I'm working remotely for a telecom, which has a strong remote-worker culture. Some people do go into the office periodically, often in a "hotel" arrangement where your desk is for the day, but I don't. There is an office near-enough that I could, but nobody on my team or related would be there.

I had three interviews, four if you include the chat with the in-house recruiter I started with. The first of the three formal interviews was the hiring manager, by phone. Second was in-person, with a future (possible) colleague. The third was with the manager's own boss, Director in this case, again by phone.

It all went well enough apparently, though have met many of my colleagues in person since then. As a rule though, I'm remote by default. It's all online chat, conference calls, screen shares and so on.

i find that very unusual. when working with someone, making a personal connection is the first thing i want to do.

that said, we don't do it in Free Software and Open Source contributions either. we send in our code, talk to someone who reviews the code via issue trackers, chat and email and we see each other after a few years at a conference.

so yeah, we build a virtual connection, not a face-to-face one. and while it has been shown that occasional in-person meetings are very good for team building in companies and FOSS projects, we do know that it can work well without.

in fact, FOSS contributions are a strong indicator for a good remote worker.