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Have you considered that those of your view and those espousing that remote is more difficult might have different personalities, levels of need of social inter

Have you considered that those of your view and those espousing that remote is more difficult might have different personalities, levels of need of social interaction, or lifestyles? Have you considered that your company is self-selecting for those who flourish in remote, but that those whose personalities differ are self-selecting for working in an office environment? It's OK for there to not be a one size fits all solution.

andrewingram 4y ago
Right. During my somewhat passive job search, I've only been considering companies that have an office local to me (i.e. Central London). I've been working remotely since the start of the pandemic, and I simply don't like it. Sure, I don't miss having to commute or offices with bad noise pollution controls, but I miss everything else. Most of all, I miss being in town at the end of the day and being able to pop to the pub with colleagues if one of us needs to vent, or go to a salsa party nearby. I basically don't go out anymore; yes, this is a me thing, but it's also always been a me thing. I've always found it easier to have a social life on weeknights rather than weekends because I struggle to overcome the inertia of being at home. This preference means some very exciting companies are effectively off-limits to me, and that's hugely frustrating; but I also know what I need.
- SQueeeeeL 4y ago
  > yes, this is a me thing, but it's also always been a me thing I feel like picking jobs off of a desire to live a social life and feel like part of a community is extremely normal and valid. Remote work is essentially accepting that the primary way you'll engage with your colleagues and labor is through a screen, and that is an uncomfortable feeling (to some people at least)
  - tjr225 4y ago
    There will be a reckoning when we collectively realize that putting more and more, and eventually all, of our lives on the internet is not good for us.
    - BlargMcLarg 4y ago
      I mean, I'm expected to put in 8 hours a day, most of which staring at a screen, either way. Only difference being now I get to use the hours spent commuting to do other things. The argument would be a lot stronger if most office work wasn't perpetually online to begin with.
      - deleted 4y ago
        [deleted]
    - bart_spoon 4y ago
      People spend 95% of the time in the office in front of a screen anyways. Perhaps there is a problem with too much of our lives being spent online, but switching from in office to remote work isn't even enough of a difference in that respect to register.
      - s1artibartfast 4y ago
        I think the problem is that there's a lot of people where that 5% non-screen time at work is the difference between a job they like and one that they don't
  - FpUser 4y ago
    >"I feel like picking jobs off of a desire to live a social life and feel like part of a community is extremely normal " Been on my own and remote since 2000. I am remote with my clients save for occasional face to face meeting when possible and I am remote with my subcontractors. It feels "extremely normal" to me and the last thing I've ever want is my friends and people I hang out with being supplied by my workplace. Does not mean that I've never made friends when I did "normal work" long time ago but it was just extra.
    - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
      Why can't they both be normal?
      - FpUser 4y ago
        I think it is normal to make friends / acquaintances anywhere as we are all different. I just expressed what I feel about it. Does not mean that "there has to be the only one".
        lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
        Fair enough. The way you quoted certain terms in the previous comment made it seem to me as a refutation rather than a separate point. Just a poor assumption on my part since I can read the other voice. I do think that this discussion is often people who disagree not bothering to disagree, which probably explains why I read your comment wrong.
  - bad416f1f5a2 4y ago
    Funny, I have always seen “work as community” to offer an illusory connection at best. At its worst it is exploited by employers. My coworkers are my colleagues. I don’t mind sharing a beer with them once in a while, but apart from “work” we have different interests, values, and experiences. That doesn’t lead to community, it leads to having acquaintances. And if you doubt that, ask yourself how many of your “work friends” from a job you’ve had more than a year ago do you still interact with? The pandemic has been a joy for me because it’s let me separate my parasocial interactions from my true friends.
    - kixiQu 4y ago
      > ask yourself how many of your “work friends” from a job you’ve had more than a year ago do you still interact with? I still interact a lot with people I was on a team with >1 yr ago – the ones I met before we went remote. Can't say the same about the ones I was never in the office with, even though they seem like equally good people. > but apart from “work” we have different interests, values, and experiences. That doesn’t lead to community, it leads to having acquaintances. It has not been my experience that "community" arises particularly from this kind of homogeneity. I'm also kind of curious what you mean by "parasocial" outside of the context of media.
      - bad416f1f5a2 4y ago
        > I'm also kind of curious what you mean by "parasocial" outside of the context of media. I actually went back and forth on using it - even considering a hedge with a "quasi-" prefix. But it felt apt: plenty of my past "work friends" exist as little beyond a persona that I interact with via LinkedIn. I give a thumbs-up for their job change, we exchange polite offers to get a coffee that we both know neither will accept, and we go on.
    - s1artibartfast 4y ago
      Different Strokes for different folks. I would say that the majority of my friends and close Social Circle are people who I met and worked with an office at one point. Sure it started with cooler chat and beers after work, but it evolve to going to weddings, backpacking trips, and our partners becoming close with friendships of their own. I do like workplace community, even if I'm only close with a subset of my colleagues. I find it vastly more fulfilling to work with friends that I enjoy. I don't like turning off my personality and become a faceless COG working with other cogs for 8 hours a day and find it depressing
  - danenania 4y ago
    The way most of us make friends and find community is school when we’re younger, then work when we’re adults. It makes sense—wherever you spend the most time around others is where you’re most likely to make friends and feel a sense of belonging. Remote work upends that. It’s great if you already have an established social circle, but bad for people who want to develop one. There’s no reason why work has to be the main thing that satisfies these needs, but it’s fulfilled that role for so long that it has sucked up most of the oxygen from alternatives. I hope that as remote work continues to take off, we’ll see a new wave of third places that can take over this function. There’s a huge opportunity here for anyone who can help socially struggling remote workers feel more connected.
- enlyth 4y ago
  But the fact that you don't go out is because you don't put any effort into it. I work remotely from Kent, we also have an office in Central London but I made the effort to make local friends with whom I go out all the time, even week nights. I prefer this to spending £40 for the train to then drink £8 pints in overfilled London pubs while standing outside and shouting over each other. I actually don't want to spend more time with my colleagues after spending all day with them, I prefer to have a second friend circle which is more diverse than <group of people who happen to work in the same company as me>.
  - mattgperry 4y ago
    "I" "I" "I" This works great for you but for many it doesn't. Both are valid perspectives.
    - dogman144 4y ago
      But one “I” is asking for others to center their life around work for the sake of socialization, the other “I” is happy for the extroverted employee to find that extroversion however suits them, just leave me out of it. Those don’t seem equal asks
      - mym1990 4y ago
        No where did I see OP ask for others to center their life around work for socialization. They admitted that many companies are cut off from their job search as a result, BUT ALSO THAT THEY ARE OKAY WITH THAT. You're twisting it completely.
        dogman144 4y ago
        No, see what I mean in another thread. Return-to-office is in large part steered by public opinion and commercial real estate issues. For every bold company that leans into remote, the majority rest check the public temperature and do what seems in line pending open revolt form their employees or competitors offering remote. So much of the public temperature around remote work is oriented around heavy support from public figures for return to office. By some employees supporting it as well, everyone risks getting swept back into office whether they like it or not and don’t have a job with enough power (like a talented dev) to go against the grain and protest. If you’re not in those jobs with leverage and at a company considering RTO or not, Employees supporting remote work are espousing very safe career views, and the employees who disagree risk going against the grain with mgmt who want the office back so stay silent. So this is what I mean by OP’s opinions mean everyone else gets swept in it as well.
- dogman144 4y ago
  The thing is you’re asking everyone else in the office to come in and experience all the negative externalities (commute, health, family) just so you can have an easy way to get out and about after work. That doesn’t seem fair to me.
  - xxxxyxxyxxyxyx 4y ago
    I don't think OP is. They know how they feels and they're betting others feel the same. Employees wanting to work in an office isn't the same thing as employers forcing people to.
    - dogman144 4y ago
      Right, my base assumption is betting a lot of the other employees don’t feel the same. There are a core group of work friends that maybe stick around after leaving a job as friends, the rest are evenings you’re taking from me, my family, and my time at a pub b/c those pub nights are ultimately important for career management and matter little for meaningful socialization. I feel like people get this or not. The relationships at work are more for career advancement than friendship (or I’m a sociopath). This has been a thing forever, Office Space was a hit for a reason.
  - andrewingram 4y ago
    I'm struggling to find the bit where I demand all the remote-first or hybrid companies changes their ways and conform to my preferences. No, I'm looking for companies that fit my preferences. Which is making my job search much harder, but I know what I need.
    - dogman144 4y ago
      Right, but the louder opinions like yours are, and these are the ones that surface most in the public debate and wrapped in some good-for-productivity ideas, the more fuel it adds to the fire of moving everyone back in office.
      - 4y ago
- jkukul 4y ago
  1. Find an interesting remote job. 2. Sign-up to a local coworking space in Central London and make a habit to go there every day. Try to make friends with people there and go out with them every now and then. Many coworking spaces even try to facilitate community building by organising events, etc. 3. Profit. Socializing doesn't need to happen at work.
  - andrewingram 4y ago
    This is an avenue i've been considering. In my case it does require enough budget to allow for a somewhat permanent co-working space setup (big monitor, mouse, keyboard etc), but it's an option.
    - jkukul 4y ago
      good luck! treat this budget as an investment into your well-being and social life. Also, keep in mind not all coworkings are made equal. It might take trying a few before you find one that suits you well. In my experience small, local coworkings are best for building relationships. Big, chain coworkings like WeWork are the worst. Everyone just minds their own business there.
- mym1990 4y ago
  This feels like me to a tee! I see so many people crapping on 'work social' life as if its some despicable activity that only those with no standards could partake in. The truth is that some of the nicest and best people I have met have been at work, and I thoroughly enjoyed going out and decompressing with them! Good times.
  - tomduncalf 4y ago
    Amen, same here. Each to their own, I guess it depends based on personality type, the company you're at, maybe the country you're in... but I've made a lot of good friends through work who are still good friends of mine despite not having worked together for many years. The polarisation of this debate is quite weird to watch. I get why people who prefer remote feel they have to fight for it now that it has become a common thing, but it's weird to deny that other people might have other preferences and there is room for both.
- dunefox 4y ago
  Then drive into town after work and go out? Not doing that is entirely your decision and has nothing to do with home office.
danwee 4y ago
> It's OK for there to not be a one-size fits all solution. Funny, because before COVID, like 90% of the IT companies out there were using a "one-size fits all" solution (i.e., 100% office-based work).
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- uxp100 4y ago
  I think it was less available, but less than 90%, which is phrased a little akwardly, but basically, I worked remotely for 5 years before covid (hated it, but also hated the office and like the California salary outside California) and it was not available to new hires at all, but there were a lot of us who basically said, I’m moving for personal reasons, why can you do for me, and HR made it work. It did involve flights and hotels for the around 10 weeks a year I was working in more of a lab situation, which I can see not wanting to do for 300 people instead of a few dozen.
wowokay 4y ago
True, I think the rhetoric and The article are focused on killing the negative concepts around remote. To the extreme in pointing out that most of the common tropes are not accurate. The problem is I don’t think anti-remote people understand that in some cases there whole team may want to be remote 100% of the time, and that it’s not right to be in the mindset that those team members should be forced to come into an office to satisfying there need for socialization, in fact unfortunately in that situation maybe they need to change fields or companies.
- A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
  A lot of people have. There is a reason remote only job postings have such a high number of applicants. In a lot of ways, remote already won. The question for me is really as to whether that means that anyone worth their salt will stay at non-remote places and whether old corps will suffer a brain drain.
ghettoCoder 4y ago
Throughout my career it's been my experience that the type of people you describe are never the top performers, and seldom average performers. The ones craving social interactions often are just looking for distractions (like spending too long at the water cooler chatting) cause either they hate their job, hate the work, can't do the actual work or view work (exchange of labour/time for money) as a predominantly social activity. That type of person is usually a negative contributor overall. No thanks. I get paid the same if it takes me 4 hours or 8 hours to complete my work. I'll take 4 hours and spend the rest of the day doing what I want.
- wpietri 4y ago
  I think you've conflated two things. People can be productive or slackers. And they can be social or antisocial. You personally noticed the social slackers. But I doubt you noticed the antisocial ones, because they're not visibly doing nothing; they're distracting themselves in quieter ways. I know plenty of people who are both productive and social. Indeed, given that both software and business are mostly team sports, some of the most productive people I know are very social.
- tpankaj 4y ago
  That's a pretty narrow viewpoint. I can tell you from personal experience that it is very difficult to graduate college almost straight into a (pandemic-induced) remote job in a new city while trying to make local connections and ramp up in my job during a global pandemic.
- izietto 4y ago
  > I get paid the same if it takes me 4 hours or 8 hours to complete my work. I'll take 4 hours and spend the rest of the day doing what I want This. working remotely you have the HUGE advantage of being able to work enough and spend the rest of your working time as you prefer, rather than waste it. Even if you deeply love your teammates, having more time for yourself is priceless, especially in a society where you're supposed to spend the most and the best of your life working.
- aiisjustanif 4y ago
  Not everyone has your job function. Not all job roles are the same and communication can be required for many. Building good rapport can help reduce tensions as well and being in person can help that.
P5fRxh5kUvp2th 4y ago
I wonder if those personality differences get considered when they throw everyone into a single room with a few low cubicle walls. I wonder if the market gives a shit about being fair to those who have personalities that thrive in said cubicles. Thirdly, I wonder if those who thrive in remote give a shit about being fair after having dealt with cubicle farms for so many years.
- UncleOxidant 4y ago
  > after having dealt with cubicle farms for so many years. Or worse, open floor plans.
  - SketchySeaBeast 4y ago
    Yeah, until I started working from home I hadn't had walls for a decade.
    - gabereiser 4y ago
      Then how do they know you are working? (more importantly, how will they know they can interrupt you?)
    - mulmen 4y ago
      I had an office for a short time. We were moving to a new building and got to pick our seating arrangements by seniority. I was toward the end of the list but nobody had picked the lone office in our area so I did. My manager immediately had the walls torn down.
  - ajaym0 4y ago
    Open floor plans can be a double edge sword buddy
    - throwaway2037 4y ago
      Yes, exactly. When you sit right next to your business users and listen to their day-to-day activities or phone calls, it is priceless "ambient information". However, if you sit next to completely unrelated, but noisy team, it is hell! The trick is floor layout. The best companies in my experience obsess about floor layout to get relevant teams close!
api 4y ago
> It's OK for there to not be a one size fits all solution. What? Nuanced thinking? No, we need a million click bait articles and BS business books about how going remote will help you win at everything no matter who you are or what your business is. Then when problems arise we can get another million click bait articles and BS business books about how remote is terrible and doesn't work... again no matter who you are or what you're doing. How else will a generation of consultants make a living helping guide "remote transformations" and then another generation of consultants make a living doing the opposite?
forinti 4y ago
I think it is probably more of an intracompany issue, not intercompany. I see older people in management who can't deal with remote and younger people who are eager to work from wherever.
- throwaway2037 4y ago
  I see exactly the opposite where I work, and I am "hard-core WFO" but non-discriminatory (WFH is fine!). You wrote your post like it is a physics theorem (absolute). To be more open-minded: If you work in a place where (old/er) management is intolerant of diverse working styles... well, f-ck them! Please kindly find a better place to work! :-)
dogman144 4y ago
Have you considered that the those different personalities are ultimately asking for a friend group in-office composed of people that largely don’t want to be those forced-friends and by extension commute/sacrifice finances/family time to do it and then just zoom-call and slack in office anyway? That’s the nonsensical aspect of all this. Everyone mentioning that the office was a key community or some higher ideal to spend time on for meaning forget that you can have that socialization and significantly more intrinsically valuable meaning-making with (a) family, (b) friends outside of work, (c) community involvement. All of which don’t require commutes, work lunches, losing family time for something that doesn’t matter in the long run. Instead, let’s hang out and support the extroverts who somehow don’t know how to make friends outside of those they helped launch a product with? Totally nonsensical. Edit: I’m at a negative downvote and dropping fast, so fwiw one day everyone gets families of some kind and also stops working, even if that’s not understood now. what connections are left over after work stops are what will power you, and most people understand that eventually.
randomdata 4y ago
> that those whose personalities differ are self-selecting for working in an office environment? Remote doesn't specify where you work, though. In my 20 years of working remotely, I've worked from home, from cars, hotels, cafes, offices, out in the middle of a field, you name it I've probably done it. 100% remote working conditions can mean working in an office environment every single day, if that's your preference. Remote is a euphemism for "work wherever you please". The actual differentiation here is whether or not an employer dictates a working location. Are you, perhaps, suggesting that there is strong overlap between those who prefer working in offices (which does no preclude 100% remote) and having a controlling power dictate how they live?
- tomtheelder 4y ago
  Working in an office without your coworkers is in no way a substitute for working in an office with them. What people are talking about when they say they prefer an office environment is face to face collaboration and socialization. You don't get that unless the people in the office with you are you coworkers.
  - randomdata 4y ago
    The theory proposed earlier is that you will self-select to work with other workers who choose to work in offices, if that's your preference, so it can remain a 100% remote situation where the preferred remote location is the office. There is an implication as well, though, that there is an additional self-selection towards having dictation on how to live your life from a greater power among those who prefer working in offices, seeing those people self-select businesses that have mandated location requirements. That is what we are exploring here.
  - SantalBlush 4y ago
    >Working in an office without your coworkers is in no way a substitute for working in an office with them. What people are talking about when they say they prefer an office environment is face to face collaboration and socialization. This, right here, explains the pushback against those who favor in-office work; it's not that they simply want to be in the office, but they want their colleagues to make the commute to join them in the office and chat with them. Conversely, remote workers do not place any such requirements on where their colleagues work. They aren't requiring that anyone else be in a specific location at a specific time, hence why it is better and more accommodating to others.
qikInNdOutReply 4y ago
Nobody is actually stopping people from forming inofficial "local" offices. As in meet remote workers near you and try to hire at there company. After that, everyone hosts the office at his/her flat once a week.
Victerius 4y ago
Introverts have had to suffer work environments made for extroverts for too long. As an introvert, I welcome the reversal. Deal with it.
deegles 4y ago
It's hard for me to imagine an office environment that would make up for commuting every day. Unless I live walking distance from the office I'll pick fully remote every time.
JaumeGreen 4y ago
> Have you considered that those of your view and those espousing that remote is more difficult might have different personalities, levels of need of social interaction, or lifestyles? Yes and no. There's the people personalities that affect the end result, but sometimes the company is the one setting hurdles that make everything hard. "There's no free interaction, like at the coffee machine." but don't offer spaces (or time) for people to relax online and/or connect. "You don't have the immediate help of others that are around you." others that can distract you sometimes, and meanwhile you want to even deduct the bathroom break's time from remote workers. "I need some socialization." do your time, then find another outlet of socialization. Some companies are not embracing remote working. Some might have valid reasons (most of the staff is local and we want the ones that could remote to have heavy interaction) or non-valid ones (I'm the boss and I want to see everyone at the office). Of course, for these companies, remote will be hard. They are making it so.
MisterBastahrd 4y ago
Have you considered that we live in the 21st century and if you can't handle modern social conventions, you're going to be left behind in an increasingly shrinking group just like everyone in previous generations who failed to adapt?
throwaway2037 4y ago
I feel the same. I read GP and thought: "Oh, another 'extremist' WFH advocate." This is a never ending battle on HN -- with so little new, interesting input on either sides of the debate. The "all office" vs "all remote" crowd: It is exhasuting. Both are correct and wrong at the same time. Like Realpolitik in geopolitics: For each team, it is all about what works for your team. But please, don't tell me what works for my team / family / personal situation. The very best teams have highly levels of adapability -- whatever comes we can adapt, but continue to be high functioning! Personally, I really like WFO. Why? I like the pressure to wake up early, dress well (suit and tie!), ride the metro/subway, and perform at the office. However, I never pressure my teammates to do the same. I tell all new joiners: You can wear hoodie and jeans everyday, but please don't take away my necktie! Yes, I know that I am the cultural equivalent of an office / cultural dinosaur in 2022! In my team, people that WFH more often have measurably lower rates of collaboration versus those who work-from-office (WFO). To be clear, the most advanced sales teams literally measure everything regarding collaberation or client contact. (I have seen custom built software at multiple companies that try to exactly measure this!) It does not mean that WFH is less productive or less collaborative. Instead, it means that each team is different. A "WFH zealot" on my team was adamant that their previous boss who commuted by high speed rail twice per week more than 500km away was a "good situation". There is no limit for the zealots (on both sides: office vs home). It could be working from the moon (WFH -- new SpaceX colony!) or everyone sleeps in the office 7 days a week (ramen profitable / office uber-zealot). Both sides are simultaneously correct (with perfect fit team) or wrong (with terrible fit team). This whole silly "argument" feels like the anti-vaxxer equivalent of WFH vs WFO. I am tired of it. What is a good reply to this post? Talk about when/where you were wrong / learned something new (!). "Oh, I was WFH zealot, but then I was forced to WFO and was suddenly much higher collab and connected with my teammates." (Or the exact opposite -- "I am tired of annoying sales people asking me to fix their broken mouse!".) Please don't reply to this post if you are the anti-vaxxer equiv of WFH/WFO. You add nothing new to the debate. Last: This whole debate feels eerily simliar to the mid-2000s argument about (only) "hire old/experienced" vs "hire young/inexperienced". Both sides were correct and wrong at the same time. The same old anti-vaxxer crowd argument again! The ultimate team had energetic people of all ages / genders / experience / ethnicity / religion. Hey... Looks the same in 2022! The best team I ever worked on had wild variety in experience. All the way from "I-Am-Old-Get-Off-My-Lawn" to "17-year-old-summer-intern". Amazingly, people were open-minded and tolerant. As a result, we worked at a furious pace and team meetings were amazing.

andrewingram 4y ago

Right. During my somewhat passive job search, I've only been considering companies that have an office local to me (i.e. Central London). I've been working remotely since the start of the pandemic, and I simply don't like it. Sure, I don't miss having to commute or offices with bad noise pollution controls, but I miss everything else. Most of all, I miss being in town at the end of the day and being able to pop to the pub with colleagues if one of us needs to vent, or go to a salsa party nearby. I basically don't go out anymore; yes, this is a me thing, but it's also always been a me thing. I've always found it easier to have a social life on weeknights rather than weekends because I struggle to overcome the inertia of being at home. This preference means some very exciting companies are effectively off-limits to me, and that's hugely frustrating; but I also know what I need.

SQueeeeeL 4y ago
> yes, this is a me thing, but it's also always been a me thing I feel like picking jobs off of a desire to live a social life and feel like part of a community is extremely normal and valid. Remote work is essentially accepting that the primary way you'll engage with your colleagues and labor is through a screen, and that is an uncomfortable feeling (to some people at least)
- tjr225 4y ago
  There will be a reckoning when we collectively realize that putting more and more, and eventually all, of our lives on the internet is not good for us.
  - BlargMcLarg 4y ago
    I mean, I'm expected to put in 8 hours a day, most of which staring at a screen, either way. Only difference being now I get to use the hours spent commuting to do other things. The argument would be a lot stronger if most office work wasn't perpetually online to begin with.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  - bart_spoon 4y ago
    People spend 95% of the time in the office in front of a screen anyways. Perhaps there is a problem with too much of our lives being spent online, but switching from in office to remote work isn't even enough of a difference in that respect to register.
    - s1artibartfast 4y ago
      I think the problem is that there's a lot of people where that 5% non-screen time at work is the difference between a job they like and one that they don't
- FpUser 4y ago
  >"I feel like picking jobs off of a desire to live a social life and feel like part of a community is extremely normal " Been on my own and remote since 2000. I am remote with my clients save for occasional face to face meeting when possible and I am remote with my subcontractors. It feels "extremely normal" to me and the last thing I've ever want is my friends and people I hang out with being supplied by my workplace. Does not mean that I've never made friends when I did "normal work" long time ago but it was just extra.
  - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
    Why can't they both be normal?
    - FpUser 4y ago
      I think it is normal to make friends / acquaintances anywhere as we are all different. I just expressed what I feel about it. Does not mean that "there has to be the only one".
      - lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 4y ago
        Fair enough. The way you quoted certain terms in the previous comment made it seem to me as a refutation rather than a separate point. Just a poor assumption on my part since I can read the other voice. I do think that this discussion is often people who disagree not bothering to disagree, which probably explains why I read your comment wrong.
- bad416f1f5a2 4y ago
  Funny, I have always seen “work as community” to offer an illusory connection at best. At its worst it is exploited by employers. My coworkers are my colleagues. I don’t mind sharing a beer with them once in a while, but apart from “work” we have different interests, values, and experiences. That doesn’t lead to community, it leads to having acquaintances. And if you doubt that, ask yourself how many of your “work friends” from a job you’ve had more than a year ago do you still interact with? The pandemic has been a joy for me because it’s let me separate my parasocial interactions from my true friends.
  - kixiQu 4y ago
    > ask yourself how many of your “work friends” from a job you’ve had more than a year ago do you still interact with? I still interact a lot with people I was on a team with >1 yr ago – the ones I met before we went remote. Can't say the same about the ones I was never in the office with, even though they seem like equally good people. > but apart from “work” we have different interests, values, and experiences. That doesn’t lead to community, it leads to having acquaintances. It has not been my experience that "community" arises particularly from this kind of homogeneity. I'm also kind of curious what you mean by "parasocial" outside of the context of media.
    - bad416f1f5a2 4y ago
      > I'm also kind of curious what you mean by "parasocial" outside of the context of media. I actually went back and forth on using it - even considering a hedge with a "quasi-" prefix. But it felt apt: plenty of my past "work friends" exist as little beyond a persona that I interact with via LinkedIn. I give a thumbs-up for their job change, we exchange polite offers to get a coffee that we both know neither will accept, and we go on.
  - s1artibartfast 4y ago
    Different Strokes for different folks. I would say that the majority of my friends and close Social Circle are people who I met and worked with an office at one point. Sure it started with cooler chat and beers after work, but it evolve to going to weddings, backpacking trips, and our partners becoming close with friendships of their own. I do like workplace community, even if I'm only close with a subset of my colleagues. I find it vastly more fulfilling to work with friends that I enjoy. I don't like turning off my personality and become a faceless COG working with other cogs for 8 hours a day and find it depressing
- danenania 4y ago
  The way most of us make friends and find community is school when we’re younger, then work when we’re adults. It makes sense—wherever you spend the most time around others is where you’re most likely to make friends and feel a sense of belonging. Remote work upends that. It’s great if you already have an established social circle, but bad for people who want to develop one. There’s no reason why work has to be the main thing that satisfies these needs, but it’s fulfilled that role for so long that it has sucked up most of the oxygen from alternatives. I hope that as remote work continues to take off, we’ll see a new wave of third places that can take over this function. There’s a huge opportunity here for anyone who can help socially struggling remote workers feel more connected.
enlyth 4y ago
But the fact that you don't go out is because you don't put any effort into it. I work remotely from Kent, we also have an office in Central London but I made the effort to make local friends with whom I go out all the time, even week nights. I prefer this to spending £40 for the train to then drink £8 pints in overfilled London pubs while standing outside and shouting over each other. I actually don't want to spend more time with my colleagues after spending all day with them, I prefer to have a second friend circle which is more diverse than <group of people who happen to work in the same company as me>.
- mattgperry 4y ago
  "I" "I" "I" This works great for you but for many it doesn't. Both are valid perspectives.
  - dogman144 4y ago
    But one “I” is asking for others to center their life around work for the sake of socialization, the other “I” is happy for the extroverted employee to find that extroversion however suits them, just leave me out of it. Those don’t seem equal asks
    - mym1990 4y ago
      No where did I see OP ask for others to center their life around work for socialization. They admitted that many companies are cut off from their job search as a result, BUT ALSO THAT THEY ARE OKAY WITH THAT. You're twisting it completely.
      - dogman144 4y ago
        No, see what I mean in another thread. Return-to-office is in large part steered by public opinion and commercial real estate issues. For every bold company that leans into remote, the majority rest check the public temperature and do what seems in line pending open revolt form their employees or competitors offering remote. So much of the public temperature around remote work is oriented around heavy support from public figures for return to office. By some employees supporting it as well, everyone risks getting swept back into office whether they like it or not and don’t have a job with enough power (like a talented dev) to go against the grain and protest. If you’re not in those jobs with leverage and at a company considering RTO or not, Employees supporting remote work are espousing very safe career views, and the employees who disagree risk going against the grain with mgmt who want the office back so stay silent. So this is what I mean by OP’s opinions mean everyone else gets swept in it as well.
dogman144 4y ago
The thing is you’re asking everyone else in the office to come in and experience all the negative externalities (commute, health, family) just so you can have an easy way to get out and about after work. That doesn’t seem fair to me.
- xxxxyxxyxxyxyx 4y ago
  I don't think OP is. They know how they feels and they're betting others feel the same. Employees wanting to work in an office isn't the same thing as employers forcing people to.
  - dogman144 4y ago
    Right, my base assumption is betting a lot of the other employees don’t feel the same. There are a core group of work friends that maybe stick around after leaving a job as friends, the rest are evenings you’re taking from me, my family, and my time at a pub b/c those pub nights are ultimately important for career management and matter little for meaningful socialization. I feel like people get this or not. The relationships at work are more for career advancement than friendship (or I’m a sociopath). This has been a thing forever, Office Space was a hit for a reason.
- andrewingram 4y ago
  I'm struggling to find the bit where I demand all the remote-first or hybrid companies changes their ways and conform to my preferences. No, I'm looking for companies that fit my preferences. Which is making my job search much harder, but I know what I need.
  - dogman144 4y ago
    Right, but the louder opinions like yours are, and these are the ones that surface most in the public debate and wrapped in some good-for-productivity ideas, the more fuel it adds to the fire of moving everyone back in office.
    - 4y ago
jkukul 4y ago
1. Find an interesting remote job. 2. Sign-up to a local coworking space in Central London and make a habit to go there every day. Try to make friends with people there and go out with them every now and then. Many coworking spaces even try to facilitate community building by organising events, etc. 3. Profit. Socializing doesn't need to happen at work.
- andrewingram 4y ago
  This is an avenue i've been considering. In my case it does require enough budget to allow for a somewhat permanent co-working space setup (big monitor, mouse, keyboard etc), but it's an option.
  - jkukul 4y ago
    good luck! treat this budget as an investment into your well-being and social life. Also, keep in mind not all coworkings are made equal. It might take trying a few before you find one that suits you well. In my experience small, local coworkings are best for building relationships. Big, chain coworkings like WeWork are the worst. Everyone just minds their own business there.
mym1990 4y ago
This feels like me to a tee! I see so many people crapping on 'work social' life as if its some despicable activity that only those with no standards could partake in. The truth is that some of the nicest and best people I have met have been at work, and I thoroughly enjoyed going out and decompressing with them! Good times.
- tomduncalf 4y ago
  Amen, same here. Each to their own, I guess it depends based on personality type, the company you're at, maybe the country you're in... but I've made a lot of good friends through work who are still good friends of mine despite not having worked together for many years. The polarisation of this debate is quite weird to watch. I get why people who prefer remote feel they have to fight for it now that it has become a common thing, but it's weird to deny that other people might have other preferences and there is room for both.
dunefox 4y ago
Then drive into town after work and go out? Not doing that is entirely your decision and has nothing to do with home office.

danwee 4y ago

> It's OK for there to not be a one-size fits all solution. Funny, because before COVID, like 90% of the IT companies out there were using a "one-size fits all" solution (i.e., 100% office-based work).

deleted 4y ago
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uxp100 4y ago
I think it was less available, but less than 90%, which is phrased a little akwardly, but basically, I worked remotely for 5 years before covid (hated it, but also hated the office and like the California salary outside California) and it was not available to new hires at all, but there were a lot of us who basically said, I’m moving for personal reasons, why can you do for me, and HR made it work. It did involve flights and hotels for the around 10 weeks a year I was working in more of a lab situation, which I can see not wanting to do for 300 people instead of a few dozen.

wowokay 4y ago

True, I think the rhetoric and The article are focused on killing the negative concepts around remote. To the extreme in pointing out that most of the common tropes are not accurate. The problem is I don’t think anti-remote people understand that in some cases there whole team may want to be remote 100% of the time, and that it’s not right to be in the mindset that those team members should be forced to come into an office to satisfying there need for socialization, in fact unfortunately in that situation maybe they need to change fields or companies.

A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
A lot of people have. There is a reason remote only job postings have such a high number of applicants. In a lot of ways, remote already won. The question for me is really as to whether that means that anyone worth their salt will stay at non-remote places and whether old corps will suffer a brain drain.

ghettoCoder 4y ago

Throughout my career it's been my experience that the type of people you describe are never the top performers, and seldom average performers. The ones craving social interactions often are just looking for distractions (like spending too long at the water cooler chatting) cause either they hate their job, hate the work, can't do the actual work or view work (exchange of labour/time for money) as a predominantly social activity. That type of person is usually a negative contributor overall. No thanks. I get paid the same if it takes me 4 hours or 8 hours to complete my work. I'll take 4 hours and spend the rest of the day doing what I want.

wpietri 4y ago
I think you've conflated two things. People can be productive or slackers. And they can be social or antisocial. You personally noticed the social slackers. But I doubt you noticed the antisocial ones, because they're not visibly doing nothing; they're distracting themselves in quieter ways. I know plenty of people who are both productive and social. Indeed, given that both software and business are mostly team sports, some of the most productive people I know are very social.
tpankaj 4y ago
That's a pretty narrow viewpoint. I can tell you from personal experience that it is very difficult to graduate college almost straight into a (pandemic-induced) remote job in a new city while trying to make local connections and ramp up in my job during a global pandemic.
izietto 4y ago
> I get paid the same if it takes me 4 hours or 8 hours to complete my work. I'll take 4 hours and spend the rest of the day doing what I want This. working remotely you have the HUGE advantage of being able to work enough and spend the rest of your working time as you prefer, rather than waste it. Even if you deeply love your teammates, having more time for yourself is priceless, especially in a society where you're supposed to spend the most and the best of your life working.
aiisjustanif 4y ago
Not everyone has your job function. Not all job roles are the same and communication can be required for many. Building good rapport can help reduce tensions as well and being in person can help that.

P5fRxh5kUvp2th 4y ago

I wonder if those personality differences get considered when they throw everyone into a single room with a few low cubicle walls. I wonder if the market gives a shit about being fair to those who have personalities that thrive in said cubicles. Thirdly, I wonder if those who thrive in remote give a shit about being fair after having dealt with cubicle farms for so many years.

UncleOxidant 4y ago
> after having dealt with cubicle farms for so many years. Or worse, open floor plans.
- SketchySeaBeast 4y ago
  Yeah, until I started working from home I hadn't had walls for a decade.
  - gabereiser 4y ago
    Then how do they know you are working? (more importantly, how will they know they can interrupt you?)
  - mulmen 4y ago
    I had an office for a short time. We were moving to a new building and got to pick our seating arrangements by seniority. I was toward the end of the list but nobody had picked the lone office in our area so I did. My manager immediately had the walls torn down.
- ajaym0 4y ago
  Open floor plans can be a double edge sword buddy
  - throwaway2037 4y ago
    Yes, exactly. When you sit right next to your business users and listen to their day-to-day activities or phone calls, it is priceless "ambient information". However, if you sit next to completely unrelated, but noisy team, it is hell! The trick is floor layout. The best companies in my experience obsess about floor layout to get relevant teams close!

api 4y ago

> It's OK for there to not be a one size fits all solution. What? Nuanced thinking? No, we need a million click bait articles and BS business books about how going remote will help you win at everything no matter who you are or what your business is. Then when problems arise we can get another million click bait articles and BS business books about how remote is terrible and doesn't work... again no matter who you are or what you're doing. How else will a generation of consultants make a living helping guide "remote transformations" and then another generation of consultants make a living doing the opposite?

forinti 4y ago

I think it is probably more of an intracompany issue, not intercompany. I see older people in management who can't deal with remote and younger people who are eager to work from wherever.

throwaway2037 4y ago
I see exactly the opposite where I work, and I am "hard-core WFO" but non-discriminatory (WFH is fine!). You wrote your post like it is a physics theorem (absolute). To be more open-minded: If you work in a place where (old/er) management is intolerant of diverse working styles... well, f-ck them! Please kindly find a better place to work! :-)

dogman144 4y ago

Have you considered that the those different personalities are ultimately asking for a friend group in-office composed of people that largely don’t want to be those forced-friends and by extension commute/sacrifice finances/family time to do it and then just zoom-call and slack in office anyway? That’s the nonsensical aspect of all this. Everyone mentioning that the office was a key community or some higher ideal to spend time on for meaning forget that you can have that socialization and significantly more intrinsically valuable meaning-making with (a) family, (b) friends outside of work, (c) community involvement. All of which don’t require commutes, work lunches, losing family time for something that doesn’t matter in the long run. Instead, let’s hang out and support the extroverts who somehow don’t know how to make friends outside of those they helped launch a product with? Totally nonsensical. Edit: I’m at a negative downvote and dropping fast, so fwiw one day everyone gets families of some kind and also stops working, even if that’s not understood now. what connections are left over after work stops are what will power you, and most people understand that eventually.

randomdata 4y ago

> that those whose personalities differ are self-selecting for working in an office environment? Remote doesn't specify where you work, though. In my 20 years of working remotely, I've worked from home, from cars, hotels, cafes, offices, out in the middle of a field, you name it I've probably done it. 100% remote working conditions can mean working in an office environment every single day, if that's your preference. Remote is a euphemism for "work wherever you please". The actual differentiation here is whether or not an employer dictates a working location. Are you, perhaps, suggesting that there is strong overlap between those who prefer working in offices (which does no preclude 100% remote) and having a controlling power dictate how they live?

tomtheelder 4y ago
Working in an office without your coworkers is in no way a substitute for working in an office with them. What people are talking about when they say they prefer an office environment is face to face collaboration and socialization. You don't get that unless the people in the office with you are you coworkers.
- randomdata 4y ago
  The theory proposed earlier is that you will self-select to work with other workers who choose to work in offices, if that's your preference, so it can remain a 100% remote situation where the preferred remote location is the office. There is an implication as well, though, that there is an additional self-selection towards having dictation on how to live your life from a greater power among those who prefer working in offices, seeing those people self-select businesses that have mandated location requirements. That is what we are exploring here.
- SantalBlush 4y ago
  >Working in an office without your coworkers is in no way a substitute for working in an office with them. What people are talking about when they say they prefer an office environment is face to face collaboration and socialization. This, right here, explains the pushback against those who favor in-office work; it's not that they simply want to be in the office, but they want their colleagues to make the commute to join them in the office and chat with them. Conversely, remote workers do not place any such requirements on where their colleagues work. They aren't requiring that anyone else be in a specific location at a specific time, hence why it is better and more accommodating to others.

qikInNdOutReply 4y ago

Nobody is actually stopping people from forming inofficial "local" offices. As in meet remote workers near you and try to hire at there company. After that, everyone hosts the office at his/her flat once a week.

Victerius 4y ago

Introverts have had to suffer work environments made for extroverts for too long. As an introvert, I welcome the reversal. Deal with it.

deegles 4y ago

It's hard for me to imagine an office environment that would make up for commuting every day. Unless I live walking distance from the office I'll pick fully remote every time.

JaumeGreen 4y ago

> Have you considered that those of your view and those espousing that remote is more difficult might have different personalities, levels of need of social interaction, or lifestyles? Yes and no. There's the people personalities that affect the end result, but sometimes the company is the one setting hurdles that make everything hard. "There's no free interaction, like at the coffee machine." but don't offer spaces (or time) for people to relax online and/or connect. "You don't have the immediate help of others that are around you." others that can distract you sometimes, and meanwhile you want to even deduct the bathroom break's time from remote workers. "I need some socialization." do your time, then find another outlet of socialization. Some companies are not embracing remote working. Some might have valid reasons (most of the staff is local and we want the ones that could remote to have heavy interaction) or non-valid ones (I'm the boss and I want to see everyone at the office). Of course, for these companies, remote will be hard. They are making it so.

MisterBastahrd 4y ago

Have you considered that we live in the 21st century and if you can't handle modern social conventions, you're going to be left behind in an increasingly shrinking group just like everyone in previous generations who failed to adapt?

throwaway2037 4y ago

I feel the same. I read GP and thought: "Oh, another 'extremist' WFH advocate." This is a never ending battle on HN -- with so little new, interesting input on either sides of the debate. The "all office" vs "all remote" crowd: It is exhasuting. Both are correct and wrong at the same time. Like Realpolitik in geopolitics: For each team, it is all about what works for your team. But please, don't tell me what works for my team / family / personal situation. The very best teams have highly levels of adapability -- whatever comes we can adapt, but continue to be high functioning! Personally, I really like WFO. Why? I like the pressure to wake up early, dress well (suit and tie!), ride the metro/subway, and perform at the office. However, I never pressure my teammates to do the same. I tell all new joiners: You can wear hoodie and jeans everyday, but please don't take away my necktie! Yes, I know that I am the cultural equivalent of an office / cultural dinosaur in 2022! In my team, people that WFH more often have measurably lower rates of collaboration versus those who work-from-office (WFO). To be clear, the most advanced sales teams literally measure everything regarding collaberation or client contact. (I have seen custom built software at multiple companies that try to exactly measure this!) It does not mean that WFH is less productive or less collaborative. Instead, it means that each team is different. A "WFH zealot" on my team was adamant that their previous boss who commuted by high speed rail twice per week more than 500km away was a "good situation". There is no limit for the zealots (on both sides: office vs home). It could be working from the moon (WFH -- new SpaceX colony!) or everyone sleeps in the office 7 days a week (ramen profitable / office uber-zealot). Both sides are simultaneously correct (with perfect fit team) or wrong (with terrible fit team). This whole silly "argument" feels like the anti-vaxxer equivalent of WFH vs WFO. I am tired of it. What is a good reply to this post? Talk about when/where you were wrong / learned something new (!). "Oh, I was WFH zealot, but then I was forced to WFO and was suddenly much higher collab and connected with my teammates." (Or the exact opposite -- "I am tired of annoying sales people asking me to fix their broken mouse!".) Please don't reply to this post if you are the anti-vaxxer equiv of WFH/WFO. You add nothing new to the debate. Last: This whole debate feels eerily simliar to the mid-2000s argument about (only) "hire old/experienced" vs "hire young/inexperienced". Both sides were correct and wrong at the same time. The same old anti-vaxxer crowd argument again! The ultimate team had energetic people of all ages / genders / experience / ethnicity / religion. Hey... Looks the same in 2022! The best team I ever worked on had wild variety in experience. All the way from "I-Am-Old-Get-Off-My-Lawn" to "17-year-old-summer-intern". Amazingly, people were open-minded and tolerant. As a result, we worked at a furious pace and team meetings were amazing.