> I think insisting on on-site work is mostly fear driven.
Hmm, I disagree, but that's based on my experiences with our attempts to integrate remote workers into a strong team environment (two of our people displaced following an earthquake so we waived our normal dislike of remote working.)
Basically, it doesn't happen. You can't integrate them into a strong team environment.
Now when I say strong, I mean that the team decides how it works, the team decides how much work it can fit in its sprint, and the team decides who it hires. We live or die by our teams, and so we focus on team culture, and team cohesion, and we reap a lot of benefit that falls from regular personal interaction. Strengths complement weaknesses, teams develop cultures that they are proud of and protect, and we deliver quality.
If you're a remote worker in this environment it sucks. You're out of sight, out of mind (despite Skype and Hangouts, if someone has to open an internet application to talk to you, communication becomes that much harder). But more importantly, you're out of the culture, you have no stake in it, and you feel left out.
However - if our environment was one where we worked solo (as opposed to pairing on all production code), and placed far more emphasis on individuals than teams, then remote workers would fit far better.
So yeah. It could be fear, or it could be that people are trying to build a team, and teamwork is vastly easier when you're interacting with others in person.