Meet my supervisor
Do you ever imagined what is like to work alone in an office doing remote work?
If you never did it. Its not as good as you might have imagined it.
The "guy" in the photo is my company on most days.. and yes he doesn't talk that much.
I work for a really small startup as a fresh graduate from bsc in computer science. Not that fresh as Ive worked before in many different areas unrelated to software engineering.
Currently undertaking an Msc in Software engineering I believe this place to be great to work in terms of learning, at least for the technologies and paradigms I get to work with. But the lack of people to talk to, and discuss ideas and difficulties, is starting to take a toll on me. Its not that Im alone all days but most probably 4 out of 5 business days, something that can be really depressing for someone as me and most of all because its giving me lack of social skills to interact with people in the same field of expertise.
Worst of all. I don't know how many of you actually take job conversations in a remote manner, but sometimes it generates a lot of misunderstandings and some friction as you don't actually get a semantical meaning derived from expressions, tones and others, especially
If you use textual means of conversation, instead video conference or others.
This is also aggravated by the fact that the real supervisor is not that easy to take on person as well so that contributes to a negative feeling on each conversation.
Not everything is terrible. I don't actually work at home. I work in an office that is located inside a startup incubator but I dont actually get to talk to other people, besides the cafeteria staff because its not an open space incubator, but I get to leave out of the house and be in a space amongst humans.
Despite all this I believe Im capable of taking my life as a remote worker, if I worked for the right motivations(yes I also mean money) and projects. Though none of those seem to be in "the contract" as of now.
And you, are you a remote worker? Would you like to be one? Do you see yourself doing it your whole life.?
Share your experience with me, maybe It could motivate me
PS:
Actually java is not currently what I actually work with despite what the "supervisor t-shirt" says, so no dependencies being managed by jfrog.
I work mostly with python, shell script, docker and other stuff. Mostly devops stuff.
I've worked remotely from home for over 6 years now. I've found it to be liberating. I can run errands, be with my family more, and take plenty of time for myself (like on Steemit). I suggest four things to help you be successful at it:
Always get your work assignments done on time and at high quality. If you deliver everything that is asked of you, it will be much harder to question your ability to work remotely.
Respond immediately to phone calls and emails (as much as possible without putting at risk #1). This will make it seem like your right there with them, ready to help at any moment, not like some guy working in who knows where who takes forever to respond.
Be willing to take calls and answer emails outside of regular hours (occassionally, don't make this a habit). When you tell someone, sure, give me a call at 6 pm and I'll be happy to help, they'll be greatly appreciative and your remoteness won't be noticed.
Finally, I suggest reading the book the "4 hour work week". There is some discussion about working remotely and how to be effective while reducing your workload.
Thank you for answering and share your experiences. Will check out the book you mention.
I believe it could be just an adapting phase even though as in my past jobs i've always worked with the public and had coworkers.
I dont actually have a schedule but its expected a certain timeframe, so can't really run for errands whenever I please. And to keep my self sane I actually have a timed routine.