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I strongly prefer remote over in-person. There are pros and cons to either. One of the interesting things that comes up in remote is confronting the conflation

by hosh 10y ago

I strongly prefer remote over in-person. There are pros and cons to either. One of the interesting things that comes up in remote is confronting the conflation people have between work and a job. Work and a job are not the same thing. A lot of people conflate the two and rely on external things to enforce a work ethic and self-discipline, but a lot of that structure is no longer there when working remote. If anything, your internal motivation and drive has to be strong. Related is that, when working on a distributed team as a remote worker, what feels like over-communicating to the point of harassment is probably the right amount of communication. One interesting consequence though is when both partners in a marriage work from home. In a situation where one or both partners work outside of home, some of the stress that comes with intensely being together all the time is not there. When both partners work from home, though, that can get interesting. I know this because my wife also works from home. I don't think the general populace is quite ready for that yet (you won't see advice for this yet on the self-help section of the bookstore), though it is something that can still be worked out.

DashRattlesnake 10y ago
> Related is that, when working on a distributed team as a remote worker, what feels like over-communicating to the point of harassment is probably the right amount of communication. Which gets at another problem of remote work: communication that feels effortless in-person becomes something that requires what feels like "harassment" (in your words) to be effective remotely. When I was working on a geographically split team, it felt like two gigabit LANs joined by a dial-up WAN link, since the in-person communication was so much more effective. Humans have literally spent at least hundreds of thousands of years talking to each other in person. That software has probably had more effort and refinement put into it than Slack, Skype, and Outlook put together.
- hosh 10y ago
  That's a perceptual bias. There's a tendency for humans to resist changes just because they don't feel normal. Humans might have spent at least hundreds of thousands of years talking to each other in person, but only a fraction of that commuting by cars, or even having the notion of jobs, or even the notion of "productivity". Further, the same arguments you made are the same arguments made in any given era. I do think it is mentally healthier to not be so addicted to technology, to have 1-on-1 personal communications. But generally-speaking, the sense of self-worth, validation, etc. for the vast majority of people at their jobs is suspect. The quality of 1-on-1, personal communication has more to do with what mindfulness meditators call "presence": how much your awareness is in the presence in the here-and-now, and less to do with whether you are intermediating that communication through technology. Much of the social communication tend to be on the superficial side, even without technology. Being present is either the most difficult thing you will ever do, or the most effortless. Tangent: Buckminster Fuller once characterized words and language as human's first technology. One that follows the ephemeralization pattern such that it disappeared (we are no longer generally conscious of language as a technology).
  - DashRattlesnake 10y ago
    > Further, the same arguments you made are the same arguments made in any given era. Communication is a mental process, transportation is not, so they're not really comparable areas of change. I'm not making some kind of Luddite argument for the way things were. The point I'm getting at is that remote work partisans often have a over-simplified model that misses the benefits of in-person presence. Human beings have a lot of support for communicating with each other in-person, verbally, non-verbally, unintentionally, etc. which often doesn't translate well to remote work scenarios. Many of the social aspects translate even more poorly. I'm just going to skip the philosophical stuff about worth and meditation because it doesn't really have anything to do with what I was talking about.
    - hosh 10y ago
      >Communication is a mental process, transportation is not, so they're not really comparable areas of change. Transportation changes the psychology of individuals and the social dynamics. It affects mental processes, so yes, they are comparable. > The point I'm getting at is that remote work partisans often have a over-simplified model that misses the benefits of in-person presence. Human beings have a lot of support for communicating with each other in-person, verbally, non-verbally, unintentionally, etc. which often doesn't translate well to remote work scenarios. Fair enough. I agree with that statement, though I still strongly prefer remote work for myself. Some other thoughts: 1. No technology is going to completely replace in-person presence. Rather than trying to work around it, one should be looking for what remote work enables that cannot be done with in-person presence. 2. Philosophical questions about worth has a lot to do with this topic, even if it does not seem like it to you. There is a bias towards in-person work because there is a conflation and confusion on what work is about, and what communication is about. 3. The same with meditation. The ground state in which one can see a lot of narratives and hangups clearly also reveals a lot of weird things underpinning a lot of people's motives for working onsite or working remotely. However, I don't expect this to be convincing to you or anyone else. It is something to be experienced rather than read about. Thanks for engaging, it's been fun chatting.
  - SubuSS 10y ago
xiaoma 10y ago
That's weird. It's totally normal for couples to run mom and pop shops together. Most businesses historically (and maybe even up through today) have been run by families. It's human. It's natural.
- hosh 10y ago
  I agree that it is normal for mom and pop shops. It is also normal for pre-modern dynamics: tribal (hunter-gatherer), family farms, etc, though the case can be made that there is some physical separation. I've also seen co-living/co-working spaces where couples live and work with other family groups within the same building. However, I also think that the Millennial generation did not generally grow up with this. Remote work also adds a different dimension too, if each partner of the couple are working with different teams remotely, rather than working together, and each partner does not have visibility into what the other partner is doing all day.

by hosh 10y ago

DashRattlesnake 10y ago

> Related is that, when working on a distributed team as a remote worker, what feels like over-communicating to the point of harassment is probably the right amount of communication. Which gets at another problem of remote work: communication that feels effortless in-person becomes something that requires what feels like "harassment" (in your words) to be effective remotely. When I was working on a geographically split team, it felt like two gigabit LANs joined by a dial-up WAN link, since the in-person communication was so much more effective. Humans have literally spent at least hundreds of thousands of years talking to each other in person. That software has probably had more effort and refinement put into it than Slack, Skype, and Outlook put together.

hosh 10y ago
That's a perceptual bias. There's a tendency for humans to resist changes just because they don't feel normal. Humans might have spent at least hundreds of thousands of years talking to each other in person, but only a fraction of that commuting by cars, or even having the notion of jobs, or even the notion of "productivity". Further, the same arguments you made are the same arguments made in any given era. I do think it is mentally healthier to not be so addicted to technology, to have 1-on-1 personal communications. But generally-speaking, the sense of self-worth, validation, etc. for the vast majority of people at their jobs is suspect. The quality of 1-on-1, personal communication has more to do with what mindfulness meditators call "presence": how much your awareness is in the presence in the here-and-now, and less to do with whether you are intermediating that communication through technology. Much of the social communication tend to be on the superficial side, even without technology. Being present is either the most difficult thing you will ever do, or the most effortless. Tangent: Buckminster Fuller once characterized words and language as human's first technology. One that follows the ephemeralization pattern such that it disappeared (we are no longer generally conscious of language as a technology).
- DashRattlesnake 10y ago
  > Further, the same arguments you made are the same arguments made in any given era. Communication is a mental process, transportation is not, so they're not really comparable areas of change. I'm not making some kind of Luddite argument for the way things were. The point I'm getting at is that remote work partisans often have a over-simplified model that misses the benefits of in-person presence. Human beings have a lot of support for communicating with each other in-person, verbally, non-verbally, unintentionally, etc. which often doesn't translate well to remote work scenarios. Many of the social aspects translate even more poorly. I'm just going to skip the philosophical stuff about worth and meditation because it doesn't really have anything to do with what I was talking about.
  - hosh 10y ago
    >Communication is a mental process, transportation is not, so they're not really comparable areas of change. Transportation changes the psychology of individuals and the social dynamics. It affects mental processes, so yes, they are comparable. > The point I'm getting at is that remote work partisans often have a over-simplified model that misses the benefits of in-person presence. Human beings have a lot of support for communicating with each other in-person, verbally, non-verbally, unintentionally, etc. which often doesn't translate well to remote work scenarios. Fair enough. I agree with that statement, though I still strongly prefer remote work for myself. Some other thoughts: 1. No technology is going to completely replace in-person presence. Rather than trying to work around it, one should be looking for what remote work enables that cannot be done with in-person presence. 2. Philosophical questions about worth has a lot to do with this topic, even if it does not seem like it to you. There is a bias towards in-person work because there is a conflation and confusion on what work is about, and what communication is about. 3. The same with meditation. The ground state in which one can see a lot of narratives and hangups clearly also reveals a lot of weird things underpinning a lot of people's motives for working onsite or working remotely. However, I don't expect this to be convincing to you or anyone else. It is something to be experienced rather than read about. Thanks for engaging, it's been fun chatting.
- SubuSS 10y ago

xiaoma 10y ago

That's weird. It's totally normal for couples to run mom and pop shops together. Most businesses historically (and maybe even up through today) have been run by families. It's human. It's natural.

hosh 10y ago
I agree that it is normal for mom and pop shops. It is also normal for pre-modern dynamics: tribal (hunter-gatherer), family farms, etc, though the case can be made that there is some physical separation. I've also seen co-living/co-working spaces where couples live and work with other family groups within the same building. However, I also think that the Millennial generation did not generally grow up with this. Remote work also adds a different dimension too, if each partner of the couple are working with different teams remotely, rather than working together, and each partner does not have visibility into what the other partner is doing all day.