
Want to attract top tech talent? Offer telecommuting - chanks
http://management.fortune.cnn.com/2011/04/19/want-to-attract-top-tech-talent-offer-telecommuting/
======
edw519
In the past 4 hours I have exchanged ones and zeros with people and computers
in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Florida, Arizona, California, Germany, Singapore,
and India.

And got 3 "office days" worth of work done.

And I haven't even brushed my teeth yet. :-)

You know what telecommuters say, "Once you've deployed a killer app in your
pajamas, you can never go back."

~~~
udp
Don't you find it gets a bit lonely after a while?

I've been working as a full-time programmer from home for about a year and a
half now, and it's beginning to get a bit weird. Aside from not having
physical coworkers, I don't leave work, go home and do something else, because
work is always all around me. There's this never-ending pattern of 9-5 quickly
becoming 2 PM - 8 AM, until I finally pull an all nighter and it resets.

It doesn't help that I'm 100% passionate about what I do...!

~~~
technomancy
> Don't you find it gets a bit lonely after a while?

At work we spend 80% of the day pairing over voip and SSH. It's ironic because
I moved from California to Seattle because I got tired of telecommuting all by
my lonesome from down there, but these days with pairing it doesn't bother me
at all.

~~~
jbrechtel
That sounds like an interesting pairing setup. Would you mind expounding on
the details, both technical and logistical, if possible?

Specifically, are you sharing a screen session with VIM in a terminal or what?

Do you rotate pairs or is it always the same person? How would you compare
your remote pairing setup with live, in-person pairing?

~~~
technomancy
We are all Emacs users, and we share tmux sessions on Vagrant VMs over SSH.
(It's like GNU Screen, but a lot more convenient for sharing.) We usually
stick with the same pair for about a week and rotate among our 10-man team,
though each person has areas they're more proficient in. We use Skype for VoIP
(though Mumble works better in some cases) and IRC for chat.

I haven't done much in-person pairing, but I think the main difference is not
having to share a keyboard. Each person can use a system they're comfortable
with; no fuss about dvorak vs qwerty, Kinesis vs Natural 4000, standing desk
vs sitting, or Ubuntu vs Macosecks. It does mean you need to use auditory cues
to indicate who is in control of a given session. The biggest drawback is
probably that you can't share a web browser over SSH, but since we are doing
backend coding it doesn't affect us.

For me it's been a huge win. We do also have week-long meetings a few times a
year to bring the whole team together in-person to promote the team's
cohesion. But working from home is great; as long as I'm able to switch things
up occasionally by working from a coffee shop a couple times a week, I'm
happy.

~~~
jbrechtel
That sounds like a really great setup. I'm going to have to try this out one
day. I've never really considered the specific benefits remote pairing would
have over in-person pairing...generally the only things considered are the
downsides.

Obviously, some of the things you mentioned with in-person pairing can be
alleviated. At my current client, our setup includes multiple keyboards and
mice. A friend of mine uses his own keyboard with a hardware switch to go
between dvorak and qwerty.

You mention not being able to share a browser which makes me think of the
times where it would have been convenient to look something up for a moment
while my pair experimented (two pronged problem solving approach... :).

Also, what kind of pairing patterns do you use in this setup? Ping Pong TDD,
driver/navigator, etc... ?

~~~
technomancy
> You mention not being able to share a browser which makes me think of the
> times where it would have been convenient to look something up for a moment
> while my pair experimented (two pronged problem solving approach... :).

Definitely. Occasionally we'll read docs in w3m, but often it's good to go
async on looking up some boring details.

What we do is probably more driver/navigator since whomever is hosting usually
has better latency. The remote guy can still get around just fine, but it's
just barely noticeable enough to give an edge to the host. Since we work in a
language that makes it easy to do strict FP, (Clojure) test-first is not as
important as it would be in an imperative language, though we do have pretty
good coverage.

------
mgkimsal
This is sort of a no-brainer. I'm pitched by recruiters about once a week, and
they're all for far away positions - typically SF area, but other areas too. I
can't sell my house any time soon - the market just isn't moving - so I'm
somewhat held hostage by geography. This doesn't mean that I can't travel
onsite and visit your office regularly, nor does it mean skype and phone don't
work out here in the sticks :)

Telecommuting requires the entire team or ideally the entire company be set up
to work like that - just having one guy out in a different state or country on
his own doesn't work very well in most cases. I understand that. What I don't
get is why more companies aren't structuring themselves to take advantage of
remote workers.

If you have strong procedures in place to deal with remote/offsite workers
(fulltime or not), you can more easily integrate short term labor when you
need it - you'll have the shared workspaces, file transfers, documentation,
version control, etc, already set up and ready to let new people in as needed.

This seems like this would be a competitive advantage that more companies
should be looking at. Maybe they will be in the coming years as the impact of
underwater mortgages and geography-locked workers starts to impact the broader
tech labor market.

~~~
eru
Why can't you sell your house? Your house has already decreased in value, not
accounting for the loss in your books doesn't make it more valuable.

~~~
hugh3
No, but if you sell your house you need to come up with the difference between
what you sell it for and the amount still owing on it in cash, don't you?

~~~
bartonfink
Or you're still on the hook for the balance of the mortgage, depending on your
terms. Either way, you're in a very unpleasant situation.

~~~
eru
Yes, but you're in the books for that anyway. No matter whether you still have
the house or not.

Though I do see that it is a problem, if you have to come up with the margin
call in cash when you sell the house.

------
angrycoder
I've spent the bulk of the past 8 years telecommuting, even when I've had full
time positions locally. It requires a strong commitment to communication and
the experience to recognize when the communication is failing so you can get
off your ass for a face to face meeting or phone call. I also ending up
working a hell of a lot more hours than I would if I just had a desk job. But
I wouldn't have it any other way.

I don't give a shit about your corporate culture or your ping pong table or
your office politics or your ego battles, I only care about solving problems
and producing solid solutions. Telecommuting lets focus on doing just that
while leaving all the other nonsense behind.

~~~
pstack
Agreed. I haven't been in the market for a job in a very long time, but the
quickest way to lose my interest in your position is to tell me I can't work
from home. After almost fifteen years, I can think of no other way.
(Especially in my case, where my colleagues are all spread across the globe,
anyway).

------
wyclif
Startups that demand relocation to NYC or SF are a total show stopper here.
Many of us are held hostage by geography-- maybe you own a home, maybe you
have kids in a school they're flourishing in, maybe your parents need help. If
you're a family man you won't like spending your wife and children's time in
Bay Area or Metro NYC traffic. But here's the thing: the technology most
startups use means they can transcend geography to an extent.

I do not underestimate the value of having a team in the same location. It
does affect morale and company culture. But with the right people and the
right technology those issues are quickly going to wind up in the rearview
mirror. When I look at a company, I want to see if they are set up to do
remote work, or are they landlocked?

~~~
michaelchisari
_I want to see if they are set up to do remote work, or are they landlocked?_

I love this term. Maybe I'll use it on my resume.

~~~
wyclif
Hi, Michael. I love Appleseed and give you guys mad props.

------
jordanb
I routinely have people begging me to work for them, but probably 4 in 5 clam
up when I specify that -- while I'm happy to spend as much time with them as
necessary to get the specs and make everyone comfortable -- I will not sit in
their office to do the programming.

I can not, for the life of me, understand why that is such a sticking point
with so many people. Fortunately I have enough people who _are_ willing to
work with me anyway that I can forget about the ones who don't, but it seems
mind-numbingly obvious to me that if you're desperate for the skills I have,
you should be willing to work with a requirement that doesn't cost you
anything.

As near as I can fathom, it's a psychological thing. Remote people don't seem
like they're part of your "empire" as you look out across the office and see
all the busy beavers hunched over their computers.

~~~
zem
also, they can't keep an eye on you to see that you're not slacking off on
company time (the horror of it all!)

~~~
jshen
But they rarely are able to tell if I'm slacking off in the office either.
They can't tell the difference between me working on their code or my own fun
side projects.

~~~
duck
That isn't how their minds work though.

------
igorgue
My advice would be, talent /= experience.

I'm sick and tired of companies being super picky because I don't know their
technology stack or maybe just one element, they don't even offer a technical
test these days.

I wont learn Cassandra or Scala because they are popular on super-webscale
sites, I did, though, learn Haskell, Node, MongoDB, Redis, Python, Ruby, not
because they teach that in college. I think that tells you I can learn other
technologies.

But I get a feeling - in many interviews I've had in the last couple of month
- they get disappointed when I tell them I don't know Scala, Cassandra,
Hadoop...

Most good programmers I know (they're not genius level, nor most of the people
here) are willing to relocate wherever you are, but they might not know the
super-awesome-webscale technologies you use because they work for actual
businesses that charge customers and don't need a billion uniques a month to
be profitable.

Instead of bitching about the lack of talent (and there are many programmers
like me) be willing to train people on your weird-ass technology stack.

~~~
scythe
You say you _refuse_ to learn them. If you're not going to learn their
technology what use can you possibly be?

~~~
daemin
I think he means that he's not going to learn it himself independently because
he doesn't use it for work, and he's learning/using other technologies for his
personal projects. And all technologies are more useful to him currently than
the one's for building billion visitors/month sites.

~~~
igorgue
Yes sir, you're right!

I love learning new things, but to be honest I don't find a good use case for
e.g. Hadoop, at least not in my personal projects. Nor they are attractive to
me. And it's not because I'm not into non-mainstream tech, because I am into
R, Haskell, Redis (yes I know some of you might consider them mainstream).

Lets say you don't have a super-model-girlfriend but you want to know
everything about them... Some people like to do that I don't.

------
mgkimsal
Posting another thought here.

I have a suspicion that there's enough people in the SF area (and a couple of
the the other "big" markets) that will actively fight against telecommuting,
specifically because it will lower wages in those areas.

As someone else posted, yes, I understand the value of a team being in the
same room. But that value comes at a premium price, and it's one which may not
always be worth paying. However, given the boom/busy/buyout cycle in the bay
area (as an example), enough of the same workers can move from company to
company as the companies are merged, bought out, or close, that this keeps the
talent supply close enough to what is needed to make it harder to embrace
telecommuting. You just need a few more people to fill in a few gaps, right?
They need to be _on site_ , or they're not a 'team player', or just not
serious about their career in tech if they don't want to move to _the valley_!
(have heard this before).

If the majority of companies out in SF set themselves up to embrace
telecommuting, that would mean it would be easier to fill that next position
with someone from Idaho, Kansas or Utah. That would mean the company could pay
a lower wage. Why would the culture of startup workers want to embrace
something that will end up driving down their salaries?

~~~
zem
how does that work? the people _paying_ the salaries would surely love to get
someone who can do the same work for less, and the people receiving the
salaries aren't the ones who make the decision as to whether a new hire can
telecommute or not.

~~~
georgieporgie
_the people receiving the salaries aren't the ones who make the decision as to
whether a new hire can telecommute or not._

True, but they can whisper into the right ears every day, 9 - 5. And it's
quite easy to negatively impact a coworker's productivity, if you so wish.

~~~
zem
i think you're attributing far too much cunning and big-picture thinking to
developers. specifically, the logic chain here would have to run "this dude is
telecommuting, which means that he can live somewhere cheaper than sf, which
means that he can accept a lower salary, which means that salaries across the
board will tend to drop, which means that my salary will be affected, which
means i'd better shaft him". i'm not saying that a malicious developer _can't_
whisper into the right ears and get someone into trouble, but it's usually
because of some more directly personal dislike or jealousy.

------
jasonkester
I've been working a remote contract these last 6 month, and one thing that
surprises me is how I bill a lot less hours than I would if I were on site.

If I boot up in the morning, spend 30 minutes trying to get into something,
fail and end up back here on HN, I don't bill any time. If I did the same
thing sitting in a cube, I'd get paid for it.

The end result is that the client gets a much better deal by having me off
site. Works great for me too, since I can justify billing out at a higher rate
that reflects the fact that they get essentially all my productive time for
the week, and nothing else. Everybody wins.

As an added bonus, if I really can't get started in a morning, I can bail and
go bouldering for the day and not feel guilty about it. The bizarro world
salaried version of me would spend that same day sitting in a cubicle secretly
playing video games on the clock.

~~~
bconway
_If I did the same thing sitting in a cube, I'd get paid for it._

Why? I bill for work done regardless of my location, I never thought it might
be out of the ordinary.

~~~
proexploit
I think he's attempting to explain that he hasn't actually done anything
(maybe loading up some programs, getting reference material together, etc.)
and then does something unrelated. I wouldn't bill for that either unless it
took a significant portion of time AND I wouldn't have to do it again later.

~~~
jasonkester
And of course there's no real mechanism to _not_ get paid for time spent
daydreaming if you're sitting in an office on salary.

On the point in question though, no, I won't bill time warming up the dev
environment unless I actually use it for productive work. You lose the odd
fraction of an hour here and there, but really if you're trying to add up
things like that to get yourself paid an extra 2 hours at the end of the week
you're probably just not charging enough for your time.

------
bravura
At MetaOptimize, I am competing with Google and Facebook and LinkedIn and a
host of other companies to recruit top ML + NLP talent.

But, the benefit of my recruiting model is that I hire people remote and part-
time. A lot of strong strong people are in academia, but love their academic
post and don't want to move. They just want build cool stuff on the side and
make some extra money.

The fact that Google + Facebook + LinkedIn + friends _must_ own you full time,
asses in seats, creates a unique hiring opportunity for me.

------
michaelchisari
I love Chicago, you just can't beat this city for the kind of value you get
for the price. The closest competitor is New York in terms of food and
culture, but the costs are astronomically higher.

When I'm contacted by a job recruiter for a position that pays more, but
requires moving to somewhere like Mountain View, I will rarely entertain the
idea. Sure, I'll fly into the office, I'll do it quite regularly actually, but
there's no way I'm picking up and moving to a city with considerably less to
offer, yet which costs substantially more.

I understand the value of social capital, and working with people face to
face. But how often does that really need to happen? As developers, our job is
ultimately to write code, and that can happen anywhere.

------
crenelle
I have telecommuted for several gigs and positions. The most difficult
situation to deal with is when most of the rest of the company doesn't
telecommute, so everyone is not in the habit of cluing you in to what's going
on. You may have all the tools required to establish and maintain decent
communications, but they often don't bother to adopt any of it for their end.
I even remote-developed for a large networking company with enormous
communications facilities designed to solve problems like that -- but they had
me fly over to headquarters all the time instead.

~~~
chc
Speaking from experience, this can be a problem even when you're not
telecommuting.

------
shimonamit
I liked the ending:

 _Maybe if we called it 'cloud commuting', CIOs would buy in._

~~~
RexM
Same, that was a nice touch.

------
ddlatham
I see several comments saying more companies should be hiring remote workers,
building their culture to support it, and why aren't they doing it?

It's interesting to see the numbers in this article.

 _What's remarkable is that, even after two years of flattish compensation,
technology professionals are willing to sacrifice $7,800 on average to work
from home_

The article speaks as if this is a huge amount, but as a chunk of total
salary, it's probably 5-15% for most tech jobs. So the question for employers
is, is it worth an extra 5-15% in salary to have your team work together in
person?

In many cases it is.

~~~
Vivtek
That's not a huge amount. Say you have a mere half-hour commute = 1 hour a day
x 250 working days a year, your $7800 turns into $31.20 an hour for the most
boring work you'll ever do - even a truck driver usually gets to see different
scenery from day to day.

And that's if you manage to live a mere half-hour from work, which in any
major city is seriously unlikely.

If you're good at tech, why would you take a second job as an automobile
driver for chump change?

~~~
orangecat
Exactly. One of the few clear-cut results of happiness studies is that
commuting really, really sucks. I can understand why telecommuting might not
work for some companies, but there's rarely an excuse for not offering
flexible hours, so you can at least dodge rush hour by coming in earlier or
later.

------
droz
I think I may be in the minority, but I don't think people are thinking of the
consequences of this telecommuting push.

I like the fact that there is a place where I do work and where I live. I do
not want these two places to be the same. Much for the same reason people
don't put a television in the bedroom. The bedroom is for sleeping, the living
room is for TV.

I find that with the remote people I need to work with, I'm working around
their schedule of when they will be around. It is difficult to communicate
over IM, IRC, telephone and Skype (doesn't feel a fluid as face-to-face
interaction).

If everyone starts becoming remote, then what's the point of having an office?
If enough companies come to the same conclusion, what's the point in owning a
building (from the eyes of a real estate guy). And ultimately, what's the
point of having big office parks and so on and on. That's a lot of land and
lot of capital at stake if this ever actually took off.

If a company asked me to be remote, I'd tell them I'm going to start looking
for other employment options.

~~~
jacques_chester
> If everyone starts becoming remote, then what's the point of having an
> office? If enough companies come to the same conclusion, what's the point in
> owning a building (from the eyes of a real estate guy). And ultimately,
> what's the point of having big office parks and so on and on. That's a lot
> of land and lot of capital at stake if this ever actually took off.

It'll be put to other uses. That's how capitalism works my friend. What do you
think happened to all those old factories and warehouses in big cities? People
live in them now.

~~~
bruce511
yes. And more to the point what happened to the people who used to _work_ in
them? 'Cause those jobs are now being done outside the US by people prepared
to work for far less. If decentralizing is an option then the US border
certainly isn't a barrier.

Understand that a telecomuting job is the easiest job to offshore. At the end
of the day if you never come in to the office you might as well be living in
India. Cause then we'd have to pay you less. Oh wait, there's some super-keen,
super bright chap in India who'll do your work for a tenth of the price? hmm
let me think about that for a while.

~~~
jacques_chester
If they're going to outsource you, they'll outsource you. Whether you come to
the office or telecommute won't make a huge difference to the decision when
you're looking at wage differences of 5x-20x.

In fact, a telecommuter is cheaper than onsite -- much lower overheads.
Employees in the office mean renting office space, getting insurance, paying
for utilities ... overhead which can add up to a lot of money quite quickly.
If they're at home you can pay them more and still come out ahead.

~~~
bruce511
"If they're going to outsource you, they'll outsource you. Whether you come to
the office or telecommute won't make a huge difference to the decision when
you're looking at wage differences of 5x-20x."

I disagree. Many companies wouldn't outsource because the shift from having
workers-in-house to workers-remote is a big one.

I _know_ I can get staff in India or China much cheaper than here, but there
are enormous benefits (perceived or real) to the employer for having people in
the office.

The point I'm making is that when a worker presents such a terrific argument
for tele-computing, they're also presenting a terrific argument for out-
sourcing.

Now personally I'm not a big fan of tele-commuting. We've had some remote
workers in the past, and it didn't work out. Communication is the key of
course, but at the end of the day, for better or worse, it simply didn't work
out. Now we operate far more like a flexitime system, people come in every
day, but there's a lot of flexibility with regard to hours.

But my root point here is that the same arguments for and against
telecommuting are the same arguments for and against outsourcing. The one
begets the other. Outsourcing is just telecommuting with "cheaper" added.

~~~
danssig
>I _know_ I can get staff in India or China much cheaper than here

No you can't. If you could more companies would be doing it. You get what you
pay for. When you get cheap outsourced labor in India you're getting people
with no experience and insanely high turn over rate. If you want people from
India with more experience you'll find them out west somewhere making a better
salary.

The market rate is the market rate. If you suddenly switched all programmers
to being remote then the guys in India would initially be getting offered so
many jobs that they'd have to push their prices up in response.

You're making the classic mistake of assuming cost = what it costs me + some
profit %. It doesn't, it's about perceived value and nothing else.

~~~
bruce511
It's interesting to see the knee-jerk reaction when someone talks about Indian
or Chinese programmers. The hypothesis that "all smart Indian programmers are
in the US" is, well, somewhat naive. Sure not _all_ Indian programmers are
great, not all are even good, but that's true everywhere. Finding the good
ones will take as much work there as it does here. There's an awful lot of
chaff. But there are good ones, even great ones. And a _very_ tiny percentage
of a billion is still a lot.

So let me make the argument less prone to misunderstanding. When you open the
door to making a post "work remotely" you are competing with programmers in
Ireland, Australia, South Africa, Israel, Holland, Germany, New Zealand and so
on. All have excellent English language skills (ok, apart from the pesky
Germans), excellent work ethics, and in many cases require a living wage below
that found in the US.

When your job requires you go to the office, you're competing with say a
million others who could do that job. You might even be the very best. But are
you still the best if we expand the pool to include a billion people?

~~~
danssig
>The hypothesis that "all smart Indian programmers are in the US" is, well,
somewhat naive.

It sure is, which is why no one is saying that. I said _the west_ (that's not
just the US, you know?).

>you are competing with programmers in Ireland, Australia, South Africa,
Israel, Holland, Germany, New Zealand and so on.

I already am. Every one of them that is willing to move where I live. The only
difference is that neither they, nor I would have to move if we moved to
telecommuting. This would depress the value of labor somewhat because commute
hassles are figured into the current price, but I don't believe we would be
looking at a long term 50% decrease.

>and in many cases require a living wage below that found in the US.

Irrelevant. Market prices are set based on perceived value of the good or
service. Not what it costs to produce or anything like that.

> But are you still the best if we expand the pool to include a billion
> people?

No of course not, but we're not all competing for one job. If all programming
jobs became telecommuting jobs then I would be competing with everyone but for
every job.

------
bphogan
I would love to do more remote work, but then I hear horror stories about
people having problems not being around people. Feelings of isolation set in
after a couple of months, and people end up going to a gig where they are
around people. To those doing remote work, is this common?

~~~
Vivtek
I've worked at home since 1996 and there is no way in hell you'd drag me back.
I never had a problem with isolation, but then I have kids. Isolation for me
is a goal, not a fear.

In this, as in all things, your mileage will certainly vary. If you're a
type-A people person, you should probably stick with a social context.
Although (as elsewhere noted) you'd be surprised how much social interaction
you can have online at home these days.

~~~
Vivtek
Oh - the other variable - I grew up on a farm miles from anywhere, so I'm used
to spending time by myself. That's probably also a factor.

------
rickmb
In my experience, the number of people that actually have what it takes to
telecommute effectively is extremely small, and most of those are self-
employed already.

Of those that want to telecommute _and_ have a steady job, very few can
actually handle the responsibility and the lack of stimulus from co-workers
for longer periods of time. Flexible hours, working from home on a regular
basis, sure, no problem, but actual full time telecommuting requires a lot of
commitment, discipline and communication skills.

------
dabent
I have failed to understand why someone in India can do my job, but
telecommuting is still frowned upon.

~~~
random42
I suppose for the premium amount you are being paid, as compared to the Indian
worker, being physically present is a requisite. I cannot say, I disagree with
the logic myself.

~~~
cosgroveb
Paying a premium so we can play butts-in-seats and management can feel like
they're tending properly to the cube farm...

~~~
random42
I cant say anything for your management, but my management (actually my
immediate boss), is very reasonable. Being a developer himself, he understands
what programmers need to be productive. He allows remote work, time to time.
In time is as late as 11:30 AM (which is also just because, we have standup
that time). In all, a very reasonable person to work for/with/under, who
believes in not micro-managing people.

However, co-locating has its own benefits, and I suppose thats why he does not
hire remote workers (for permanent positions). We have hired remote
contractors in the past, and they worked fine to good, but it required lot of
effort on collaborating.

------
atacrawl
_With an unemployment rate of just 4% among tech professionals, and shortages
in specific fields, flexibility shouldn't be a last resort._

I would have guessed that tech unemployment would be lower than the national
average, but 4% is _really_ low.

~~~
il
The unemployment rate for college graduates as a whole is under 5%. White
collar workers are not the ones feeling the brunt of the recession.

~~~
braddunbar
Wow. That's a statistic that doesn't get reported nearly enough. It puts an
entirely different spin on the unemployment rate.

~~~
hugh3
It could probably afford to be aired in the "is college a waste of time and
money?" threads which crop up here every day too.

~~~
il
I doubt it, the correlation does not imply causation. My hunch is that the
people graduating from college are the kind of people that would find it
easier to find a job anyway.

~~~
InnocentB
There was actually an interesting study about this which got mentioned
recently on the Freakonomics podcast (you can see a transcription of the
segment at [http://freakonomicsradio.com/does-college-still-matter-
and-o...](http://freakonomicsradio.com/does-college-still-matter-and-other-
freaky-questions-answered.html), the original study is at
<http://faculty.arts.ubc.ca/tlemieux/papers/unintended.pdf>).

Basically, it uses men who were eligible for the Vietnam draft (who enrolled
in college in greater numbers than they otherwise would have, to avoid
military service) to demonstrate that success from college graduates is more
than a "these people are the ones who were already going to succeed" thing.

~~~
il
Thanks for the link, that is interesting. Of course, there were no startups
willing to eschew traditional hiring practices back then.

------
SoftwarePatent
Want to attract top tech talent? Offer a high salary.

~~~
famousactress
I think there's a difference between attracting and keeping (productive). High
salaries can lead to a 'golden handcuffs' scenario where the company can
flounder, do stupid things, mistreat employees.. and they'll stick around for
the cash.

I think paying well is a good idea, but it's not a complete strategy and I
don't think it actually is as likely to bring the lifestyle satisfaction that
telecommuting can for many people.

------
pbj
I was reading a study a while back about how an absurdly high percentage of
total jobs could be done via telecommute but aren't. It's crazy to think about
how many millions upon millions of dollars in fuel costs and reduced emissions
could be saved by having more telecommuters. Not only that, but companies
could save so much money by having reduced or no office space/electricity/etc.
Plus they'd get the added benefit of increased worker satisfaction in most
cases.

~~~
praptak
What you said, plus the employee commute time - I have actually turned down a
(nominally) better paid job offer to accept a (nominally) lower one. The pay
is lower, but the almost instant commute means I actually earn more per (work
+ commute) hour. On top of that I also save on fuel, car wear and tear and
road jam frustration.

------
kayoone
I worked from home for the past couple of years and now work in an office and
have to communte everyday. But i have to say i like working in a space with
other engineers to discuss ideas and concepts and energy more as sitting alone
at home.

------
Harkins
Anecdote: I've been traveling for the last three months, but most of my
network is in Chicago. I hear from recruiters and hiring managers every couple
days and, despite the consensus that Chicago has a "developer crisis" (to use
the words of an Obtiva blog post), every single job has onsite only.

~~~
pacaro
I read "Anecdote" as "HNecdote", not sure what that says about anything.

------
megamark16
Thinking back to the recent post about Performable paying a $12,000 referral
bonus: I consider myself a perfect candidate for the Performable job, with the
exception of location and willingness to pick up my family and move them
across the country. For a competitive salary (by midwest standards, which
would be a lot less than what you'd pay in Boston) I'd tell them to keep that
$12,000 and use it to fly me out to boston twice a month for a few days at a
time, and let me work from home the rest of the time. I work hard when I'm at
home. Shoot, I built AppRabbit from the ground up evenings and weekends from
the recliner in my home office. Plus, I spend more than an hour a day
commuting right now, so you can have that time too :-)

------
adnam
I recently _quit_ my job because they wanted me to telecommute.

~~~
trustfundbaby
Care to share the reason why?

~~~
adnam
I figured working from home would be great for the first month, and then I
would start going mad. And when I asked who was going to pay for my chair,
desk and computer, and who would pay the heating, lighting, ADSL and air-
conditioning ... it looked like I was going to be out of pocket too.

~~~
jrsmith1279
You don't already have a chair, desk, computer, and internet access at home?
Air conditioning may cost more, but you'd no longer be paying high gas prices
to drive to and from work (which I'm assuming your company doesn't pay for
now?).

------
melipone
I agree. We need to see more of that. I would suggest to offer a few trips a
year to the "office" though for morale.

------
spoiledtechie
<shameless plug for a job>

I know im a bit late to the game.

I have been looking for a telecommuting job for the past 6 months with no such
luck. I am a solid programmer and I get the job done. I hobby code at home and
have an awesome work ethic. I have several years experience and have been
everything for GIS software to coding directly on the GPU.

I have worked on all three types of mobile devices for my current job, and
have a pretty intense background of C#.

If anyone has a job that they would love to fill with a telecommuter. Please
look my direction.

my blog at spoiledtechie.com my email spoiledtechie with gmail.

Thanks for the look see!

~~~
bruce511
Not to pick on you, but let me ask this question;

Since you want to be a remote worker, what do you bring to the table that a
remote worker in say Mexico doesn't? Or India? Or China? 'Cause sure as hell
they'd be a lot cheaper...

And while quantity doesn't equal quality, I'm certainly not so egotistic as to
suppose there isn't a single Indian smart enough and keen enough to do
whatever I can do for a fraction of the cost.

So why doesn't my boss hire him? Cause I'm in the office when something needs
to get done. Because I'm the one who has a relationship with the customers.
Because I make the people around me more productive as I pass on my knowledge.
Oh, and perhaps because I am the boss.

------
dekayed
I think it is also important for in-office workers be allowed to telecommute
when needed. Having that flexibility offers a lot of freedom as there are
times where you need to be out of the office but can still work. I currently
have a family situation where I try and be at my parents' home a week a month
and having the option to work from there has been a huge help. It is
definitely a big factor in why I would stick around in my current job for a
while at least.

~~~
krschultz
I actually would prefer that to an all-telecommute gig. Be in the office 16-18
days a month out of 20, but those 2 or 4 days a month you want to work from
home you can.

------
fshaun
As with many things, working from home entails tradeoffs whose [dis]advantages
will be weighted differently.

For me, it's great when I need to concentrate and bang out the code. No
distractions, and I can poll IMs instead of needing a context switch when
someone drops by. If I'm stuck on a problem I'll go for a walk, cook food, or
take the laptop out to a coffee shop to work. I enjoy the flexibility.

Downsides for me: I do miss some of the random office chatter -- finding out
cool problems coworkers have solved and generally learning by osmosis. And I
have yet to find a great replacement for 3-4 people standing at a wall of
whiteboards. IMs, skype and meeting highlights solve some problems. Our group
is 2/3 remote spanning 8 time zones, so we're used to working a bit harder on
communication.

As for social factors, it was hard at first. I'd find myself not leaving the
apartment for weeks, which was less than good... I'm making an effort to get
out of the house daily, whether hitting the gym, buying groceries, or just
strolling around. This is getting easier, especially as spring seems to
finally be hitting Boston.

The biggest non-technical advantage for me is not needing a car. I detested
commuting. Instead of spending an extra hour or two driving I can take breaks
(or even naps) in the day and have the same "door-to-door" time. Financially,
it's also a winner. I don't even know how much gas costs here. There are 4
zipcars within a few blocks if I need them.

Work-life separation is trickier. I'd love to have an apartment with an extra
room for an office, but that would likely cancel out any vehicle savings.
Getting a separate desk to split work and personal computing helped a ton
here.

------
adyacplus
I have never earned a dollar in IT, but in other fields I got a lot of
success, so I consider IT a hobby. Perhaps I could be a top tech talent if
enough money and flexible conditions were around, anyway I think programmers
are mere pawns in game of business, so it seems better to devote time and
energy to develop better strategies.

------
pdenya
I used to work in NYC but I've been working from home for a couple years now
for an agency based in NYC (I live in CT now). I make good money but I've been
offered a 20k+ raise and other bonuses to work in the city. Barely considered
it.

------
johnbacon
Timely article, comsidering 37Signals is relocating their entire team to
Chicago. Apparently they are freaked out, not about their employees, but about
people in their homes who might break in to their stuff. Aka ex spouses et al.
So David H said they will all work from the Chicago office, with iMacs Chained
to their desks and wear uniforms. No more working from home or laptops unless
it's on open source projects. I'd link to the post on 37Signals blog, but I'm
in bed and on an iPhone.

Just cruise to their corporate blog. They posted the details a few days ago.

~~~
joelrunyon
I'm on an iPhone but I did anyways.

Here's the link - [http://37signals.com/svn/posts/2838-were-relocating-
everyone...](http://37signals.com/svn/posts/2838-were-relocating-everyone-to-
chicago)

Look at the date - April 1st.

Context.Context. Context.

~~~
johnbacon
Thanks for the context Joel. April fools is what I get for reading that on
April 15th!

------
Garbage
Quite offtopic. But still I wanted to share this. ;)

Why working at home is both awesome and horrible -
<http://theoatmeal.com/comics/working_home>

------
kalleboo
I've never had a proper job in an office - I started working an online gig in
uni, and I've been working for them ever since. It's great not needing to be
in one place. I've started taking round-the-world trips - live cheap in
hostels, work in coffee shops using their WiFi. Hanging out in Singapore and
Tokyo sure motivates me to work a lot more than my apartment at home.

------
BenSS
I've telecommuted for 8 years now and I'm looking for a new gig. I'm really
surprised how difficult it is to to find good companies who are really in to
telecommuting and are looking for my skill set (web, cms, mobile). While it
can be isolating if you don't force yourself to get out once in a while the
flexibility and productivity sure can't be beat.

------
jherdman
Like hell I would! Nothing beats face-to-face communication, and the wonderful
things that can arise from spontaneous interactions.

------
lancefisher
I live in Missoula, MT and I'm not willing to move because my family is here,
and I love the city. Programmers here are willing to take a pay cut to stay,
and I know several that telecommute to out of state jobs that pay better than
most local companies. I telecommute too, but my employer is local.

------
mdink
I started an interesting thread awhile back about this very topic:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2202187>

Had some interesting comments...

------
amorphid
I like hiring people that are available to meet locally, and then let them
work remotely for most things.

~~~
hkarthik
I think this is the best of both worlds, and probably the right way to go for
startups in cities with a huge urban sprawl.

------
Andys
<http://remote-jobs.com/>

------
keefe
sane people like to work for other sane people and work should be about what
you produce unless you have necessary human interactions

------
brndnhy
If you're "top tech talent", compromising on salary will likely not be part of
your telecommuting scenario.

------
cheez
Haha, cloud computing!

------
earl
I've previously worked for a pair of bosses who telecommuted. Never again. At
least for the types of algorithmic / machine learning software I work on,
frequent in person collaboration is really helpful and none of the remote
collaboration software came close to standing in front of the same piece of
paper / monitor / whiteboard.

