Re:We surveyed 331 remote workers and here's what they say
by Klathmon on Friday January 17, 2020 @11:52AM
(#22076377)
>you get this weird dance of finding a spot sufficiently far away from each other to be able to stick with the policy and not also hear each other directly, with no latency.
See if you can talk to your boss and get everyone over-ear headsets with a boom mic, and spend some time tuning them so the mics only pickup the person talking.
That way you can have several people all in the same area all on the same or different calls, and for the most part it won't be an issue.
IMO this is a key point. I wouldn't recommend working remotely unless the entire company (or at least the department) is organized online and people are generally remote.
That said, I don't believe 100% is a necessity, as long as you act it. Eg some companies have a "one camera per face policy" for meetings. We recently adopted it, and it works super well. At my company though, sometimes a few people are colocated, and you get this weird dance of finding a spot sufficiently far away from each other to be able to stick with the policy and not also hear each other directly, with no latency. It's weird but it works super well. Everybody feels more connected.
With a few rules like that you can be, say, 80% remote and not 100%, without the downsides. Really it's all about the mindset.
Also, seriously folks, do retrospectives.