5 ms·

I think you would have a hard time getting a valid candidate from Louisville, MO, to take a ~5 hours flight to LA, for a job that was supposed to be remote. May

I think you would have a hard time getting a valid candidate from Louisville, MO, to take a ~5 hours flight to LA, for a job that was supposed to be remote. Maybe the reason the candidate is looking for a remote job, is they don't have to travel? But I get what you say, maybe this approach is better when hiring in the same city/area.

n8cpdx 4y ago
Put it on a Friday, let them stay the weekend, and pay all the expenses. My company does that for a less glamorous location than LA and I loved it. It is essentially a vacation, and if you are deciding to relocate, a good opportunity to explore potential homes/neighborhoods. But I like exploring new places. I’m not sure how popular all expenses paid weekend vacations are.
- SketchySeaBeast 4y ago
  The very reason I want remote is to stay around my family, this seems to be made to appeal to the young and/or unattached.
  - fknorangesite 4y ago
    I love my family, but that doesn't mean I would object to a weekend away.
- drc500free 4y ago
  Having worked in business travel tech, and run a LOT of customer interviews, travelers have very different views on it. Some love it, some hate it, some are in it for the points or for the tourism. The only thing business travelers have in common is that they all think everyone views business travel just like they do.
s1artibartfast 4y ago
really? At my company, full time WFH still expects a couple trips a year to meet up with the team.
- ghaff 4y ago
  Barring unusual circumstances, e.g. disabilities, I will never travel at all is probably disqualifying for a lot of roles.
  - s1artibartfast 4y ago
    Yeah, refusing to fly even for a final interview/on boarding is a very hard line. Even with disabilities, inability to meet the job description is a legally valid reason to discriminate.
    - ghaff 4y ago
      If the job itself doesn’t require travel such as to meet with customers I’m at least sympathetic to hopping on a plane being a higher bar for some than for others.
  - ipaddr 4y ago
    Many people are afraid to fly and/or have motion sickness on long road trips. If remote roles require travel and crossing borders working locally becomes more appealing.
    - ghaff 4y ago
      I would think if someone doesn’t want to travel they could find some low to mid level coding position where no one travels outside a local office. That would make the most sense to me.
  - dalyons 4y ago
    Absolutely, we would not hire someone with such a hard line, and we hire a lot of remote. There’s a good reason… a tiny tiny amount of in person time every year or so pays outsized dividends in team productivity
ghaff 4y ago
If most of the team is in LA, yes, I'd expect the candidate to travel for an interview. Of course, if everyone is distributed anyway, then it doesn't really make sense to fly them to a specific location.
codegeek 4y ago
I donno. There is a difference between "I want to work fully remote but don't mind coming in for a day or so every once in a while if its fully paid for" vs "I never want to meet you in person". I personally would never hire the 2nd type of candidate.
- notsapiensatall 4y ago
  Some of the best engineers that I've ever worked with have been quiet types who don't particularly want "work mates". They work fine with people, can parse small talk and bring a positive attitude, etc. But they were out like a shot when the workday was over, and they would never dream of attending a company-sponsored teambuilding event. If they were hired for a 100% remote job, they would expect to never see a coworker in person, and consider it a perk. Some people just don't want to mix their personal and professional lives. What's wrong with that?
  - ghaff 4y ago
    Nothing wrong with it but it probably excludes them from a lot of roles. I’ve been essentially fully remote for years but I still traveled a quarter to a third of the time pre-Covid. I wouldn’t assume remote meant absolutely zero travel unless that was spelled out.
    - dml2135 4y ago
      I would absolutely assume that "remote" means "absolutely zero travel" unless that was spelled out. Remote means you don't need me physically present at a particular place (outside of knowing my location for tax purposes). It's pretty clear in the word "remote". If that's not always 100% the case, I would expect those expectations to me made clear during the hiring process, not after I've already come aboard. Do you really think it would be unreasonable for someone to balk if you hired them for a remote role but then asked them to fly somewhere quarterly after they were onboarded?
      - ghaff 4y ago
idiotsecant 4y ago
I don't think it's that unreasonable if the employer is covering the cost of the flight and paying for the person's time.
- ipaddr 4y ago
  What if the employer came to meet you instead?
bluetraveler 4y ago
For most remote jobs I've had there was still an expectation of some travel, usually 1-2 on or off-site visits per year. Further, many Big Name companies will ask that you travel out as a part of the interview process in the first place, remote or not. So long as there is no undue burden out-of-the-gate, i.e. you pay and or we reimburse, it's not particularly untoward. Still, that wouldn't solve for the "My laptop doesn't have a camera" problem for the early phases of the interview. You would need to save face / voice samples to cross-reference at various stages of the pipeline to watch for the changeling.
dehrmann 4y ago
I've flown out-of-state twice for interviews for jobs that were local to me. It was just where they were better set up to interview.
Ancapistani 4y ago
> I think you would have a hard time getting a valid candidate from Louisville, MO, to take a ~5 hours flight to LA, for a job that was supposed to be remote. I've done it many times, pre-COVID. I live in a small town (<25k) in the South and have been working remotely for ~10 years. In that time I've gone through four rounds of interviews. The first three were pre-COVID, and they all included at least a "half day" of on-site interviews, most of which were in LA or SF. The most recent round was about eighteen months ago and didn't include any travel. > Maybe the reason the candidate is looking for a remote job, is they don't have to travel? This is not my experience. In my personal network of remote workers we're pretty uniformly working remotely because we don't want to move to where the companies are, not because we are entirely opposed to traveling. Each person has their own expectations of course, but I see traveling for less than a week per quarter as entirely acceptable.
- rebeccaskinner 4y ago
  > I've done it many times, pre-COVID. But we're not pre-covid. Before covid I worked remote because it allowed me access to a larger job market without having to relocate, but I didn't mind occasional travel. Now that we're dealing with covid, there's no way you'd get me on a plane or in an office for a job interview. My health is worth far more than any particular job.
  - Ancapistani 4y ago
    That’s fair, but I’d argue those concerns are separate from the expectation of whether or not it’s reasonable to conduct an interview for a remote position on-site.
Philip-J-Fry 4y ago
Why? They'd travel on company dime in company time. A cheap holiday if you ask me!

n8cpdx 4y ago

Put it on a Friday, let them stay the weekend, and pay all the expenses. My company does that for a less glamorous location than LA and I loved it. It is essentially a vacation, and if you are deciding to relocate, a good opportunity to explore potential homes/neighborhoods. But I like exploring new places. I’m not sure how popular all expenses paid weekend vacations are.

SketchySeaBeast 4y ago
The very reason I want remote is to stay around my family, this seems to be made to appeal to the young and/or unattached.
- fknorangesite 4y ago
  I love my family, but that doesn't mean I would object to a weekend away.
drc500free 4y ago
Having worked in business travel tech, and run a LOT of customer interviews, travelers have very different views on it. Some love it, some hate it, some are in it for the points or for the tourism. The only thing business travelers have in common is that they all think everyone views business travel just like they do.

s1artibartfast 4y ago

really? At my company, full time WFH still expects a couple trips a year to meet up with the team.

ghaff 4y ago
Barring unusual circumstances, e.g. disabilities, I will never travel at all is probably disqualifying for a lot of roles.
- s1artibartfast 4y ago
  Yeah, refusing to fly even for a final interview/on boarding is a very hard line. Even with disabilities, inability to meet the job description is a legally valid reason to discriminate.
  - ghaff 4y ago
    If the job itself doesn’t require travel such as to meet with customers I’m at least sympathetic to hopping on a plane being a higher bar for some than for others.
- ipaddr 4y ago
  Many people are afraid to fly and/or have motion sickness on long road trips. If remote roles require travel and crossing borders working locally becomes more appealing.
  - ghaff 4y ago
    I would think if someone doesn’t want to travel they could find some low to mid level coding position where no one travels outside a local office. That would make the most sense to me.
- dalyons 4y ago
  Absolutely, we would not hire someone with such a hard line, and we hire a lot of remote. There’s a good reason… a tiny tiny amount of in person time every year or so pays outsized dividends in team productivity

ghaff 4y ago

If most of the team is in LA, yes, I'd expect the candidate to travel for an interview. Of course, if everyone is distributed anyway, then it doesn't really make sense to fly them to a specific location.

codegeek 4y ago

I donno. There is a difference between "I want to work fully remote but don't mind coming in for a day or so every once in a while if its fully paid for" vs "I never want to meet you in person". I personally would never hire the 2nd type of candidate.

notsapiensatall 4y ago
Some of the best engineers that I've ever worked with have been quiet types who don't particularly want "work mates". They work fine with people, can parse small talk and bring a positive attitude, etc. But they were out like a shot when the workday was over, and they would never dream of attending a company-sponsored teambuilding event. If they were hired for a 100% remote job, they would expect to never see a coworker in person, and consider it a perk. Some people just don't want to mix their personal and professional lives. What's wrong with that?
- ghaff 4y ago
  Nothing wrong with it but it probably excludes them from a lot of roles. I’ve been essentially fully remote for years but I still traveled a quarter to a third of the time pre-Covid. I wouldn’t assume remote meant absolutely zero travel unless that was spelled out.
  - dml2135 4y ago
    I would absolutely assume that "remote" means "absolutely zero travel" unless that was spelled out. Remote means you don't need me physically present at a particular place (outside of knowing my location for tax purposes). It's pretty clear in the word "remote". If that's not always 100% the case, I would expect those expectations to me made clear during the hiring process, not after I've already come aboard. Do you really think it would be unreasonable for someone to balk if you hired them for a remote role but then asked them to fly somewhere quarterly after they were onboarded?
    - ghaff 4y ago

idiotsecant 4y ago

I don't think it's that unreasonable if the employer is covering the cost of the flight and paying for the person's time.

ipaddr 4y ago
What if the employer came to meet you instead?

bluetraveler 4y ago

For most remote jobs I've had there was still an expectation of some travel, usually 1-2 on or off-site visits per year. Further, many Big Name companies will ask that you travel out as a part of the interview process in the first place, remote or not. So long as there is no undue burden out-of-the-gate, i.e. you pay and or we reimburse, it's not particularly untoward. Still, that wouldn't solve for the "My laptop doesn't have a camera" problem for the early phases of the interview. You would need to save face / voice samples to cross-reference at various stages of the pipeline to watch for the changeling.

dehrmann 4y ago

I've flown out-of-state twice for interviews for jobs that were local to me. It was just where they were better set up to interview.

Ancapistani 4y ago

> I think you would have a hard time getting a valid candidate from Louisville, MO, to take a ~5 hours flight to LA, for a job that was supposed to be remote. I've done it many times, pre-COVID. I live in a small town (<25k) in the South and have been working remotely for ~10 years. In that time I've gone through four rounds of interviews. The first three were pre-COVID, and they all included at least a "half day" of on-site interviews, most of which were in LA or SF. The most recent round was about eighteen months ago and didn't include any travel. > Maybe the reason the candidate is looking for a remote job, is they don't have to travel? This is not my experience. In my personal network of remote workers we're pretty uniformly working remotely because we don't want to move to where the companies are, not because we are entirely opposed to traveling. Each person has their own expectations of course, but I see traveling for less than a week per quarter as entirely acceptable.

rebeccaskinner 4y ago
> I've done it many times, pre-COVID. But we're not pre-covid. Before covid I worked remote because it allowed me access to a larger job market without having to relocate, but I didn't mind occasional travel. Now that we're dealing with covid, there's no way you'd get me on a plane or in an office for a job interview. My health is worth far more than any particular job.
- Ancapistani 4y ago
  That’s fair, but I’d argue those concerns are separate from the expectation of whether or not it’s reasonable to conduct an interview for a remote position on-site.

Philip-J-Fry 4y ago

Why? They'd travel on company dime in company time. A cheap holiday if you ask me!