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

What if remote work didn’t mean working from home?

newyorker.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

221–230 of 260 posts

Re: What if remote work didn’t mean working from home?

#221

Post by vladvasiliu »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #155
late2part wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for answering. I ask because I have this theory that there is a correlation between employees who don't mind working more to make stock to go up if they have stock. It's never a simple analysis. I don't mind working more for a deadline if I recognize a tangible increase in revenue or cost savings, as I benefit from the stock. "Gave away" is an interesting term. In our company, stock is 10-40% of our compens…

> In our company, stock is 10-40% of our compensation, so it aligns our motives in a way that folks without stock don't have. Is it a publicly listed company? If not, how do you mitigate or incorporate the risk of being diluted and/or not being able to cash out?

This.

I have a friend who gets part of his compensation as stock, but the company is not publicly traded. There's the vesting part, which he knows upfront, but the worst of it is that the valuation seems somewhat arbitrary, and he can't sell when he likes.

Now I understand they give the same valuation to everyone, as estimated by some third-party, but the issue is that even after the vesting period, he's not able to sell his stocks as he pleases if he needs the money. There's a pretty convoluted process, where he basically can only do this once a year and has to let someone know (don't know the specifics) ahead of time that he's looking to sell.

Re: What if remote work didn’t mean working from home?

#222

Post by ehnto »

egypturnash wrote: post #19

This has been my life for years except without the “renting a place” part. I work in cafes. I work in parks. I work sitting on a bench taking shelter from the rain on my way to somewhere else. I work anywhere I have space to take my Wacom tablet out of my bag and plug it into my laptop, and the desire to spend more time working today. I also work at home in my studio but getting away from the distractions of home is,…

> Sometimes I’ve toyed with the idea of getting together with some friends and splitting the rent on a shared studio space but really I know I’d only show up a few days a month.

I am the same. I actually do rent a "hot desk" at a co-working space and I use it barely once a month.

I have probably used it more for a private bathroom in the city centre than for the desk.

The original goal was just to get me out of the house and an excuse to get into the city for a wander. But I almost always choose to actually work in the gardens or at a cafe en-route. I keep renting it because it is pretty cheap and is entirely tax deductable for me, and on occasion it has proven invaluable (rain, cold, noisy at home, need to work for more than a few hours in a row and need the commitment device etc).

Re: What if remote work didn’t mean working from home?

#223

Post by dlsa »

I get the remote work as "get out of the house" thing. Changing your workspace away from home changes your frame of mind. It can be a discipline thing. You start work at x and finish at y, theres a place to do it, you go there and your return at end of the day. Here is not there, and work happens there and home happens here.

That said, the WFH / remote work has shown a lot of people that in-office isn’t so much about productivity but instead more about other matters. But they're now wondering exactly what those other matters are and whether they're important. I think its not actually clear what the fallout will be but a lot of the pushback around Wfh is from lobby groups and office space owners, property developers and everything else around office life. All those vested interests with a complete ecosystem they've set up and are now a lot less stable about.

The other aspect is that in person face-to-face is still great. Well... as long as no one sneezes.

Re: What if remote work didn’t mean working from home?

#225

Post by hyko »

deviation wrote: post #142

Some people fail to recognise the actual problem here. I, among many, live within The deciding factors were - that I didn't have to leave the room for a personal call so that I didn't disturb anyone. - that I didn't need to have six seperate conversations in the morning before being able to sit down and begin my work. - that I didn't need to sacrifice portions of my lunchtime to grab a coffee with others and look lik…

Exactly, we should all have the freedom to choose how we work.

Never really understood people managers who don’t get this. You hired the best, right? Listen to them! They are experts about what makes them happy and productive.

I think the fear stems from the idea that people will try to be happy and not productive. To any managers out there: you have nothing to fear, just fire those people.

Re: What if remote work didn’t mean working from home?

#226

Post by ehnto »

egypturnash wrote: post #144
shard wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't mind working in a different place than at home, but I've grown accustomed to having a 27" screen, and having to switch to using just the 13" screen of my work laptop would drive me bonkers. Perhaps one day when rollable monitors are a common thing and I can carry a 27" scroll screen in a poster tube...

yeah all you people who Absolutely Require a giant screen, or multiple ones, are stuck at desks. Me, I like plugging my laptop into the 24" screen on my desk, but I also like sitting out in a park with birds and cicada singing, so I've got my tools set up for both ways.

I have a big screen laptop that has a full 10-key keyboard layout so it's workable anywhere. I also have a few tools that let me use the keyboard for 99% of actions I need for work.

But admittedly I also don't work long stints at once. If I had to work a few hours in a row my neck would protest and my eyes would concede defeat.

Re: What if remote work didn’t mean working from home?

#227

Post by conductr »

ryandrake wrote: post #195
deviation wrote: post #142

Some people fail to recognise the actual problem here. I, among many, live within The deciding factors were - that I didn't have to leave the room for a personal call so that I didn't disturb anyone. - that I didn't need to have six seperate conversations in the morning before being able to sit down and begin my work. - that I didn't need to sacrifice portions of my lunchtime to grab a coffee with others and look lik…

Different stokes for different folks. To me, WFH purely means I avoid my crushing 2.5hr-each-way commute. If my employer built an office next to my house, I'd happily go to the office every day. Or even better, if my employer built an office in a cheaper cost-of-living area like the Nevada desert, I could move to a trailer there and happily go to the office every day. I'm not enamored with my home office. I don't rea…

This sounds self inflicted and you should reevaluate your physical presence requirements but that was the case pre-WFH too

Re: What if remote work didn’t mean working from home?

#228

Post by berkes »

shard wrote: post #163
egypturnash wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yeah all you people who Absolutely Require a giant screen, or multiple ones, are stuck at desks. Me, I like plugging my laptop into the 24" screen on my desk, but I also like sitting out in a park with birds and cicada singing, so I've got my tools set up for both ways.

I'm guessing you are young and have better eyesight than me. :) When I was young, I carried a little subnotebook with a 7.1" screen and really enjoyed it. Now I have to hold my phone at a certain exact distance, too close and it's burry, too far and it's blurry. I had to use the 13" work laptop for a few weeks without an external monitor and it was painful, the screen was small enough that I have to lean in to see th…

While I do use a large second screen, often, I don't need it all the time.

I don't need it when cleaning my inbox. Or planning a sprint. I don't need it when conferencing. Or when designing an architecture. I don't need it when reviewing PRs, stepping through a debugger, poring through logs, deploying, running ansible or finding what config made that deploy fail.

I split my time as such. I can work on my laptop for a morning, then go home and plug into my large screen just fine. It actually helps me focus: multi-monitor = coding. Laptop only = other work.

Re: What if remote work didn’t mean working from home?

#229

Post by conductr »

dlsa wrote: post #223

I get the remote work as "get out of the house" thing. Changing your workspace away from home changes your frame of mind. It can be a discipline thing. You start work at x and finish at y, theres a place to do it, you go there and your return at end of the day. Here is not there, and work happens there and home happens here. That said, the WFH / remote work has shown a lot of people that in-office isn’t so much about…

I think training and onboarding could be difficult for many companies/teams/bosses to adapt to in a remote environment. I feel like many people stayed put in their jobs in the past year so this hasn’t really been stress tested. When you already know everyone and the way work-is-done going remote is liberating. Trying to navigate a new organization where you know nobody and nothing would be a challenge.

Re: What if remote work didn’t mean working from home?

#230

Post by dlsa »

conductr wrote: post #229
dlsa wrote: post #223

I get the remote work as "get out of the house" thing. Changing your workspace away from home changes your frame of mind. It can be a discipline thing. You start work at x and finish at y, theres a place to do it, you go there and your return at end of the day. Here is not there, and work happens there and home happens here. That said, the WFH / remote work has shown a lot of people that in-office isn’t so much about…

I think training and onboarding could be difficult for many companies/teams/bosses to adapt to in a remote environment. I feel like many people stayed put in their jobs in the past year so this hasn’t really been stress tested. When you already know everyone and the way work-is-done going remote is liberating. Trying to navigate a new organization where you know nobody and nothing would be a challenge.

Much harder to mingle on zoom. Introductions are a little or even more awkward. I think team building will be a challenge.
Post reply on HN