Thread by @eriktorenberg

High-level thoughts on remote work:

- Advantages
- Frameworks for thinking about it
- Hiring
- Compensation
- 2nd order effects
- Remote as an investible category

Much of this inspired by conversations w/ @andreasklinger & @photomatt & others.

How did remote work go mainstream?

- Cost of housing & employment soared (particularly in SF)

- Better tech (Zoom & Slack)

- Successful distributed companies emerged (e.g Automatic, Gitlab, InVision)

"Soon SF will be only for founders & bankers, & everyone else distributed"

What are the advantages to remote work?

- Happier employees
- Same quality labor for lower cost
- Higher quality of life
- Broader talent pool
- Longer retention (avg retention in SF is 16 months)

Remote doesn't mean outsourcing or freelancing or digital nomad-ing or working from home.

Most remote workers are working in a highly professional setup at a dedicated office and work at hours that are optimized for their productivity

Innovation often easier in person.

If you need to do like a major pivot, it's easier if you get like product people together in front of a whiteboard and just discuss it.

Conflict management certainly easier in person.

Iteration is easier remote.

InVision Model is to keep everyone on the same time zone.

They say you can work anywhere, but you have to work on east coast hours.

Gitlab has an emphasis on asynchronous communication. If you have 3 hrs of overlap, schedule meetings then.

There's no single right model.

Hiring remotely:

Challenge is it's hard to evaluate international CVs—you don't know the university or company brands, & there are also cultural differences that make evaluating talent hard

The solution is to focus on real work

Pick a challenge you understand & have them do it

Compensation:

Some people think should pay equally everywhere. Others think you should pro-rate to cost-of-living. No silver bullet.

Probably makes sense to keep equal equity regardless.

Don't overpay them in contract such that they don't want to join!

Any thoughts here?

Remote isn't a binary decision. It's a spectrum.

Everybody's already working remote. The Q now is like, How much?

Fully distributed? or HQ but remote-first? Same or different time zones?

Managing remote:

Optimize for single player mode:

Meaning, empower people to make decisions without having layers of bureaucracy.

Micro-managing remote doesn't work well.

Some people make all remote work, some make all co-located work, and some make hybrid work.

It's an art to thread the needle between doing working asynchronously in documents vs meeting synchronously to discuss pivots & key product decisions.

Remote as a category:

One way to think about it is communication tools, payroll, benefits, healthcare, etc.

A broader way of thinking about it is that remote companies are perfect early customers: since they have higher complexity, they're more willing to try stuff early.

Future of Private Equity is remote work.

Talent arbitrage is one obvious reason:

Buy companies. Fire expensive people & replace them with people globally who are just as good or better *and* cheaper.

2nd order effects: Boon for rural areas. You don't need to move to a city to work at a tech company anymore. You don't need to move to the U.S.

https://twitter.com/eriktorenberg/status/1118574254860017664?s=20

"Saying I'm an expert for remote work is like saying I'm an expert at standing desks

This button goes up, this button goes down

Yes, it has advantages & disadvantages

But ultimately, your success isn't determined by whether you have a standing desk, you know?"-@andreasklinger

To go deeper:

follow @andreasklinger.

Listen:

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