In my experience both same time zone, and meeting up regularly (eg once a month) are important for making remote working as effective as possible. This can lead

In my experience both same time zone, and meeting up regularly (eg once a month) are important for making remote working as effective as possible. This can lead to a same country policy. If I was starting a new remote organisation now I’d allow a number of weeks a year to work more remotely in other countries. It would be disruptive and impact meeting scheduling, so I think is most effective when planned like a holiday. Another odd factor is envy which oddly gets blended mentally with audio quality. If the boundaries of remote get stretched, you end up with staff with tropical islands in the background and often worse or unreliable internet, and often a poor semi-temporary audio setup. I rationally like the idea of everyone working in amazing locations. But in reality, while people joke about it, emotionally they get envious. Not a fair reason, but I can imagine some business owners blocking it just for that.