Ask: Why do so many developer jobs require on-site presence? | Hacker News Reader

Ask: Why do so many developer jobs require on-site presence?

6 pointsuysrc14 comments

I'm perplexed... even after 37signals NYE plea (http://37signals.com/svn/posts/3064-stop-whining-and-start-hiring-remote-workers) and never mind general access to the internet now approaching 2 decades old, and never mind a supposed lack of tech talent, nor the general trend of minimal meetings... I don't understand why so many jobs posted on job boards require on-site presence. No Telecommuting! Why???

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I wonder if it is a "reflexive" view point on how to manage a worker. If you don't have the "employee" in front of you, how do you know that they are working? Of course, there are advantages to collaboration and access with a developer on site. Then again, those kinds of needs can be met technologically if an employer is willing . . . Which leaves me back a "That's the way it has always been done."

I have been at two companies now where the workforce was split between two facilities. The overhead of connecting employees in the two efficiently and resulting in effective collaboration is huge... And it never does work as well as bumping into someone in the hall to chat. I see the same challenges in connecting individuals from home.. As much as I personally want to work from home, I just don't see the same level of teamwork you can get by standing next to someone.

I believe telecommuting can and does work well, but I can also see the other side of things. Many times developers on their own spend excess time on issues that could be done quickly just with a little collaboration. I understand that there are many project/team collaboration tools out there, but developers seem to thrive better in a whiteboard environment.

I also work in an extremely fast paced shop so I may end up working on 3 or 4 different projects in one day while pulling in different people to discuss business requirements.

For a stable shop with a lot of structure, I believe telecommuting can excel but for smaller shops that are constantly fighting fires and releasing new functionality on multiple projects on almost a weekly basis, telecommuting becomes difficult.

The largest problem is the loss of mentor-ship. Since it is difficult to hire experienced developers right now, we are having to hire more level one developers and have them become men-tees. I have a hard time believing that a telecommuting mentor-ship would be possible.

I understand that there are many project/team collaboration tools out there, but developers seem to thrive better in a whiteboard environment

I used to think the same way, that the organic nature of the team could not be fostered in a distributed environment. That was until I did several remote projects and started finding ways to replace the whiteboard with electronic equivalents. Once we figured out how to replace that with an electronic alternative we saw the teams grow and bear fruit. I have many coworkers now that I have never meet face to face that I know as well as many of my long time coworkers from physical environments. I was skeptical at first but I have changed my stance. It takes effort by one person on the team to foster the community but once it starts it seems to run on autopilot.

Persons are challenged by the perceived need a telecommuter brings to the table. In reality a telecommuter costs the company less overhead.

The root is corporate culture does not know how to change. Or is unwilling to.

It is especially strange that Tech companies making their living in the "cloud" can't manage off site employees. If they can't even manage their own employees remotely why should I trust them to manage my data remotely.

Unfortunately for me, all of my jobs generally have had actual technical reasons for working onsite. If you are working with interfacing to hardware, especially very expensive custom hardware, onsite work is generally needed. For everything else, just let me work from home and come in as needed.

I think it's just a point of view as one can be very productive working remotely and another do nothing while being on site.

By the way in U.S. remote situation is not that bad. I am from EU myself, i work exclusively remotely for already 7 years (what proves that it is really possible to work remotely) but I am capable to find long lasting contracts just in U.S. In EU it seems like it's not possible at all :(

Most reasons are obsolete, but managers don't know it. They've been burned trying to cobble together conference calls, GoToMeeting and other screen-share tools, and Skype video into something workable.

But now there are unified tools that make it easy. They're starting to gain traction. It takes time, so until then we're stuck trying to evangelize hiring managers one at a time.

Out of curiosity, can you suggest some of those unified tools?

Sococo, but I work there (architected the client engine).

From a managerial viewpoint, if folks had the skills to manage telecommuters, they could manage offshoring and save far more $. I contend that most managers have a hard time managing folks directly in front of them and don't have the skills to manage remotely.

I don't think it is a one for one, there are a lot of cultural issues to contend with when going off shore. Little things we take for granted as cultural knowledge are not common in other cultures, these macro items filter into software development and we just take it for granted. It is the same reason that if you outsourced the other way, as US team doing development for say India's market, it would have just as high of a risk profile.

I think that is also why managers don't like off site employees. Upper management might think a remote employee is the same as and outsourced Person. And decide to outsource due to your successful remote employees.

There are different levels of telecommuting. Sometimes it is easier to hash everything out in a face to face meeting. Ideally the telecommuter would live close enough, say up to a few hours drive, that given proper notice they could come in for a meeting. I could see that being abused, but it would give everybody the flexibility of telecommuting but with the ability to meet in real life occasionally.

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