How was this determined to be best?
(Obviously, they haven't controlled for variables like the switch to 4 smaller batches, and the high percentage of startups all doing one exciting thing (AI). And do they realize the costs. And is it best for some people, and not for others.)
That's an important debate but orthogonal to what I wrote. The YC batch is not a company. It doesn't really have a close analogue, but if you forced me to choose, I'd say that doing YC is more similar to going to college than working at a company. And as all we all know, while many companies are staying fully remote, hardly any university is.
Having now done this back-to-back, I can tell you exactly the ways in which in-person YC turned out to be better than remote YC.
1). Most founders in remote YC didn't make strong connections with their batchmates. When I ask founders from remote batches "how many founders in your batch are you still close with?", they typically give an answer that's 0-3. When I ask founders from in-person batches the same question, it's 10+.
2). When YC really works, it's because it not only conveys some factual advice, but changes the way founders think and behave.
When founders go through in-person batches, they're usually significantly different by the end of the batch - tougher, savvier, and more formidable. Whatever causes that did not translate well to zoom.
3). In-person YC is simply more fun. YC has always been in part about being fun experience, because startups need to be fun or they'd be too difficult and demoralizing. Zoom is very effective for communicating information, but no one has fun at Zoom parties.
> YC is more similar to going to college than working at a company.
The 3 ways you mentioned are also critical for a successful company.
1. Strong connections: you want to make strong connections in your company. That is what your network is and those connections help you in countless ways like referrals, job search or mentorships.
2. A company with "tougher, savvier, and more formidable" employees can wipe the competition against a company who doesn't have this kind of workforce. If zoom didn't work for YC to foster this, then why do you think it will do the trick for companies?
3. More fun - I really prefer a workplace which is fun than the one which is not. A fun workplace also helps with stronger connections with colleagues (#1).
My actual experience also aligns with these observations. In-person workplaces really produced stronger connections, more fun and better/stronger teams. Fully remote companies simply never had that level of camaraderie.
I do believe remote work can "work" - so can four day work weeks (probably even three day) and many other arrangements. Companies and individuals can do it and not go bankrupt.
But I think to reach your fullest potential as a team/company/unit, you simply need to spend a lot of time together. If you don't want to reach your full potential, then that's a choice you can make.
(Disclosure: I'm pro-WFH overall, or, ideally, my own version of hybrid. I can see some benefits to some uses of in-person. I can also see WFH problems that still need creative solutions. I'm also aware that, in dialogue around this, some other people might not be playing the same game of nuance and problem-solving.)
From my perspective WFH saves me so much time, money, and stress that I’d be insane to not insist on it. Why would I read a study that doesn’t take my perspective into account?
WFH saves me tens of thousands a year. Any conversation that ignores the financial impact of return to office from my point of view is worthless.
It’s also for only 11 weeks. Other companies probably want to be always be intense and hands-on and have the YC atmosphere, but that’s actually a terrible way to manage a company, a recipe for getting everyone to burnout and quit, and even if people stay after awhile the intensity will cool off.
I don’t doubt YC is better in-person, but also that your typical boring company is better remote.
I'm sure they get lots of feedback from the companies in a batch, not to mention the partners' own assessments of how things work. It seems entirely reasonable to me then, after they did have different sessions with different configurations, to point to particular points and say "in-person just worked way better".
Why not? There is a barrage of companies touting the benefits of in person collaboration, thinly veiled to just being "surveil the workers"
Is this a serious question? For one thing, every founder will obviously know whether they are in-person or not, so it's not even possible to do a single-blind study.
What do you have in mind for a quantitative assessment?
I'm certain CEOs of FAANG are looking at stats to make these decisions. And what many WFH diehards miss is that your (or my) individual productivity is irrelevant, because all that matters is the output of the company as a whole. I can work really efficiently on the wrong thing and/or not spend time helping others in a way that my overall output for the company, not myself, is worse vs. in-office.
I'm not so certain. https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-andy-jassy-no-data-re...
I have family members in SV who have started their own startup. Talking to them, "founder" seems to be a roll which needs a lot of social interactions and they are constantly networking. Right from raising money to making the first hires to finding the first customers. So no wonder YC batch finds in-person to be the best experience.
To put it another way... In-person is best for the business in the short term and detrimental to their long term but it is a sacrifice startups make as they have no long term without the short term success so just punt all the long term stuff until they've made it that far.
Absolutely breathtaking level of cynicism from executive class that as soon as interest rates went up, hiring market cooled, and the power balance between workers & bosses swung back their way, suddenly in-office was "most productive".
100% vibes and "because we say so / we can get away with it".
I understand some people are more productive at home but I’m yet to see a _team_ that is more productive being remote. I lack the experience working in remote-first companies like gitlab though.
In my career I've generally been on teams spread across 3 continents and sit in open floorplan offices surrounded by other loud teams. So I commute into the office to be collocated with at-best 1/3 of my team, surrounded by unrelated noise.
In some ideal state where we were 100% in the same city, sat in a dedicated pod area without so much commotion & distraction, in-office might be great. I've never experienced this.
Even in that ideal state, it may likely turn out ideal team productivity happens at 3-4 days in-office, as there's time for coordination and then time for deep quiet work.
The top-down, C-suite level dictates are not based on what's most productive.
This was a startup, that had one big problem: a CEO that believed he was better than any and all of his workers at what the workers did. He also believed that collaboration was important, as through discussion, everyone would agree that he was right all along. You can imagine how unhealthy someone like that can be.
In a remote world, dealing with problem people is easier. The amount of acting one has to perform lowers. The lower visibility also allows people to self organize: Ignore coworker A as much as necessary, yet pair all day with coworker B, who is useful. Is someone very loud, or getting into other people's business? Being far from each other can help!
It didn't take 8 weeks in-office for all the coping that people were doing to become clear to everyone in the company. A CEO that was manageable via short interactions became an unavoidable thorn into the company's side, as remoteness covered their weaknesses. An open office didn't help matters. Everyone that wasn't a founder knew this was all untenable and quit.
So a team can definitely be far more productive being remote, as remoteness mandates far less gelling. Local conflict often has explosive results. People you dislike become far more tolerable. And really, every company ends up getting people like that, and sometimes chooses them over those that are team builders: I've seen my fair share of horrible managers that cost a company money in supposedly high performance, well known companies, and I have yet to see one getting a Pip out of it.
You more quickly arrived at the point were the company fell apart, which was clearly inevitable.
Your anecdata vs mine? ;)
Just cause you can't imagine why anyone would care about being in person doesn't mean the only remaining reason is a greedy powertrip. You're just not being sufficiently imaginative.
But the lingering question is... Why is it that everyone was super cool with hybrid & remote, even past COVID danger, but as soon as FAANG had massive layoffs we went from 2days to 3days to majority back in office at many tech companies?
And the east coast bank/fund/finance tech companies quickly dragged everyone else back to the office as soon as we all stopped quitting for FAANG jobs?
Hard to tell what the cause could possibly be.
Correlation, causation.. who knows!
Or perhaps all the managers, typically fairly extroverted people, get more depressed over time the longer their daily social interactions are just on video calls.
Or perhaps over time it's found that new hires do worse and worse without an office to bond with others in and a culture to absorb.
Etc. No shortage of plausible reasons.
Perhaps these companies were remote for a while because a lot of people were loud and annoying about it, and now a lot of them are quietly backpedaling to avoid offending the people who love it while reclaiming the benefits of an office?
Perhaps! I don't know. You'd have to ask them. One thing is for sure: there are a lot of plausible reasons besides 'evil'.
Simply stating that tech employers have the power back and now they are using it.
Aka - the old Wall St saying that when the economy turns and labor loses power, casual Fridays go out the window and everyone is back to wearing suits.
So I do think that the debate is all kayfabe. There is no data.
They really see remote/hybrid as just an accommodation like allowing jeans, paying for your lunch, or having yoga classes on site... and look forward to cutting it at any time of their choosing, when they can get away with it.
If data shows some % of the company has been completely slacking off with WFH (or over employed etc) you could either hold mgmt accountable (but how? Fire all VPs for letting that happen? Fire all line managers?) or just make blanket policies…
My spouse is at a shop that keeps ratcheting up the RTO days “because people aren’t abiding by the current RTO days”.
This of course is idiotic because the shirkers don’t get punished and everyone ends up worst off. In fact the people already complying are worst effected.
If you can’t count on managers to enforce rules then why have managers or rules?
Umm? Pot meet kettle