I Only Work Remotely

Yeah, the assumption that only bad actors will fail is galling; the unstated assumption that even high performing good actors will never fail just smacks of ego or naivety (how good can you be if you've never failed?).

It's a comfort/environment problem, at its core. Just like was pointed out in the article.

Do you know what the most popular type of monitor stand is in a major corporation? Paper reams. In fact recently where I work they came around to people with these and asked they not do it because it screws up their paper ordering/estimation.

Why is this a problem? Because offices are super picky about the $100 equipment order but NOT about the $2000 plane ticket/hotel. One is considered a necessary expense and the other is "waste".

People are more productive when they are comfortable/have the tools they need. The building doesn't matter as much. Just an opinion.

You don't want to allow work from home? Cool, give me my two large enough monitors, my adjustable stand, a motorized sit/stand desk, and maybe something simple like free coffee/soda so I'm not spending $X/day on it. Let me come in at 10 and stay until 6 if it suits me.

At the office, make sure there are places I can go to escape from noise when I need to. What would even be MORE awesome is if you somehow worked it out if I could get a discount on noise cancelling headphones.

Pretty simple stuff, and really at the core of what is written here. The title is just meant to infuriate some of you.

There's a lot of misinformation here, so let's go 1 by 1. For the record, I'm a night owl, and I've been trying to change my schedule to a morning person for about 11 years now (with limited success).

1. Sure, that works, for a time, possibly even a few months. Until you begin subconsciously turning the alarms off or hitting the snooze. That leads to a self-reinforcing loop of "turn alarm off --> pleasure from sleep --> no mental block to turning it off next time --> turn alarm off".

Anecdotally, the periods where I've lasted longest as a "morning person" lacked any sort of alarms at all.

2. That's simply not true. Coffee takes about 5-7 hours to wear off, so if you're going to bed around 2100, your safest cut off would be 1400, but generally 1600 wouldn't be that bad either. I've also had coffee and had deep, restful naps just an hour later. If you're really, truly tired, coffee is not a significant inhibitor after 5 hours.

3. That is simply not an option for most people. Family members, roommates, gyms, all might have TV screens or people browsing their phones and talking loudly and doing various activities. You can't simple "escape" the digital world entirely at 8pm. This is realistic on vacation, and I can confirm it results in better sleep, but in day2day, you're bound to slip eventually.

4. Workout - working out can prevent you from falling asleep from all the adrenaline generated during the workout. Just like coffee, it's better to not do it within 3 hours of sleep but many people don't have the luxury of choosing when they go to the gym (if they go at all).

But what's the end result? You wake up earlier, and you get tired and sleepy in the afternoon, around 1-2pm. Most workplaces don't allow you to nap for an hour, so you keep feeling tired and unproductive for the rest of the day. Not to mention waking up early makes you feel really hungry if you don't eat a big breakfast.

This is in the context of shifting your schedule towards being an early-riser, so I imagine you'd be going to bed at no later then 10pm, not much more than the 90 minutes you are thinking of.

Never had problems explaining to the kids I'm unavailable during work time. You pretty much need a separate office room, of course.

Home time and work time do end up hopelessly intermingled, but it works both ways. The extra flexibility ends up giving me more time with my kids, I think.