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Ask HN: What still sucks about remote work?

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Re: Ask HN: What still sucks about remote work?

#11

Post by Buttons840 »

mattcdrake wrote: post #10

I've noticed that it's hard to build rapport with coworkers when working remotely (especially if they are in an office and you're remote). In my experience, remote communication is mostly transactional and doesn't facilitate building relationships with people. I'm not saying I need my coworkers to be my best friends or anything, but I think that you are more likely to have a well functioning work relationship with pe…

Wonder if having some games in Slack would help, like one round of Mafia per day or other team building games?

Re: Ask HN: What still sucks about remote work?

#12

Post by anonymouswacker »

leetbulb wrote: post #5

I've been working from home for about 10 years. The only thing that's ever been a problem is maintaining a healthy work-life balance. It took years to realize and resolve all of the various underlying issues before I started feeling comfortable without being complacent with things. My advice for people new to remote work: reserve an hour each morning for exercise, start reading fiction, try out the keto diet, avoid a…

Great tips. I am not sure why you'd limit caffeine intake? Is this to prevent circadian rhythm disturbances?

Re: Ask HN: What still sucks about remote work?

#13

Post by postcynical »

Video Conferencing (we're using zoom). The "time to conversation" routinely take minutes of idle time or raging about the miserable state of technology.

Simple annoyances such as opening the laptop when using with an external monitor (1 out of 10 times making macos unresponsive for half a minute), to changing your bluetooth noise cancelling headphones for music to airpods, reconfiguring airpods tethered to your iPhone to macos. Making sure the wrong input/output audio is selected in macos...

People working from coworking space or a regular office, usually want to switch to a phone booth/meeting room, that takes them 2-3 minutes to walk to the next phone booth and get set-up.

Once you're up&running too often audio/video is unreliable, or simply airpods running out of battery.

I'm experimenting now with a tablet (with its own headset) dedicated to voice&video calls. While the audio/video setup now works seamlessly, there's still some usability issues that need workarounds.

Re: Ask HN: What still sucks about remote work?

#14

Post by anonymouswacker »

Working at home, the existential dread and feeling of meaninglessness in my tasks increased with remote work for a time, given my separation from the distractions of workplace politics, drama, etc. that pervaded office life.

It is hard to make connections with coworkers, and it is so important to build a social life outside of work if you do not have one.

I find I work less hours in front of the computer, accomplish more, and have to spend more time "screwing off" to fill in that void of losing office banter, work lunches with coworkers, etc.

Re: Ask HN: What still sucks about remote work?

#15

Post by masukomi »

mattcdrake wrote: post #10

I've noticed that it's hard to build rapport with coworkers when working remotely (especially if they are in an office and you're remote). In my experience, remote communication is mostly transactional and doesn't facilitate building relationships with people. I'm not saying I need my coworkers to be my best friends or anything, but I think that you are more likely to have a well functioning work relationship with pe…

> If any of you have this figured out, I'd love to hear tips. Most of the other aspects of remote work are fantastic.

overcommunicate. Share like you do IRL. Kvetch. Cheer. Share interesting finds. Say good morning. Ask team-mates how they're doing.

I find I build pretty good rapport with my team mates because I _don't_ limit communications to required transactions.

You build relationships by communicating about life and sharing feelings. So, communicate about life and share feelings.

Re: Ask HN: What still sucks about remote work?

#16

Post by marpstar »

Buttons840 wrote: post #11
mattcdrake wrote: post #10

I've noticed that it's hard to build rapport with coworkers when working remotely (especially if they are in an office and you're remote). In my experience, remote communication is mostly transactional and doesn't facilitate building relationships with people. I'm not saying I need my coworkers to be my best friends or anything, but I think that you are more likely to have a well functioning work relationship with pe…

Wonder if having some games in Slack would help, like one round of Mafia per day or other team building games?

When most of us worked in the office, we did the cliché foosball table. Since our team has become more and more distributed, we've been playing TagPro (https://tagpro.koalabeast.com) a time or two per day.

We typically hop into a video conference while we play to make it more personal. It's better than foosball in that more than 4 people can play (we generally play with 8-12) and it's got a much shorter path to proficiency.

Rookies always suck at foosball for their first few months, so getting them involved with something less intimidating has been helpful.

Re: Ask HN: What still sucks about remote work?

#17

Post by croh »

1. Technology is still not good enough for conferencing.

2. Some family members/friend thinks your work is easy and not that important. So you should run their errands or take extra responsibilities.

3. As someone already mentioned, it is difficult to build team rapport. This affects badly in situations like sudden change in deadlines.

4. If you don't have active social life outside job, it becomes very difficult to build new one.

Re: Ask HN: What still sucks about remote work?

#19

Post by kochikame »

croh wrote: post #17

1. Technology is still not good enough for conferencing. 2. Some family members/friend thinks your work is easy and not that important. So you should run their errands or take extra responsibilities. 3. As someone already mentioned, it is difficult to build team rapport. This affects badly in situations like sudden change in deadlines. 4. If you don't have active social life outside job, it becomes very difficult to…

Re number 2, my wife just doesn't get that when I'm working from home, I actually need to work
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