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You hear about remote jobs all the time, with more and more people wanting them because of the leisure and convenience. Along with that, you hear about people w

You hear about remote jobs all the time, with more and more people wanting them because of the leisure and convenience. Along with that, you hear about people with on site jobs that want to go remote. You never really hear about people who prefer on site over remote. I'd be interested to hear some stories about on site workers who were forced(or pushed towards) remote work and denied it.

beat 8y ago
I worked remote for two years for a large bank. There was an office right downtown, but I never used it. There were other people, though, who came into the office, even though they could do their jobs remotely. They liked the ritual of it, and the psychology of being able to say "Not at work now".
- notahacker 8y ago
  It's one of the major reasons the workspace industry exists. Had a flatmate who had a beautiful big room in a usually empty house to run his one-man agency from and contracted all his developers remotely, but he bought himself a desk space with 30 minute commute as soon as he had the cashflow to do so. I guess it helped create an illusion of separation even when he was still emailing clients after getting home, and offered social interaction during the day as well as the evenings As for workers being forced to work remote by bigger companies, a colleague of mine who mostly worked from home because they closed her local office always insisted she much preferred the days she came into the London office, even though she seldom participated in office chat outside formal social events (even in the original office) and was very productive when working mostly at home. Had another friend who didn't mind the remote work one day a week because we don't have the space for all of you rota at all, but found it a bit weird since he was a quant at a major bank...
CPLX 8y ago
I hate remote work. I want to go to an office and do work there and then when I leave I'm living the rest of my life. I even rented myself an office when I was working solo for almost a year before hiring someone, just so I could have a desk, a file cabinet, a printer, and a real office environment to get work done. I lived alone. I still got up in the morning and went to the office, it was good for my productivity and mental health. I feel that it's important to set up boundaries, or tasks and work will contaminate your personal spaces. I also think that it's just 100x better for communication to have everyone in the same room working together. Nothing beats verbal interpersonal communication. With that said, I recognize that my opinion on this is 1) entirely subjective and 2) maybe because I'm old.
- bauerd 8y ago
  I'm 25 and it's the same for me completely. Working from home doesn't work for me, I need to get out in the morning or I never leave home state of mind. Same goes for leaving.
- brailsafe 8y ago
  Don't sell yourself short. Everyone works differently and not everyone keeps the same interest in how they work forever. I personally don't mind an office or the clear delineation between work and life if the office and company are set up in such a way as to not crush my spirit and allow flexibility. Otherwise I like being to work however I want. Usually this ends up being coffee shops. Right now this is coffee shops while I'm road tripping and living out of my car. It works for me kind of, certainly wouldn't for everyone. But, I can't work at home. Even if I have a home, I go to a coffee shop or park, partly for the reasons you mention.
  - hosh 8y ago
    I have had the same mentality. Being married for the past few years and with a step-daughter, I've been thinking of having better boundaries like that. If it were just me, I think I like remote work, living alone, just fine.
    - brailsafe 8y ago
      It's also much more supportive of different levels of productivity throughout a day. I have incredibly poor consistency when it comes to focus. So sometimes I'll sit down and not be abke to get anything done, so maybe I'll go exercise and pick it up at a time where I'll be abke to concentrate.
- throwaway080383 8y ago
  Perhaps a distinction should be drawn between "remote work" and "working from home".
simongray 8y ago
I worked remote for two months and hated it. Why? Because it was lonely and chat rooms feel like talking into an abyss. Half the reason I choose to go to an office is to have a social life during the day. It also made my home feel like a prison, because I spent almost all my time there. I'm as introverted as the average programmer, but I'll take interrupting coworkers over permanent solitude any day.
- rimliu 8y ago
  I wonder, what's the introversion level of the average programmer. Because solitude during the work hours is a blessing for me. I had a chance to work remotely for a couple of years and I will take that over having "social life" in open space office.
gdulli 8y ago
I would refuse it. I could never work from home regularly. I spend enough time there, I want an excuse to get out into the world. It would be so boring for me not to be surrounded by people, activity, and energy. Even if I'm not interacting with people I prefer to be around them in general rather than sit alone all day. I think you don't hear about this because it's the norm and very neutral and fundamental. I don't think most people struggle with commuting, being around people, etc. Of course those things can be annoying. But I put up with the annoyances of participating in the world because it's overall better than the alternative. Which I think describes most people.
eeZah7Ux 8y ago
Some people in this thread are conflating "remote work" with "working alone at home". A service to connect with other remote workers in the same city as you would be really helpful.
- 394549 8y ago
  > A service to connect with other remote workers in the same city as you would be really helpful. But only part of it. Surrounding yourself with strangers you have no connection to, except that you all work "remotely" somewhere, is not the same as being surrounded by colleges you work with face to face.
  - viraptor 8y ago
    In my experience it comes close actually. I do remote work with 1 day a week from a coworking space, 1 video call every morning, and some pairing every week. The coworking space with mostly "random" people (but a mostly consistent group) really helps me fill that some kind of communication need.
alangpierce 8y ago
I greatly prefer on-site work over remote work. Being able to walk over and have a conversation, or draw something up on a whiteboard, is a much, much higher bandwidth form of communication than any remote communication that I've seen. I've seen conflicts come up in code reviews and over chat that never would have happened in person, and I always move a conversation to in-person whenever there's any worry of conflict or confusion. I'm also much happier if I spend my day interacting with other people, even if it's about work things.
maxxxxx 8y ago
You need to be cut out for remote work. It's not for everyone and it's good to realize that.
throwawaymath 8y ago
> You never really hear about people who prefer on site over remote. Surely you used this phrasing because you wanted to be corrected :) I've worked both remotely and onsite and I prefer onsite. I enjoyed working remotely for the first two years. Grocery shopping mid-day on a Monday! Going for a run at 11 am! No commute! Cooking whatever I want for lunch! Awesome! Then it got old and wore down on me. I don't like working remotely anymore. I have worked on a team which was exceptionally well-suited for it: almost all communication happened on Slack, video conferencing was a strong part of the culture, managers didn't try to micromanage, etc. But after a while I felt pretty de-socialized and disengaged from the atmosphere of the company. My work output and productivity were fine, but I found myself really missing human interaction. I staved this off somewhat with meetups and by working in a public place, but it never really replaced what I enjoyed about being onsite at HQ. I have two (very obviously anecdotal) observations about working remotely. First, most of the people I knew who worked remotely did not adjust their lifestyle to take advantage of that time. They did not exercise any more than their onsite counterparts. They didn't really run any errands in the middle day. I generally observed that their work and play time wasn't really divorced; in some cases they didn't seem to have a work life balance, irrespective of the corporate culture. The time they saved by not having a commute was usually spent doing more work. Second, most of the time when I voice my concerns about long-term remote work and point out the problems I personally have with it - or the problems I've personally observed - I am told that this is not an issue intrinsic to working remotely. I think that's probably true but not really relevant, and frequently used as a dismissal of people who try to voice legitimate reasons for not working remotely. With sufficient social supplementation, investment in corporate culture and communication and self-discipline, I think just about anyone can do well as a remote employee. But it's also legitimate to say that you don't really want to make that investment (as a company) or want to do what's needed to avoid working too much and not seeing other people enough (as an individual). Remote work can work very well, but I do not think most people should work remotely.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

beat 8y ago

I worked remote for two years for a large bank. There was an office right downtown, but I never used it. There were other people, though, who came into the office, even though they could do their jobs remotely. They liked the ritual of it, and the psychology of being able to say "Not at work now".

notahacker 8y ago
It's one of the major reasons the workspace industry exists. Had a flatmate who had a beautiful big room in a usually empty house to run his one-man agency from and contracted all his developers remotely, but he bought himself a desk space with 30 minute commute as soon as he had the cashflow to do so. I guess it helped create an illusion of separation even when he was still emailing clients after getting home, and offered social interaction during the day as well as the evenings As for workers being forced to work remote by bigger companies, a colleague of mine who mostly worked from home because they closed her local office always insisted she much preferred the days she came into the London office, even though she seldom participated in office chat outside formal social events (even in the original office) and was very productive when working mostly at home. Had another friend who didn't mind the remote work one day a week because we don't have the space for all of you rota at all, but found it a bit weird since he was a quant at a major bank...

CPLX 8y ago

I hate remote work. I want to go to an office and do work there and then when I leave I'm living the rest of my life. I even rented myself an office when I was working solo for almost a year before hiring someone, just so I could have a desk, a file cabinet, a printer, and a real office environment to get work done. I lived alone. I still got up in the morning and went to the office, it was good for my productivity and mental health. I feel that it's important to set up boundaries, or tasks and work will contaminate your personal spaces. I also think that it's just 100x better for communication to have everyone in the same room working together. Nothing beats verbal interpersonal communication. With that said, I recognize that my opinion on this is 1) entirely subjective and 2) maybe because I'm old.

bauerd 8y ago
I'm 25 and it's the same for me completely. Working from home doesn't work for me, I need to get out in the morning or I never leave home state of mind. Same goes for leaving.
brailsafe 8y ago
Don't sell yourself short. Everyone works differently and not everyone keeps the same interest in how they work forever. I personally don't mind an office or the clear delineation between work and life if the office and company are set up in such a way as to not crush my spirit and allow flexibility. Otherwise I like being to work however I want. Usually this ends up being coffee shops. Right now this is coffee shops while I'm road tripping and living out of my car. It works for me kind of, certainly wouldn't for everyone. But, I can't work at home. Even if I have a home, I go to a coffee shop or park, partly for the reasons you mention.
- hosh 8y ago
  I have had the same mentality. Being married for the past few years and with a step-daughter, I've been thinking of having better boundaries like that. If it were just me, I think I like remote work, living alone, just fine.
  - brailsafe 8y ago
    It's also much more supportive of different levels of productivity throughout a day. I have incredibly poor consistency when it comes to focus. So sometimes I'll sit down and not be abke to get anything done, so maybe I'll go exercise and pick it up at a time where I'll be abke to concentrate.
throwaway080383 8y ago
Perhaps a distinction should be drawn between "remote work" and "working from home".

simongray 8y ago

I worked remote for two months and hated it. Why? Because it was lonely and chat rooms feel like talking into an abyss. Half the reason I choose to go to an office is to have a social life during the day. It also made my home feel like a prison, because I spent almost all my time there. I'm as introverted as the average programmer, but I'll take interrupting coworkers over permanent solitude any day.

rimliu 8y ago
I wonder, what's the introversion level of the average programmer. Because solitude during the work hours is a blessing for me. I had a chance to work remotely for a couple of years and I will take that over having "social life" in open space office.

gdulli 8y ago

I would refuse it. I could never work from home regularly. I spend enough time there, I want an excuse to get out into the world. It would be so boring for me not to be surrounded by people, activity, and energy. Even if I'm not interacting with people I prefer to be around them in general rather than sit alone all day. I think you don't hear about this because it's the norm and very neutral and fundamental. I don't think most people struggle with commuting, being around people, etc. Of course those things can be annoying. But I put up with the annoyances of participating in the world because it's overall better than the alternative. Which I think describes most people.

eeZah7Ux 8y ago

Some people in this thread are conflating "remote work" with "working alone at home". A service to connect with other remote workers in the same city as you would be really helpful.

394549 8y ago
> A service to connect with other remote workers in the same city as you would be really helpful. But only part of it. Surrounding yourself with strangers you have no connection to, except that you all work "remotely" somewhere, is not the same as being surrounded by colleges you work with face to face.
- viraptor 8y ago
  In my experience it comes close actually. I do remote work with 1 day a week from a coworking space, 1 video call every morning, and some pairing every week. The coworking space with mostly "random" people (but a mostly consistent group) really helps me fill that some kind of communication need.

alangpierce 8y ago

I greatly prefer on-site work over remote work. Being able to walk over and have a conversation, or draw something up on a whiteboard, is a much, much higher bandwidth form of communication than any remote communication that I've seen. I've seen conflicts come up in code reviews and over chat that never would have happened in person, and I always move a conversation to in-person whenever there's any worry of conflict or confusion. I'm also much happier if I spend my day interacting with other people, even if it's about work things.

maxxxxx 8y ago

You need to be cut out for remote work. It's not for everyone and it's good to realize that.

throwawaymath 8y ago

> You never really hear about people who prefer on site over remote. Surely you used this phrasing because you wanted to be corrected :) I've worked both remotely and onsite and I prefer onsite. I enjoyed working remotely for the first two years. Grocery shopping mid-day on a Monday! Going for a run at 11 am! No commute! Cooking whatever I want for lunch! Awesome! Then it got old and wore down on me. I don't like working remotely anymore. I have worked on a team which was exceptionally well-suited for it: almost all communication happened on Slack, video conferencing was a strong part of the culture, managers didn't try to micromanage, etc. But after a while I felt pretty de-socialized and disengaged from the atmosphere of the company. My work output and productivity were fine, but I found myself really missing human interaction. I staved this off somewhat with meetups and by working in a public place, but it never really replaced what I enjoyed about being onsite at HQ. I have two (very obviously anecdotal) observations about working remotely. First, most of the people I knew who worked remotely did not adjust their lifestyle to take advantage of that time. They did not exercise any more than their onsite counterparts. They didn't really run any errands in the middle day. I generally observed that their work and play time wasn't really divorced; in some cases they didn't seem to have a work life balance, irrespective of the corporate culture. The time they saved by not having a commute was usually spent doing more work. Second, most of the time when I voice my concerns about long-term remote work and point out the problems I personally have with it - or the problems I've personally observed - I am told that this is not an issue intrinsic to working remotely. I think that's probably true but not really relevant, and frequently used as a dismissal of people who try to voice legitimate reasons for not working remotely. With sufficient social supplementation, investment in corporate culture and communication and self-discipline, I think just about anyone can do well as a remote employee. But it's also legitimate to say that you don't really want to make that investment (as a company) or want to do what's needed to avoid working too much and not seeing other people enough (as an individual). Remote work can work very well, but I do not think most people should work remotely.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]