5 ms·

And every employer insists on local employees, just because it's trendy. Salaries have not kept pace with housing costs.

by jbronn 10y ago

wyclif 10y ago
"Every employer" is an exaggeration, but I'd agree that far too many of them do. I also wonder if they do it not because it's "trendy", but because management has bought into "culture fit" arguments without challenge or at least serious reflection and criticism, or perhaps because of the envy that goes along with their own management responsibilities ("hey, if my ass needs to be in a seat downtown at 8am, so does yours, even if your job doesn't require on-site work and all-hands meetings"). Remote work is becoming a benefit, not a feature, and I think it's becoming a major factor in whether a certain sector of developers and engineers accept a given gig or not. Especially if you're a grownup and have a family and young children. And once you've tasted remote work, and have your own home office, setup, and workflow, it's hard to go back to commuting, time-wasting meetings that should have been an email, and million dollar housing.
brian-armstrong 10y ago
There is a real difference between collaborating with someone in person rather than via Skype. You get to know proximal coworkers too.
- atemerev 10y ago
  For everybody telling that there is "real difference" of collaborating in person vs remotely, nobody seems to be able to explain what this difference _is_, except in some vague terms. If the difference is "being able to go and ask your coworker directly if you don't know something about the project or want to share some ideas", it is: a) obviously possible over Skype, and b) it brings nothing but damage to development efforts, as interruptions break the flow for hours. Unless it is urgent, it is much more preferable to write an e-mail and go work on some other park of the project. I am an introvert, and human interactions are draining my energy. Most of the developers I know are also introverts. Of course, occasionally direct interactions are absolutely necessary, but it is rarely enough to warrant 100% presence and constant interruptions, which simply don't allow to get anything done.
  - brian-armstrong 10y ago
    Those interruptions, on a small volume, are actually pretty important. That's one way that information cross-pollinates on the team. Those accidental conversations about the codebase can and do lead to reprioritising changes or coming up with new approaches. With a remote person, you don't get that. Remote workers can't make nearly as big of an impact when it comes to doing the stuff they /aren't/ directed to work on. Also, at some point, somebody has to bring new hires up to speed, and I certainly wouldn't want that process to happen over Skype. Teaching new hires is an important time to get them on the same page on the team's practices and help find the rough spots in bootstrapping someone to the codebase. In general, software development is much more high-bandwidth than people give it credit for. It's often much more beneficial to hash out an unclear specfication with a coworker over coffee than it is to forge ahead and just make stuff that seems like it could work.
  - aytekin 10y ago
    I think the biggest benefit is sitting together with your teammates. At JotForm, (most of) our teams have their own rooms with doors that can close. They can have lively "high bandwidth" discussion in front of a white board. People glance what is on their teammates' screens. Making comments about what they are doing and coming up with new ideas. They go to lunch together. Once a week, team lunch out is paid by the company. Informal talks turn into amazing ideas. Sitting together as a team is very motivational. You see excitement in other person's eyes and that in turn excites you. We also do a lot of co-piloting. Working on hard tasks or tasks that requires knowledge of two people can be done much more quickly when you sit together. We do have many remote developers but they all work individually on individual projects. It works really well if you work by yourself and if you have a backlog of tasks to do. In such cases, working alone remotely is perfect.
  - RestlessMind 10y ago
    Here you go (something I have posted previously on this forum)- 1. Timezone issues - this is, imo, the biggest one. Especially after working with people in China, India, Europe or even eastern USA (with me in SF bay area). People all over the world usually start working around 9-10, and stop working around 6-7. Meetings, code/design discussions are very difficult on those schedules, especially when you want a decision on smaller issues where a quick back n forth would settle the matter in 30 min if everyone was in the same room. And there are plenty of such issues, where unavailability of your coworkers seriously affects the productivity. 2. Impromptu discussions: These are triggered by spontaneous ideas, and ideas do not come according to a fixed schedule of meetings. By not having remote workers in these discussions, both sides lose (by not having more brains, as well as by missing out).
- duaneb 10y ago
  Then don't make your employees move to the most expensive region in the world.
  - brian-armstrong 10y ago
    Like it or not, this is where the movement is, and the VC. There is a lot of momentum to it. And yes it's expensive, but at least they do pay well here
    - duaneb 10y ago
      Actually, taking into account cost of living, I don't believe the Bay Area pays any better for the median developer than other competitive cities.

And every employer insists on local employees, just because it's trendy. Salaries have not kept pace with housing costs.

by jbronn 10y ago

And every employer insists on local employees, just because it's trendy. Salaries have not kept pace with housing costs.

wyclif 10y ago

"Every employer" is an exaggeration, but I'd agree that far too many of them do. I also wonder if they do it not because it's "trendy", but because management has bought into "culture fit" arguments without challenge or at least serious reflection and criticism, or perhaps because of the envy that goes along with their own management responsibilities ("hey, if my ass needs to be in a seat downtown at 8am, so does yours, even if your job doesn't require on-site work and all-hands meetings"). Remote work is becoming a benefit, not a feature, and I think it's becoming a major factor in whether a certain sector of developers and engineers accept a given gig or not. Especially if you're a grownup and have a family and young children. And once you've tasted remote work, and have your own home office, setup, and workflow, it's hard to go back to commuting, time-wasting meetings that should have been an email, and million dollar housing.

brian-armstrong 10y ago

There is a real difference between collaborating with someone in person rather than via Skype. You get to know proximal coworkers too.

atemerev 10y ago
For everybody telling that there is "real difference" of collaborating in person vs remotely, nobody seems to be able to explain what this difference _is_, except in some vague terms. If the difference is "being able to go and ask your coworker directly if you don't know something about the project or want to share some ideas", it is: a) obviously possible over Skype, and b) it brings nothing but damage to development efforts, as interruptions break the flow for hours. Unless it is urgent, it is much more preferable to write an e-mail and go work on some other park of the project. I am an introvert, and human interactions are draining my energy. Most of the developers I know are also introverts. Of course, occasionally direct interactions are absolutely necessary, but it is rarely enough to warrant 100% presence and constant interruptions, which simply don't allow to get anything done.
- brian-armstrong 10y ago
  Those interruptions, on a small volume, are actually pretty important. That's one way that information cross-pollinates on the team. Those accidental conversations about the codebase can and do lead to reprioritising changes or coming up with new approaches. With a remote person, you don't get that. Remote workers can't make nearly as big of an impact when it comes to doing the stuff they /aren't/ directed to work on. Also, at some point, somebody has to bring new hires up to speed, and I certainly wouldn't want that process to happen over Skype. Teaching new hires is an important time to get them on the same page on the team's practices and help find the rough spots in bootstrapping someone to the codebase. In general, software development is much more high-bandwidth than people give it credit for. It's often much more beneficial to hash out an unclear specfication with a coworker over coffee than it is to forge ahead and just make stuff that seems like it could work.
- aytekin 10y ago
  I think the biggest benefit is sitting together with your teammates. At JotForm, (most of) our teams have their own rooms with doors that can close. They can have lively "high bandwidth" discussion in front of a white board. People glance what is on their teammates' screens. Making comments about what they are doing and coming up with new ideas. They go to lunch together. Once a week, team lunch out is paid by the company. Informal talks turn into amazing ideas. Sitting together as a team is very motivational. You see excitement in other person's eyes and that in turn excites you. We also do a lot of co-piloting. Working on hard tasks or tasks that requires knowledge of two people can be done much more quickly when you sit together. We do have many remote developers but they all work individually on individual projects. It works really well if you work by yourself and if you have a backlog of tasks to do. In such cases, working alone remotely is perfect.
- RestlessMind 10y ago
  Here you go (something I have posted previously on this forum)- 1. Timezone issues - this is, imo, the biggest one. Especially after working with people in China, India, Europe or even eastern USA (with me in SF bay area). People all over the world usually start working around 9-10, and stop working around 6-7. Meetings, code/design discussions are very difficult on those schedules, especially when you want a decision on smaller issues where a quick back n forth would settle the matter in 30 min if everyone was in the same room. And there are plenty of such issues, where unavailability of your coworkers seriously affects the productivity. 2. Impromptu discussions: These are triggered by spontaneous ideas, and ideas do not come according to a fixed schedule of meetings. By not having remote workers in these discussions, both sides lose (by not having more brains, as well as by missing out).
duaneb 10y ago
Then don't make your employees move to the most expensive region in the world.
- brian-armstrong 10y ago
  Like it or not, this is where the movement is, and the VC. There is a lot of momentum to it. And yes it's expensive, but at least they do pay well here
  - duaneb 10y ago
    Actually, taking into account cost of living, I don't believe the Bay Area pays any better for the median developer than other competitive cities.