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Because our jobs are collaborative by nature, and zoom can't replace in person interactions. It's also not only meetings. Social interactions are important too.

Because our jobs are collaborative by nature, and zoom can't replace in person interactions. It's also not only meetings. Social interactions are important too. Some of my colleagues became friends, or at least people I feel I can trust in the workplace. This would be hard to achieve purely remote. Now I'm not saying everybody should return to office, and I've been full remote for several years now, and I'm a bit worried that it's not going to last. But objectively, there's value to work in the office. It's not all black or white.

pclmulqdq 3y ago
I have found that what can replace in-person interactions for discussion of thought processes and ideas is medium- to long-form writing. A lot of people either don't know how to do it or hate doing it (so they don't do it), but I believe that it is necessary to have a culture of document writing if you want to be successfully remote. That is a big part of the cultural divide I have seen on remote work. A lot of people who are used to doing long-form writing are very comfortable working remote and building a remote culture (see Hey and Oxide for two big examples). People who do not like long-form writing and want to have meetings instead (eg bank executives and the current YC partners) are pushing for the office. The social stuff is true - a lot of people used to use the office to find friends and romantic partners, and that is not going to happen over zoom calls or essays.
- The_Colonel 3y ago
  Long form writing, while very useful, is no silver bullet. Sometimes the most effective way to make a decision (or just clarify misconceptions) is to get people into the same room and talk things through.
  - pclmulqdq 3y ago
    That's why you write some position papers and then get people on a zoom call with that specific topic when you need to talk it out. No ambling daily standups or weekly standing "progress update" meetings - use focused meetings with a specific topic. This is how many successful engineering and knowledge organizations through the years have functioned (s/zoom call/meeting/).
    - The_Colonel 3y ago
      > That's why you write some position papers and then get people on a zoom call with that specific topic when you need to talk it out. That sounds like a good option in cases when you're already aligned on what problem you're trying to solve. If not, you might spend days researching a problem and writing a paper on something you don't need to solve.
- convolvatron 3y ago
  the engineering culture of the last century has largely been lost in software. design documents, well-scoped technical meetings, plans of record, schedules. what you lose in remote is its replacement, a kind of freewheeling, ad hoc, piecewise discussion where everything just evolves organically. while I enjoy the latter, the constraints of remote force the former in order to function at all. and it really does have its benefits.
pelasaco 3y ago
well put. I work from home since 2011. My team was 90% of people working from office. 10% from Home. Now we have 10% working from office and 90% from home. The team cannot perform, there is people that simply cannot perform from home but dont want to go back to office. Team spirit from home is almost inexistent. We killed our team spirit and the quarterly meetings that we had in the office (which means people working from home, would go to the office and spend a week there), because it became to expensive. Managers dont know what to do, but its clear that something has to be done.
- dd82 3y ago
  Why can't your team perform? Collaboration can exist and grow if its fostered. The same things that foster collaboration in office can be done remotely, but you do need to be explicit about it. One thing remote does select for is those people who are independently productive.
  - pelasaco 3y ago
    Is that your experience? I see people loosing the empathy with colleagues, colleagues are just a handle on slack, not committing in the level they should, not attending meetings. Meetings where people are just looking their mobiles, don't turn it on their cameras and don't participate at all at meetings.. It happens a lot and with some people the whole social aspect deteriorates pretty fast. In the office there is a dynamic that for some people is vital, the social aspect... i.e people tend to be much less rude and open to compromise face to face than just online..
    - dd82 3y ago
      I guess at base, what is keeping these people in jobs where collaboration is required, along with a standard of base professionalism and courtesy? In other words, why haven't these people been counseled to change their act? And if no progress has been made, have them seek employment elsewhere? Just because you're in a remote environment doesn't give you free reign to be an asshole.
ryandrake 3y ago
I would push back on the "collaboration" thing a bit because it's an often-used reason for forcing everyone into one place. Yes, tech jobs (we're mostly talking about Software Engineering, so let's just stick with that) are not 100% lone-wolf coding projects where each engineer goes into their vacuum and pumps out software. On the other hand, it doesn't require constant human interaction like a Wall Street trading floor. It's somewhere in the middle, and that's where company culture and deliberate choices come into play. We don't collaborate constantly like on the trading floor, nor do we have to be available at all times to collaborate. Nothing worse than being in the zone and then having Lumburgh walk up and say, "Heeyyyy, mind if we chat about something right this minute??" I could see a workable scenario where you set aside 1 hour per day as "human interaction time" when you do face-to-face collaboration. And, if that's feasible, then maybe instead you could do 1 day every two weeks or even 1 week every quarter. I also like full remote, but when I took the job, I made sure that I was within striking distance of the office in case there was something I absolutely couldn't do without this in-person collaboration.

pclmulqdq 3y ago

I have found that what can replace in-person interactions for discussion of thought processes and ideas is medium- to long-form writing. A lot of people either don't know how to do it or hate doing it (so they don't do it), but I believe that it is necessary to have a culture of document writing if you want to be successfully remote. That is a big part of the cultural divide I have seen on remote work. A lot of people who are used to doing long-form writing are very comfortable working remote and building a remote culture (see Hey and Oxide for two big examples). People who do not like long-form writing and want to have meetings instead (eg bank executives and the current YC partners) are pushing for the office. The social stuff is true - a lot of people used to use the office to find friends and romantic partners, and that is not going to happen over zoom calls or essays.

The_Colonel 3y ago
Long form writing, while very useful, is no silver bullet. Sometimes the most effective way to make a decision (or just clarify misconceptions) is to get people into the same room and talk things through.
- pclmulqdq 3y ago
  That's why you write some position papers and then get people on a zoom call with that specific topic when you need to talk it out. No ambling daily standups or weekly standing "progress update" meetings - use focused meetings with a specific topic. This is how many successful engineering and knowledge organizations through the years have functioned (s/zoom call/meeting/).
  - The_Colonel 3y ago
    > That's why you write some position papers and then get people on a zoom call with that specific topic when you need to talk it out. That sounds like a good option in cases when you're already aligned on what problem you're trying to solve. If not, you might spend days researching a problem and writing a paper on something you don't need to solve.
convolvatron 3y ago
the engineering culture of the last century has largely been lost in software. design documents, well-scoped technical meetings, plans of record, schedules. what you lose in remote is its replacement, a kind of freewheeling, ad hoc, piecewise discussion where everything just evolves organically. while I enjoy the latter, the constraints of remote force the former in order to function at all. and it really does have its benefits.

pelasaco 3y ago

well put. I work from home since 2011. My team was 90% of people working from office. 10% from Home. Now we have 10% working from office and 90% from home. The team cannot perform, there is people that simply cannot perform from home but dont want to go back to office. Team spirit from home is almost inexistent. We killed our team spirit and the quarterly meetings that we had in the office (which means people working from home, would go to the office and spend a week there), because it became to expensive. Managers dont know what to do, but its clear that something has to be done.

dd82 3y ago
Why can't your team perform? Collaboration can exist and grow if its fostered. The same things that foster collaboration in office can be done remotely, but you do need to be explicit about it. One thing remote does select for is those people who are independently productive.
- pelasaco 3y ago
  Is that your experience? I see people loosing the empathy with colleagues, colleagues are just a handle on slack, not committing in the level they should, not attending meetings. Meetings where people are just looking their mobiles, don't turn it on their cameras and don't participate at all at meetings.. It happens a lot and with some people the whole social aspect deteriorates pretty fast. In the office there is a dynamic that for some people is vital, the social aspect... i.e people tend to be much less rude and open to compromise face to face than just online..
  - dd82 3y ago
    I guess at base, what is keeping these people in jobs where collaboration is required, along with a standard of base professionalism and courtesy? In other words, why haven't these people been counseled to change their act? And if no progress has been made, have them seek employment elsewhere? Just because you're in a remote environment doesn't give you free reign to be an asshole.

ryandrake 3y ago

I would push back on the "collaboration" thing a bit because it's an often-used reason for forcing everyone into one place. Yes, tech jobs (we're mostly talking about Software Engineering, so let's just stick with that) are not 100% lone-wolf coding projects where each engineer goes into their vacuum and pumps out software. On the other hand, it doesn't require constant human interaction like a Wall Street trading floor. It's somewhere in the middle, and that's where company culture and deliberate choices come into play. We don't collaborate constantly like on the trading floor, nor do we have to be available at all times to collaborate. Nothing worse than being in the zone and then having Lumburgh walk up and say, "Heeyyyy, mind if we chat about something right this minute??" I could see a workable scenario where you set aside 1 hour per day as "human interaction time" when you do face-to-face collaboration. And, if that's feasible, then maybe instead you could do 1 day every two weeks or even 1 week every quarter. I also like full remote, but when I took the job, I made sure that I was within striking distance of the office in case there was something I absolutely couldn't do without this in-person collaboration.