Working remotely, coworking spaces, and mental health

Seems you are doing the right thing. I used to work remotely for a long time. During that I did a ton of non-work stuff. Now I work in a cube farm and I am way too tired in the evening to do anything. In addition, most of social interactions at the company are bullshit like meetings and politics.

One thing I did for a while was to rent a little office with two other freelancers a few bicycle minutes away from home. That was the best setup for me. You go out in the morning but still control your work environment.

I am in the same situation. People tell me all the time how lucky I am to work remotely, and I was excited when it started. But it definitely has some drawbacks that I didn't expect, especially in the mental health department.

Webex/Hangouts/GTM is fine for 90% of the banal, communication meetings. But it really fails for any design meetings that need a whiteboard. I have tried getting my team to use some alternatives, but there is always some eye rolling, and it never sticks around. It doesn't help that the majority of our team is onsite, so any alternative is 100% for my benefit. Also I haven't found an app that can compete with the tactile feeling of a physical board.

Also I feel like I miss out on the "water cooler" talk. Any sort of communication I have is very formal. My team doesn't like using chat casually, so it really hampers my ability to form relationships with them.

Finally, time management is an issue. When you have an office, its much easier to turn on and off. When I am at home too many mornings start late, and too many evenings run long.

Are you in the VOIP chat all day, or only when you want to talk? And if all day, is your mic open all the time, transmitting whatever sounds you make as you're working?

The funny part is, I have this, and it's fun to joke about, but we never actually do anything. I'm too busy in my world of meetings/development etc to even desire sexy times. I just want to get the next bug fixed.

Overall a well written article with some valid criticisms. After 2 years working remotely I observed roughly the same facts, but have a slightly different spin on the whole thing.

Like everything in life, working remotely has tradeoffs. One person's pro is someone else's con.

Pro: I potentially gained hours of my life back every day. I know many people who work for similar companies who spend more than an hour commuting every day. They take less-desirable jobs and leave behind their coworkers just so they can get an hour of their life back and reduce their commute from 2+ hrs to 30 minutes.

Pro: I can disassociate my COL from the company's choice of office location.

Pro: I can cook food in the crock pot on a regular basis without worrying about my house burning down.

Pro: I can walk my dogs during my lunch break (or pick up food from the grocery store or run some other errand).

Pro: (subjective) My coworkers competence is higher than what I typically observe from companies that limit their hiring pool to people who live within a few minutes (or hours) of one office building.

Pro: I can and have worked from a hammock, a camper van in a state park, a car on a road trip, and a cafe in Paris.

Pro: No requirement to waste literally hours of my day in bullshit pre-lunch planning, post-lunch coffee, etc. When I'm onsite I'm happy to spend lots of time on watercooler talk, but I'm not obligated to do it every work day.

Pro: I can go hiking on my lunch break.

Con: I don't see anyone but my spouse. I have to go to additional meetups in order to make up for this.

Con: Not as much face time with execs. This can matter politically and for your career.