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Sam Altman says era of remote work is over

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Re: Sam Altman says era of remote work is over

#141

Post by j7ake »

The nuance here is that sometimes work from home is more productive, sometimes office is more productive.

When initially figuring out what the “problem” actually is then it is better when people are together.

When the problem has been well defined, and people just need to run with the project: work from home is better.

If project needs pivoting or redefining, back to office is again better.

The further along a project is, the better work from home becomes. This is because all members of team have a solid foundation of why the project matters, so they can be free to work with less interactions.

Re: Sam Altman says era of remote work is over

#142

Post by jochem9 »

makingstuffs wrote: post #119

Autonomous working has proven to be a game changer for myself and others in my team. I can login and out when I need to (meetings/stand ups I obviously need to factor in) which allows me to take an actual break and go somewhere with my dog when I am feeling bogged down/unproductive. The ability to do this means that, when I return to the desk, I am refreshed and ready to tackle a problem with fresh eyes instead of gl…

The point of the article is that for team work with unclearity you are more creative by working in a physical space together.

If your work can be done in isolation and doesn't require a team to deal with any uncertainty, then by all means work fully remote. However, if your work is about innovation and collaboration, then it's going to be more effective to spend time together.

I think it's telling that you talk about 'looking at a clock'. If that's how you spend your office time, then indeed there might be something off. E.g. a controlling manager who wants their minions to be visible and on the clock.

Personally I work one or two days from home. Some team members more, a few even fully remote (but it's noticable that they are more task oriented and less included in any new concepts/roadmaps/designs/etc). The majority of the people spend the same one or two days together in the office where all kinds of formal and informal interactions happen that further the collaborative creative process.

Re: Sam Altman says era of remote work is over

#145

Post by jollofricepeas »

jochem9 wrote: post #142
makingstuffs wrote: post #119

Autonomous working has proven to be a game changer for myself and others in my team. I can login and out when I need to (meetings/stand ups I obviously need to factor in) which allows me to take an actual break and go somewhere with my dog when I am feeling bogged down/unproductive. The ability to do this means that, when I return to the desk, I am refreshed and ready to tackle a problem with fresh eyes instead of gl…

The point of the article is that for team work with unclearity you are more creative by working in a physical space together. If your work can be done in isolation and doesn't require a team to deal with any uncertainty, then by all means work fully remote. However, if your work is about innovation and collaboration, then it's going to be more effective to spend time together. I think it's telling that you talk about…

Or…

Just have optional office hours, Slack huddles and mob sessions every few days.

Some of my engineers…

- have a open huddle for a few hours a day where anyone can drop into their project while they work

- others make use of our scheduled themed mob sessions (ie. Maintenance Mondays, deployment Thursdays). have a problem, idea or just want to hangout then come by?

- ICs & seniors are required to host at least a weekly office hour to assist juniors or teach something of their choice.

The default doesn’t always have to be return to office for a physical meet.

There’s lots of other options.

Re: Sam Altman says era of remote work is over

#147

Post by wg0 »

RestlessMind wrote: post #78
wg0 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So two friends living in two different places can never build a product and then business around it together. They must be sitting within one meter proximity or the magic potion doesn't work.

Why don't you show us successful startups where people built it fully remotely without meeting each other in person? Sam is claiming that in early stage startups , one need some in-person interaction which I fully agree with.

As the claim is being made in the above - I'd like to see the startups that didn't work out solely because they were remote.

There are plenty of companies working fully remote of different sizes ranging from a duo to a trio of three up to few hundred.

The claim is as absurd as startups not having mechanical keyboards or not using JIRA fail miserably to capture market.

Re: Sam Altman says era of remote work is over

#148

Post by pcthrowaway »

RestlessMind wrote: post #78
wg0 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So two friends living in two different places can never build a product and then business around it together. They must be sitting within one meter proximity or the magic potion doesn't work.

Why don't you show us successful startups where people built it fully remotely without meeting each other in person? Sam is claiming that in early stage startups , one need some in-person interaction which I fully agree with.

I don't want to out myself, but the company I work for is a smallish startup (2 years and have not met any of my coworkers, and only one is in my country, at the opposite end)

While some of the execs have met in person now, the whole thing was bootstrapped by a handful of people before they met.

Re: Sam Altman says era of remote work is over

#149

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

blitzar wrote: post #9

> He said, "some of our best people are remote, and we will continue to support it always, so please don't let hating SF stop you from applying to OpenAI! I don't like the open air fentanyl markets either.” I am going to give him the benefit of the doubt and say that the reporting is terrible, not that the guy is an idiot and can not stick to a consistent thought process in the course of a single 30 minute panel at a…

I think that if you live in SF and are a CEO then trying to get people in person makes sense. If you are anywhere else then you gain an awful lot from the recruitment flexibility of remote.

But as a former eng manager at Mozilla used to say, sometimes the best tool for remote work is a plane.

Re: Sam Altman says era of remote work is over

#150

Post by lytefm »

j7ake wrote: post #141

The nuance here is that sometimes work from home is more productive, sometimes office is more productive. When initially figuring out what the “problem” actually is then it is better when people are together. When the problem has been well defined, and people just need to run with the project: work from home is better. If project needs pivoting or redefining, back to office is again better. The further along a projec…

> "The more unclear and early the product is, the more in-person time the team needs to grind together"

I agree and that statement from Sam makes sense to me.

Early on, it's great to work face to face. But once a project's or a Startup's direction is set, important decisions have been made and all leaders are on board, it's great to work remotely.

I'd say it's also good for new hires, especially juniors, to be on-site for a few months before going full remote.

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