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I was hired into a senior role (architect level) by a company that was compelled to go remote because of the pandemic. Remotely building working relationships a

by Sai_ 3y ago

I was hired into a senior role (architect level) by a company that was compelled to go remote because of the pandemic. Remotely building working relationships at that level was hard AF since most people I had to work with already knew each other from the pre-pandemic days and were happy to have sidebar conversations to keep moving. We parted ways about 9 months into the job when we both realised this wasn’t working. My impression is that remote work for new employees needs a lot of explicit relationship and trust building that we get for free when we interact with people in an office.

rwmj 3y ago
This is about being "remote first". All discussions should happen in the shared chat or at the weekly group video call except if there's some specific reason not to (eg. disclosure of non-public corporate financials, personal 1-1s, or similar). It sounds like that company transferred some bad office habits to online.
- raverbashing 3y ago
  This is the thing right here Remote requires personal responsibility as well. From everybody
- Sai_ 3y ago
  This sounds suspiciously like a “no true Scotsman” argument to me. Remote first is a spectrum and dismissing lived experiences as “oh, you just haven’t experienced the right kind of remote first” helps no one. What makes you think documenting everything exhaustively is a panacea? What if the quality of documentation sucks? Will your argument change to “you have to document everything to a certain level of quality otherwise you aren’t remote first enough”? Please don’t feel I’m attacking you. I was a big remote first proponent before experiencing the difficulties of integrating with teams who didn’t know me except as a voice on a call. After this, I’m more sympathetic to execs demanding RTO for culture reasons.
vidarh 3y ago
I joined a remote only company 5 months ago and saw people face to face for the first time earlier this week. It takes more conscious effort, sure. But that's also all. It will be a hard adjustment for companies whose staff is not used to remote work, but it's just a skill people will acquire.
DrBazza 3y ago
I'm in a similar situation now, but the new company has been more than happy to have company days where we fly in from around the world and get to know each other and it works pretty well. Also, having zoom/teams/slack video channels permanently open works surprisingly well too (you don't have to have your camera on). Companies that have gone fully remote, also quickly discover how much of their company knowledge is in one person's head, or whether it's well documented, which helps with the onboarding too. Some companies have definitely moved to remote working better than others.

by Sai_ 3y ago

rwmj 3y ago

This is about being "remote first". All discussions should happen in the shared chat or at the weekly group video call except if there's some specific reason not to (eg. disclosure of non-public corporate financials, personal 1-1s, or similar). It sounds like that company transferred some bad office habits to online.

raverbashing 3y ago
This is the thing right here Remote requires personal responsibility as well. From everybody
Sai_ 3y ago
This sounds suspiciously like a “no true Scotsman” argument to me. Remote first is a spectrum and dismissing lived experiences as “oh, you just haven’t experienced the right kind of remote first” helps no one. What makes you think documenting everything exhaustively is a panacea? What if the quality of documentation sucks? Will your argument change to “you have to document everything to a certain level of quality otherwise you aren’t remote first enough”? Please don’t feel I’m attacking you. I was a big remote first proponent before experiencing the difficulties of integrating with teams who didn’t know me except as a voice on a call. After this, I’m more sympathetic to execs demanding RTO for culture reasons.

vidarh 3y ago

I joined a remote only company 5 months ago and saw people face to face for the first time earlier this week. It takes more conscious effort, sure. But that's also all. It will be a hard adjustment for companies whose staff is not used to remote work, but it's just a skill people will acquire.

DrBazza 3y ago

I'm in a similar situation now, but the new company has been more than happy to have company days where we fly in from around the world and get to know each other and it works pretty well. Also, having zoom/teams/slack video channels permanently open works surprisingly well too (you don't have to have your camera on). Companies that have gone fully remote, also quickly discover how much of their company knowledge is in one person's head, or whether it's well documented, which helps with the onboarding too. Some companies have definitely moved to remote working better than others.