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The effects of remote work on collaboration among information workers

nature.com

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Re: The effects of remote work on collaboration among information workers

#61

Post by jay_kyburz »

phillipcarter wrote: post #14

The key thing is here: > over the first six months of 2020 Those first six months were pretty rough. The large majority of people had little to no experience working remotely, so many folks didn't have a good home office environment, and there was a general sense of being unsure if this would just be temporary or if employees should settle in for the long haul. Many orgs didn't have good practices set up for remote w…

I was set up for working from Home. Home schooling 2 preteens is what has killed my productivity.

Re: The effects of remote work on collaboration among information workers

#63

Post by cortesoft »

phillipcarter wrote: post #14

The key thing is here: > over the first six months of 2020 Those first six months were pretty rough. The large majority of people had little to no experience working remotely, so many folks didn't have a good home office environment, and there was a general sense of being unsure if this would just be temporary or if employees should settle in for the long haul. Many orgs didn't have good practices set up for remote w…

Not to mention kids being at home.

I got so little work done that first few months until daycare opened back up. You can’t do much work with a one year old and a four year old demanding your attention. Focus work was impossible, and speaking in meetings had to be timed for the few moments of quiet.

Re: The effects of remote work on collaboration among information workers

#64

Post by civilized »

huetius wrote: post #27
civilized wrote: post #13

Next paper from these guys will say: "the shift from an open office plan to private offices caused work to become more siloed. Previous research shows this may impede the flow of information through the network" People need to stop fetishizing "breaking down silos" and "serendipitous hallway encounters" and all that nonsense and think about the big picture. You're more likely to have something worth saying, and a wor…

I can sympathize with this, given that truly high-functioning, collaborative work environments are anything but ubiquitous, but I think that these kinds of environments are still the ideal, however rare and difficult to achieve they are. I’ve only worked for two orgs that really got it right, and they were far and away the best work experiences I’ve had. I can’t imagine those orgs being able to thrive in a completely…

I get that some people love their offices and think they are amazing work environments, but when I probe, it always seems to boil down to emotional attachment. A lifestyle choice. Offices usually don't actually improve productivity, IMO.

Re: The effects of remote work on collaboration among information workers

#65

Post by wombatmobile »

aaomidi wrote: post #25

Here's an anecdote. I left because Microsoft was being weird about long term remote plans and I wanted to actually be able to plan ahead. They lost me because they couldn't give me a straight answer if I can continue working there if I went fully remote or not.

"If there's one thing in business that's certain, it's uncertainty."

-- Stephen Covey

"It is in the admission of ignorance and the admission of uncertainty that there is a hope for the continuous motion of human beings in some direction that doesn't get confined, permanently blocked, as it has so many times before in various periods in the history of man."

-- Richard P. Feynman

"There is no such uncertainty as a sure thing."

-- Robert Burns

Re: The effects of remote work on collaboration among information workers

#66

Post by cortesoft »

maxclark wrote: post #2

“Together, these effects may make it harder for employees to acquire and share new information across the network.” Remote is hard and not every company is going to adapt to this long term. I’m happy that remote is now an accepted structure but I worry that full time remote employees will miss out simply because they aren’t present.

I always have heard it said “if you have one remote employee on your team, everyone is a remote employee”, because if you don’t interact as if you are all remote, then the remote employee is going to miss so much.

Re: The effects of remote work on collaboration among information workers

#68

Post by kiklion »

earthscienceman wrote: post #54
kahmeal wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Elsewhere at their own expense? Yea that's gonna be a no from me.

"We used to pay for entire buildings to house our employees, but covid made us realize we can pass that cost on to them!"

It kind of depends on the details.

My company has offices that you can go to, but if you want to work remotely then it’s up to you to manage your environment.

The company already has offices. Why would they pay for more just because you don’t want to go to the offices.

There is a one time budget for hardware, such as a second monitor at home, we’ll have to see how that plays out with upgrades in a few years.

Re: The effects of remote work on collaboration among information workers

#69

Post by walshemj »

maxclark wrote: post #2

“Together, these effects may make it harder for employees to acquire and share new information across the network.” Remote is hard and not every company is going to adapt to this long term. I’m happy that remote is now an accepted structure but I worry that full time remote employees will miss out simply because they aren’t present.

And I think the number of new employees not making it past probation will increase.

Re: The effects of remote work on collaboration among information workers

#70

Post by walshemj »

mmaunder wrote: post #29

“ Our results show that firm-wide remote work caused the collaboration network of workers to become more static and siloed, with fewer bridges between disparate parts. Furthermore, there was a decrease in synchronous communication and an increase in asynchronous communication. Together, these effects may make it harder for employees to acquire and share new information across the network.” So less interruptions and m…

You didn't see "static and siloed" that's just asking for a disruptor to come in and eat your lunch
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