have worked remotely and also managed a remote team. There are causes of
remote work that I consider positive, and causes I consider negative. The
positive causes are that companies have access to a much wider pool of talent
all over the world, and remote workers have more jobs to choose from. The
negative causes are: 1) many cities are failing to provide affordable housing,
so it doesn't make financial sense for people on the same team to work in
physical proximity to each other. 2) there has been a wave of xenophobia in
the Western liberal economies that has made it more difficult for talent
outside those economies to migrate.

------
asdfman123
> We tend to think of mental health disorders as something that happens to
> others

Oh, that's hilarious. I certainly don't.

------
xfitm3
Your manager makes all the difference. Having a remote manager is the key.

------
fendy3002
Is remote overtime that bad? I guess I'll consent to put work at 10 hours a
day (1 hour break included), in exchange of 1 hour commute time.

I wanna try remote working, wonder how it'll goes through.

~~~
no1youknowz
I work from home.

My schedule is:-

6.50am wake up

7.00am start work

12.00pm lunch

1.00pm start work

5.00pm dinner

6.00pm start work

9.45pm get ready for bed

10.00pm sleep

I don't have any distractions (except the occasional quick read of HN, when I
need a short mental break), don't own a tv, no kids, wear the same clothes, I
eat the same meals daily and I wear headphones and listen to music.

I'll do this for 90 days and then relax on the schedule somewhat and then
repeat for another 90 days.

Let me tell you. It's actually quite interesting on what you can accomplish
with 13 hours of work (91 hours a week) available to you.

Elon has it right. In a compound interest sort of way, what you can achieve in
90 days (with this schedule) is akin to someone else taking 6 months or more
to do the same.

Of course it means no social life. But that's for later on.

~~~
SketchySeaBeast
How long have you been doing this? And I'm confused on what you mean by "Of
course it means no social life. But that's for later on." \- Do you have a
spouse or significant other? Do you not think that having social interactions
are important at all points in life?

~~~
notfromhere
This whole schedule is super bleak and reads like an intro to a dystopian
novel

------
Rapidfir3
One small thing I want to add is that as someone with many hobbies and goals
not related to my job I love the idea of getting X amount of work done and
then being done as early as 2 or 3.

Those extra hours to make more progress on whatever personal project(s) I'm
working on at that time keep me motivated and, more importantly, happy. Which
means I'll enjoy doing my actual work more (or just tolerate it better) and
you'll probably get better results from me.

------
drngdds
I wouldn't want to work 100% remotely, mostly because of the loneliness they
talk about. But I would probably take it over my current situation of working
in an open office 100% of the time, because open offices are a special level
of hell for anyone with attention issues or sensory sensitivities.

Also, do people actually think "infinite vacation" is a perk? I like having a
fixed number of vacation days that I can take without question or explanation.

~~~
mac01021
> do people actually think "infinite vacation" is a perk? I like having a
> fixed number of vacation days that I can take without question or
> explanation.

It really depends on your manager and what the fixed number is going to be.

At my last job, I had "infinite" and my boss let me take six weeks over the
course of a year.

At my current job, my boss would love to let me take 6 weeks (or more), but
the giant behemoth of a company sets the limit at 3 weeks (but I get another
week if I stay in my job for 10 years).

------
semanticjudo
It appears to me that work environment is a personal preference based on an
array of personality traits and motivations mostly opaque to most people until
they've had a chance to try a few out. Further, it seems that the preferences
fall into a few categories that are broadly represented in the population.
Each has objective pros and cons but for any individual, the cons are easily
outweighed by our preferences and motivations.

Once you realize this, articles regarding "X environment has Y good and Z bad"
stop providing any value. What I want to read about is how to effectively
manage a company to allow my employees to 1) discover the environment they
prefer 2) be in that environment and 3) maintain a high performing team across
those environments. Given considerations around maintaining culture,
communication challenges and "informal, de-facto decision makers" forming up
where people to choose to work closely together, #3 is a challenge I haven't
seen a good answer to. (e.g. office or co-working employees naturally have a
networking advantage and can quickly form an "in group" that makes decisions
while, at best, unconsciously leaving remote workers out)

------
dekhn
I would love to work remotely- I am already productive when working from home
on a big monitor in a quiet room- but I always worry that eventually I'd
become decoupled from my coworkers and isolated.

Also there are many things at my startup where we really all need to be in the
same place to make a decision- I don't think slack or other chat apps can
really replace the high bandwidth in person discussions for important decision
making.

------
rdtsc
Been working remotely for 4 years and so far it worked really well. One of the
key factors is that most of the team is remote. So remote is a default here.
In the previous position, we had some people working remotely, and it was
tough for them. They'd miss a lot of context for why some decisions were made
and it was very frustrating. So I'd put that at the very top of the list of
things to have for remote work risks.

> Intentionally carve a space and routine and set up a separate remote working
> space

Yes. It's very important to have a separate "office" space. Then get dressed
in the morning, get ready as if you're heading out of the door to an actual
office. In the evening at 5pm close the laptop, walk out of the office and
closer the door behind you. And you're done for the day.

------
erdo
Is it that people love remote working, or that they hate commuting?

I would prefer a 20 min commute on a clean train, to a nice office than remote
working (and I did have that on an Amsterdam based contract).

But an hour plus drive to an industrial estate in the middle of nowhere - I'd
maybe push for a remote option.

~~~
jriot
I am a data scientist with little to nothing in common with my colleagues
(particularly on the engineering side), outside of us working for the same
company. I'd rather spend my time with my wife and kids, pursuing my hobbies,
and generally being outdoors. Not having to commute or waste hours pretending
to be interested in my colleague's lives outside of work is a huge benefit.
Side conversations occurring at the office which are beneficial are a rare
occurrence - put more specifically, I am willing to risk missing out on in
office perks to benefit my own life. When I hit my financial number, I won't
write code, conduct analysis or do anything near a computer screen again.

~~~
erdo
This made me chuckle, all power to you! How many of us would work in our
current role if money were genuinely no object - in reality there are far more
rewarding things to be doing with our limited time on this planet.

~~~
jriot
I thought our (you and me) mindset was normal, that if money weren't an issue
no would work, but I have been mistaken many times. I am not sure if people
don't have interests outside of their work, or their work is their interests
but it seems many people would continue working if financially secure.

------
dpods
We're big proponents of location flexibility in the workplace at Out Of
Office. Work doesn't have to be so black and white with 100% in the office or
100% remote work. We think a combination of both working in the office and
offering employees one or two flexible days to work from home or a coffee shop
leads to higher employee retention.

I'm 100% remote but have never experienced some of the downsides mentioned in
the article, but I know others who have. I'd like to see companies transition
from their rigid policies to more flexibility that gives their employees
greater control over their schedule.

------
vpmpaul
I think there is a sort of subconscious push for this that not everyone
attributes. In tech work if you are at an office you tend to get "dump
trucked" work even if it is not your domain or responsibility. "I gave it to
you its yours now figure it out"

The reality is bad management is the rule rather than the exception in most of
the world. If you are home you are "out of sight out of mind" for
MBWA(management by walking around)managers. At the very least it requires a
manager to stop think before just running over and screaming we need this done
today type stuff.

------
siffland
Last contract i was on everyone was remote. I ended up driving in everyday to
work on the systems because i was one of 3 people who lived in the same city
as the systems.

I could hardly ever get ahold of anyone. They would just not be there. Come to
find out most would only work the 4 core hours (10-2 CST) we were required,
then "work" after hours when no one was online. We lost the contract.

Remote CAN work and work well, you just need management in place to keep the
ducks in line.

------
DanielleMolloy
The optimal situation for me is having the freedom to decide whether it makes
sense to be at the office for meetings, technical discussions, ideas; or
whether I need full uninterrupted focus which is easier to achieve at home
(without building closing times, commuting, and with the choice to work late
into the night). I think purely remote work would make me feel very self-
centered and disconnected (even though I'm leaning towards the introvert
spectrum).

------
dmode
I wonder if the author misread the poll referenced in this article. When
people choose remote work, often they are referring to the ability to work 1
or 2 days remotely in a week. Most companies in the Bay Area allow that and
are quite flexible on where you work from if you are traveling. I don't think
that can extrapolated to being fully remote

------
icxa
The poll asks what is _most_ important to you, and they failed to leave out
salary and other more obvious ones as one of the options.

It would be a much more sound poll if it was framed as "Among these options,
which one is the most important when looking for a new job"

~~~
sidlls
In the US it's generally frowned upon to acknowledge one considers salary a
very important factor, unless one is at the top of the hierarchy. There's a
reason "passionate" and "mission driven" are memes in the hiring landscape
here.

------
rconti
One enormous ad that won't go away and can't be closed. Sweet.

------
stuff4ben
I've always hated working from home. Too much distraction, not enough verbal
interaction with my team, and not enough face-time with my boss and his boss.
Now that I'm a manager and manage a team that is remote to me (but colocated
for everyone else including my boss) it's just terrible. I'm now a remote
worker, while the rest of my team is mostly in-office. And yes that means that
my boss goes directly to my team to get stuff done completely bypassing me.
Sometimes he'll let me know, sometimes I find out after the fact. It's
basically the worst of both worlds and I would never do this again.

------
jackcosgrove
I know everyone is different, and noisy offices can be disruptive to some, but
I can't help think that an ulterior motive with working from home is working
less.

Maybe work from home will be how we reduce the workweek to account for the
diminishing need for work.

~~~
Strom
Eliminating dead time is definitely part of it. However if a thinking based
worker doesn't feel like working, it doesn't matter if they're sitting at an
office. There's no way to verify whether they're thinking about a work related
problem or thinking about their vacation plans. On top of that, in a lot of
cases people can get away even with just blatant non-working like reading
Hacker News on their work computer. Thus it's always about trust anyway. It
doesn't matter much where the worker physically is.

Additionally, it's results not methods that should be managed. You want to set
goals for your workers and see how they progress. Whether they achieve those
goals sitting at an office or by outsouring their work to their little nephew
while playing video games, it shouldn't really matter. Ultimately what matters
is if the goals are achieved, as that's why you're paying the person -- not
because you want them to physically be doing some specific activity.

