7 ms·

OK. I WFH as well. I know all the benefits. And as I'm WFH for pandemic only I've been trying to find remote work post-pandemic and there I realized some bitter

OK. I WFH as well. I know all the benefits. And as I'm WFH for pandemic only I've been trying to find remote work post-pandemic and there I realized some bitter points: 1. I compete for positions with people all over the world. Who can complete with a fraction of the salary I need. 2. As a remote worker -most often working as a contractor- I'm even easier to be replaced in a heartbeat. No severance or anything alike. 3. Did I mention that I compete with all the planet? That makes competition for good roles really crazy. 4. Work blends into life and it is very hard to keep it from. This gets worse depending on the company/role but in general these things tend to go the employers way not yours. 5. You need to find new ways to socialize (and the motivation to do so is minimal) or you risk mental health issues. All I'm trying to say is be careful what you wish for because you might get it.

MattGaiser 5y ago
> Work blends into life and it is very hard to keep it from. This gets worse depending on the company/role but in general these things tend to go the employers way not yours. Am I one of the few that sees this as an enormous benefit? Work becomes a series of tasks I need to achieve throughout the day, like all the other tasks like laundry and doctors appointments. I get to restructure what I need to do in a way that suits me best. I can push code at 11PM and go for a nap at 4PM if I choose (assuming no meetings). Then my life isn't segmented into exclusive blocks. It is just one seamless integrated life.
- flatline 5y ago
  When an emergency comes up, you are right by your desk and it’s hard to not sit down to address it right away, even if it’s 11 PM. When you have a deadline it’s so easy to log back in after dinner and burn your night away working. As the work life divide begins to erode, burn out is a real risk. I see my computer and if I’m stressed about work I get stressed at times I’d have normally left it behind and not thought about it. I feel guilty if I’m not working late on something I think I’m behind on. Keep in mind I have kids, a social life, etc. I’ve built my time around work/life balance and keeping the two distinct. It’s healthy for me in ways that having the two conflated never was. May not be an issue for everyone.
  - Clubber 5y ago
    >When an emergency comes up, you are right by your desk and it’s hard to not sit down to address it right away, even if it’s 11 PM. That happens when I work at the office. At least at the roles I work, I'm expected to be on call all the time to support production environments. I'll get a text or something and usually have to address it.
    - toomuchtodo 5y ago
      Consider a new, better role if you’re not properly compensated for both when you’re on call and when a response is required. Remaining in such a role is a choice.
      - Clubber 5y ago
        I'm well compensated, but it's just the nature of development in every place I've worked.
    - flatline 5y ago
      I realized that may have been a poorly made point on my part. If you are on call you’re on call. But a lot of “emergencies” in non-operational contexts can wait till the next day in my experience, and often do due to societal norms - everyone is home doing other stuff in the evening, we’ll reconvene first thing in the AM when everyone is together and fresh.
      - Clubber 5y ago
        I can definitely see it when someone works later than usual (me) and is in the middle of something and has a question for someone who usually works at normal time or earlier than everyone else. When I'm in that situation, I don't expect a response immediately. I know I'm a night owl and other people aren't. I'm sure other people do. At the same token, when I work late and the early people schedule an 8am meeting, it's the same. Having said all that, the only difference for me in this scenario is whether or not I commute to the office every day. Same, same.
    - 5y ago
- StavrosK 5y ago
  This is good if you want work to be a part of your life, which almost nobody wants. It's terrible for a good work/life balance, pretty soon you're going to be stressed 24/7 because you "should be working right now".
- triceratops 5y ago
  > Work becomes a series of tasks I need to achieve throughout the day, like all the other tasks like laundry and doctors appointments. I don't know about you but I'm not smart enough to feel that my job is as easy as doing laundry or going to the doctor. I'd rather finish all my work in one focused block of time and not think about it the rest of the day. Due to the pandemic destroying most childcare options, this is an unattainable dream for many.
- juiyout 5y ago
  If you work in a team that requires lots of collaboration, you might not get to restructure work. Can people call you or message you to clarify what you just now pushed at 11pm? Do you respond immediately? Let's say you do immediately because you restructure your night time as your best work time, does that mean you're automatically exempt from 8am meetings in a few hours? Come to think of it. Pushing code at 11pm is not that unusual even pre-covid, but the expectation for the associated communication might be totally different.
artichokeheart 5y ago
1. That is true whether you WFH or not. 2. As a contractor, yes, As an employee WFH changes nothing here, particularly in countries with worker favorable employment laws. 3. See 1. 4. True, remote workers need to maintain a 9-5ish routine. meaning that remote means you can be flexible about which 8 hours you work, but you should still stick to the 8 hours you are paid for 5. True, but you now have more time to find a social group to join, closer to home and more into things your interested in outside of work.
- one2three4 5y ago
  About 1: Are you saying that the competition for a role offered in Munich is the same as for the same role offered remotely within +-5 hours CET or planet wide? I really don't think so. And I'm afraid that this is a classic race to the bottom for the most of us.
- Leherenn 5y ago
  1. and 3. Most countries have significant barriers to immigration, and even within a country, many people do not want to/cannot move for a job.
skapadia 5y ago
+1000. You literally said everything I was thinking.
metafunctor 5y ago
It’s not like companies can or will actually hire globally. There are huge timezone, language, cultural, trust, connections, and other barriers.
- giantg2 5y ago
  And legal barriers around location for data governance too.
  - tomatocracy 5y ago
    There are legal barriers around regulated activities and tax problems too, at least in my line of work (particularly tax residency of companies/corporate vehicles). Many of these are temporarily waived by the authorities for the duration of the pandemic but that won't last forever.
- fairity 5y ago
  The impacts mentioned by OP aren't predicated on companies hiring globally. Simply expanding hiring across the US (or even just your US timezone) will result in a significant drop in salary for your average role. Employers aren't going to drop salaries in the midst of a pandemic, but if remote work persists, salaries will drop substantially. It's simple supply and demand, and I'm sure there's data out there (for existing remote positions) that corroborates this.
- dcolkitt 5y ago
  Not to mention that the notion that there's a huge global pool of talented devs is largely a myth. It's true that labor is cheaper in India or Russia, but research confirms that the average engineer is far less competent than their American counterparts.[1] Software wages in the US are high, because it's very hard to replicate the quality of an American workforce. By and large global differences in wages reflect global differences in workforce quality. It's not like this is the first time companies have realized that global labor is cheaper. They've been trying to capitalize on cheap engineers in developing countries since the 1980s. It's always the same issue. Lower price on paper, but delivery and quality issues that scale far beyond the up front cost savings. [1]https://www.pnas.org/content/116/14/6732 https://www.pnas.org/content/116/14/6732
Sevii 5y ago
1. I kind of expect a general reduction in the "living in the USA' salary premium for a lot of jobs. It sucks for the people getting paid less, but hopefully the deflationary effects on the economy make up for it a bit.
- drstewart 5y ago
  >but hopefully the deflationary effects on the economy make up for it a bit. Have you paid attention to the housing market, car market, or really... any market in the last year?
Avalaxy 5y ago
Might happen for some companies, but the vast majority not. At least in Europe I'm pretty sure I'm not going to be replaced by someone from India because they don't speak our language, they live in vastly different timezones and their culture is different which doesn't make for the most efficient collaboration.
- valarauko 5y ago
  > their culture is different which doesn't make for the most efficient collaboration. Could you expand on this?
mixologic 5y ago
3. The number of "good" roles is also dramatically expanded.
- bart_spoon 5y ago
  This can't be understated, at least for some of us. I'm in the Midwest and in the last 6 months about 20% of my company's engineering team has left and taken positions at new companies. Virtually none of them had anything bad to say about the company, its just that for a developer in the Midwest, the number of jobs that have opened up to them that were unavailable to them a year ago is unbelievable. And on the flip side, it hasn't been too rough for my company to replace them because there are now a huge number of devs in places like the West Coast that wouldn't have been interested in working for us prior moving to remote work who now are. I suspect some of this will all calm down a bit as the new order of things settles in, but for now, remote work is shaking things up in terms of opportunities for workers in a big way.
MeinBlutIstBlau 5y ago
These are my gripes as well. Primarily the socializing one. Can't have a legitimate relationship with someone over Skype. I'm sorry.
- nucleardog 5y ago
  I think half the people here probably know or know of someone that’s made lifelong friends online, met their spouse online, etc. That would seem to indicate that you can make and maintain relationships over text and video chat. I mean, personally, I’d count as my best friends of nearly two decades two people that I’ve only ever seen in person… 3 times? Building and maintaining those relationships is different from in person. It’s certainly not impossible.
ashtonkem 5y ago
> I compete for positions with people all over the world. Who can complete with a fraction of the salary I need. Perhaps. On one hand, the office was clearly one barrier separating onshore and offshore talent. On the other hand, there never really was a lot preventing companies from setting up offshore offices to attract cheaper talent worldwide. The fact that many US jobs remain still quite expensive compared to the developing world implies to me that there are still some barriers there above and beyond the ability to drive to a shared office.
racl101 5y ago
Yeah, I agree. Aside from the commute itself I don't mind working at the office and seeing people. It ain't good to be holed up like a hermit not socializing. I'd like a good balance of some office days and WFH days.
nathias 5y ago
You really aren't, if you are from US most companies that are advertising remote positions really want you to be located in US, I've been looking for remote work and I don't really believe that its possible to get a US job as a foreigner.
throwawaygh 5y ago
> I compete for positions with people all over the world. Who can complete with a fraction of the salary I need. This is what always jumps to the front of my mind when I read about WFH on software engineering forums. I'm lucky -- I have deep technical expertise in a very uncommon intersection of economically valuable topics. I never compete for positions, because there is way more work than available skilled labor. Even still, I'll be back in the office. One day the education system will catch up -- or my skill-set will become obsolete -- and at that point having a decade-long in-person relationship is my only bulwark against ruin. I can't imagine being a SWE working on a standard tech stack without deep personal connections in an application domain and thinking of WFH as anything other than an enormous and terrifying threat.
- castlecrasher2 5y ago
  WFH absolutely screws over younger people joining an industry. There's nothing like face-to-face learning, and I don't envy anyone who's had to start their career recently.
  - throwawaygh 5y ago
    I've had excellent experience working virtually with new hires, but I've also seen a lot of failures. Mentoring remotely is definitely a skill that us older workers had to be intentional about cultivating in ourselves. The moment pandemic started, I bought a top-of-the-line iPad for whiteboarding, insisted my new hire mentors get the same from the company, and called up a couple old professors to get all their tips on remote teaching. Hopefully the next generation will have it easier; their mentors experienced remote learning so might be better equipped for remote teaching/mentoring.
  - jdgiese 5y ago
    I've heard this idea repeated several times from people I respect, and thus I take it seriously. That being said, I've seen some contrary evidence. At Innolitics, we've hired several engineers out of college who've blossomed into talented and independent contributors within a couple of years. I'm not sure if we're doing something special or different that has solved the "junior's need face-to-face learning" problem, or if it's not as much of a problem as many people think.
wdb 5y ago
A lot of the WFH roles I have seen are mostly North America only though
Apocryphon 5y ago
1. and 3. are still somewhat mitigated by time zones, so it wouldn't be the entire planet.

MattGaiser 5y ago

> Work blends into life and it is very hard to keep it from. This gets worse depending on the company/role but in general these things tend to go the employers way not yours. Am I one of the few that sees this as an enormous benefit? Work becomes a series of tasks I need to achieve throughout the day, like all the other tasks like laundry and doctors appointments. I get to restructure what I need to do in a way that suits me best. I can push code at 11PM and go for a nap at 4PM if I choose (assuming no meetings). Then my life isn't segmented into exclusive blocks. It is just one seamless integrated life.

flatline 5y ago
When an emergency comes up, you are right by your desk and it’s hard to not sit down to address it right away, even if it’s 11 PM. When you have a deadline it’s so easy to log back in after dinner and burn your night away working. As the work life divide begins to erode, burn out is a real risk. I see my computer and if I’m stressed about work I get stressed at times I’d have normally left it behind and not thought about it. I feel guilty if I’m not working late on something I think I’m behind on. Keep in mind I have kids, a social life, etc. I’ve built my time around work/life balance and keeping the two distinct. It’s healthy for me in ways that having the two conflated never was. May not be an issue for everyone.
- Clubber 5y ago
  >When an emergency comes up, you are right by your desk and it’s hard to not sit down to address it right away, even if it’s 11 PM. That happens when I work at the office. At least at the roles I work, I'm expected to be on call all the time to support production environments. I'll get a text or something and usually have to address it.
  - toomuchtodo 5y ago
    Consider a new, better role if you’re not properly compensated for both when you’re on call and when a response is required. Remaining in such a role is a choice.
    - Clubber 5y ago
      I'm well compensated, but it's just the nature of development in every place I've worked.
  - flatline 5y ago
    I realized that may have been a poorly made point on my part. If you are on call you’re on call. But a lot of “emergencies” in non-operational contexts can wait till the next day in my experience, and often do due to societal norms - everyone is home doing other stuff in the evening, we’ll reconvene first thing in the AM when everyone is together and fresh.
    - Clubber 5y ago
      I can definitely see it when someone works later than usual (me) and is in the middle of something and has a question for someone who usually works at normal time or earlier than everyone else. When I'm in that situation, I don't expect a response immediately. I know I'm a night owl and other people aren't. I'm sure other people do. At the same token, when I work late and the early people schedule an 8am meeting, it's the same. Having said all that, the only difference for me in this scenario is whether or not I commute to the office every day. Same, same.
  - 5y ago
StavrosK 5y ago
This is good if you want work to be a part of your life, which almost nobody wants. It's terrible for a good work/life balance, pretty soon you're going to be stressed 24/7 because you "should be working right now".
triceratops 5y ago
> Work becomes a series of tasks I need to achieve throughout the day, like all the other tasks like laundry and doctors appointments. I don't know about you but I'm not smart enough to feel that my job is as easy as doing laundry or going to the doctor. I'd rather finish all my work in one focused block of time and not think about it the rest of the day. Due to the pandemic destroying most childcare options, this is an unattainable dream for many.
juiyout 5y ago
If you work in a team that requires lots of collaboration, you might not get to restructure work. Can people call you or message you to clarify what you just now pushed at 11pm? Do you respond immediately? Let's say you do immediately because you restructure your night time as your best work time, does that mean you're automatically exempt from 8am meetings in a few hours? Come to think of it. Pushing code at 11pm is not that unusual even pre-covid, but the expectation for the associated communication might be totally different.

artichokeheart 5y ago

1. That is true whether you WFH or not. 2. As a contractor, yes, As an employee WFH changes nothing here, particularly in countries with worker favorable employment laws. 3. See 1. 4. True, remote workers need to maintain a 9-5ish routine. meaning that remote means you can be flexible about which 8 hours you work, but you should still stick to the 8 hours you are paid for 5. True, but you now have more time to find a social group to join, closer to home and more into things your interested in outside of work.

one2three4 5y ago
About 1: Are you saying that the competition for a role offered in Munich is the same as for the same role offered remotely within +-5 hours CET or planet wide? I really don't think so. And I'm afraid that this is a classic race to the bottom for the most of us.
Leherenn 5y ago
1. and 3. Most countries have significant barriers to immigration, and even within a country, many people do not want to/cannot move for a job.

skapadia 5y ago

+1000. You literally said everything I was thinking.

metafunctor 5y ago

It’s not like companies can or will actually hire globally. There are huge timezone, language, cultural, trust, connections, and other barriers.

giantg2 5y ago
And legal barriers around location for data governance too.
- tomatocracy 5y ago
  There are legal barriers around regulated activities and tax problems too, at least in my line of work (particularly tax residency of companies/corporate vehicles). Many of these are temporarily waived by the authorities for the duration of the pandemic but that won't last forever.
fairity 5y ago
The impacts mentioned by OP aren't predicated on companies hiring globally. Simply expanding hiring across the US (or even just your US timezone) will result in a significant drop in salary for your average role. Employers aren't going to drop salaries in the midst of a pandemic, but if remote work persists, salaries will drop substantially. It's simple supply and demand, and I'm sure there's data out there (for existing remote positions) that corroborates this.
dcolkitt 5y ago
Not to mention that the notion that there's a huge global pool of talented devs is largely a myth. It's true that labor is cheaper in India or Russia, but research confirms that the average engineer is far less competent than their American counterparts.[1] Software wages in the US are high, because it's very hard to replicate the quality of an American workforce. By and large global differences in wages reflect global differences in workforce quality. It's not like this is the first time companies have realized that global labor is cheaper. They've been trying to capitalize on cheap engineers in developing countries since the 1980s. It's always the same issue. Lower price on paper, but delivery and quality issues that scale far beyond the up front cost savings. [1]https://www.pnas.org/content/116/14/6732 https://www.pnas.org/content/116/14/6732

Sevii 5y ago

1. I kind of expect a general reduction in the "living in the USA' salary premium for a lot of jobs. It sucks for the people getting paid less, but hopefully the deflationary effects on the economy make up for it a bit.

drstewart 5y ago
>but hopefully the deflationary effects on the economy make up for it a bit. Have you paid attention to the housing market, car market, or really... any market in the last year?

Avalaxy 5y ago

Might happen for some companies, but the vast majority not. At least in Europe I'm pretty sure I'm not going to be replaced by someone from India because they don't speak our language, they live in vastly different timezones and their culture is different which doesn't make for the most efficient collaboration.

valarauko 5y ago
> their culture is different which doesn't make for the most efficient collaboration. Could you expand on this?

mixologic 5y ago

3. The number of "good" roles is also dramatically expanded.

bart_spoon 5y ago
This can't be understated, at least for some of us. I'm in the Midwest and in the last 6 months about 20% of my company's engineering team has left and taken positions at new companies. Virtually none of them had anything bad to say about the company, its just that for a developer in the Midwest, the number of jobs that have opened up to them that were unavailable to them a year ago is unbelievable. And on the flip side, it hasn't been too rough for my company to replace them because there are now a huge number of devs in places like the West Coast that wouldn't have been interested in working for us prior moving to remote work who now are. I suspect some of this will all calm down a bit as the new order of things settles in, but for now, remote work is shaking things up in terms of opportunities for workers in a big way.

MeinBlutIstBlau 5y ago

These are my gripes as well. Primarily the socializing one. Can't have a legitimate relationship with someone over Skype. I'm sorry.

nucleardog 5y ago
I think half the people here probably know or know of someone that’s made lifelong friends online, met their spouse online, etc. That would seem to indicate that you can make and maintain relationships over text and video chat. I mean, personally, I’d count as my best friends of nearly two decades two people that I’ve only ever seen in person… 3 times? Building and maintaining those relationships is different from in person. It’s certainly not impossible.

ashtonkem 5y ago

> I compete for positions with people all over the world. Who can complete with a fraction of the salary I need. Perhaps. On one hand, the office was clearly one barrier separating onshore and offshore talent. On the other hand, there never really was a lot preventing companies from setting up offshore offices to attract cheaper talent worldwide. The fact that many US jobs remain still quite expensive compared to the developing world implies to me that there are still some barriers there above and beyond the ability to drive to a shared office.

racl101 5y ago

Yeah, I agree. Aside from the commute itself I don't mind working at the office and seeing people. It ain't good to be holed up like a hermit not socializing. I'd like a good balance of some office days and WFH days.

nathias 5y ago

You really aren't, if you are from US most companies that are advertising remote positions really want you to be located in US, I've been looking for remote work and I don't really believe that its possible to get a US job as a foreigner.

throwawaygh 5y ago

> I compete for positions with people all over the world. Who can complete with a fraction of the salary I need. This is what always jumps to the front of my mind when I read about WFH on software engineering forums. I'm lucky -- I have deep technical expertise in a very uncommon intersection of economically valuable topics. I never compete for positions, because there is way more work than available skilled labor. Even still, I'll be back in the office. One day the education system will catch up -- or my skill-set will become obsolete -- and at that point having a decade-long in-person relationship is my only bulwark against ruin. I can't imagine being a SWE working on a standard tech stack without deep personal connections in an application domain and thinking of WFH as anything other than an enormous and terrifying threat.

castlecrasher2 5y ago
WFH absolutely screws over younger people joining an industry. There's nothing like face-to-face learning, and I don't envy anyone who's had to start their career recently.
- throwawaygh 5y ago
  I've had excellent experience working virtually with new hires, but I've also seen a lot of failures. Mentoring remotely is definitely a skill that us older workers had to be intentional about cultivating in ourselves. The moment pandemic started, I bought a top-of-the-line iPad for whiteboarding, insisted my new hire mentors get the same from the company, and called up a couple old professors to get all their tips on remote teaching. Hopefully the next generation will have it easier; their mentors experienced remote learning so might be better equipped for remote teaching/mentoring.
- jdgiese 5y ago
  I've heard this idea repeated several times from people I respect, and thus I take it seriously. That being said, I've seen some contrary evidence. At Innolitics, we've hired several engineers out of college who've blossomed into talented and independent contributors within a couple of years. I'm not sure if we're doing something special or different that has solved the "junior's need face-to-face learning" problem, or if it's not as much of a problem as many people think.

wdb 5y ago

A lot of the WFH roles I have seen are mostly North America only though

Apocryphon 5y ago

1. and 3. are still somewhat mitigated by time zones, so it wouldn't be the entire planet.