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Shopify Goes Digital by Default
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- realbarack 6y agoAnother one. This is a big-and-getting-bigger deal. I'm keeping track of announcements here: https://airtable.com/shrC1mvKjwntaqocO/tbl73UY1jDmReLge7 https://airtable.com/shrC1mvKjwntaqocO/tbl73UY1jDmReLge7
- dpflan 6y agoThanks for tracking. Maybe commercial real estate will have to become residential to survive the shift in demand? Economics of a skyscraper vs. residential are different, but the building still exists (I can see how not opening could be cheaper, but still, I'd like to ponder this situation.)
- xivzgrev 6y agoWhoa there silver. Just because a few tech companies are giving up their space doesn’t mean commercial office space is doomed. There are still plenty of non-tech companies and local businesses (like law firms) that I doubt will be going away. Tech companies have a huge incentive here - they can now start hiring engineers at non Bay Area prices. Which, if enough companies do it, means your salaries are at risk. Nobody cares that it’s expensive to live here, they only pay because they all insisted on in person offices. By going remote they can stop paying Bay Area rents and compensation levels.
- dpflan 6y agoI agree this not a private sector overall trend, but seed for the thought experiment. Recent news and surveys do indicate significant change expected in remote work changes and real estate footprint changes. "Large companies already expect more of their workers to continue to work remotely and say they plan to reduce their real estate footprint, which will, in turn, reduce the foot traffic that feeds nearby restaurants, shops, nail salons and other businesses." [1.] This is part of data from a deport by Deloitte [2.][3.]: > "In a year, 75% of CFOs expect more of their workforce to work remotely and nearly half expect a smaller real estate footprint." [1.] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/21/business/economy/coronavirus-unemployment-claims.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/21/business/economy/coronavi... [2.] https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/deloitte-cfo-signals-survey-executive-teams-are-largely-focused-on-adapting-operations-for-near-term-performance-and-evolving-their-businesses-for-a-post-crisis-future-301061671.html https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/deloitte-cfo-signal... [3.] https://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/pages/finance/articles/reopening-for-business-but-near-normal-operating-levels-not-expected-until-next-year.html?id=us:2pm:3em:ceocfo:awa:cons:051820 https://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/pages/finance/articles/reope... Regarding salaries due to support expensive city lifestyles: True, I would like to see how remote-first companies handle hiring people in such cities.
- Apocryphon 6y ago> Which, if enough companies do it, means your salaries are at risk. Nobody cares that it’s expensive to live here, they only pay because they all insisted on in person offices. By going remote they can stop paying Bay Area rents and compensation levels. There would be a transition period, probably on the order of years to even decades, before they would cease considering the cost of living in where their remote workers live. Hopefully by that time, rents in the Bay Area will have dipped as people slow moving in/start moving out because of flexible remote work situations.
- jonny_eh 6y ago> Just because a few tech companies are giving up their space That hasn't happened yet either. It's more like "we're going to stop expanding".
- Androider 6y agoInterestingly the law firm our company uses has converted to permanent remote only just now. So it's not just tech companies. I think, once the boss gets a taste of working from home, they too want to enjoy their fancy homes and spending times with their kids instead of sitting in traffic all day. And Covid now provides them a generally acceptable way to push that change through.
- voisin 6y agoHard to know what net impact will be. They aren’t getting rid of space, just allowing digital first. Fewer people in the office, but Covid19 may result in people in the office getting more space per person than previously. The productivity gains of WFH might be only in comparison to awful open office plans, and may disappear when compared to more private office layouts. There are still major questions about long term impact to new hires and their growth, where retention takes a hit (employees feel more like free agents and consequently switch jobs more frequently), etc. It seems incredibly short sighted to be making these decisions on the basis of a 3 month experiment with confounding factors (to say the least!).
- floatingatoll 6y agoTweet content: As of today, Shopify is a digital by default company. We will keep our offices closed until 2021 so that we can rework them for this new reality. And after that, most will permanently work remotely. Office centricity is over. — Tobi Lutke, Shopify CEO
- ideals 6y ago> Office centricity is over. I hope this mindset carries over to other companies who are committing to allow employees to stay home. There's more to remote working than staying at home. The whole culture of the company has to embrace it.
- robertoandred 6y agoWill they be paying for their employees' home office setups?
- troydavis 6y agoThis has been a solved problem for many years. Many or most larger remote-first employers do. Here's an example from Automattic (https://automattic.com/work-with-us/ https://automattic.com/work-with-us/): > Home office setup and coworking allowances. Working from a coffee shop? You can use your coworking allowance for the requisite latte! and from https://javi.blog/2016/01/10/automattic-perks/ https://javi.blog/2016/01/10/automattic-perks/: > If you don’t enjoy working from home 100% of the time, the company will give you up to $250 per month to rent a coworking space. Also, if you don’t want to have a permanent place to attend, you can use that $250 to pay for whatever you drink while you’re working from a coffee or similar places. > You can get a completely equipped home office on the company. For example, I got an Aeron chair, an Ikea Bekant standing desk & a desktop lamp even before my first official day in the Automattic.
- TheGeminon 6y agodisclaimer: I work at Shopify They did already gave out $1000 for WFH setups: https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/12/coronavirus-shopify-gives-employees-1000-stipend-to-work-from-home.html https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/12/coronavirus-shopify-gives-em...
- GhostVII 6y agoThe cost of a home office setup is pretty negligible relative to a Shopify employees compensation, so I don't think it would change anything if they did. But I would be surprised if they didn't give them anything towards it.
- floatingatoll 6y agoIn March, Shopify offered a stipend of $1000 (which is quite low) for workers to convert from office to home, with a note that they should take home their office workstations and install them there. Presumably that implies that, at the very least, new employees will be offered the same measly one-time $1k payment. Hopefully their restructuring of offices will include a more appropriate reallocation of that spending to cover the true costs of remote working.
- hylaride 6y agoThey currently have a MASSIVE office lease for a building under construction in Toronto right now. This will be interesting...
- GhostVII 6y agoI really hope this doesn't become a bigger trend. Shopify was a company I was seriously considering working at in the future, but this would probably disqualify them. Working from home once a week sounds great to me, but doing it full time would drive me insane. Virtual meetings are awful for me, and you miss out on so much of the discussion that happens outside of the meeting - I think most of the important discussions I have with people are informal, either walking to or from meetings or just sitting in the office and talking for a few minutes. Communicating over video is also a lot harder for me since you miss out on a lot of the nonverbal cues that come across a lot better (and with lower latency) in person. Outside of just being harder to communicate virtually, I really need the change of scenery and social interaction that comes with an office. Sure you can get that by joining different social groups outside of work, but that requires lots of intentional effort, and I actually enjoy hanging out at work and going to lunch with my coworkers. And the office has lots of perks like snacks and meals which can't be easily replicated at home (I mean I don't mind cooking, but I get much better lunches at work than the sandwich I would make for myself). I can't think of a working situation much better than going to an office where I have all of the food I need, a properly set up workstation, and coworkers I am able to talk to in person and go to lunch/dinner/social activities with. To me that is far better than sitting in my home alone all day (and I don't even have kids, which would be a whole other set of distractions).
- Axsuul 6y agoJust wondering–would you do a 2 hour commute for this?
- GhostVII 6y agoNo, but I would do a half hour commute for it. For some people I'm sure remote works great, but it's not for me, and I am fine with paying higher rents in order to live close to the office and have a short commute.
- bytematic 6y agoAm I the only one who enjoys my commute? To be fair, I bike or take the bus in the winter, but I listen to audiobooks, podcasts, music, and get a good amount of exercise.
- icpmacdo 6y agoIn terms of market cap, Shopify must be by far the largest employer to announce this wfh shift
- joelbluminator 6y agoAll I can say is f* yeah
- moneywoes 6y agoDo these all digital decisions forecast lower developer salaries in the horizon?
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- jwagenet 6y agoWhat is the long term downward pressure on salary and compensation with all these companies going full remote? It’s true many companies are paying SV salaries for remote work, but how long will this last when the labor pool opens up?
- purple_ferret 6y ago>we now have the opportunity to be joined by a whole lot of incredible individuals from around the world that otherwise couldn’t because of our previous default to proximity. Wow, so they'll be hiring non-Canadians by the majority now? Interesting. I wonder how this will affect the economies of places like Ottawa, with Canada not having the type of Tech Sector the US does.
- bregma 6y agoWell, Canada has a robust tech sector, equivalent to the US but proportional to population size. The question is whether Americans can compete in a global marketplace against the rest of the world who don't expect SV-level compensation and also don't need US-level private health insurance. I'm trying but failing to see the value proposition to hiring American outside of the USA.
- godzillabrennus 6y agoAnyone else think these companies will pull a Yahoo and undo this policy after the pandemic?
- tachyonbeam 6y agoIt's possible. Lots of people don't like working remotely. They might lose a lot of valuable employees. I suppose over time they might also attract people who prefer working from home exclusively, but they would be losing many older employees with valuable knowledge. One way or another, there's going to be some kind of pushback. Many people threatening to quit, many actually quitting. The cynical part of me thinks this is a way of trying to save costs (of renting offices) and pass this as some kind of politically correct virtue signalling. We so care about your well-being and we're so forward looking!
- quaffapint 6y agoWill they? In my little view of the world I see younger workers who use the office for a social atmosphere as the ones who want to go back. Those of us that are older with older kids/wives seem more content at home. At least that's what I'm seeing in my current company.
- tachyonbeam 6y agoI meant older as in more seniority.
- enobrev 6y agoLong before I ever even considered starting a family, I've always preferred working from home. I very much prefer keeping my social life and my work life separate. I'm close with a few people in my industry, but only the ones I really enjoy spending time with, personally. I also have a great deal of respect for my teammates, some of whom I've worked with on multiple projects and companies over the past decade. But I'm especially glad not to complicate our relationships beyond our work together.
- cryptoz 6y ago
- clivestaples 6y agoSometimes I wonder how long "permanent" will be for these decisions. Off topic, but if the permanent work-from-home trend continues, I cannot imagine what is going to happen to commercial real estate. Convert to residential? Is this equilibrium needed for overheated housing markets?
- djohnston 6y agoThat's an interesting point, I would guess they'd have no choice but to switch to condos or flats. But then if everyone is working anywhere why on earth would you live in SF. And why would companies hire in SF if they can pick up comparable talent at a fractional price from Romania. Lots of questions!
- pb7 6y agoIf the glaring problems with SF were fixed, this is still one of the best places in the world to live quality-of-life wise. Weather, accessibility to some of the best nature in the world, great food, entertainment, etc.
- djohnston 6y agoYeah fair enough, but if my job let me live anywhere I think I could find a reasonable approximation for a significant CoL reduction somewhere else.
- pb7 6y agoSure, not denying that, but I think it's uncharitable to question why anyone would want to live here. There are many reasons. You personally may not strike that ideal cost-value balance but it's certainly there for many people, especially if the biggest reasons why people leave SF are gone -- cost, homelessness, and possibly politics (mostly related to homelessness and cost).
- fourmyle 6y agoSF anywhere near Market or Mission is a 3rd world country. I just moved to Seattle. The QoL difference is striking.
- pb7 6y agoSquare flew under the radar compared to Twitter coverage but it too is on the same policy as Twitter given Jack is CEO of both. Noteworthy because it has a similar number of employees, an even larger market cap, and HQ'ed in the same location.
- raiyu 6y agoThe biggest positive to companies going all digital especially at Spotify's scale is the cost savings. The problem with companies that have started in Urban centers is that many of their employees don't have the "extra" bedroom in their house to be able to accommodate for this new work from home scenario. This is especially true in NYC. Where apartments are usually significantly smaller than anywhere else. And if both adults in the house hold are working from home, often times one of them ends up in a closet taking zoom calls.
- jaredcwhite 6y agoWhat's surprising isn't that a company like Shopify is going remote-first. It's that it was ever not remote-first in the first place. The now-passing era of startups and big tech companies centering their workforce around physical offices will be looked back on as one of the most strange and illogical aspects of early 21st-century business!
- oiasdjfoiasd 6y agolol
- testfoobar 6y agoHow does corporate security handle permanent work-from-home? It seems that there would be vastly more risks added. E.g. When Joe Employee walks into the office, we know it is him and what he does and where he works. At home, Joe Employee might have a friend who looks over his shoulder at the project launch document he is completing, at the financials that are being submitted to the CFO.
- brainzap 6y agowith training
- SpicyLemonZest 6y agoThe security risks aren't any different in permanent work from home vs "once in a while when I have to watch the kids" work from home, and most companies have long since allowed the latter. You just don't give sensitive documents to people who can't be trusted to protect them.
- kwanbix 6y agoWell, many Joe Employees take work home, so how is that different? And also, Joe Employee can be decide to take interesting docs/info for his own use, I don't see much of a difference.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- MattGaiser 6y ago> How does corporate security handle permanent work-from-home? It seems that there would be vastly more risks added. Do they handle it? A heck of a lot of companies are using nothing more than remote desktop from personal machines right now.
- iso1631 6y agoWhen Joe Employee works on the train on the way into the office he has strangers looking over his shoulder
- TheGeminon 6y ago
- anarbadalov 6y agoThis one is behind a paywall and i'm not a Bloomberg subscriber. Here's a long article published today at Vox that gets into this: https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/5/21/21234242/coronavirus-covid-19-remote-work-from-home-office-reopening https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/5/21/21234242/coronavirus-co... "A survey of senior finance leaders by research firm Gartner found that 74 percent of organizations plan to shift some employees to remote work permanently. Consulting company Global Workplace Analytics estimates that when the pandemic is over, 30 percent of the entire workforce will work from home at least a couple times a week. Before the pandemic, that number was in the low single digits." This is kind of terrifying. I started working from home a few months before this mess, and i've found that work-life balance hasn't really improved. Yes, my day is more flexible — i can spend a few hours in the morning with my kid and make up lost time in the evening when she's down — but the days stick to one another, and i'm having trouble disconnecting completely. I used to get home from the office at 4:30, hang with the kid, get her to bed, and then have a few hours to either write or go to the gym or hang with my wife. These days, work is always on my mind to some degree, accompanied by low-level anxiety — and not just because of this surreal and disorienting pandemic.
- michaelbuckbee 6y agoAs someone who has worked from home for a decade-plus, don't discount the surreal and disorienting pandemic. The past couple of months have been a very different situation than the "normal".
- anarbadalov 6y agothis is encouraging, thanks. yeah, i started working remotely in December and felt i was just getting used to it.
- tomatotomato37 6y agoI've found that my work-life balance has simultaneously improved and worsened - I have more free time to relax, but I still end up working at like 10pm because I end up spending too much time binging Netflix or whatever and have to quickly make up the work. It's like I'm slowly reverting to my college days
- dmode 6y agoPeople have commented the impact of this shift on SF/NYC etc, but based on this announcement the impact on smaller tech hubs will be even more devastating. Why would you now open a office in a smaller tech hub when you can hire someone from anywhere ? The impact of this in Canada can be huge
- adamnemecek 6y agoMaybe but it will boost tech community in villages.
- Majromax 6y ago> Why would you now open a office in a smaller tech hub when you can hire someone from anywhere ? The impact of this in Canada can be huge Why not? The wage differential will still apply: why hire someone remotely from SF when you can hire someone remotely from Ottawa at 70% the wage?
- newfeatureok 6y agoRemote-first is the future. I'm not sure why anyone would be against it. No one is forcing you to work from home. From a compliance and operations perspective a remote-first company is effectively forced to do a lot of things many companies do not or will not undertake: - Make meetings accessible to everyone - Communicate more effectively and transparently internal to the organization (and even externally, for the adventurous types) The main "downsides" of working from home (which is not necessarily remote-first) - not seeing your colleagues in person, life <-> work separation, etc. will be a new industry that will end up resolving itself. I've seen office space costs. It would be cheaper to fly literally every employee out once a quarter and throw a giant party than to maintain an office space sized for the same amount of people by an order of magnitude in a large, popular city (NYC office space is approximately ~$100/sqft/month - a desk sized for two monitors, a keyboard and writing space is about 2 x 4 minimum, so 8sqft, or $800/month just for a single person in a nice space) In other words, being forced to do anything - whether that was working from home or from an office - is an oppressive activity. Remote-first simply gives back that freedom of choice. Companies can maintain more minimalist offices for those who insist, and coworking spaces will grow for those who don't like the office and want separation, and finally those who have the space in their homes can work from home. I'd be curious to hear a good argument against all organizations that can be remote-first being remote-first.
- codemac 6y agoHave you considered that some humans prefer to meet & work with other humans, directly, in reality?
- stronglikedan 6y ago> No one is forcing you to work from home. > And after that, most will permanently work remotely. Office centricity is over. It does seem like they plan on forcing their employees to work from home in this case. I think that's the problem that most people have - not having the option to work from work.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- MattGaiser 6y agoI am curious about the sustainability of work from home for truly team-based work. I get to develop features independently, so if I am given the spec, I have no need to speak to anyone for the rest of the day except for a couple messages with QA. For me, it is great. But I am essentially a microservice with defined inputs and outputs. For the people who actually work in teams (rather than me who is part of a team but works independently), this seems to be a miserable experience. Anecdotally, while productivity seems to remain at a high level, a lot of that seems to be enabled by employees working more hours and being always available.
- alexbanks 6y agoThe things you're describing don't go away with a remote team. It's not like going remote means all your employees just never talk to eachother in favor of working independently. It just means you use technology to solve in-person problems rather than being in person. I would argue it's no more miserable, in fact far less, than having to A.) Commute, B.) Sit in a conference room instead of my own home, C.) Let people walk over to my desk whenever they want and interrupt me.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y agoBut your description of (C) reflects a presumption of what I would call working independently. In many work cultures, and on many kinds of projects, that freedom is important and mostly unavailable in a culture where people have to stop to put on pants and hop on a call.
- alexbanks 6y agoI'm confused by your wording. Are you saying that working independently is important but also unavailable because you're working from home? How?
- SpicyLemonZest 6y agoSorry, no, I meant the opposite. Being available for essentially arbitrary interruptions is part of how some people naturally work.
- rfdearborn 6y agoSeems like permanent remote-optional is rapidly becoming the competitive equilibrium in tech. As tooling improves, there is some point at which gains from expanded recruiting pool + real estate savings outweigh coordination/culture costs of remote. Beyond this it will be irrational to force physical presences (for many roles, at least) and there'll be no going back.
- 650REDHAIR 6y agoIt will also drive down wages across the board long term.
- diogenescynic 6y agoSo Twitter, Square, Coinbase, and now Shopify. I wonder how many other companies will allow this and what this shift will lead to. I imagine this will lead to an exodus out of the Bay Area and possibly to places like Tahoe, Santa Cruz, Marin, and a corresponding shift in real estate prices. No real advantage to living in a tiny apartment in a city if you can't go to concerts, bars, restaurants, and now can WFH where ever you want. My question is how companies will handle cost of living differences and if salaries will be adjusted based on locations? Or can I take my California salary to Seattle and pay no income taxes?
- fourmyle 6y agoSalaries will almost certainly be cut. If you can go 100% remote someone in the Midwest can do your job on $80k/year. All the places you listed are still expensive and if you are remote you don’t need to live there.
- NonEUCitizen 6y agoNon-compete clauses are illegal (or at least not enforceable) in California, but they're legal in Washington state. The savings from state income tax (bulk of your taxes are federal anyway) are not enough to account for the non-compete clause.
- sequoia 6y agoRelated: September 25, 2019 | https://torontolife.com/city/inside-shopifys-new-nine-floor-office-with-plenty-of-craft-beer-and-a-rooftop-terrace/ https://torontolife.com/city/inside-shopifys-new-nine-floor-... > Canada’s tech darling Shopify—the online platform used to sell everything online, from wallpaper to roasted almonds—has just moved into their new King Portland Centre digs. The quickly growing company (they currently have 700 employees in Toronto and have committed to doubling that number by 2022) has taken over the top nine floors of this 15-storey, Hariri Pontarini–designed tower. Shopify will be keeping their Spadina and Wellington office and plan to add a third location at the Well once that development is complete. This new office at 620 King Street West will house around 450 “Shopifolk,” which is what the company calls its employees.
- newfeatureok 6y agoRemote-first is the future. I'm not sure why anyone would be against it. No one is forcing you to work from home. From a compliance and operations perspective a remote-first company is effectively forced to do a lot of things many companies do not or will not undertake: - Make meetings accessible to everyone - Communicate more effectively and transparently internal to the organization (and even externally, for the adventurous types) The main "downsides" of working from home (which is not necessarily remote-first) - not seeing your colleagues in person, life <-> work separation, etc. will be a new industry that will end up resolving itself. I've seen office space costs. It would be cheaper to fly literally every employee out once a quarter and throw a giant party than to maintain an office space sized for the same amount of people by an order of magnitude in a large, popular city (NYC office space is approximately ~$100/sqft/month - a desk sized for two monitors, a keyboard and writing space is about 2 x 4 minimum, so 8sqft, or $800/month just for a single person in a nice space) In other words, being forced to do anything - whether that was working from home or from an office - is an oppressive activity. Remote-first simply gives back that freedom of choice. Companies can maintain more minimalist offices for those who insist, and coworking spaces will grow for those who don't like the office and want separation, and finally those who have the space in their homes can work from home. I'd be curious to hear a good argument against all organizations that can be remote-first being remote-first.
- randtrain34 6y agoI feel like this would also bring about an increase in coworking spaces
- lordCarbonFiber 6y agoSo all of the negatives of working at an office (distractions, commute, etc) with none of the perks (free food, good tech, access to coworkers). I enjoy the office as a perk (with wfh an as needed thing rather than a regular thing) and consider it part of my comp. I'd would want a substantial raise if Im going to be expected to outfit space on my own to serve the same purpose.
- booleandilemma 6y ago
- skuthus 6y agoI wonder how much this situation would have benefited WeWork, and how much the future of WFH will create opportunities for its successor
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- bregma 6y agoI'm glad a few companies are being dragged kicking and screaming into the XXIst century. I have had to turn down attractive job offers because they wanted me to relocate to do a job that can be done just as effectively -- more effectively even -- remotely. I spent 7 years working purely remotely with a globally-distributed all-remote team for a mostly remote company. I'm not impressed by armchair arguments of "it won't work" because I've done it and it works great. Nor am I impressed by the argument of "I don't like it so no one should do it" because I don't like commuting or working in a rigid office regime so my counter is "I don't like it so no one should do it" right back. Also, I spent a year working in the building beside Shopify's head office and the 1-to-3 hour commute (each way) and downtown parking fees would be a big incentive for me to choose remote work if I was an employee there. So good on them.
- poxrud 6y agoI find this strange as they've just recently opened brand new fancy offices in Toronto. As I've visited these offices, you could see through the glass windows of meeting rooms, people brainstorming in groups on whiteboards and presumably working together on solving interesting problems. I'm not sure if working from home is conducive to this type of group problem solving/brainstorming sessions.
- fourmyle 6y agoPeople are going to change their tune once the paycuts start coming. There is no reason to pay SF money to someone living in the Midwest. $80k a year is comfortable most places. I hope remote first people like the suburbs and country because there is no reason to live in the city with no office. The real truth though is most people are far less productive remote because it requires proactive communication and self discipline that just don’t appear because now you are working remotely. This is to virtue signal and get out of expensive real estate in Civic Center SF in Twitter’s case. That area is a zombie apocalypse. If you are fully remote then anyone in the world can do your job. Supply goes up prices go down. I bet execs will get paid the same though.
- Ancalagon 6y agoThis is my fear as well. Not only will I no longer have face-t-face interaction, and the break-up in my day that and office allows, but pay will probably decrease across the board. Coming from a non-coastal state, I honestly do not understand the superiority complex a lot of coastal developers have. There are good developers everywhere, and the ones living in the southwest or the midwest are willing to do the same work for less money. But, you can be willing to bet the execs will receive a pay bump for their "cost-saving measures".
- fourmyle 6y agoAgree, I am also from the midwest and don't get the superiority complex.
- baron_harkonnen 6y ago> it requires proactive communication and self discipline that just don’t appear because now you are working remotely. My experience has been that people that struggle with these things are just as unproductive in an office, they just hide it better. By far the most productive teams I've been on as far as getting work done are remote teams. When you're remote all that matters at the end of the week is how much stuff you can concretely show you have accomplished. In an office you can get credit for doing nothing very easily. So yea remote work is going to be rough for people that are currently using office culture to hide, and in some offices that is a very large number of people.
- cletus 6y agoSo I've now been WFH for 2 months and honestly I hate it. Work was already flexible enough such that if you wanted to WFH you could. By convention, people would most often WFH on Wednesdays. I liked this timing of people doing it at the same time. But communication and collaboration is just much harder work remote and you can't change my mind. I'm sure you can work hard to make it almost as good but it's never going to be better (IMHO). I of course miss the meals and snacks. Many people who work at these companies live in big cities where they don't have huge amounts of space and it's not conducive to being productivity, particularly if you live with other people, if you can't get some form of separation. Those of you who are claiming this will be some form of revolution I think are naive. I've found that advocates of WFH are mostly motivated by that's what they want to do more than anything else. I mean that's fine but it often leads to thinly-veiled, self-serving, biased arguments and proclamations of the benefits to everyone. If you need an office anyway you don't really save anything by WFH unless you oversubscribe your work areas (eg hot-desking) and that has its own problems. All-remote might work best. I've seen this claimed but have no direct experience with it. I do know that mixed WFH and in the office is nearly always detrimental to the remote people and the team as a whole (IME). I just don't think a company with 50,000+ employees can operate this way indefinitely.
- PopeDotNinja 6y agoI loved work from home until I wasn't allowed to outside for almost 2 months. Then I felt like a caged animal. Going outside is my offset to work.
- dehrmann 6y ago
- dehrmann 6y agoIt's interesting to see companies do this so soon into the WFH experiment. There are still lot of open questions around long-term planning, communication, mental health, and productivity.
- softwaredoug 6y agoThis feels very much like a shock response, not a choice. I would expect in 5 years a rediscovery of a more office centric culture: “Informal whiteboarding saves me so many meetings!” “It’s great to get to know your coworkers as people!” “Relationships with colleagues actually matter!” (Though i can’t see going back to pre covid office centricity)
- benbristow 6y agoIf I had a really nice detached home with a wife & children then working from home permanently would be the dream. I don't. I live in a flat and live by myself. The only physical people I talk to are cashiers or delivery drivers. If your life is further on than others or you have a nightmare capital commute then I can see WFH being the way forward. But personally I like to go to the office for social interactions and the banter that happens within. Just going to the shop for lunch with a colleague makes my day. That burger that you all decide to go for in the pub around the corner and have a cheeky pint alongside, even better! This permanent WFH is already making me feel separated and even lonelier than normal.
- dragosmocrii 6y agoI feel you. I took a job this year for a fraction of what I earn as self-employed, just because I wanted to go out and be among people. I was later laid off because of the virus, but it was nice to go to the office, talk to people face to face, have lunches together. Now, back to being self employed, I like it more, but I think I'll be looking for some coworking spaces.
- pgm8705 6y agoI definitely see where you're coming from, but remember, the current situation isn't normal. I used to live by myself in an apartment working from home too. I still went out to lunch with friends and business associates. I could meet friends for drinks after work all over the area and didn't have to worry about my commute home. I'd work in co-working space, at coffee shops, on vacation, or anywhere else I wanted. That being said, if I was in a new city with no friends or family, I would 100% want to have an office to go to.
- pickle-wizard 6y agoBefore this job I worked from home for 2 years. When I wanted human interaction, I could go to a restaurant, the gym, a hockey game, or a friends house. You can't do any of those things now. Once things open backup, I think a lot of people find that WFH is a lot less lonely.
- 6y ago
- wnzl 6y agoEven tho all those companies are shifting to perma WFH, still it's utterly impossible to be considered if you work from Europe, relocation must happen anyway. Wondering if this will change at some point as well :)
- disgruntledphd2 6y agoTimezones make this hard, rather than anything else. Have you considered Stripe? They have been hiring remote and have people based out of Europe.
- aswanson 6y agoGovernments should offer tax incentives to companies for work-from-home. It reduces traffic snarl, pollution, accidents, health issues from sedentary commutes. Its a public policy and environmental win across the board.
- ycombonator 6y agoBye bye wework
- tinyhouse 6y agoActually this is good news for rework and other co-working spaces. Many of the employees of these companies will prefer working from a co-working space, myself included. Most remote companies are already paying for it.
- bamazizi 6y agoConsider the domino effect of these decisions. With WFH culture rising: (Disclosure, I'm 100% in favour of WFH and been doing it for past ~5 years) - Commute time is reduced to seconds/minutes - Driving or taking public transportation plummets - Fuel consumption is vastly reduced, taking care of Pollution as well - Rush hour peaks flattens. might still have traffic, but it won't be because of volume of cars. like from accidents or road work - Cook/eat at home vs. going out for lunch solo or with colleagues - Work from home or sometimes go to nearby cafe, the rise of nearby desk options - Dressing up for work, replaced with pijamas! Who needs a suit or any formal wear? - Suburban expansion, city planning project have to be completely revised. - Location becomes irrelevant, housing/rent costs will displace huge amount of families - Office space occupancy plummets and thus impacting commercial real estate. Might see a plan for retrofitting office buildings into residential properties which will increase the inventory of homes and reduction of housing costs in major cities - Group meetings and gathering going digital, will also prevent spread of viruses and general sickness, impacting health care industry and pharmaceuticals - and so many other direct or indirect dominos I haven't mentioned or considered... = Conclusion: Savings are huge for both employees and employers but other in-direct industries will have to reinvent or disappear.
- carierx1 6y agoGreat breakdown. WFH really is better at a societal level. The people complaining about it are tremendously self absorbed.
- andarleen 6y agoYeah but apparently there are people who can't make their own sandwiches because that leads to decision fatigue, and as such remote work sucks. Anyway, sarcasm. I totally support WFH due to less commute time, more money saved, increased productivity and overall higher quality of life, oh and it's much more environmentally friendly.
- mokash 6y agoOn a practical level, I agree, working from home is better in many ways. However, you can't forget to think about this on a human level. We are social animals after all. You may not agree but I feel that so much human interaction is non-verbal and it is very difficult to replicate this very natural form of communication over video link. Meetings are great but so many great ideas and initiatives (valuable to your employer or not), friendships, romances and what have you arise from informal and off-the-cuff discussions that take place in offices, at the tea point, at lunch, at 4pm when you are mentally dozing off and the guy next to you starts to talk about how he is remodelling his kitchen. You miss all of that by working from home. The sponteneity, the organic and unplanned human interaction that makes life so great. That being said, I do enjoy working from home but I also like being in the office. Perhaps a more hybrid solution is the future, rather than working from home being the exception, or vice versa.
- ohsik 6y agowow things are really changing. Is this a good thing or not?
- jjice 6y agoI know a lot of people like working from home, and I like the option, but I'm personally more of a fan of being in the office. I feel more productive and I like having the ability to talk to my coworkers. I've seen a lot of people saying that working from home is objectively better, and I think that that is a bit of a radical claim. I rent a room in a beaten up house, so I have about 130ft2 of personal space, a shared kitchen, and a shared bathroom. There are other people like me who also feel like they're stuck in a bubble, especially now that they can't see their friends and family, or even strangers at a coffee shop.
- carierx1 6y agoThe amount of "I"s in the above message is staggering.
- CyanLite2 6y agoIt's not just real-estate to consider. You need security guards, facility/maintenance personnel. Utility costs, including raised flooring for your in-house networking/data center. Phones for each desks, office furniture. You need Becky down in Accounting to be the person ordering the office furniture for new hires. Sally in IT keeps the VoIP phones working in-office. Bob in Networking runs cables between floors so Marketing can have better WiFi and uses top of the line Cisco WiFi repeaters. Sam in the Maintenance department assembles those sweet mesh chairs that Becky orders and also makes sure the vending machines and break room is stocked full of snacks. Karen, the contracts vendor just signed a new long-term agreement with a local ISP for full gigabit fiber connectivity to the office. In reality, it's probably 3x savings on top of just real-estate.
- throwawaysea 6y agoGreat news. I am looking forward to a decentralized society, where people can choose to live where they want to live. Not everything has to happen in San Francisco or Seattle. Many will cherish the freedom to live near friends/family elsewhere, or in a different political climate, or with a more rural lifestyle. For forward thinking companies that lean into remote work, it will be a huge pull for talent away from companies that may not make this change.
- code4tee 6y agoMost going this direction are, rightly, treading WFM as people treated travel reductions. Few are saying you never work face to face for any reason ever... but it shouldn’t be the default without any reason. For better or worse the days of just turning up at an office everyday by default are likely over in many places. Same with travel. Default should be a Zoom (or similar) but if an in person meeting or workshop is warranted then do it and just be prepared to justify the travel cost. Offices are very expensive so rightfully so companies are re-evaluating how much commercial real estate they truly need to execute their mission successfully.
- BoysenberryPi 6y agoI really enjoy working from home however I have realized that I have become increasingly unhappy with the communication on my team. Getting answers to simple yes/no questions takes hours. Someone will ask me a question, I'll reply within a few seconds asking for clarification and then radio silence for the next 90 minutes. Personally, I also feel that I'm learning less in some areas. This is not a commentary on WFH in general but I think most people who endorse 100% remote work do the type of work where they get their assignment and then go sit in the corner and bang it out with headphones on and not the type of work that requires active communication and collaboration.
- obstacle1 6y agoIf a prerequisite to making progress on your work is getting an answer to a simple yes/no question within minutes, that's a fundamental problem with how you're planning your work, not some commentary on the nature of 'active' vs 'passive' jobs. Expecting instant answers from others is the WFH equivalent to "I love being able to walk to my coworker's desk and ask them questions!" Sure, because being able to do that lets you off the hook for needing to break down large tasks into parallel chunks, plan phases of work in advance, juggle multiple plates for when you are blocked, etc. It's making your job easier at the expense of everyone else around you, by basically outsourcing part of your job. WFH is a mindset shift.
- umeshunni 6y agoLooks like Facebook is announcing the same: https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10111935689155051 https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10111935689155051 https://www.facebook.com/zuck/videos/10111936118050541/ https://www.facebook.com/zuck/videos/10111936118050541/
- cmrdporcupine 6y agoSmart move from a talent aquisition POV. Had me looking at their postings right away [but, nothing fit my profile]. I'm sure others here did the same.
- realbarack 6y agoI'm tracking remote work announcements: https://airtable.com/shrC1mvKjwntaqocO/tbl73UY1jDmReLge7 https://airtable.com/shrC1mvKjwntaqocO/tbl73UY1jDmReLge7 I expect lots of announcements from 5k to 10k-person companies over the next few weeks.
- dang 6y agohttps://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-05-21/shopify-is-joining-twitter-in-permanent-work-from-home-shift https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-05-21/shopify-i... has a bit more background and a video interview. (via https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23259684 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23259684)
- tinyhouse 6y agoThis is huge because Shopify is a big company and will likely get much bigger in the next few years. Most fully remote companies are small. We cannot know for sure if it will stick. I remember Yahoo telling their employees to return to the office. But looks like this time it's going to be different.
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- rglullis 6y agoIs it going to be a thing on HN now where the top thread for every announcement of a company embracing Remote Work will be from someone complaining about not liking Work-From-Home and 50+ replies discussing about "WFH vs office" or discussing their own personal preferences? I am starting to be astonished by the amount of supposedly-intelligent people who are completely missing the forest for the trees. What we are witnessing might be a historical shift as big as Nixon re-opening with China, and the top comment is really complaining about some missing perks? How about start thinking of how many people who live in these big tech centers only because of their jobs and how many will just leave these cities once it is become accepted practice to work at a Canadian company while you live in the Caribbean? Or maybe start thinking that people who used to complain about H1B workers bringing the salary down now having to face competition from some random guy in Romania who can code circles around you and can accept a job at one quarter of your salary? Or how about we discuss the opportunities for startups that will come from this? Also, start thinking if you are a VC and soon you will actually have to leave Sand Hill because no one will be crazy enough to move there to sleep on someone else's dishwasher hoping to make it big. Personally, every announcement from an established company that is moving to a Remote-First (or Digital by Default, call it whatever you like) mentality is thrilling. Is anyone from Shopify here reading HN? I was already planning to apply for them but this announcement made me even more interested.
- matthewfelgate 6y agoYup I get frustrated at this too. Tectonic changes taking places but there is always 1 dickhead going "I don't like working from home" that seems to dominate the discussion. I have a funny feeling the people that don't like working from home are the same dickheads in the office that everyone else hates working with.
- satysin 6y agoI do not agree with the name calling but I do agree with your feeling the majority of people who want to return to the office are the same who cause a lot of disruptions. Where my wife works there are two types of people who want to return to the office; the old school "we only trust you if we can see your butt in a seat" and those who need the social aspect of the office. The first group I couldn't care less about. I hate the attitude that I am good enough to be employed but clearly not mature enough to be able to work without being monitored. The second group are more interesting. Personally I mostly dislike the social aspect of the office. Sure it is fine during lunch but I hate the interruptions at my desk either directly (i.e. someone walking over to ask a question when an IM would be far better) or indirectly such as the conversations of others. My hope moving forward is that working from home won't be seen as something "special" the few are "rewarded" with for a day or two a month but that it is a choice for each person without prejudice. For those that want/need an office fine let them go in. But for those of us who function better working from home we can do that. It doesn't have to be a binary option for companies moving forward of "our company is only work from home" but instead a mixture.
- shade 6y agoTo add some counterpoints to the WFH criticism here, my team's also been working from home for the last two months and I'd honestly prefer to never go back to the office. I have a unique situation since I can't hear well, and everyone being on WFH has been a huge benefit for me: since everyone's got their own microphone/camera/etc, they come through clearly enough that my captioning app can actually understand them well - typically I get captioning as live CART through a crap conference room phone. Being able to hook my captioning app on my phone up to my laptop's audio out and jump on a Teams call with just a few minutes' notice has also been a huge benefit in easily being able to collaborate with my team and talk through problems. I'd worked from home before, but never in this kind of remote-first/remote-only scenario, and now that I've gotten a taste of it I kind of never want to go back. I understand that other people are more extroverted than I am, and can hear normally, and it's not an ideal situation for them - but it's been pretty awesome for me.
- alexashka 6y agoThere is a trend among companies that have established themselves as a monopoly of sorts in a niche and stopped innovating. They can work 'remotely'. Of course they can - they are hardly doing anything :) Twitter, Basecamp, Shopify - what do all these companies have in common? They don't need to do anything and even if they could, they haven't for so long, that working in an office or remotely changes nothing. They're in maintenance mode - you can do maintenance mode from home while cutting staff/costs. Good.
- _peeley 6y agoAs a college student just entering the job market, this trend will be an absolute nightmare if it continues to its natural terminus (all tech companies permanently and primarily WFH). My current internship has been WFH for the past ~2 months and it has drastically reduced how much I actually enjoy my job. Talking with my coworkers and the office atmosphere in general was a large part of why I enjoyed my job, and that has been reduced to a daily standup over Zoom and a handful of strictly work-related Slack messages when necessary. I understand there are some people who simply like to clock in and clock out but for people like me for whom the office is a large source of regular socialization, working from home is incredibly lonely. It seems as though a large amount of people pushing for WFH situations are more senior engineers, especially those with children or other concerns at home. For a moment, just put yourself in the shoes of a junior engineer or fresh grad who is new to the job or the industry in general and remember your first day on your first job. Probably the only thing that relieved some of the stress or anxiety was a friendly coworker, or the ability to grab a mentor to answer questions sitting just a few feet away. WFH, no matter the technology, cannot create a substitute for this.
- wh-uws 6y agoA someone who started my career in the office and transitioned to full time remote over time I hear you. Don't let these extraordinary circumstances color you vision of things though. Once people feel like it's safe enough we'll likely go back to hybrid office / WFH as people manage building capacity to allow for distancing. That will be a lot better
- rglullis 6y agoFirst, please do not confuse "Work-from-Home" with "Remote Work". These are very different beasts, and the situation you are going through now is neither of those. Second, if you can avoid entering the market now, do so. There is a lot of data showing how entering the job market in an economic downturn can be worse than a few years of unemployment. You will thank me 25 years from today. Third, understand that Remote Work (not WFH!) will also allow you to separate the choice of place of where you live from the place/activity that makes you money. You don't have to live in a big faceless city. It will be okay to try spending 3-6 months in different places of the world, meet different people, find different ways to belong to your local community, whatever. If in the end you still want to do Remote Work in an environment that resembles a company office, it will be possible (again: Remote Work is not WFH) Fourth, if the office is your largest source of regular socialization, I'd seriously recommend you finding ways to change or mitigate that regardless of your working conditions. As friendly and cordial your relationship with your colleagues is, they are still just colleagues. You are not in school anymore. Lastly, things are changing for everyone, not just the juniors. Even the seniors will have to figure out some of the new protocols and processes when dealing with the upcoming challenges. But finding a way to communicate and exchange some thoughts with your colleagues will always be necessary and recommended. There is no reason to feel more anxious about it.
- kaishiro 6y agoThe number of people in this thread seemingly fine with losing 1-2 hours a day for their entire working life simply commuting is just astonishing to me.
- fulldecent2 6y agoWFH makes a lot of sense when you have a team of people that are used to meeting in person and are on the same time zone. Daily stand-up meetings? Easy. Weekly team and one-on-one meetings? Easy. Knowing when your coworkers are working? Easy. My team is mostly remote, diverse location, diverse ages/demographics. Getting everyone on Slack was hard enough. Having people report when they are actually contactable is impossible. And now that Slack removed presence from their API I have to rely on every more metrics to measure my team. I should be using many metrics all along? No that's stupid, the reason I have employees is so I can build relationships with good people. If everything was metrics and work whenever you want that's called programming, not managing.