[LRUG] [JOBS] Freelancer. And some reflections.

Mon Feb 27 03:10:36 PST 2017

Wanted to say that I think Jon is exactly right. I'm lucky enough to be
a part time remote freelancer in another country at the moment and the
process with my client is superb because all tasks are documented, all
code goes through PR review, and any questions are handled
asynchronously through Slack or ticket comments. Of course I miss out a
bit on the company culture and various informal discussions.

I also have a lot of experience working on-site in open plan offices
where things are poorly documented and team members frequently
interrupted one another to discuss things in person. I've found that
often the critical knowledge accumulates to a  "super" dev who knows
everything by virtue of being there the longest. They end up constantly
having to answer questions or become a bottleneck when they are
unavailable.

Neither is perfect for every situation. A rapid prototype is probably
going to benefit from a small team sitting next to each other. But for
most things I think that it's purely down to process whether remote
workers can be beneficial or not.

(full disclosure, I'm also looking for p/t remote or on-site Berlin work
at the moment! :D)

Andrew

@odaeus

On Mon, 27 Feb 2017, at 11:52, Jon Wood wrote:

> My feeling from what people have said so far is that reactions to
> remote work, working from a different timezone, and working part time
> all boil down to the same questions of how one works with somebody who
> isn't currently sitting next to you so you can walk over and ask them
> questions. The answer to that in my experience is to make sure
> everything is properly documented - with a co-located fulltime team
> you can get away with building something and assuming people will come
> and ask you if anything needs clarifying, that's much less true if the
> person who built the feature is now off work until Thursday.
> 

> The nice thing is that once you have developed a culture of properly
> documenting everything and making sure all communication happens using
> mediums that can be searched you also deal with the other
> circumstances in which you find you can't just walk over to somebody.
> Holidays, maternity leave, people leaving the company. Situations in
> which you can't just ask somebody about their code aren't unique to
> companies with remote employees, they're just surfaced earlier and
> more frequently.
> 

> On Mon, 27 Feb 2017 at 10:40 Patrick Gleeson
> <patrick at gojimo.co.uk> wrote:
>> Re the bit of the question about part-timers, I have to say that the
>> various times I've been looking for a coder I've never even
>> considered part-time developers. The reason being, I'm always hiring
>> someone to be part of a team (even when it's a teeny tiny team). When
>> a team of coders works together it's a very involved, collaborative
>> process. You can make it work if people are remote, as long as you
>> have good communication hygiene, but having someone who's not
>> available 2 days a week? That really messes with the dynamic, both on
>> a practical level ("WhyTF did they do it like this?" / "Dunno, and we
>> can only ask them when they're back in on Thursday, so you'd better
>> not touch that class until then."), and more importantly on a
>> psychological one: people are tribal, and if you're not fully in the
>> tribe you're an outsider.
>> Of course, if the whole team worked part-time, with the same days
>> off, you'd sidestep that. But even if the feel-good factor offset
>> some of the lost hours, your output will still drop, and I've never
>> worked for a company that wasn't in a desperate hurry to get stuff
>> done....
>> 

>> 

>> On 27 February 2017 at 10:23, Thomas Buckley-Houston
>> <tom at tombh.co.uk> wrote:
>>> Wow Evgeny, I really appreciate the feedback. It gives me a
>>> much more
>>>  digestible perspective than, "no, sorry, not at the moment"
>>>  (which is
>>>  of course a legitimate response itself).

>>> 

>>>  I should have mentioned though that all the places I'm applying

>>>  clearly express remote focuses or remote friendliness. So I totally
>>>  understand your preference for face to face, it's a basic human
>>>  medium
>>>  we've evolved over millions of years. And I love your;

>>>
>>>  > I need a person who will look at the company and figure out how
>>>  > to prevent half the tickets from appearing.
>>>
>>> Also perhaps I could make clearer that I'm not just looking
>>> for short
>>>  term contracts. I'd love a permanent part time role, I just have no
>>>  need for the kind of money full time involves.

>>> 

>>>  Anyway, like I said, this is such a first-world problem. But
>>>  still I
>>>  very much appreciate the feedback.

>>> 

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>> 

>> 

>> 

>> -- 

>> *Patrick Gleeson*

>> Senior Ruby Developer

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