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70% of startups offer remote work options as hiring heats up, YC data shows

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Re: 70% of startups offer remote work options as hiring heats up, YC data shows

#271

Post by moises_silva »

mullingitover wrote: post #129
moises_silva wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People keep on saying this but it's just not obviously true. How is it obviously not true? I mean. I love remote work. I started working remotely way before it was mainstream and I'm advocate for it. I've managed remote teams for many years too. Even so, I can't claim there's no performance hit. I just think the performance hit is small enough that in most cases the benefits for people and businesses outweigh it.

How do you balance that against the performance hit of working on-prem? You can't just hand-wave away the unpaid labor and risk to your life that you undertake with every trip to and from the office. You can't ignore the drive-by conversations you get roped into when you're trying to do head-down work or the overall noise in an office. Yes, in ideal conditions your office might approach what you get working at home,…

I suppose I can only speak from my experience. I can see definitely how many corp onsite environments are awful. There are productivity killers both onsite and remote and there are no absolutes. If we assume a 'good' remote vs 'good' onsite environment, collaboration is easier and faster onsite. Yes, you need to be very careful, and in my case we are super conscious of 'maker's time' and respect it with discipline.

Re: 70% of startups offer remote work options as hiring heats up, YC data shows

#272

Post by moises_silva »

voakbasda wrote: post #144
moises_silva wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People keep on saying this but it's just not obviously true. How is it obviously not true? I mean. I love remote work. I started working remotely way before it was mainstream and I'm advocate for it. I've managed remote teams for many years too. Even so, I can't claim there's no performance hit. I just think the performance hit is small enough that in most cases the benefits for people and businesses outweigh it.

If there is a performance hit for your remote teams, then I suggest you look to your own teams and employees for the root cause. I have been in plenty of organizations that actively cripple their remote workers' performance, and others where I have been my most productive. Remote work productivity depends directly on the culture surrounding it. If you believe a remote team will be less productive, then it becomes a s…

The 'you are doing it wrong' argument cuts both ways. Having an office does not magically make you more productive. You also need to cultivate an adequate environment to allow makers enough focus time and not randomly interrupted any time.

Re: 70% of startups offer remote work options as hiring heats up, YC data shows

#273

Post by hirako2000 »

heurisko wrote: post #253
nostrebored wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because everyone who seriously invests money in businesses knows that there’s a performance hit you take as a remote company. People haven’t been paying for offices for the last ten years for no reason. Engineering is one segment where this penalty seems to be lower. However, engineers seem to be unable to understand that every other function functions better in person. The tradeoff you’re hoping to make is that the…

> People haven’t been paying for offices for the last ten years for no reason. Companies have been paying for open plan offices for years. When I first started my career I found it bizarre that open plan offices were in any way considered suitable for programming problems. However it's evident that many companies haven't got an issue with handicapping their staff in this way.

People being asked to handler cost reduction haven't got an issue with that. The company is an abstract entity, and if it could think, it would certainly have an issue with handicapping productive employees.

I would rather point out the dishonest personnel, paid to reduce costs by x, who won't hesitate to sell some brillant ideas that will ultimately cost the company 2x to 10x. Elsewhere. Making sure it isn't clearly noticeable in the short term.

Re: 70% of startups offer remote work options as hiring heats up, YC data shows

#274

Post by wayoutthere »

nostrebored wrote: post #53
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #40

I honestly don't understand how any startup can even hope to compete if they don't offer remote options. Hiring is incredibly tight right now, and I'm sure glad my options are "anybody within ~2 timezones" over basically only people within a 15 mile radius of my office because traffic is horrendous in my city. Not to mention, how have companies not realized how to build robust remote company cultures over the past 2…

Because everyone who seriously invests money in businesses knows that there’s a performance hit you take as a remote company. People haven’t been paying for offices for the last ten years for no reason. Engineering is one segment where this penalty seems to be lower. However, engineers seem to be unable to understand that every other function functions better in person. The tradeoff you’re hoping to make is that the…

My company (management consulting) has smashed profitability records the last two years. A large part of that was not having office expenses and not doing in-person events. It’s completely apparent that many people used the office as their social outlet, with little work of value happening during those interactions. We are more productive in fewer hours.

Beyond that, our clients are seeing increased success on their major initiatives — communications are much easier when handled digitally as it forces some amount of PMO hygiene if you want to get anything done.

I actually am noticing a bifurcation of companies: the ones who pivoted to full remote indefinitely are able to pay more and are winning the war for talent, particularly in engineering roles. On top of that, it turns out out in-person isn’t so great or efficient when over half your meeting participants are virtual: everyone in the meeting room needs their laptop open anyway for the camera and hot mic issues abound.

Personally, I’m not going back. If they try to push us back, I’m getting another job. This is why employers pulled back on trying to bring everyone back — one of my clients who announced in October they were requiring everyone in-office in January saw 30% of their engineering staff walk out the door over the course of 6 weeks. That’s apocalyptic, it will take them a year plus to recover as most of their teams are now in the “on-call death spiral”. They are now permanently hybrid for all roles, not just engineering.

Re: 70% of startups offer remote work options as hiring heats up, YC data shows

#275

Post by rkk3 »

mulmen wrote: post #194
nostrebored wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have done B2B sales since the shift to remote work. The nature of the work actually highly lends itself to being in person. Even remote workers will be on some physical location the majority of the time. COVID changed this, and not for the better. It is much harder to do remote.

There's no reason for the sales staff to be in the same room as eachother. Plenty of B2B deals happen remotely, even pre-covid. I don't recall any customers coming on site at my last B2B company and there's no way sales had a travel budget. Remote workers are equally or better suited to occasional visits to customer locations anyway.

> I don't recall any customers coming on site at my last B2B company and there's no way sales had a travel budget.

That sounds odd. Maybe the company was so big you weren't aware of these things or the company wasn't mature and only had low value contracts. But eventually all b2b software goes to enterprise and that means face to face time with clients, expense accounts for thousand dollar dinners & travel budgets large enough to get global services status.

Re: 70% of startups offer remote work options as hiring heats up, YC data shows

#276

Post by tclancy »

namelosw wrote: post #250

Meanwhile, I'm happy to see some startups trying to fix the "remote (US only)" stuff. It could be a great business. On one hand, many great talents (including me) around the world are blocked from these opportunities (like those from India, Russia, China, etc). On the other hand, many companies would like to have great talents with lower cost, but most of them don't want to deal with the hassle.

Small companies really can’t fix this. It means having the capability to legally comply with whatever US and foreign laws govern the hiring of a worker from that country. If you’re a tiny startup, there’s little incentive to take time to incorporate in a foreign country on the chance this potential hire is a superstar. So you work out some kind of contracting arrangement instead.

Re: 70% of startups offer remote work options as hiring heats up, YC data shows

#277

Post by salmonlogs »

tclancy wrote: post #276
namelosw wrote: post #250

Meanwhile, I'm happy to see some startups trying to fix the "remote (US only)" stuff. It could be a great business. On one hand, many great talents (including me) around the world are blocked from these opportunities (like those from India, Russia, China, etc). On the other hand, many companies would like to have great talents with lower cost, but most of them don't want to deal with the hassle.

Small companies really can’t fix this. It means having the capability to legally comply with whatever US and foreign laws govern the hiring of a worker from that country. If you’re a tiny startup, there’s little incentive to take time to incorporate in a foreign country on the chance this potential hire is a superstar. So you work out some kind of contracting arrangement instead.

There are a bunch of companies out there that provide this as a service - remote employment. They setup a company in each local country and handle all the tax and legal implications.

Re: 70% of startups offer remote work options as hiring heats up, YC data shows

#278

Post by bin_bash »

aunty_helen wrote: post #168
bin_bash wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's also hard to work with people across hemispheres because of daylight saving time. I'm used to the hour difference I have with people I work with in Europe but I have no idea how many hours I'm separated from Australians because it changes 4 times through the year.

Wait, doesn't your calendar just update itself for this? This is a pretty weak reason. It changes at most 2 hours.

no? if I create a meeting at 9am pacific zone that happens every wednesday it will move around for people in australia being a different time throughout the year. Meetings are also not the only reason to want to know what time it is for colleagues. There is also setting up on-call and knowing when to message people.

Re: 70% of startups offer remote work options as hiring heats up, YC data shows

#279

Post by alistairSH »

rowanajmarshall wrote: post #262
jacobmischka wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The employee cares, but most employers do not. That's why changing jobs every couple years gets people 20% pay increases these days but they're lucky to get an inflationary raise at their yearly review.

Employers might not care in the short term, but in the long term they have to, because the general skill level of the labour market will be significantly diminished.

As long as individual employees are willing to invest in themselves and change employers, this isn't a problem. Employers have effectively off-loaded the cost of career development fully onto employees. This is even more true at the low end of the career/pay/skill spectrum.

Anecdote: I have a friend who manages a large food production plant in middle America. He constantly gripes about being unable to find skilled welders to maintain the giant metal vats used to mix/cook/etc ingredients. But, he's reluctant to start any sort of apprenticeship program because it costs money. He'd rather keep the employee churn and bitch on the internet instead of up-skilling existing employees or creating a training program for new employees.

Re: 70% of startups offer remote work options as hiring heats up, YC data shows

#280

Post by learc83 »

askonomm wrote: post #70
lotsofpulp wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

askonomm wrote remote worker, not remote employee. A remote worker can be an independent contractor and easily not run afoul of employee/contractor distinctions, especially because a lot of those distinctions have to do with being at a certain place at a certain time, and being locked to one client.

Yup, remote worker not employee. That being said, I'm officially a contractor, but I always work for just one client at a time and usually for many years, from Monday to Friday, just like one would with a regular job, except of course remotely. With my current client I even get paid vacations, while still technically being a contractor.

That’s exactly what I’m talking about. You are essentially a full time employee in all but name.

Here’s one of the tests. Notice vacation is explicitly called out.

> Are there written contracts or employee type benefits (i.e. pension plan, insurance, vacation). Will the relationship continue and is the work performed a key aspect of the business?

Your employer is clearly treating you like an employee while paying you like a contractor. This kind of thing is common. But the more US jobs get outsourced like this, the more likely it is that people will notice and demand enforcement actions.

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