Why Remote Work Should Change Startup Culture

Someone's ability to adapt shows tactical proficiency. Particularly in an engineering environment I would put a high premium on tactical proficiency because the objectives are typically explicit and linear.

Culture fit speaks to traits like open-mindedness, inclusion and confidence in leadership. These are less linear, but no less important.

I would like to hear more from jcadam about the culture fit judgment he experienced. Was it really that you were not like them, or was it that you are from, and fit better with a different culture?

Culture fit isn't about listening to the same music, or what you do on a Friday night. It's a less tangible, but collective agreement about purpose and objective. I am from the Midwest (Ohio), and I have worked in Manhattan and Los Angeles over a couple of decades at a couple of different companies. I am aware of a distinct difference between East and West coast culture and thinking, and likewise, Ohio culture and thinking.

None of this is meant to judge superiority of any culture over another. Simply, if you are seeking to optimize an entire organization for the best possible results in working towards your objectives, culture fit is relevant.

I'm curious whether you find hipchat / slack to actually be less intrusive. In my experience, working from home can result in protracted text conversations causing me to stay less focused for longer periods of time. In the office, I can usually stop, take off the headphones, resolve their problem, refill my coffee and then get back to work in less time.

I spent the past two years working remote, and at this point I don't think I would ever want to do it again. Something I don't think I've ever really seen mentioned about working from home is that it can be incredibly isolating and overall mentally unhealthy. The isolation, lack of separation of work and home environment (in the physical sense), and even weird hours caused me to become very depressed and unstable.

In my case, my company was still located in-town and I even had weekly lunch/beer meetings. I pushed myself to get out and socialize with my friends, co-workers, and girlfriend several times a week. I still don't quite know what it is about working in an office with other people does that wasn't being replicated, but there's something there for me.

As far as the physical environment goes, I spent enough time reading different folks strategies. I tried many different strategies as well. I tried having normal office hours and a normal (home) office. I tried just floating about the house, working wherever I felt like. I tried working from coffee shops, bars, parks, and so forth. I tried working in blocks of time, all at once, having an inverted sleep schedule. As mentioned, I even had an actual company office I could work from. Still, I came to have a certain feeling of disdain, of wanting to escape the office at the end of a day of work. The only problem was my office was my home. You can't run from that.

I will say the convenience of having a flexible schedule is amazing. Being able to run errands as needed, or just go to the beach for a couple hours on a Tuesday because "why not" is great. However I always felt a bit weird about things, because "normal" people are in an office that I'm somehow doing something weird or wrong by being out and about during non-traditional hours. And of course among your friends and family there's always a little gentle chiding about how "You don't really work/have a real job", in a semi-jealous but not actually hostile way.

Working from home can be great, and I would enjoy the flexibility to do it a day here and there as needed. What I cannot do is work from home permanently.