Everywhere you look there’s always something remotely new showing up. Pun intended. It’s the new Holy Grail that a lot of people are pursuing and their most utter deep desire. Live with no schedules, live without being stuck to a place. Work when, where and how you want to.
Is Remote Work, the new final and the most desirable goal you should have for your life or career? We don’t know the correct answer, yet. But we believe that work is not a place, not a schedule and not for life. And on that, we strongly align our vision that the future of work is not only but also Remote.
Technology deeply changed some of the roots in which our society was built for generations. It broke and is still breaking barriers, and specifically, in this case, the physical ones. Thanks to all the different technology resources you have available now, it is not mandatory for you to be physically in the same space as the rest of your team. So if you can be working from a balcony with an amazing ocean view, why shouldn’t you?
We want to help you understand it and demystify Remote Work for you, so below we’re sharing three perks and three challenges of working remotely. We hope to enlighten you a little bit and help you understand that Remote Work is more than work, it has a specific purpose and also great potential.
The Perks
- You work from wherever you wish to
We spoke about it above, but of course, we have to mention it here again. After all, if you search for the formal definition in the dictionary for the word remote, the result shows that it means to be “situated far from the main centers of population; distant”. This means that you can choose to be working far from the place where you were born, where you grew, or from the city where your colleagues that prefer to work in the office are based.
- You set most of the rules
Are you an Early Bird? Are you a Night Owl? It doesn’t matter. As long as you can get a communication flow going with the rest of your team (if you have one), you can adapt your working hours to whatever suits you the most. This is usually a big plus for people that have specific more productive periods during the day since they can adapt their working hours to those specific high-productivity peaks.
- You’ll be more independent
This applies to several and different areas of your life. You won’t need to commute every day, so you’re not dependent on any means of transportation. You’ll save money since you won’t be spending it on tickets and most of your lunches will be in your own house. You’ll be working without anyone physically there with you so you’ll end up trying to fix that bug or learn that new trick on your own.
But of course, that it’s not all a “bed of roses”, despite the Bon Jovi song. So let’s see the other side of the picture.
The Challenges
- You’ll have less social interaction
You will not be in a physical office together with more 5, 10, 100 people. That means you’ll lose all the social interaction that comes with office work. You won’t have team lunches, your side desk colleagues or that physical standup daily meeting that you’re used to by now, with the classic manager ice breaker dad joke. And you won’t meet your new colleagues straight when they join the team.
- You may have a hard time finding the right workspace
Should you get a standing desk? Should you work on your sofa? Should you separate your working space from the living room in your house? And if you’re traveling, will you find that amazing coffee with a good wifi connection that won’t be breaking every time you join a call? It will matter whether you’ll want to set yourself with a nice home office, with comfortable and ergonomic equipment, and of course with a reliable Internet connection.
- You’ll have to get your work-life balance straight
When working in a physical office, you end up having specific and usual hours that you’ll be starting and finishing your work. You get used to set your schedule around your commuting hours and think about exceptions to the usual working hours on the days. But if you don’t have to commute and you don’t need to catch that train or bus, will you be able to set the limits right? You’ll have several distractions at your own house. Can you beat them?
As with everything in life, when you think about Remote Work, you’ll always have the good things and the associated challenges around it. With the points we raised above, we want to help you understand and think if working remotely is for you. Of course, the perks are great, but we believe that you should aim to comprehend if working remotely is the right solution for you.
Are you ready for it? If you are, check our remote job positions here.
Aim for more,
João Ramadas
Remote Market Lead
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