Remote startups will win the war for top talent • Hacker News Board

Re: Remote startups will win the war for top talent

#21

Post by ekianjo » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:17 PM UTC

benreesman wrote: post #10

It’s possible that some companies will pay significantly more to keep all of their employees in office all of the time. But they’ll be paying 2-3 times: higher TCO, more expensive real-estate, and more scope for the (fortunately few) “I’m have people skills damnit” careerist middle managers without technical chops (higher payroll and worse mechanism design). The A16Z model sounds about right to me: flex work with low…

You can pay as much as you want but after a certain threshold having the possibility to work from home is paying for itself in many ways. No stress from commuting, more flexibility and more focus.

Re: Remote startups will win the war for top talent

#22

Post by TOMDM » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:18 PM UTC

Okay, how about a tad more nuance though.

The better headline would be "Remote Startups will win the war for top talent among employees who prefer to work remotely"

Not quite so sexy. Sure some; probably even most software devs prefer remote/hybrid work, but there are still plenty of incredibly talented people out there who prefer being in the office every day.

Re: Remote startups will win the war for top talent

#23

Post by draw_down » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:18 PM UTC

seibelj wrote: post #14

My productivity went at least 10x when the pandemic happened. - No commute - No 1 hour lunch (walking, buying, eating, cleaning up) - Not in an open-desk office where I'm constantly interrupted - Meetings are much more focused and I can hop between meetings quickly - Easy to do chores if necessary during the day and then work extra hours at night to make up - Office politics much reduced, output is easier to measure…

No post body was provided.

Re: Remote startups will win the war for top talent

#24

Post by weakwire » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:19 PM UTC

mrkurt wrote: post #12

weakwire wrote: post #2

Remote startups may win the war for top talent (in the short term) but who will win on productivity and by extension revenue? I guess we will all see that in the next 24 months.

I'm not sure productivity maps that directly to revenue. People are wildly productive when they work remotely. What's harder is sharing context and tackling large problems with other people.

Maybe the word productivity is creating some ambiguity here. Company (net) productivity is very different than individual or team productivity. Direction, Strategy and Agility play a much more significant role than raw speed or throughput.I believe with in person communication & interaction it is much easier to succeed in that.

Remote introduces barriers. It is theoretically possible that remote can move 100x faster & have better net productivity than in person, however that is far from the truth today.

Re: Remote startups will win the war for top talent

#25

Post by Joel_Mckay » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:19 PM UTC

paulcole wrote: post #6

I always think this is a funny argument because most companies don't need top talent. For nearly every business, good enough is definitely good enough. So the question to me is for average to slightly above average employees, will remote companies "win"?

Yup, most of the hard problems were solved in 1960 to 1980, and modern libraries cover 99.999% of use-cases.

If people are focused on Research and Development in a large commercial project, it will often catch the ire of people responsible for risk mitigation.

Re: Remote startups will win the war for top talent

#26

Post by ghaff » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:19 PM UTC

"A study conducted on the main campus of a Fortune 500 company found that just 10 percent of all communications occurred between employees whose desks were more than 500 meters apart. This suggests that once companies span multiple floors, buildings, or campuses, they’ve already lost much of the collaborative value of being “in the office” together."

This point often seems to get missed. If you're at a large company, you're often working with people on different floors, buildings, offices, countries. I want to be co-located with the people I work with often just isn't an option at larger companies even if many people come into an office.

Re: Remote startups will win the war for top talent

#27

Post by jstx1 » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:20 PM UTC

I used to simply dislike remote. Now I hate it with a deeper passion with every additional day that I do it.

Other things I'm looking for in a job (apart from a convenient office location) - (1) high pay and (2) stability. Startups just can't offer these things, least of all remote startups.

Re: Remote startups will win the war for top talent

#28

Post by ImprobableTruth » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:20 PM UTC

bearjaws wrote: post #16

I never really understood why people say productivity and socializing is difficult remote. It's difficult because people aren't putting thought into it. At my last big-co job the leadership just kept waiting for 'covid to be over' and not improving our remote work culture. Hybrid models will always struggle and 1/3/1 is going to be probably the best you can do. My company is fully remote, we embraced the GitLab model…

>Hybrid models will always struggle and 1/3/1

What does 1/3/1 refer to?

Re: Remote startups will win the war for top talent

#29

Post by dijit » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:20 PM UTC

seibelj wrote: post #18

vinaypai wrote: post #13

That might be true, but this is probably the beginning of sharply declining developer salaries. If you're going remote, a developer in California is going to be competing with devleopers in Kansas, not to mention overseas. The era of people fresh out of a developer bootcamp getting six figure salaries is all but done.

My company pays SF-payscale salaries no matter where the employee lives. That's how we attract and retain the best talent.

I’m happy for you. Let’s talk in 3 years.

Re: Remote startups will win the war for top talent

#30

Post by spaniard89277 » Tue, Aug 23, 2022, 3:20 PM UTC

Remote work is not perfect, but it's better than going to my office without windows (yeah, you heard right).

I don't do creative work or programming, as I work in HelpDesk, so I don't see the reason for going back to my bunker. It seems most of my coworkers have the same beliefs because as my company started threatening with going back to the office previous to thos summer, people left, and many became pretty hostile.

In my case it takes a I have to take some mandated breaks (collective agreement). In my office it was dead time, I couldn't do anything interesting. At home I wake up and do some house chores.

When my journey ends, I just get up, pack some stuff and go to the beach or go meet friends. I have way more energy than when I worked at the office.

I'm clearly not "top talent" but having tried this, I can't just forget it.

Companies say there's a lot of intangible benefits while working at the office, and I say there is a lot of intangible benefits while working at home, at least for me. I didn't even know I was to have that much energy and do so much stuff instead of laying in the sofa because I was tired.