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Let employees work from home

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Re: Let employees work from home

#51

Post by jacobkg »

beachbum8029 wrote: post #27
camelNotation wrote: post #4

I think WFH is a great idea, but until we can do multi-user video conferencing over the average home internet connection, it just isn't going to be as good as in-person interactions. However, once we can reliably see one another's faces in HD and share screens at the same time, it might even be superior to sitting next to someone and having them try to look over your shoulder as you show them something or ask a quest…

Doesn't Google Hangouts let you do this? Is the average home connection not good enough for hangouts?

Our experience with a Google Meet (formerly Hangouts) is that it is almost always good but during any given 30 minute meeting the audio will drop out for one person at least once. It breaks up the flow for sure but isn't a deal breaker.

Re: Let employees work from home

#52

Post by TeMPOraL »

radmuzom wrote: post #36

As a divorced single guy with not too many friends, I look forward every day to go to work and have people around me. I interact socially only with three or four of my office mates. Anyway, I may be the exception, but I am not an employee who wants to work from home.

I think companies need to accommodate the differences in people here; either within one company or within the industry they need to split into "office friendly" and "remote friendly" groups.

I'm on the introvert side of things and I'm simply oversaturated with human interactions. I have to actively avoid being physically around other human beings just to keep my sanity. I recently managed to convince my boss to give me 2 WFH days a week and I saw both my productivity and happiness skyrocket within those days.

A lot depends on the type of project, I guess. Mine is such that I'm mostly collaborating with the customer side, which works in a different country. For me, 99% of events in the office are off-topic. Others in this thread seem to have close-knit team projects, so I'm not surprised they feel more productive in the office.

Re: Let employees work from home

#53

Post by dsacco »

Qwertious wrote: post #15
rmah wrote: post #5

This article essentially boiled down to: I want X. A few companies already offer X. You should offer X too. There are sometimes advantages to offering full or partial work-from-home options to employees. For some projects and company cultures, it can work well. But honestly, this blog post was a rather shallow argument in favor of it.

I think what the article is trying to say is that employers' arguments are more often bullshit than legitimate (and obviously, both sets of employers think their arguments are legitimate), so usually they should just give it a shot.

Unfortunately, that's not meaningfully different from, "I want X, you should offer X." It is basically the same as saying, "I want X, some companies do X, give it a shot" in persuasive power.

I love working from home and have done it for most of my career. The next job I take will probably be in an office though for a change of pace. I honestly find that despite my personal affection for it, most arguments in favor of remote work really just aren't very compelling.

"Some companies do it successfully" is not compelling to most companies. It's a disingenuous portrayal of the real difficulties and sacrifices that need to occur for remote work to be successful. Remote work rarely works partially, because without a deep seated remote culture the employees who are not in the office will be fundamentally left out of subtle but important group interactions. If you are the only remote employee on your team, they're not going to video conference with you to have a spur of the moment discussion that leads to a business insight. Conversely, asking a company without a remote culture to change is asking all of the employees who are already there to embrace a new, unfamiliar culture where they can't just lean over and ask someone a question.

It's my personal opinion that there is a very vocal minority that wants remote work to succeed, a more silent swath larger than the first that is indifferent, followed by a supermajority that silently disapproves (or at least, wouldn't want to work in such an environment). Even though I enjoy it, it appears selfish to me to ask companies to offer remote work without significant evidence it will work for them, all the while imposing a real communication cost on employees that work there who already thoroughly enjoy the status quo.

It seems to me like it's similar to a lot of other things in professional life: you can't have everything, and if this is really important to you then find a job that offers it. But don't expect companies to alter their organizational machinery to cater to you when they have no reason to.

Re: Let employees work from home

#54

Post by petra »

jasode wrote: post #7

>Objections to work from home fall apart Essays from workers like Jen McCown isn't going to work. What works is to have massively successful businesses that beat the competition because their employees work remotely . Since no multi-billion dollar business has demonstrated that specific cause & effect, the idea doesn't gain traction. Yes, businesses like Basecamp and Automattic have remote workers but I'm talking abo…

But massive business success is only one way for innovations to spread. Many innovations are small, and do spread, by having enough credible positive value, and small enough negative value, for the employer, combined with the right marketing.

Why is this one different and requires that much higher standard of proof ? because i'm not sure that there's much value there, at least today.

Re: Let employees work from home

#55

Post by dsacco »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #52
radmuzom wrote: post #36

As a divorced single guy with not too many friends, I look forward every day to go to work and have people around me. I interact socially only with three or four of my office mates. Anyway, I may be the exception, but I am not an employee who wants to work from home.

I think companies need to accommodate the differences in people here; either within one company or within the industry they need to split into "office friendly" and "remote friendly" groups. I'm on the introvert side of things and I'm simply oversaturated with human interactions. I have to actively avoid being physically around other human beings just to keep my sanity. I recently managed to convince my boss to give…

I'm sensitive to the fact that you're more productive in an environment that caters to being an introvert. But if an organization were to allow people to work from home who asked to, how would they maintain the same overall productivity between groups?

What if you want to work from home but your team believes there will be a productivity-reducing communication cost? How does the organization respond to this? Can it bifurcate the teams between remote only and office only? What happens if they identify consistent productivity differences?

My point is not that you're wrong, but that I think adopting remote work requires answers to very challenging questions for companies that do not settle on one culture or the other. And if they don't start with a remote culture, in my experience they'll never have it.

Re: Let employees work from home

#56

Post by jusuchin »

barrkel wrote: post #45

I worked remotely, from home, for 5 years. These days, I work mostly in the office, with a 40 minute commute each way, despite the option for occasional working from home. There's a few reasons to prefer working in the office. The single biggest one is the hard delimiting of the work day; when I'm not in the office, I'm not working, I'm not available on email or chat, and unless it's an exceptional situation, nobody…

I guess it's different strokes for different folks. Personally, I feel I can communicate much more efficiently via chat/messaging mediums than email. Chatting, in my opinion, at least in a late 20 something (27 year old)'s mind, emulates a real conversation where if you don't respond it's essentially ignoring the other person. If you have a bigger thought, sure you can type it out and get that message to multiple people in a better format - but for the majority of quick Q and A's I don't see any issue with messaging.

Re: Let employees work from home

#57

Post by daleco »

jasode wrote: post #7

>Objections to work from home fall apart Essays from workers like Jen McCown isn't going to work. What works is to have massively successful businesses that beat the competition because their employees work remotely . Since no multi-billion dollar business has demonstrated that specific cause & effect, the idea doesn't gain traction. Yes, businesses like Basecamp and Automattic have remote workers but I'm talking abo…

InVision App may not be a Billion dollar company yet, I bet that they are close and they will in 2017-2018 (50 million serie D in 2016). They are an entirely remote company (at least they claim that when doing a demo at work couple weeks ago)

https://www.invisionapp.com/blog/remote-worker-truths/

Re: Let employees work from home

#58

Post by H1Supreme »

6DM wrote: post #32
camelNotation wrote: post #4

I think WFH is a great idea, but until we can do multi-user video conferencing over the average home internet connection, it just isn't going to be as good as in-person interactions. However, once we can reliably see one another's faces in HD and share screens at the same time, it might even be superior to sitting next to someone and having them try to look over your shoulder as you show them something or ask a quest…

Honestly, I prefer to screen share even in the same office over having to round up chairs and what not. It's almost like working from home now.

Same here. I really don't like people leering over my shoulder, and vice-versa. Additionally, I talk to people over the phone more than in person. My office isn't an open floor plan (thankfully). There's lots of rooms, and we're spread out. So, it's easier to ring someone up.

Also, any user issues that I need to investigate are done with Team Viewer. So, even though I'm in the office, most things are done remotely.

Re: Let employees work from home

#59

Post by matwood »

dsacco wrote: post #28
Veen wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't follow your logic. The vast majority of businesses aren't like Google or Facebook. The vast majority of the nation's GDP isn't created by companies like Google and Facebook. Hundreds of thousands of businesses are the size of Automattic, Basecamp, or smaller. Those businesses employ the the vast majority of workers. Therefore, Basecamp and Automattic are excellent role models. Unequivocal success does not mea…

Your syllogism doesn't work. You begin by stating accurately that most companies aren't like Google and Facebook, which is true. Then you implicitly state that Basecamp and Automattic are more representative of most companies, which is patently false in many ways; in the relevant way, it's untrue because most companies do not have remote workers, and most people do not work remotely. You can't really lead with, "Base…

> it's untrue because most companies do not have remote workers, and most people do not work remotely

There is work at home and there is remote work. Most companies of any size (more than 1 location), have remote workers. My first job out of college in the late 90s had most of my 'team' spread across the globe in other offices. We got everything done through conference calls and emails. Eventually I stopped going to the office because there was no point. This also was not some super forward thinking tech company, but it was very cost conscious. The cost savings alone led the company down the path of figuring out who could WFH and how to make that work.

Re: Let employees work from home

#60

Post by maxxxxx »

Veen wrote: post #17
jasode wrote: post #7

>Objections to work from home fall apart Essays from workers like Jen McCown isn't going to work. What works is to have massively successful businesses that beat the competition because their employees work remotely . Since no multi-billion dollar business has demonstrated that specific cause & effect, the idea doesn't gain traction. Yes, businesses like Basecamp and Automattic have remote workers but I'm talking abo…

I don't follow your logic. The vast majority of businesses aren't like Google or Facebook. The vast majority of the nation's GDP isn't created by companies like Google and Facebook. Hundreds of thousands of businesses are the size of Automattic, Basecamp, or smaller. Those businesses employ the the vast majority of workers. Therefore, Basecamp and Automattic are excellent role models. Unequivocal success does not mea…

I am a big proponent of remote work but I think it's harder to manage a remote company. Automattic and Basecamp have excellent people in leadership who have a clear understanding of their company.

A lot of mediocre middleman managers in the typical company aren't capable of setting expectations and evaluating work results.

You need very good workers and leaders in a remote company.

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