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Why would you expect remote to be less efficient? Working in an open office is incredibly distracting—of course there’s productivity gains from going remote.

by drb91 7y ago

domlebo70 7y ago
I am full time remote for past 6mo. Never been less productive in my career. I'm looking to switch back to onsite as soon as I can. Edit: I'm not saying remote is bad - just that in my experience I'm definitely less productive.
- zrail 7y ago
  It’s not for everyone. I’ve been remote for the past 6 years and love it, but it definitely had a learning curve. Friends of mine have tried it and went back to the office. One thing that has really helped me I’d having a non-work group of online friends who also all work remote. We can commiserate and trade tips.
  - avgDev 7y ago
    I think this is the key to working remote. Having a network of people who also work remote online. I need to try that. I work half of the time remote and sometimes feel very unmotivated due to lack of human contact. Having someone to just chat with would be awesome. Neat idea I wonder if there is a discord chat for that.
- SkyPuncher 7y ago
  Are you by chance just noticing all of the empty space that was previously filled with non-productive time in an office? I've worked remotely for about 5 years now. Without the water cooler talk, chit chat, and misc distractions, I can easily fit a 8+ hour day into less than 6 hours when I work from home.
  - skellera 7y ago
    I think it just depends on the person. I work full time remote for a 100% remote consulting company. Some people come in and do very well. Others don’t seem to be able to make the transition into remote. I’ve worked with new hires that literally take entire days off and give excuses why they were unreachable. Sadly they are just shuffled around the company instead of disciplined but that’s another topic. But I figure in that case, they were probably not so great workers in-office either.
    - ghaff 7y ago
      I work almost entirely remote today and definitely prefer it. (The people I work with are scattered all over the place anyway.) But I can't really imagine how I would have done well working remotely towards the beginning of my career. It was a different time with far fewer communication tools but, even taking that out, it would have been very difficult both socially and in terms of work discipline.
  - jb3689 7y ago
    I did remote for about two years. Found it really draining and too easy to go full workaholic and work into the late hours/be constantly stressed out. I'd like to try working remote again but I can totally get how it wouldn't work for some people. I'm way more likely to take a short breather in the office than at home
  - domlebo70 7y ago
    What empty space? When I arrived at work, I work intensely, and hard. None of us want to be longer than we need to accomplish our work. Occasional chit chat while making coffee is definitely not slowing us down in any meaningful way. Except for a few places (contracting at government) I've never felt on site had too many distractions
  - yitchelle 7y ago
    > fit a 8+ hour day into less than 6 hours. I suppose that could be one measure of productivity. Another view would be an increase in the number of backlog items closed in the 8hour.
- dudul 7y ago
  What metrics do you use to realize that you are less productive?
  - domlebo70 7y ago
    I was a lead/senior developer of a team of ~10 (in a startup of 30). I was involved heavily in the direction of the company, as well as the day to day running of my team. I now work remotely with a 15 hr time difference. Nowadays I feel extremely left out of the direction of the company, the direction technically, and what my team is up to day to day. I try to close these gaps during calls with my team every day, but it's just not enough. This leads to intense feelings of anxiety and impostor syndrome. As an example, I'm currently working on a proof of concept using Rust to replace some existing C++ that coordinates some Gstreamer pipelines. This sounds like the perfect task for remote: self contained task, redoing existing code, fairly small scope. But remote (or more specifically the time difference) makes it pretty difficult. I don't know Gstreamer that well, and I don't know the existing code that well. I'll often run into a problem that I KNOW someone on my team could answer in 2minutes, and unblock me. Instead I need to push through wasting valuable time trying to figure it out myself, or wait till they are online. Perhaps this is the time difference not the remote aspect at fault. If they were on the same timezone, it'd be a quick Slack message away Now, I am reduced to writing code that slots in around my team. As for actual empirical metrics, I don't have many. We tend to track achievements as a team (OKR's etc), and my team has been hitting there goals mostly. I do feel we could achieve more though if I was onsite. A probably non valuable one might be Github commit count, which dropped from ~ 3500 for the 2018 year to ~ 300 for the last 6 mo. So at least on code alone, I am churning substantially less of it out. I'm not poo-pooing remote btw. I think my story would be totally different in a 100% remote company, or a company with substantial remote presence. I think for me though, in this situation, I prefer on site.
    - yitchelle 7y ago
      The work package that you are assigned to yourself is not necessary a problem with remote per se. It sounds like that the work package is not matching the skills/knowledge for assigned team. But you are correct, the ramping up of knowledge is much easier when the teams are close together where sharing of know-how is much lower.
- parthdesai 7y ago
  Yeah i currently WFH one day/week and i actually look forward to going into work the next day. I guess it might be different if you had family and kids, but i'm single and live on my own and I am a bit of a social person so i actually look forward to going into office.
komali2 7y ago
My experience is that some people genuinely are less productive without the social pressure net of their co-workers around them, or literally the boss on-hand as a sort of "productivity enforcer." It's varied wildly from job to job, office culture to culture, and at an individual level, but I take all those experiences with me and it tints my perceptions of productivity as well. I remember when I was a recruiter it was a life of KPIs handed on down from on high. Management would pat you on the shoulder as they walked by if you were on a call, expressing approval of your activity. We'd crack jokes only somewhat ironically like "any time is a good time for a client call!" If you were still in the office at 7, you could expect a heartfelt appreciative email from management. If you hadn't been on the phone for an hour, a boss may shout across the room "bit quiet over there, someone check if komali_2's napping!" Then on the days that all of management was at an off-site, things got a lot "looser." Less calls, less grandstanding, more hanging out in the kitchen, longer lunch etc. I don't know if productivity was actually lower ( it probably wasn't ) but it felt that way, because of the culture of our work place. To that business, the idea of working from home would be laughable. Never mind that there were independent recruiters working out of their house and pulling in literally millions in revenue. How could you be as productive as an office of hardcore recruiters with their managers setting excellent KPIs and tracking goals and establishing milestones and shouting "a bit quiet over there!" occasionally? Of course now that I'm an engineer I'm easily more productive on my own at home or at a cafe than I am in my office for a multitude of reasons. My purpose is to explore and explain why some people, particular management, believe remote to be less efficient.
- CalRobert 7y ago
  "If you were still in the office at 7, you could expect a heartfelt appreciative email" This sort of thing is horrible. Stop normalizing this. It's OK not to work all day. My kid goes to bed at 7:30 and I hate that my colleagues are so willing to work late, normalizing the idea that 6-7PM calls are OK. I mean, I get it - it's not their fault I had a kid, but hell, when IS it OK to stop working?
  - komali2 7y ago
    I don't intend to normalize it. I think it's bad. That's why I became an engineer.
raverbashing 7y ago
This. Whenever someone asks "but how do they manage to be as productive as an office" I just roll my eyes People who "can't adapt to it" usually is resistant to using technology to communicate efficiently. They're usually the ones who think it's just fine to do a quick loud meeting with a colleague (next to someone else's desk who has nothing to do with the conversation and is deeply annoyed by it) Of course, talking in person is important, but it is absolutely not necessary to discuss 90% of mundane stuff. "How do you remote work?" The answer is "Always work as remote, even if your colleague is next to you"
- ghaff 7y ago
  I'm not sure that's completely fair. A lot of people--perhaps especially those earlier in their careers--genuinely enjoy the social aspects of an office as well as the ability to grab a room and whiteboarding something with colleagues, etc. Sure, the latter can be replaced with other forms of communications, but it's not a 1:1 replacement and I totally get why a lot of people wouldn't want to work remotely, at least not full-time.
sandGorgon 7y ago
its not about less productivity... its about perceived unfairness about quality of life by the in-office team. this is a very tenuous issue when you have one company with an inhouse and remote team at the same time. I made another comment to patio11's response up the thread.
- ghaff 7y ago
  As someone who works at a company with a lot of remote workers but also people who regularly work out of offices, I haven't personally experienced this. I'm sure there are people who feel forced to come into an office even though it's not their preference and resent those who don't have to. But I find that there are a lot of people who like coming into an office, people who mostly like working remote, and people who like doing a bit of each. So I don't see any sort of widespread resentment of people who choose/are allowed to work at home.
  - planetburgess 7y ago
    I don't see much of this within hybrid companies and don't see why it would occur. The whole point in a hybrid setup is you get to choose what suits you. If you want to work in an office with people, choose that. If you prefer to be remote, work remote.

Why would you expect remote to be less efficient? Working in an open office is incredibly distracting—of course there’s productivity gains from going remote.

by drb91 7y ago

Why would you expect remote to be less efficient? Working in an open office is incredibly distracting—of course there’s productivity gains from going remote.

domlebo70 7y ago

I am full time remote for past 6mo. Never been less productive in my career. I'm looking to switch back to onsite as soon as I can. Edit: I'm not saying remote is bad - just that in my experience I'm definitely less productive.

zrail 7y ago
It’s not for everyone. I’ve been remote for the past 6 years and love it, but it definitely had a learning curve. Friends of mine have tried it and went back to the office. One thing that has really helped me I’d having a non-work group of online friends who also all work remote. We can commiserate and trade tips.
- avgDev 7y ago
  I think this is the key to working remote. Having a network of people who also work remote online. I need to try that. I work half of the time remote and sometimes feel very unmotivated due to lack of human contact. Having someone to just chat with would be awesome. Neat idea I wonder if there is a discord chat for that.
SkyPuncher 7y ago
Are you by chance just noticing all of the empty space that was previously filled with non-productive time in an office? I've worked remotely for about 5 years now. Without the water cooler talk, chit chat, and misc distractions, I can easily fit a 8+ hour day into less than 6 hours when I work from home.
- skellera 7y ago
  I think it just depends on the person. I work full time remote for a 100% remote consulting company. Some people come in and do very well. Others don’t seem to be able to make the transition into remote. I’ve worked with new hires that literally take entire days off and give excuses why they were unreachable. Sadly they are just shuffled around the company instead of disciplined but that’s another topic. But I figure in that case, they were probably not so great workers in-office either.
  - ghaff 7y ago
    I work almost entirely remote today and definitely prefer it. (The people I work with are scattered all over the place anyway.) But I can't really imagine how I would have done well working remotely towards the beginning of my career. It was a different time with far fewer communication tools but, even taking that out, it would have been very difficult both socially and in terms of work discipline.
- jb3689 7y ago
  I did remote for about two years. Found it really draining and too easy to go full workaholic and work into the late hours/be constantly stressed out. I'd like to try working remote again but I can totally get how it wouldn't work for some people. I'm way more likely to take a short breather in the office than at home
- domlebo70 7y ago
  What empty space? When I arrived at work, I work intensely, and hard. None of us want to be longer than we need to accomplish our work. Occasional chit chat while making coffee is definitely not slowing us down in any meaningful way. Except for a few places (contracting at government) I've never felt on site had too many distractions
- yitchelle 7y ago
  > fit a 8+ hour day into less than 6 hours. I suppose that could be one measure of productivity. Another view would be an increase in the number of backlog items closed in the 8hour.
dudul 7y ago
What metrics do you use to realize that you are less productive?
- domlebo70 7y ago
  I was a lead/senior developer of a team of ~10 (in a startup of 30). I was involved heavily in the direction of the company, as well as the day to day running of my team. I now work remotely with a 15 hr time difference. Nowadays I feel extremely left out of the direction of the company, the direction technically, and what my team is up to day to day. I try to close these gaps during calls with my team every day, but it's just not enough. This leads to intense feelings of anxiety and impostor syndrome. As an example, I'm currently working on a proof of concept using Rust to replace some existing C++ that coordinates some Gstreamer pipelines. This sounds like the perfect task for remote: self contained task, redoing existing code, fairly small scope. But remote (or more specifically the time difference) makes it pretty difficult. I don't know Gstreamer that well, and I don't know the existing code that well. I'll often run into a problem that I KNOW someone on my team could answer in 2minutes, and unblock me. Instead I need to push through wasting valuable time trying to figure it out myself, or wait till they are online. Perhaps this is the time difference not the remote aspect at fault. If they were on the same timezone, it'd be a quick Slack message away Now, I am reduced to writing code that slots in around my team. As for actual empirical metrics, I don't have many. We tend to track achievements as a team (OKR's etc), and my team has been hitting there goals mostly. I do feel we could achieve more though if I was onsite. A probably non valuable one might be Github commit count, which dropped from ~ 3500 for the 2018 year to ~ 300 for the last 6 mo. So at least on code alone, I am churning substantially less of it out. I'm not poo-pooing remote btw. I think my story would be totally different in a 100% remote company, or a company with substantial remote presence. I think for me though, in this situation, I prefer on site.
  - yitchelle 7y ago
    The work package that you are assigned to yourself is not necessary a problem with remote per se. It sounds like that the work package is not matching the skills/knowledge for assigned team. But you are correct, the ramping up of knowledge is much easier when the teams are close together where sharing of know-how is much lower.
parthdesai 7y ago
Yeah i currently WFH one day/week and i actually look forward to going into work the next day. I guess it might be different if you had family and kids, but i'm single and live on my own and I am a bit of a social person so i actually look forward to going into office.

komali2 7y ago

My experience is that some people genuinely are less productive without the social pressure net of their co-workers around them, or literally the boss on-hand as a sort of "productivity enforcer." It's varied wildly from job to job, office culture to culture, and at an individual level, but I take all those experiences with me and it tints my perceptions of productivity as well. I remember when I was a recruiter it was a life of KPIs handed on down from on high. Management would pat you on the shoulder as they walked by if you were on a call, expressing approval of your activity. We'd crack jokes only somewhat ironically like "any time is a good time for a client call!" If you were still in the office at 7, you could expect a heartfelt appreciative email from management. If you hadn't been on the phone for an hour, a boss may shout across the room "bit quiet over there, someone check if komali_2's napping!" Then on the days that all of management was at an off-site, things got a lot "looser." Less calls, less grandstanding, more hanging out in the kitchen, longer lunch etc. I don't know if productivity was actually lower ( it probably wasn't ) but it felt that way, because of the culture of our work place. To that business, the idea of working from home would be laughable. Never mind that there were independent recruiters working out of their house and pulling in literally millions in revenue. How could you be as productive as an office of hardcore recruiters with their managers setting excellent KPIs and tracking goals and establishing milestones and shouting "a bit quiet over there!" occasionally? Of course now that I'm an engineer I'm easily more productive on my own at home or at a cafe than I am in my office for a multitude of reasons. My purpose is to explore and explain why some people, particular management, believe remote to be less efficient.

CalRobert 7y ago
"If you were still in the office at 7, you could expect a heartfelt appreciative email" This sort of thing is horrible. Stop normalizing this. It's OK not to work all day. My kid goes to bed at 7:30 and I hate that my colleagues are so willing to work late, normalizing the idea that 6-7PM calls are OK. I mean, I get it - it's not their fault I had a kid, but hell, when IS it OK to stop working?
- komali2 7y ago
  I don't intend to normalize it. I think it's bad. That's why I became an engineer.

raverbashing 7y ago

This. Whenever someone asks "but how do they manage to be as productive as an office" I just roll my eyes People who "can't adapt to it" usually is resistant to using technology to communicate efficiently. They're usually the ones who think it's just fine to do a quick loud meeting with a colleague (next to someone else's desk who has nothing to do with the conversation and is deeply annoyed by it) Of course, talking in person is important, but it is absolutely not necessary to discuss 90% of mundane stuff. "How do you remote work?" The answer is "Always work as remote, even if your colleague is next to you"

ghaff 7y ago
I'm not sure that's completely fair. A lot of people--perhaps especially those earlier in their careers--genuinely enjoy the social aspects of an office as well as the ability to grab a room and whiteboarding something with colleagues, etc. Sure, the latter can be replaced with other forms of communications, but it's not a 1:1 replacement and I totally get why a lot of people wouldn't want to work remotely, at least not full-time.

sandGorgon 7y ago

its not about less productivity... its about perceived unfairness about quality of life by the in-office team. this is a very tenuous issue when you have one company with an inhouse and remote team at the same time. I made another comment to patio11's response up the thread.

ghaff 7y ago
As someone who works at a company with a lot of remote workers but also people who regularly work out of offices, I haven't personally experienced this. I'm sure there are people who feel forced to come into an office even though it's not their preference and resent those who don't have to. But I find that there are a lot of people who like coming into an office, people who mostly like working remote, and people who like doing a bit of each. So I don't see any sort of widespread resentment of people who choose/are allowed to work at home.
- planetburgess 7y ago
  I don't see much of this within hybrid companies and don't see why it would occur. The whole point in a hybrid setup is you get to choose what suits you. If you want to work in an office with people, choose that. If you prefer to be remote, work remote.