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Want to attract top tech talent? Offer telecommuting

management.fortune.cnn.com

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Re: Want to attract top tech talent? Offer telecommuting

#101

Post by jasonkester »

proexploit wrote: post #91
bconway wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I did the same thing sitting in a cube, I'd get paid for it. Why? I bill for work done regardless of my location, I never thought it might be out of the ordinary.

I think he's attempting to explain that he hasn't actually done anything (maybe loading up some programs, getting reference material together, etc.) and then does something unrelated. I wouldn't bill for that either unless it took a significant portion of time AND I wouldn't have to do it again later.

And of course there's no real mechanism to not get paid for time spent daydreaming if you're sitting in an office on salary.

On the point in question though, no, I won't bill time warming up the dev environment unless I actually use it for productive work. You lose the odd fraction of an hour here and there, but really if you're trying to add up things like that to get yourself paid an extra 2 hours at the end of the week you're probably just not charging enough for your time.

Re: Want to attract top tech talent? Offer telecommuting

#102

Post by jrsmith1279 »

adnam wrote: post #99
trustfundbaby wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Care to share the reason why?

I figured working from home would be great for the first month, and then I would start going mad. And when I asked who was going to pay for my chair, desk and computer, and who would pay the heating, lighting, ADSL and air-conditioning ... it looked like I was going to be out of pocket too.

You don't already have a chair, desk, computer, and internet access at home? Air conditioning may cost more, but you'd no longer be paying high gas prices to drive to and from work (which I'm assuming your company doesn't pay for now?).

Re: Want to attract top tech talent? Offer telecommuting

#103

Post by droz »

I think I may be in the minority, but I don't think people are thinking of the consequences of this telecommuting push.

I like the fact that there is a place where I do work and where I live. I do not want these two places to be the same. Much for the same reason people don't put a television in the bedroom. The bedroom is for sleeping, the living room is for TV.

I find that with the remote people I need to work with, I'm working around their schedule of when they will be around. It is difficult to communicate over IM, IRC, telephone and Skype (doesn't feel a fluid as face-to-face interaction).

If everyone starts becoming remote, then what's the point of having an office? If enough companies come to the same conclusion, what's the point in owning a building (from the eyes of a real estate guy). And ultimately, what's the point of having big office parks and so on and on. That's a lot of land and lot of capital at stake if this ever actually took off.

If a company asked me to be remote, I'd tell them I'm going to start looking for other employment options.

Re: Want to attract top tech talent? Offer telecommuting

#104

Post by umjames »

enjo wrote: post #27
bphogan wrote: post #14

I would love to do more remote work, but then I hear horror stories about people having problems not being around people. Feelings of isolation set in after a couple of months, and people end up going to a gig where they are around people. To those doing remote work, is this common?

Coworking spaces work wonders for this.

The biggest benefit of a co-working space is that you are in more control of when you want to be around other people. You can always go home when you need pure isolation.

At your employer's workplace, you don't have that control. You can be interrupted at any time by anything.

You don't appreciate that flexibility until you have to use headphones and music to drown out your co-workers' inane personal conversations.

Re: Want to attract top tech talent? Offer telecommuting

#105

Post by earl »

I've previously worked for a pair of bosses who telecommuted. Never again. At least for the types of algorithmic / machine learning software I work on, frequent in person collaboration is really helpful and none of the remote collaboration software came close to standing in front of the same piece of paper / monitor / whiteboard.

Re: Want to attract top tech talent? Offer telecommuting

#106

Post by httpitis »

jordanb wrote: post #51

I routinely have people begging me to work for them, but probably 4 in 5 clam up when I specify that -- while I'm happy to spend as much time with them as necessary to get the specs and make everyone comfortable -- I will not sit in their office to do the programming. I can not, for the life of me, understand why that is such a sticking point with so many people. Fortunately I have enough people who are willing to wo…

Been full time remote for 10 years. So true, and I second your questioning as to why onsite is so important to many ppl.

Re: Want to attract top tech talent? Offer telecommuting

#108

Post by hugh3 »

eru wrote: post #40
mgkimsal wrote: post #4

This is sort of a no-brainer. I'm pitched by recruiters about once a week, and they're all for far away positions - typically SF area, but other areas too. I can't sell my house any time soon - the market just isn't moving - so I'm somewhat held hostage by geography. This doesn't mean that I can't travel onsite and visit your office regularly, nor does it mean skype and phone don't work out here in the sticks :) Tele…

Why can't you sell your house? Your house has already decreased in value, not accounting for the loss in your books doesn't make it more valuable.

No, but if you sell your house you need to come up with the difference between what you sell it for and the amount still owing on it in cash, don't you?

Re: Want to attract top tech talent? Offer telecommuting

#109

Post by hugh3 »

braddunbar wrote: post #12
il wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The unemployment rate for college graduates as a whole is under 5%. White collar workers are not the ones feeling the brunt of the recession.

Wow. That's a statistic that doesn't get reported nearly enough. It puts an entirely different spin on the unemployment rate.

It could probably afford to be aired in the "is college a waste of time and money?" threads which crop up here every day too.

Re: Want to attract top tech talent? Offer telecommuting

#110

Post by cagey »

droz wrote: post #103

I think I may be in the minority, but I don't think people are thinking of the consequences of this telecommuting push. I like the fact that there is a place where I do work and where I live. I do not want these two places to be the same. Much for the same reason people don't put a television in the bedroom. The bedroom is for sleeping, the living room is for TV. I find that with the remote people I need to work with…

> Much for the same reason people don't put a television in the bedroom.

? I think having a TV in _every_ room is most consumers' dream come true.

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