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Remote Only

remoteonly.org

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241–250 of 374 posts

Re: Remote Only

#241

Post by vonmoltke »

jpatokal wrote: post #220
AstralStorm wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If your process cannot revert a breaking change with a figurative snap of fingers, the process is broken. It is like driving a car with no brakes. About the only time where I've seen this fail is if it was a publicised feature launch that was way premature.

And when it's the build server itself that's broken? No process can account for every possible edge case, and you need to have flexibility to handle the unexpected.

At some point problems reach the "Call Kevin now, I don't care what time it is" level. Your processes should enable anyone to handle problems that are not at this level.

Re: Remote Only

#242

Post by pmlnr »

hartator wrote: post #6

> Disadvantages > Scares investors - Scares some partners - Scares some customers - Scares some potential employees, mostly senior non-technical hires - Onboarding is harder, first month feels lonely We do a full remote policy at SerpApi.com, however I found this disadvantages list a bit dishonest, they are more way numerous and important, the most obvious are missing real human contacts (and it doesn't get easier wi…

> the most obvious are missing real human contacts

Human contact for me is more about friends and out of work activity. Colleagues are colleagues, if you want "real human" interaction, you'd need to get out of the office anyway.

Re: Remote Only

#243

Post by passiveincomelg »

AYBABTME wrote: post #231
nvarsj wrote: post #207

My somewhat reductive conclusion about remote work is that it boils down to the ability to be an effective writer. If you're not good at written communication, or you work with people who are not good at it, remote work will be miserable. People who are not highly fluent in the company's written language or those with some level of dyslexia will struggle. Also some people get frustrated with the more analytic approac…

People say that, yet in my experience it's not actually true. We just need to communicate enough to coordinate. I'm not a great communicator, I don't think most people at my work are great communicators, yet we work just fine as a remote company. I feel people exaggerate this belief. Regular chatter in public chat channels seems sufficient. What really seems to matter is work ethics.

Maybe the bar is lower than you think. As your comment demonstrates, you are able to form complete sentences that are either correct in terms of spelling and grammar, or so close that I can't tell the difference.

I don't know where exactly the bar is, but a sentence is certainly below it if I can't figure out whether someone told me they did X or they are asking me to do X.

Re: Remote Only

#244

Post by lagadu »

warcher wrote: post #11

Yo, you gotta tell me when you’re working. You must. You’re on a team that is depending on you and somebody has to know where the fuck your are and when you’re going to fix whatever is broken today. “Where’s will?” “I don’t know, our manifesto says nobody gets to know when he’s working.” “Well he broke the site.” “That’s his right as a sovereign citizen.” The end.

So you're saying that "Will" is your organization's single point of failure? So, when he goes on vacation or when he's sick or quits the whole thing comes crashing down?

If that's the case, I hope I don't own any stock of it, as you're a single injury away from disaster.

Re: Remote Only

#245

Post by pmlnr »

JamyDev wrote: post #62

Didn't see anyone top level mention it, but: Disadvantages -> Timezones Timezones make scheduling team meetings hard, and if your organization ever becomes big enough to warrant a physical office people far away will start working late hours to keep up with the main office. YMMV, but it's 3 AM here in Berlin and until 10 minutes ago I was still actively working.

> scheduling team meetings

See written & async first communication. Mailing lists work for things like linux kernel development.

Re: Remote Only

#246

Post by lagadu »

mfonda wrote: post #148
bmelton wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Kevin broke the site, it's a process problem. Kevin didn't break the site, he introduced code that might have broken the site, and the lack of tests to have detected the it broke the site. Jane then peer reviewed the code that might have broken the site and approved it. Bob then failed to notice that the site was broken during QA. The QA environment was apparently configured differently enough by Taylor that the s…

As true as this is, unexpected problems happen. Kevin may be the only one that can fix it, or at least be able to fix it a lot more effectively than others. The issue might not be Kevin's fault (i.e it's really a process problem), but being able to talk to him immediately (or at least know his schedule) will go a long ways in getting the issue resolved in an acceptable time frame. Nothing against remote work, but kno…

And what happens when Kevin is on vacation or is sick or quits?

Re: Remote Only

#247

Post by nounaut »

megaman22 wrote: post #151
mfonda wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As true as this is, unexpected problems happen. Kevin may be the only one that can fix it, or at least be able to fix it a lot more effectively than others. The issue might not be Kevin's fault (i.e it's really a process problem), but being able to talk to him immediately (or at least know his schedule) will go a long ways in getting the issue resolved in an acceptable time frame. Nothing against remote work, but kno…

Kevin's available hours should be common knowledge, or easily findable in a system of some sort, ranging from text file to excel sheet to Exchange to massively overpriced time-tracking software.

Doesn't really help to know peoples hours. If they're not overlapping with yours then you have a potentially crazy overhead on time it takes to get responses to issues that could hold up your work completely.

Re: Remote Only

#248

Post by jvannistelrooy »

AYBABTME wrote: post #231
nvarsj wrote: post #207

My somewhat reductive conclusion about remote work is that it boils down to the ability to be an effective writer. If you're not good at written communication, or you work with people who are not good at it, remote work will be miserable. People who are not highly fluent in the company's written language or those with some level of dyslexia will struggle. Also some people get frustrated with the more analytic approac…

People say that, yet in my experience it's not actually true. We just need to communicate enough to coordinate. I'm not a great communicator, I don't think most people at my work are great communicators, yet we work just fine as a remote company. I feel people exaggerate this belief. Regular chatter in public chat channels seems sufficient. What really seems to matter is work ethics.

I think it also makes a difference if you work with people across different timezones or not.

Regular chatter might be good enough to communicate between people in roughly the same timezone. However, If I send an unclear chat (or email) to a colleague who's starting her day when mine has already ended, she can't act on my message and we'll have to waste another day clearing up that miscommunication.

Re: Remote Only

#249

Post by newscracker »

nvarsj wrote: post #207

My somewhat reductive conclusion about remote work is that it boils down to the ability to be an effective writer. If you're not good at written communication, or you work with people who are not good at it, remote work will be miserable. People who are not highly fluent in the company's written language or those with some level of dyslexia will struggle. Also some people get frustrated with the more analytic approac…

I agree that writing well is important, but I would characterize this as beyond writing alone. Assuming that "remote work" isn't confined only to teams in time zones where working hours don't overlap, it's quite easy to start a chat or an audio call/conference. "Talking" directly is more important, and many a times yields quicker results than exchanging long emails or documents, whether it's with text (chat) or voice or even video calls. But it does come at the cost of trying to setup a mutually convenient time and being available (synchronous vs. asynchronous).

Re: Remote Only

#250

Post by amorphous »

throwawaymath wrote: post #222
amorphous wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

so true. I have a business partner that I can talk to very effective in person. I had to relocate, and now we have to deal mostly via email. I have been working remotely for ten years now and saw no problem with the change. But it has become disastrous. I figured out that he is just not an "email type". Only picking up the phone works with him, but this does not fit into my workflow. I'm undoing our business partners…

Why doesn't picking up a phone fit into your workflow?

_Always_ picking up the phone doesn't fit into my workflow. Some things are better discussed via email or chat. I think it is very difficult to work remotely if you only have direct verbal communication available.
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