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In practice, even most office jobs are remote. Everyone is wearing headphones & don’t want to be disturbed, so you gotta Slack them. If even one person on the

In practice, even most office jobs are remote. Everyone is wearing headphones & don’t want to be disturbed, so you gotta Slack them. If even one person on the team is in another office or at home for the day, then the meeting is over Zoom. For any type of 100% onsite job, when is it even 50% onsite anymore?

jupp0r 5y ago
This is the case for software development, but I doubt that procedures like that are widespread in other areas. From anecdotes, people in remote positions are often just left out.
Silhouette 5y ago
Everyone is wearing headphones & don’t want to be disturbed, so you gotta Slack them. Or maybe don't interrupt the person who is deep in thought about a complex problem? I've worked with clients who are fully on board with Slack (or Teams or whatever) and their culture doesn't really do email or phone so the most effective way to communicate with them remotely ends up being to join whatever channels the people you need to work with are on. If you all get along well it can be fun in the same way as any social network. But it can also be toxic to productivity because of the constant interruptions and if anything that effect is worse when everyone gets along because it's like everyone is in permanent water cooler mode as well.
civilized 5y ago
I spent a few years in an office before going remote and this was 100% my experience. The endlessly proclaimed, robotically repeated benefits of office work -- the vaunted "serendipitous encounters", "water-cooler conversations", and "impromptu lunchroom innovation sessions" -- they all involved nothing but small talk. All meetings were calls. No meaningful thinking or decisions occurred in-person. When everyone joined me in working from home in 2020, the main thing I noticed was that people stopped trying to force down my throat all the mindless, unjustified, undocumented decisions they made in the office. I finally got a chance to use my voice to make the org stop being so dumb. And people were grateful. I think people mostly make this "benefits of the office" stuff up to rationalize getting out of the house, away from their spouse and kids, and into the local urban center with all their favorite food trucks. There are probably some industries where it has real benefit, like artistic ones, but for the most part I don't think SWE falls in that category.
- hackerfromthefu 5y ago
  In my experience there's a difference in the level you're operating at. What you've mentioned is familiar from IC level, whereas senior architect/tech director/cto roles many were done and made real progress through personal interactions. Often these things involve politics and personalities as much as situational specifics.
  - upsidesinclude 5y ago
    Haha, I can't help but find this humorous! I genuinely can't take this perspective seriously. What most people see is the 'architect' (read: [micro]manager) make 'important' interventions in others efforts... I understand the role, I'm not ignorant of the purpose of these positions. But I'm painfully aware of how many people are b*llshitters and found their positions using these very office politics to get ahead. Their ultimate fear is being assessed on their own for their effort. Largely because they don't actually contribute much at all.
    - hackerfromthefu 5y ago
      Fair enough, that kind of thing is toxic and I don't get involved with those kind of places. Personally I moved back from Lead Architect/CTO roles to being a consultant mainly doing IC work where I deliver the entirety of a system myself. In other words I do deliver the goods technically, and happen to prefer that to working politically. So it would seem my observation/perspective is coming from a different perspective than you were thinking of!

jupp0r 5y ago

This is the case for software development, but I doubt that procedures like that are widespread in other areas. From anecdotes, people in remote positions are often just left out.

Silhouette 5y ago

Everyone is wearing headphones & don’t want to be disturbed, so you gotta Slack them. Or maybe don't interrupt the person who is deep in thought about a complex problem? I've worked with clients who are fully on board with Slack (or Teams or whatever) and their culture doesn't really do email or phone so the most effective way to communicate with them remotely ends up being to join whatever channels the people you need to work with are on. If you all get along well it can be fun in the same way as any social network. But it can also be toxic to productivity because of the constant interruptions and if anything that effect is worse when everyone gets along because it's like everyone is in permanent water cooler mode as well.

civilized 5y ago

I spent a few years in an office before going remote and this was 100% my experience. The endlessly proclaimed, robotically repeated benefits of office work -- the vaunted "serendipitous encounters", "water-cooler conversations", and "impromptu lunchroom innovation sessions" -- they all involved nothing but small talk. All meetings were calls. No meaningful thinking or decisions occurred in-person. When everyone joined me in working from home in 2020, the main thing I noticed was that people stopped trying to force down my throat all the mindless, unjustified, undocumented decisions they made in the office. I finally got a chance to use my voice to make the org stop being so dumb. And people were grateful. I think people mostly make this "benefits of the office" stuff up to rationalize getting out of the house, away from their spouse and kids, and into the local urban center with all their favorite food trucks. There are probably some industries where it has real benefit, like artistic ones, but for the most part I don't think SWE falls in that category.

hackerfromthefu 5y ago
In my experience there's a difference in the level you're operating at. What you've mentioned is familiar from IC level, whereas senior architect/tech director/cto roles many were done and made real progress through personal interactions. Often these things involve politics and personalities as much as situational specifics.
- upsidesinclude 5y ago
  Haha, I can't help but find this humorous! I genuinely can't take this perspective seriously. What most people see is the 'architect' (read: [micro]manager) make 'important' interventions in others efforts... I understand the role, I'm not ignorant of the purpose of these positions. But I'm painfully aware of how many people are b*llshitters and found their positions using these very office politics to get ahead. Their ultimate fear is being assessed on their own for their effort. Largely because they don't actually contribute much at all.
  - hackerfromthefu 5y ago
    Fair enough, that kind of thing is toxic and I don't get involved with those kind of places. Personally I moved back from Lead Architect/CTO roles to being a consultant mainly doing IC work where I deliver the entirety of a system myself. In other words I do deliver the goods technically, and happen to prefer that to working politically. So it would seem my observation/perspective is coming from a different perspective than you were thinking of!