Ask HN: How have you fared working remotely this past year?

1) Hybrid, I design hardware so I typically have to go in to use equipment about once every week or two. A bit surprise is how little I need to be in the office.

2) I'm about a 30 minute walk/10 minute drive from the office

3) Working from home hasn't been too bad, a bit of loneliness, but mostly it is fine.

4) Pros - Less people bugging me throughout the day to answer questions, able to go run errands during the day if needed (e.g. grocery shopping off peak hours). Cons - Having to plan when I go into the office to do stuff, keeping track of the other people on my projects and making sure work is being done, more meetings, later hours (mostly due to being asked to oversee an project from an overseas team, at least I don't have to get home before or after the meetings).

5) It sucks living in a tiny apartment and working from home. It would be greatly useful if I had a separate office so I can shut work away at the end of the day. I literally go an lie on my bed just to get away from my workspace. If it was permanent, I'd be looking to move to a larger place. A job specific observation/quirk, remote desktop doesn't work well with 3D CAD programs when you run 4K monitors at home.

6) It depends on the type of person. My job could never be fully remote, but a hybrid model works better than I expected. I'll definitely be wanting to work from home occasionally even once everyone is back in the office.

1) Fully remote 2) 15 bike ride 3) Fine. I live in 500 square feet though which has had some sort of unquantifiable mental toll on me though. 4) Less overall work which is nice. Easier to just turn of my laptop at the end of the day and no one can swing by and drop more stuff on my plate. I do miss the interpersonal aspects of the office at times though. 5) A lot of the folks I work with or have worked with are changing jobs. If team culture is great but you’re underpaid it’s now easier to leave for more money/new opportunities without having to tell your team that you’re leaving to their face. 6) I miss working in the office at least part of the time. Perhaps I’ve idealized it though and would not feel the same way after a full week of commuting.

Were schools or daycares or whatever still in operation, would you still find working from home with two small kids a problem?

1) Hybrid, we’re allowed at the office as much as 50% of days. I reckon having spent 10% of my days at the office.

2) 25 min commute by bike (supplanting 25min metro this year)

3) Very well. The first few weeks was a great relief, an opportunity to get work done without constant disturbances. As the months went on, I started craving a little more social interaction, one day at the office every now and then would do the trick.

4) Pros: gotten much more work done. Cons: poor ergonomics in my small apartment setup.

5) I could use a bigger apartment with room for a proper desk and multiple screen setup.

6) Absolutely

1) Fully remote.

2) 20 minutes walk.

3) I miss lunch talks with some of my colleagues.

4) Other than that, everything else was an improvement. I am strongly introverted, so just sitting in an open space for half of day increases my stress level; I dread the day I will have to experience that again, unfortunately most jobs in my area are like that.

6) Different people have different needs. Extraverts seem to suffer from not being surrounded by people. Also, for juniors this seems difficult, because it makes it harder to ask for help. So I wouldn't recommend it to everyone. But for people like me, it is incredibly helpful.