I actually enjoy regularly seeing the people I work with, and working in the office is somehow less distracting sometimes than working at home (where the desire to do anything but work is a bit higher).<p>Also, this title should have a 'Ask HN'.
As a remote worker of 6 years whose recently spent two weeks having to commute in the city. Thank god for my 30 foot commute from bed to across the hallway into the office.<p>Really wish the government would start forcing employers to pay employees for their average commute times. Would really encourage allowing remote work or relocation into smaller residential areas. It's hard to fathom why being stuck in traffic isn't considered work. Certainly feels like it.
Does any engineer over mid-level actually still code for most of their day? I'm sure there are exceptions, but most senior engineers I've worked with spend most of their time communicating with other teams, laying out architecture, and code reviews.
Been working remotely for 7 years. Started to think I might want to work in an office so I interviewed for an on site position. On the drive there I got stuck in traffic. On the drive back the same. Cured me of that idea real fast.
I've been working remotely for 2 years now and have begun to crave an on-site job. I'm rejecting remote offers nowadays because I really want to move to a different country and work with great engineers in an office where we can talk in person and not over Slack all the time.<p>It gets tedious and lonely when the nerdiest person I know around me is me. I can't even talk to my friends or family about the clever hacks I did because they couldn't begin to understand the complexity. I mean, sure, I give dumbed down versions all the time: but they're always met with a customary pat on the back (with a smile) and we move onto another topic that we all know very well.
Thanks for all the replies everybody. My bad for missing the “Ask HN” part, kind of posted this pretty fast. Yeah, I think that for me the pro that I give to working on site is the social aspect of it. But as far as productivity, I get much more done when I’m working from home. I also think that less people driving for god knows how many hours a year would also bring a million other collateral benefits for everybody. I live in Miami and I think about the infrastructure that we have for the number of people that live here, and it just seems crazy that it hasn’t improved at all in the 8 years I’ve been here. Hopefully autonomous cars + hyperloop really take off pretty soon. Anyway, thanks again for your thoughts on this random end of the day question ;)
As a remote worker of over 12 years I'm definitely enjoying getting back to in person interaction, especially during the colder months when people socialize a lot less. A mix of going to an office and working at home is hard to beat.
Because employers is hiring your service base on time and not according to delivery.<p>Need to devise a system where programmers are paid base on deliveries and not time.<p>It's also more fair to be paid base on deliveries instead of time.
Was a remote programmer but I thought I needed human interaction to keep me sane but I think the horrible traffic is doing the opposite of my goal.<p>Suddenly, doing remote work and feeling like a shut-in is so much more comfortable.
Why we are going to the office? In most cases I saw it's because management wants to have more control, more performance and possibility to change our environment in any moment. Also most of the employers want us to work same amount of time daily and for all of the week. If it changes it will only if goverment will change the law or something big happens. It is simply more profitable for employers and they have upper hand for most of the people.
As people in a world of machines and computers and extremely efficient farming, why are we still working 8hrs a day 5 days a week for food and shelter?
Without office space there is no networking. Without networking there is no real means to find a better job when the time is to move on. Humans are meant to collaborate and share perspectives. But again, it depends on what career path you choose on the next venture.
It takes time expertise and investment to actually effectively track programmer productivity.<p>A lot of organizations don't have the resources to do that, so time in seat and making sure your workers seem productive is a decent alternative.
I’m a consultant and I usually work alone in my own office (near home) but it’s nice to visit clients where I work on site for a few weeks once in a while. I would hate it if there was a big commute though.
I know I’m certainly not. I work for a major bank in Canada in their iOS application and we have one of the most robust remote working situations I’ve seen.