I agree culture change requires time and effort, but "upfront investment" is not the same as "inherently takes more time and effort".
I even said it takes more time and effort if you are adopting it when other people aren't (I.e. unevenly distributed progress like you mention).
I think you’re underselling the impact of the prerequisite culture change, because very few companies are remote-first or even know what a good remote-first strategy looks like.
If a company already has a solid and effective remote culture, great! But this is pretty rare, and can’t be considered a general case. Those companies are also made of people who fit the mold of that remote culture, and I question the merit of generalizing their success to a broader workforce made up of people who weren’t pre-selected for their compatibility.
And to be clear, I’m not saying I don’t think the investment is worthwhile; just necessary and not trivial.
> "upfront investment" is not the same as "inherently takes more time and effort".
We can agree to disagree here, but I just find this to be a rather odd conclusion. I’m not trying to split hairs, but think that “just change the culture” hand waves away a massive undertaking for most orgs, and it’s better to address this head-on than pretend it doesn’t exist.
Culture change requires time and effort.
And without structured guidance shaping the change, progress will not be evenly distributed.
I think the harsh reality is that remote-first does inherently take more time and effort, even if some of that is a one time investment.
The trouble is that this one time investment is difficult to quantify.
I worked remotely for many years prior to the pandemic so I’m not against remote work. But I don’t think it’s fair to claim that it comes at no cost. I did find it incredibly important to still get to the office periodically for team bonding and to catch up on the 100 little hallway conversations that can’t happen remotely.