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Yup, being in-person lowers the friction to asking questions and exchanging ideas. It's way easier to gauge people's understanding of things when working with t

Yup, being in-person lowers the friction to asking questions and exchanging ideas. It's way easier to gauge people's understanding of things when working with them in the same space than having to explicitly coax it out of them over chat or video.

iLoveOncall 4y ago
> being in-person lowers the friction to asking questions and exchanging ideas This is a downside, not a benefit. I don't want to hear about your compilation error when I'm heads down on my own work.
- the_snooze 4y ago
  We're very explicit about it in our hiring process. Our culture is that team leads serve to mentor junior people. If we introduce barriers to question-asking, then we're shooting ourselves in the foot. "Shut up and code" isn't our culture, by choice, and we let candidates sort themselves out accordingly.
  - SketchySeaBeast 4y ago
    What stopped your team lead from regularly reaching out via teams/slack/zoom and from letting the juniors know they were available and open to communicate?
    - the_snooze 4y ago
      Absolutely nothing. I'm the team lead and I bug people all the time for their questions and ideas. Quite explicitly so, like "why aren't you reaching out to me with questions?" But it's like trying to squeeze water out of a rock when they're online. But when I call them into the office to chat in person, then they have tons to talk about. With few exceptions, juniors are in the default mindset that they're bothering people when they have problems. My job is to socialize them out of that. I accomplish that by bringing them into the office, because the alternatives very rarely work.
    - rhaway84773 4y ago
      How is that any less disruptive? When I was a junior, as someone who was very hesitant to disturb a senior, it helped that I could actually just walk past their desks while getting water or a coffee, and could tell whether they were deeply engrossed or more relaxed just by looking at them at their desks. Sometimes I could even time my coffee break based on when I saw them getting theirs so I could ask them a question without disturbing them. Now, I’ll submit there are people who are not considerate at all. And to be honest, a lot of people have become way worse since the pandemic. It’s almost like they’ve forgotten basic human decency. And those people can be far more disruptive in person than they can be remote. But there are ways to resolve those issues (basically by telling them that you’re busy and not indulging them when they’re disturbing you, and very quickly they’ll get the hint).
- rhaway84773 4y ago
  Your comment perfectly describes why some folks may feel they’re much more productive at home, and wonder why leadership might still want them to come to the office. Personal productivity does not necessarily map organizational productivity. You might be insanely productive by focusing heads down on your work all the time, but the organization as a whole may not grow as much. Now, this may not apply to you and your organization at all, or may not even be generally true, but I did want to point it out because a lot of people here wonder why managers would ask them to come to office even though they believe they’re clearly more productive at home. There are non nefarious reasons leadership may be asking for this.
  - iLoveOncall 4y ago
    Your comment perfectly describes how managers live in their own bubble, make up narratives from excerpts, and don't understand anything about what their reportees do. I never said I don't answer people asking for help. I said working remotely allows me to decide WHEN I answer people asking for help. If someone cannot wait 30 minutes for me to finish whatever the hell I'm doing, and try to solve or at least understand their problem on their own in the meantime, they should be fired.

iLoveOncall 4y ago

> being in-person lowers the friction to asking questions and exchanging ideas This is a downside, not a benefit. I don't want to hear about your compilation error when I'm heads down on my own work.

the_snooze 4y ago
We're very explicit about it in our hiring process. Our culture is that team leads serve to mentor junior people. If we introduce barriers to question-asking, then we're shooting ourselves in the foot. "Shut up and code" isn't our culture, by choice, and we let candidates sort themselves out accordingly.
- SketchySeaBeast 4y ago
  What stopped your team lead from regularly reaching out via teams/slack/zoom and from letting the juniors know they were available and open to communicate?
  - the_snooze 4y ago
    Absolutely nothing. I'm the team lead and I bug people all the time for their questions and ideas. Quite explicitly so, like "why aren't you reaching out to me with questions?" But it's like trying to squeeze water out of a rock when they're online. But when I call them into the office to chat in person, then they have tons to talk about. With few exceptions, juniors are in the default mindset that they're bothering people when they have problems. My job is to socialize them out of that. I accomplish that by bringing them into the office, because the alternatives very rarely work.
  - rhaway84773 4y ago
    How is that any less disruptive? When I was a junior, as someone who was very hesitant to disturb a senior, it helped that I could actually just walk past their desks while getting water or a coffee, and could tell whether they were deeply engrossed or more relaxed just by looking at them at their desks. Sometimes I could even time my coffee break based on when I saw them getting theirs so I could ask them a question without disturbing them. Now, I’ll submit there are people who are not considerate at all. And to be honest, a lot of people have become way worse since the pandemic. It’s almost like they’ve forgotten basic human decency. And those people can be far more disruptive in person than they can be remote. But there are ways to resolve those issues (basically by telling them that you’re busy and not indulging them when they’re disturbing you, and very quickly they’ll get the hint).
rhaway84773 4y ago
Your comment perfectly describes why some folks may feel they’re much more productive at home, and wonder why leadership might still want them to come to the office. Personal productivity does not necessarily map organizational productivity. You might be insanely productive by focusing heads down on your work all the time, but the organization as a whole may not grow as much. Now, this may not apply to you and your organization at all, or may not even be generally true, but I did want to point it out because a lot of people here wonder why managers would ask them to come to office even though they believe they’re clearly more productive at home. There are non nefarious reasons leadership may be asking for this.
- iLoveOncall 4y ago
  Your comment perfectly describes how managers live in their own bubble, make up narratives from excerpts, and don't understand anything about what their reportees do. I never said I don't answer people asking for help. I said working remotely allows me to decide WHEN I answer people asking for help. If someone cannot wait 30 minutes for me to finish whatever the hell I'm doing, and try to solve or at least understand their problem on their own in the meantime, they should be fired.