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Remote Only

remoteonly.org

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Re: Remote Only

#321

Post by sampleinajar »

JTbane wrote: post #292

Question for remote workers: how do you deal with the innate need for managers to know that you are busy?: i.e. that you're not just more or less slacking off for a salary.

It was explained to me when starting my current remote position that they didn't care how I got things done as long as they got done, and that I was expected to reasonably be available during normal local working hours and respond to communications in a timely manner. It might seem a bit vague, but it has worked well. Basically if someone emails me from my team I respond as quickly as I can. Also, Levels of Effort don't change because I am remote, so there is already a common understanding how long things take. Not having a jerk for a boos helps too.

Re: Remote Only

#322

Post by dredmorbius »

specialist wrote: post #285
pricees wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has been my experience, 100%. All of the jobs I have ever interviewed for casually listed "great oral and written communication" as a skill in the job reqs. I have felt that I had a problem in this area. I have worked as a remote contractor off and on for most of my life and have never run into an issue. For the past year and a half I have been on a remote team. It wasn't until my team lead, who did all of the o…

1) I don't believe you. You're a fine writer. 2) Writers write. So write more. The only actionable advice I ever got. I used to devour howtos like Bugs In Writing. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/601222.Bugs_in_Writing Once I felt confident that I'm saying what I meant to say, I think I stopped. I should probably revisit the classics for a refresher. 3) Simple is harder. Explaining complex stuff is a ninja power.…

Write more, but get feedback.

Unselected, ungoverned, training, can simply reinforce bad habits.

Re: Remote Only

#323

Post by Felz »

bendixso wrote: post #280

LOL Disadvantage: "The need to prepare food." Are we talking about generally existing as a human being? Yeah, until they invent food replicators you're gonna have to prepare your own food. Get used to it. I'd say getting to use your own kitchen to prepare your own delicious and nutritious meals is one of the prime advantages of remote work. It saves you way more money over going out to eat, and it's a much more healt…

I assume catering food for your employees is tax advantaged.

Re: Remote Only

#324

Post by tkxxx7 »

speleding wrote: post #291
yosito wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you give people more explicit feedback about their performance and hold them accountable only for their performance regardless of where they get the work done, the problem disappears. I get the sense that you're holding yourself responsible for the performance of your employees, but for remote work to be successful, you need to hold the employees responsible. If you find that some employees aren't responsible enou…

Yes, I came to the same conclusion: I need employees that don't need to be micro-managed. Changing their behaviour (if that is even possible) seemed to require more effort than I was prepared to put in, so I ended up replacing them. However, I haven't found a good way to assess whether potential hires are good at this. Everyone claims to be an independent self-starter who is great at remote work whilst in the hiring…

This is the kind of thing you can suss out of personal references. Of course, many people will provide the best / most reliable (for them) references they possibly can, but you can still get a good signal with the right question. Ex. "Can you tell me about any times ____ pulled through without oversight", or "delivered something both useful and unexpected", etc. Anything that isn't a fast, resounding "yes" with details is probably a "no".

Re: Remote Only

#325

Post by toasterlovin »

warcher wrote: post #11

Yo, you gotta tell me when you’re working. You must. You’re on a team that is depending on you and somebody has to know where the fuck your are and when you’re going to fix whatever is broken today. “Where’s will?” “I don’t know, our manifesto says nobody gets to know when he’s working.” “Well he broke the site.” “That’s his right as a sovereign citizen.” The end.

This is easy: you call Will on the phone. You should have the personal contact information of anybody who is a single point of failure.

Re: Remote Only

#326

Post by smpetrey »

nvarsj wrote: post #207

My somewhat reductive conclusion about remote work is that it boils down to the ability to be an effective writer. If you're not good at written communication, or you work with people who are not good at it, remote work will be miserable. People who are not highly fluent in the company's written language or those with some level of dyslexia will struggle. Also some people get frustrated with the more analytic approac…

100% agree. I think this would even apply to non-remote jobs too.

I used to work remotely as a freelancer and I miss it so much. I now work in-house at an agency and everyone here fails so miserably at writing. Almost all discussion is verbal, nothing is documented and so much double-work happens it's not even funny.

To make matters worse, the agency doesn't use any project management software. So all projects have seemingly imminent deadlines. It's miserable.

If our team was more apt to learn, adapt and document more, we'd probably be a lot happier.

Re: Remote Only

#327

Post by jimejim »

danpalmer wrote: post #180
jimejim wrote: post #123

I've worked mostly remote for over 20 years, both as an engineer and a business owner. I wouldn't give it up for the world. However, simple fact: not all people are cut out for it. Some perfectly fine engineers are better in an office environment with other people. Sometimes an office environment is LESS distracting for those people, not more. It also depends on where they are in life: A person with toddlers is going…

I completely agree with this. Probably due to being much earlier in my career, I haven't yet learnt how to separate my personal life from my work life well. I use the office and my commute to form a boundary, which works very well so I have a good work life balance, but as soon as I work from home I either get much less done, or I get much more done and have no free time. I hope to improve at this, in 10 years time (…

The struggle never really goes away and you have to accept that. You will have peaks where you're excited about something and super productive working late and then valleys where you go weeks feeling way less productive.

Life will find ways to make you have to change your strategy over and over, but I think that's more about being human than anything to do with where you decide to work.

Re: Remote Only

#328

Post by jimejim »

huskyr wrote: post #217
jimejim wrote: post #123

I've worked mostly remote for over 20 years, both as an engineer and a business owner. I wouldn't give it up for the world. However, simple fact: not all people are cut out for it. Some perfectly fine engineers are better in an office environment with other people. Sometimes an office environment is LESS distracting for those people, not more. It also depends on where they are in life: A person with toddlers is going…

+1. I'm the exact opposite. I've been offered remote jobs a couple of times, but there's just something about going to an office, talking with people in real life, even getting interrupted during work is something i tend to like. Working from home, or even from a co-working space doesn't make me happy. A lot of the things mentioned in this manifesto are perfectly valid for non-remote work as well. Making sure knowled…

I tend to lean more towards the classic introvert where too much interaction will tire me out after a while, but I make sure to spend time with people I care about on the weekends to balance things out and that's usually the right balance. My week is devoted to work and taking care of the kids, which I love too.

I still go through peaks and valleys of how much outside interaction I'm craving though.

Re: Remote Only

#329

Post by intrasight »

nvarsj wrote: post #207

My somewhat reductive conclusion about remote work is that it boils down to the ability to be an effective writer. If you're not good at written communication, or you work with people who are not good at it, remote work will be miserable. People who are not highly fluent in the company's written language or those with some level of dyslexia will struggle. Also some people get frustrated with the more analytic approac…

>If you're not good at written communication, or you work with people who are not good at it, remote work will be miserable.

not just remote - any and all work will be miserable. I work remote and in person with lots of people who will not write things down. When I call them on it, they say "I'm not your secretary" - but they are happy to have everyone be their secretary.

Re: Remote Only

#330

Post by OJFord »

bendixso wrote: post #280

LOL Disadvantage: "The need to prepare food." Are we talking about generally existing as a human being? Yeah, until they invent food replicators you're gonna have to prepare your own food. Get used to it. I'd say getting to use your own kitchen to prepare your own delicious and nutritious meals is one of the prime advantages of remote work. It saves you way more money over going out to eat, and it's a much more healt…

I think it's an intended joke; a dual of "home food" in the advantages.

(Unless you, or someone else contributed that after reading and before I did, of course...)

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