htxag09 said:
Complete Idiot said:
Points in those last 2 posts above are what concern me - building professional teams that originate 100% remotely is perhaps not impossible, but I think very difficult and it's very different than existing teams pivoting to WFH at the start of the pandemic. Can we build connections?
And when I read "I save X hours driving, X dollars of gas, more time for myself" I extrapolate that to - OK, can we make that argument for school? For ANYTHING that can potentially be accomplished online? If you never want to leave your house, you can work, get educated, shop for pretty much everything, join virtual social groups, even date (I guess?) online. Is that healthy? Good? I needed in person school, in person work, to make friends and build real social networks. I was an early adopter in the 90's of online communities - I'm an introvert - but it is not all the same as in person interaction and not healthy if that's all you have (in my opinion). I do feel if I was growing up now, and able to give in to my base introvert instincts, I could exist (sadly) entirely online.
I think it varies industry to industry, company to company, even on the team/individual level. My wife lives in Houston, for a company/group out of North Carolina, and I think only her boss lives there. Everyone else is spread across the US. They have zero issues working as teams, connecting. She met a lot of them in person for the first time this year and she said it was like they were normal colleagues. Post pandemic they get together for meetings, conferences, something like that at least once a quarter.
I like hearing the success stories, and totally agree that it would vary by the type of work and maybe most importantly by the company culture.
For you wife's team, what is the equivalent of a break room conversation about gardening? Or your boss dropping by and the conversation turns to kids and hobbies and whatever. Or when seeing a coworker visibly upset and you privately ask if they are doing alright and they share some private story about a sick relative, and they benefit from having an ear to listen.
These are honest questions, can they get those opportunities enough at the quarterly meetups? Or do their online connection tools make it easier to have similar off the cuff moments like that?
And even more importantly, I don't really even know if those interpersonal moments are important to our professional lives. I feel like they are, but I could be totally wrong - or they could be helpful but to such a small degree it is overcome by the benefits of NOT having non-business talk interrupt your 9-5. Do we need to care about our coworkers on a personal level? Does it satisfy some inner basic need of our species to be connected in that way to coworkers? Answers are not the same for everyone, but I'm interested in the the overall impact to a large population of samples.
The rate of change is quite drastic, PC, applications, and network capabilities really only made this possible in last 15 years.
The reliance of humans on technology, on our devices and our software and our network speeds, makes me agree that we are already, in some form, turning in to cyborgs.
