What is the biggest downside of working remotely?

I miss going to coffee with colleagues. On the other hand I love that I can work from anywhere and that I can design my office the way I want it. I believe that every company does well in improving written communication and remote work is a forcing function for this. At the same time, quick interaction across the table with the people you work with closely is missing. Also the after work beer by your self doesn't feel the same and it doesn't work over video either. This probably leads to stronger separation of your work and home friends, which might be a net positive as there is the tendency of migrating your live all the way to work. Space, tie and friends.

I really like the deep focus that remote work enables .. but I really miss quick spontaneous interactions, water-cooling and non-verbal communication which are only possible if you are in close contact - in the same room.

Being the one who creates content from the scratch and gets the whole team to assemble and stick on the same page is a big deal for me. Imagine working with a designer by not by your side. That's pain. We share the screen. But that's not of big use. Yet takes away half of the pain.

Work remotely in my job as a consultant and also with my co-founder building Product HQ. I love it. The initial challenge/downside was that I couldn't lean over the desk and ask someone for help with something. Quickly overcame that by creating an environment in our team where we jump into a zoom on a moments notice for a 30sec call to sort something. Works well for us!

I think the subtle elements of workplace culture are missed out on. I know that in working in an office environment there are small conversations between meetings, before and after work, or even at lunch, where you get to know the people you work with. I know that companies are trying to work around this with happy hours and activities, but its hard to replicate the naturally occurring connection that builds in a physical working space

For me, it's sometimes too hard to separate my work and life and their balance is broken. So time management is one of the most important parts of working remotely, I think.

80% of human communication is non-verbal. So you end up spending more time on the phone or online navigating through what wasn't said and get the 'water cooler' knowledge sharing.

I worked from home for 1,5 years. I got a lot of benefits when I didn’t have to go to the office. No traffic jam, no pollution,…I even combined working to travelling. However, I missed chill activities and hangout with collegues in the office. Sometime, conversations were lag when the internet got poor connection. I couldn’t separate my work and life. For missing in collaboration, yes, that’s a big problem. I just wanna share how my old company solves this one. - Cross team collaboration: My company allows members join different teams to work in short time. For ex, members in marketing team can collaborate with members in product team. Besides cross-team project will involve members from different teams. Our company tried to have a bot in Slack and randomly create virtual room as well as invite 2-3 people to join and talk freely. However it failed because everyone don’t know what to say. - For Internal collaboration, we have daily meeting, sprint review, sprint planning. However, i still got stuck in working and life balance and social enagagement. I decided to be back to the office.

I find it's the fact you just don't have those chance conversation starters like you do when you are together as a group, Craig

For me... its like really missing on the million dollar opportunities which used to be discussed in between running for meetings, breaks and other such... By all means, while the virtualization has evolved significantly, it still lacks that physical proximity factor, which ensures we remain human

I miss the real community with personal conversations. Remote work can be more effective and focused but a little bit soulless