Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: How is the remote vs in-person trend looking?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 243 posts

Re: Ask HN: How is the remote vs in-person trend looking?

#161

Post by akhmatova »

Uptrenda wrote: post #116
akhmatova wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should expect a large number of companies to ghost you. It's just part of the process. I would say no - it's not part of the "process". Every company swears they are against ghosting (and are "shocked" when it gets publicly exposed), but they all keep doing it anyway. It's a reflection of the cynical, emotionally immature nature of this industry.

What's depressing as hell is when you first start searching for a job and you've put in a massive effort yet for like ~a week you get no responses. It really kills moral. But usually then all the replies come in a deluge and you wonder why you were ever worried to begin with. Job searching is a legit emotional roller coaster, lmaoo.

And the irony is -- they suddenly think you're "hot" because you're getting competing offers (or competing invites to do 7 or 8 rounds of culture fit interviews and/or LC grinding, in any case). Which is another way for them to say: "Actually we really don't know how to evaluate these candidates, so instead we rely on random externalities, like the number of other interviews they're having this particular week."

Re: Ask HN: How is the remote vs in-person trend looking?

#162

Post by harrydehal »

CoffeeOnWrite wrote: post #102
nine_k wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> my humble abode appears on video Isn't blurring the background, or using a virtual background, nearly universal now? (Around me, it is.)

It's fairly popular in my organization yes, but too much trouble for me until/unless Google Meet supports it in Firefox.

Looks like it's supported in Google Meets (as well as Zoom):

https://support.google.com/meet/answer/10058482?hl=en&co=GEN...

Re: Ask HN: How is the remote vs in-person trend looking?

#163

Post by Uptrenda »

akhmatova wrote: post #161
Uptrenda wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's depressing as hell is when you first start searching for a job and you've put in a massive effort yet for like ~a week you get no responses. It really kills moral. But usually then all the replies come in a deluge and you wonder why you were ever worried to begin with. Job searching is a legit emotional roller coaster, lmaoo.

And the irony is -- they suddenly think you're "hot" because you're getting competing offers (or competing invites to do 7 or 8 rounds of culture fit interviews and/or LC grinding, in any case). Which is another way for them to say: "Actually we really don't know how to evaluate these candidates, so instead we rely on random externalities, like the number of other interviews they're having this particular week."

Agreed. I also find it problematic that you have no control over the schedule of when the interviews start, when offers are made, how long companies might wait. E.g. if you have offers and you're still interviewing do you tell those companies to wait? If so - might they consider it a lack of interest? Possibly too much competition to waste further time on you with? Do you risk making them wait too long and rescinding an offer? idk... i wish there was a guide on how to handle this crap based on actual research. I've read from a recruiter not to indicate you have other offers at all because they're likely just to say to take them and not to proceed further. There are so many aspects of hiring that seem unknown.

Re: Ask HN: How is the remote vs in-person trend looking?

#164

Post by [deleted] »

akhmatova wrote: post #85
bityard wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you missed the part where the parent said that they were going into the office _by choice_ every day anyway. You are demanding that they quit just because the company doesn't make it optional? There seems to be a hard-core "WFH or nothing" contingent here that refuse to acknowledge that a great many people prefer and even thrive working in a typical office environment.

It was a suggestion, not a demand. Anyone who reads stay/quit advice they read on the internet as a "demand" has bigger problems than I can help them with.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: How is the remote vs in-person trend looking?

#165

Post by smileysteve »

jokethrowaway wrote: post #160
y-c-o-m-b wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if these people insist on not being in the office we may just outsource the job for a tenth of the comp Hah, they can go ahead and do that. In fact I encourage it because it makes me more money in the end. When the software falls apart due to shoddy practices, they'll learn a very hard lesson when coming back to reality and end up paying people like me double (at best) what they would've originally paid to fix the…

Why would you assume people in a remote country will write worse software than you? There is plenty of foreign talent. Sure, companies are not great at picking outsourcing firms, I think corruption and/or picking your mate's consultancy firms plays a role in that.

The reason is the comp. You rarely get the similar results by off shoring AND cutting comp significantly.

It often turns out that people who are empowered to write good software as a team are also empowered to research their market value.

Or vice versa

People who don't challenge if they're getting paid similarly as the previous workers also aren't asking if they're being provided with the correct technical detail or even building the "right" thing. (This can be true of hiring too little experience, hiring people and burning them out)

Re: Ask HN: How is the remote vs in-person trend looking?

#166

Post by TimTheTinker »

dleslie wrote: post #142
Yhippa wrote: post #138

For some reason, I have in my mind September when we're going to see a lot more RTO of at least 3 days a week. Also in my mind, companies that are either smaller or have a good idea of what they need their people to do are the ones that are going to be able to thrive and provide full-remote work. BigCo's are probably going to continue to push for in-person as they are unable to determine what they need from their peo…

BigCos need to justify the expenditure of maintaining an office, and the office culture that goes with it: all those over staffed meetings, the HR and management roles that exist primarily to facilitate in-office culture, the facilities staff and so forth. A non trivial amount of BigCo roles and expenses are simply unnecessary when the physical office no longer exists. And all those people in those roles will advocat…

I think there's a lot of sunk cost fallacy going on with BigCos that spent a lot of money on building their own office buildings.

Re: Ask HN: How is the remote vs in-person trend looking?

#167

Post by msmenardi »

ajcp wrote: post #137
ragnot wrote: post #70

We are still full remote and I don't think anyone has any intention to go back to "in-person" honestly. As a side note: I think the reason you are going to find so much friction with this is for the first time in recent history "workers" (specifically software engineers) have incredible leverage over management. I honestly don't think we've seen this since the days of labor unions. Think about it: software engineers…

I wonder if that makes it the best time for software engineers to form a union? I think the conventional wisdom is that unions are formed to benefit those without power otherwise, but would it make sense to unionize to maximize an already outsized position? Would that thereby ensure (to an extent) those proceeds for when a bargaining position might not be as powerful? The Icelandic press industry (I know, just hang i…

Check out "No Shortcuts" by Jane McAlevey. Great book about creating a tech union, and it gives background on how other industries did it (and often where they went wrong)

Re: Ask HN: How is the remote vs in-person trend looking?

#168

Post by ajcp »

msmenardi wrote: post #167
ajcp wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if that makes it the best time for software engineers to form a union? I think the conventional wisdom is that unions are formed to benefit those without power otherwise, but would it make sense to unionize to maximize an already outsized position? Would that thereby ensure (to an extent) those proceeds for when a bargaining position might not be as powerful? The Icelandic press industry (I know, just hang i…

Check out "No Shortcuts" by Jane McAlevey. Great book about creating a tech union, and it gives background on how other industries did it (and often where they went wrong)

Excellent, thanks so much!

Re: Ask HN: How is the remote vs in-person trend looking?

#169

Post by akhmatova »

Uptrenda wrote: post #163
akhmatova wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the irony is -- they suddenly think you're "hot" because you're getting competing offers (or competing invites to do 7 or 8 rounds of culture fit interviews and/or LC grinding, in any case). Which is another way for them to say: "Actually we really don't know how to evaluate these candidates, so instead we rely on random externalities, like the number of other interviews they're having this particular week."

Agreed. I also find it problematic that you have no control over the schedule of when the interviews start, when offers are made, how long companies might wait. E.g. if you have offers and you're still interviewing do you tell those companies to wait? If so - might they consider it a lack of interest? Possibly too much competition to waste further time on you with? Do you risk making them wait too long and rescinding…

You do have control, actually -- you can always say things like "Sorry, but the number of weeks / rounds does not seem to be in line with the TC being offered", knowing that this carries a moderate-to-high risk of rejection. Or if that is too blunt for your style -- you can always politiely excessive rounds of LC, interviews that start before 9 a.m. in your time zone, or (one of favorites) interviews with people who expect you to have your camera on while they have theirs off.

Or any of the other tokens of gratuitous unpleasantness, carelessness and plain one-sided-ness that these companies routinely rub in our faces, as if we're desperate to work for them.

It just depends how much FY money you're sitting on at the moment. Like anything else in this industry.

Re: Ask HN: How is the remote vs in-person trend looking?

#170

Post by peppermint_tea »

GenerocUsername wrote: post #127
drakonka wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in a 48sqm apartment and never even thought about this. I work usually either from my little desk and kneeling chair in my bedroom or my couch. My remote coworkers at different levels have all kinds of stuff in their backgrounds - pets, kids, books, walls, posters, clutter, paintings, and thinking back I have not once found myself judging them negatively _or_ positively for it. A candidate judging your house i…

I judge people who still live in tiny apartments in downtown cores after 2 years of lockdowns and remote work. I don't want coworkers who are so stalwarts they stick with a bad plan for years. Get out of the city.

i'll be enjoying my city life, thanks :)
Post reply on HN