I worked remotely for years and I really enjoyed it. I missed the social aspect of working directly with people, you know, the water cooler chats and all that. Working with people who I can learn from is one of the most important things to me – my brain needs fed beyond books, blog posts & screencasts!

I’m not saying that you can’t learn from people when you’re not working in the same location, its just a bit trickier as it can be more difficult to know when you’re interrupting someone in mid-flow.

I know from experience some of the best conversations just happen when a teammate turns round in their chair and starts to openly brainstorm out an idea in an open discussion. In my team I encourage this sort of behaviour. There is no obligation for another teammate to stop what they are doing if they are mid-flow. A phone call doesn’t really allow for this kind of thing and persistant chat doesn’t spawn discussion that is as creative, especially when we normally end up at the whiteboard. Open team based Google huddles with cams are meant to rock for this sort of thing with remote teams.

I designed a product for this very thing, but in the context of a solo developer who wants to pair up to learn about a technology from somebody who is experienced in that area. -> An application to bring people together to learn from one another and get things done.

When I did work remotely I travelled to way more conferences and meet-ups (usually in Dublin and a few times further a field); one time I even held an open “Super Happy Dev Castle” (hacker) event in the spirit of getting like minded devs with no single technology preference to hang out and churn some codes together. (I was also sick of the only regular events being .NET oriented).

I had a great job, interesting work and had done a good job of creating a comfortable home office which gave me good sense of separation. I lived with my buddy who was also a developer so I had someone to throw ideas at over a few beers.

I also enjoyed being in full control of my dev environment and time management. I was so happy that I worked in an industry that understood these concepts. It is such a shame when a company has an outdated policy with regards to remote workers and flexible hours, failing to see the benefits that being open to such ideas entails…

Flexible working hours is a whole other topic really, but in a nutshell, why hire people who don’t want to work for you? If you can’t trust people to work and make up their hours when they’re most productive, and to stop working when they are trashing or burnt out then what is the point of having them work for you at all? I guess there will always be 9 to 5 developers out there, but here.. at least they are in their chair when they are supposed to be right? Pfft… [Cutting early morning rant off at this point D= ]

As you will read in the posts I’ve linked to, which I feel are well worth a read, you will get the perspective of a developer who “optimizes for happiness” by working remotely + an employeer who embraces remote workers and warns of the potential down-sides to working remotely on a personal level.

Why I Love Being A Programmer in Louisville (or, Why I Won’t Relocate to Work for Your Startup) – by Ernie Miller

Why We (Still) Believe in Working Remotely – Stack Exchange

Bonus Post (from which the previous post is a follow-up):

On Working Remotely by Coding Horror

I hear this podcast is full of great remote worker testimonials and tips:

Wide Teams Podcast