4 ms·

This has been my experience as well. The amount of flying done by most remote workers is astounding. If anything, remote workers have a bigger carbon footprint

by tharne 7y ago

This has been my experience as well. The amount of flying done by most remote workers is astounding. If anything, remote workers have a bigger carbon footprint than your typical commuter from all the flying. The other thing I see is a lot of remote workers moving to very sparsely populated areas that are cheap to live in, but where they end up driving 40 minutes for groceries. There are lots of great benefits to remote work, but environmentalism (in most cases) is not one of them.

cableshaft 7y ago
I (and everyone in my office, except the director, who flew once to go to corporate headquarters) have flown zero times in a year and a half of working remotely. It's not a guarantee that remote workers will necessarily do a bunch of flying. It depends on the culture of the workplace. We are able to get plenty done with conference calls and email. I can't speak for the management and executives above the director, though. They might do a decent amount of travel. But there's about 200 employees that aren't doing any travel at all for work, and only a handful of people in management above them. And from what I hear, it sounds like a lot of the other departments in the corporation don't do a whole lot of travel either.
icebraining 7y ago
I'm curious, why are those remote workers flying? I've started working remotely this year, and only flown once, at the start of the project.
- chrisseaton 7y ago
  Are you not flying anyway, to go to conferences and things?
  - ghaff 7y ago
    A lot of developers really don't travel a lot for work if they don't speak to customers much. And it's not uncommon that a developer/sysadmin may get to go to one conference a year or something like that. Certainly some people I work with, whether developers or other roles, are traveling all the time. But it's not everyone.
  - icebraining 7y ago
    No, I go to big conferences less than once a year. I've lived in multiple EU countries, and never worked anywhere where a common developer went to conferences regularly. Didn't even realize that was a "thing" except for a few people who were known to give talks everywhere.
ghaff 7y ago
Agreed although, in a lot of cases, remote workers travel a lot not because they're remote (though that may contribute) but because people who travel around a lot anyway for their job are often a good candidate to work remotely some or all of their time. If you're only going to randomly come into the office for a day here and a day there anyway, it's not a big step to just go fully remote with, possibly, some F2F team meetings now and then.

by tharne 7y ago

cableshaft 7y ago

I (and everyone in my office, except the director, who flew once to go to corporate headquarters) have flown zero times in a year and a half of working remotely. It's not a guarantee that remote workers will necessarily do a bunch of flying. It depends on the culture of the workplace. We are able to get plenty done with conference calls and email. I can't speak for the management and executives above the director, though. They might do a decent amount of travel. But there's about 200 employees that aren't doing any travel at all for work, and only a handful of people in management above them. And from what I hear, it sounds like a lot of the other departments in the corporation don't do a whole lot of travel either.

icebraining 7y ago

I'm curious, why are those remote workers flying? I've started working remotely this year, and only flown once, at the start of the project.

chrisseaton 7y ago
Are you not flying anyway, to go to conferences and things?
- ghaff 7y ago
  A lot of developers really don't travel a lot for work if they don't speak to customers much. And it's not uncommon that a developer/sysadmin may get to go to one conference a year or something like that. Certainly some people I work with, whether developers or other roles, are traveling all the time. But it's not everyone.
- icebraining 7y ago
  No, I go to big conferences less than once a year. I've lived in multiple EU countries, and never worked anywhere where a common developer went to conferences regularly. Didn't even realize that was a "thing" except for a few people who were known to give talks everywhere.

ghaff 7y ago

Agreed although, in a lot of cases, remote workers travel a lot not because they're remote (though that may contribute) but because people who travel around a lot anyway for their job are often a good candidate to work remotely some or all of their time. If you're only going to randomly come into the office for a day here and a day there anyway, it's not a big step to just go fully remote with, possibly, some F2F team meetings now and then.