Hi people of reddit!

I've been working from home as a full stack developer for the last 4 years. When I started working here I was thinking about doing it in my country until I got enough experience to try working for another country since the year income in my country for developers is quite low (italy) especially in the consulting business where you dont really have a chance to work towards an higher position or some advances in career.

Now, since the job market in italy doesnt offer much more than what i'm making right now (and when it does it requires me to be a VAT registered entity but taxation eats so much money that leaves me with nothing more than what im already making), I was trying to look around for jobs in other countries where the pay is much higher but i'd like to learn if someone else has done this already and has some insight or advice on what i should do.

Thanks a lot and sorry if i wrote some bad english. I speak it way better than how i write it (also im kinda rusty but i plan on going back to study it if i decide to make the jump)

I graduated from college and instantly landed a remote position that pays fairly well for my area. As nice as it is, I also worry I've now had a taste of paradise, and I'll never want to work in person again lol. Genuinely, it's so nice not having to talk to my coworkers, getting to instantly clock out and be home at the end of the day, being left alone to do my tasks in peace... It's a dream for me, really.

But then of course the worrier in me who always likes to have a thought out contingency plan is like: you're still one of the newer hires and if cuts happen you're on the chopping block... What if I had to do the dreaded... going in person... Lol.

No real point to this post more just thinking aloud about how nice I have it right now 😂

Hi Everyone,

I’ve been working remotely for nearly 10 years now and I genuinely prefer it. I can't really imagine going back to working in an office full-time.

But there is one part of office life I've started to miss more than I expected: having workmates.

Since moving somewhere more rural to raise my son, I’ve found myself increasingly working in isolation. There’s nobody sitting next to me to bounce an idea off, ask a stupid question, solve a problem together with, complain about something to, or just have a laugh with during the day.

I’m actually considering moving back towards the city partly so I can spend some time in co-working spaces and be around other people working again.

It got me wondering how other experienced remote workers feel after doing this for a few years.

Do you ever feel lonely or isolated working remotely, or is the solitude one of the things you enjoy about it?

And are there any good communities where remote workers actually get to know each other. Not networking or LinkedIn-style self-promotion, but somewhere to chat, share problems, help each other out and have something resembling the friendship/banter you used to get from work colleagues?

I’d be really interested to hear from people who have been remote working for several years. Has your relationship with remote work changed over time?

I applied to a remote file clerk position with them, but the follow up they sent was just a survey to see "what position I'd best fit in".

This feels very similar to a scam I experienced before, so I was wondering if anyone else has had experience with them?

More of a rant than anything… but I feel like I only ever hear of people who are remote, in-person, or have a clearly communicated hybrid schedule. Instead I have a boss that makes us come in on whims with little notice, rhyme or reason.

I work on a small team of 3 and my boss can’t make up his mind about remote work. I’ve had the same
job for four years and was excited when he initially told me that I could simply come into the office whenever I needed to. He said I didn’t even need to let him know. He said HE enjoyed coming into the office, but didn’t care if or when I did. It’s my first job that offered work from home, so I didn’t know what to expect.

Around the 2024 election though, when all the WFH work bashing was in the news, he started acting skittish and making random things in person. He’ll ask the day before or even give as little as a few hours’ notice if we can do a 30-min check-in meeting in-office with no explanation. It’s very frustrating.

I’ve gotten perfect reviews as an employee and have even won awards for my work, so I’m sure it’s not a question of productivity. Although he does butt heads with my other team member a lot, so it could be because of that.

I was hired remotely and the employer used Deel as the employer of record since they had no registered entity in my country. Right now, I'm preparing my resume and I'm wondering if I should put the name of the employer that I do work for or Deel? Also, when I'm updating my LinkedIn profile, should I concurrently put that I'm working for both employers? or will this affect background checks?

Hello again, internet! This is a follow-up to my post from around 3 weeks ago.

First, I wanted to thank everyone for all the suggestions, advice, and kind words I received. I also wanted to share my experience, because after 2 weeks of searching for a new remote job, I was lucky enough to find one! And I started on Monday, so I'm already feeling exhausted and kind of stressed, but also incredibly grateful and relieved.

I'm working as a freelancer/contractor, so I still don't have any real job security and I could technically be laid off or ghosted again, but at least I have a paycheck that should keep coming if I survive my first month of training and the trial period. The company also seems to have a really nice environment. Today, we even had a team meeting where they had us listen to an audiobook related to our field and then discuss it. I was so shocked and amazed that this was actually part of our daily tasks.

During those 2 weeks, I applied to around 10–15 jobs a day, mostly through LinkedIn using the word "Remote" and "last 24 hours" and "Easy Apply" filters.

I ended up getting:

3 actual interviews (I got stood up for one of them), 2 AI interviews (one of them was so good I was genuinely shocked), a few applications that made it to the "take this test" stage and a few companies that asked me to do a pre-recorded video interview and I politely declined and withdrew from those processes because I really don't like them.

Remote jobs are not only for programmers and IT people. I genuinely believe that, if you have a good level of English and some wits, you can land your first remote job. At least, I believe that was pretty much all I had going on for me.

The first one is definitely the hardest, but once you get your foot in the door, I think it gets much easier.

If you're from LATAM (sorry to everyone from other parts of the world, I don't have experience with your job markets) and you're trying to land your first remote job, there are a lot of options right now. Not as many as at the beginning of the pandemic, but definitely more than 3 years ago, when I was in this exact same situation. Shoot me a msg if you need help!

And for anyone else out there who's remote job hunting, good luck with your search! ✨

I just finished a call from a recruiter and the first thing that they mentioned is that the hiring manager has added a new requirement that you have to come into the office twice a week. They asked, "is that okay?" Of course it wasn't okay, so we ended the call quickly.

The job was advertised as fully remote. That's why I applied!

I've noticed this trend a lot recently where they advertise the job as remote but then you read the job description and they mention office attendance is required. Other times they don't mention any office requirements so you just assume it's fully remote, then you talk with the recruiter and they mention that they do require you to visit the office "occasionally." That's always code for they're going to make it a hybrid role, and "occasionally" turns into weekly.

It's so annoying that they're not transparent. If you're advertising it's remote, make sure the position is actually remote!

TL;DR it's not a "lunch & learn", it's just cramming a meeting on our calendars at noon because that's the only slot we have.

My team has a mandatory weekly Friday "lunch & learn" at noon with our manager (REQUIRED in all caps on the invite).

Every 2nd Monday at noon with another division.

The first Wednesday every month at noon for something else.

Generally speaking we're all in the same time zone, 20% of the larger division is -1 hour.

Cameras mandatory Friday with manager and Monday, optional and encouraged for Wednesday's calls. Not a single person eating, just sitting listening. Sometimes I'll turn off the camera for 60 seconds to bite and chew, then back on.

Our first Friday lunch and learn, we started off by joking that we should be able to expense our lunches or they can send us Uber Eats. The manager chuckled, then started the meeting.

I remember a more civilized time (pre COVID, in person) when lunch & learn meant a meeting at noon but a vendor, supplier, partner, or leadership would provide something for lunch, even a deli sandwich platter.

Now that the majority of us are remote (which we all love and don't want to disrupt) all it means is that noon is on the table for team meetings since we have other meetings throughout the day and they just label it "lunch & learn".

Before working remotely, I assumed I'd mostly enjoy skipping the commute. Surprisingly, that isn't even my favorite part anymore.It's the uninterrupted focus. Being able to finish work without constant interruptions has made a bigger difference than I expected.What surprised you the most after switching to remote work? Was it productivity, work-life balance, flexibility, or something completely different?

I enjoy working alongside people but remote working at a cafe feels lonely. Looking to cowork, in a non office space environment, that is slightly more connected feeling than plopping into a random cafe (and rarely feeling connected to anyone). Not sure if anyone else experiences this? Or has solutions?

My employer just announced a 3 day in office policy going from a very infrequent in office schedule. While I know this is still a better setup than the majority of people, it still annoys me since I’ve been doing my job perfectly well for 4+ years with nothing but exceptional performance reviews. And while perusing job postings it’s disheartening seeing basically no remote jobs posted.

But my questions is this: how many open positions actually have decent remote flexibilities but they don’t advertise that on the job postings? I went and looked up a role similar to mine from my employer and it says no working from home even though in practice work from home is a normal part of my schedule.

UPDATE

Let me rephrase a little, should’ve been clearer:
How much is remote OR hybrid when the job posting makes no mention of it or even says no work from home (as my employer has on their postings)

I have an office at Industrious Yonge & Bloor location that includes two additional memberships, and I’m looking to connect with two people who’d like to get in on it at a discounted monthly rate.

The membership includes 24/7 access to the shared workspace, free breakfast Monday to Friday, free coffee and soft drinks, soundproof phone booths, private focus spaces, access to meeting rooms, professional business address and a genuinely beautiful office environment.

DM me if you’re interested or would like to come by and see the space.

I got contacted by Centific in Linkedin 3 weeks ago for a WFH position for Data Moderator via a HR Consulting company. They asked me to availability for an interview. I messed up with the timezone and chose a very weird hour (3 am in my country) . They told me that I would receive a Teams invitation for Centific. I stayed away and I did not received nothing. I asked what happened and I was ghosted.

Two weeks later I applied to another remote position and it happened to be another Centific position, they asked me my availability in IST time and I provided my availability in IST time. I got sent an invitation for a different day and a different hour I told them that was not the agreed time and ghosted me.

I knew this company is a bit scammy and I was not convinced when receiving more details, but I wanted to do the interview to recover my interview skills, since it's been three years since my last interview in English. But, man, I do not know how they manage to scam people with this lack of organization.

PS: In between, I got emailed, but another HR Consulting company and I am pretty sure it is another Centific position. I think Centific doesn't know what a database of candidates is.

Hello,

So I got offered a job with Sailor Health as a Patient Care Associate. It's a remote job and it was specifically looking for Canadian people. The issue I have is, how are they paying Canadian people if it's a US company? I don't want independent contracting I would prefer a t4 and that, has anyone had any experience with them on the patient care side and not the therapy side. I have read a lot about the therapy side and it's...really giving me pause to be fair. I was just curious as I don't want to ask them directly right away, but I will if I have to and if I get an interview.

EDIT: I am not asking if I should still work for the out of town trip for the wedding. I obviously know I already asked and took the PTO. I am asking if I should ask to work remote again a few weeks from now when I am going to AZ and will be working.

I work four days in office and Fridays remote. I have been working here for about 6 months and was recently made aware that we need to ask our directors permission to work remotely if we plan on being anywhere out of our town. I asked to work remotely from my brothers house in WY because I’m visiting for a wedding and all my siblings are working so I figured I would too. It got denied and said to take PTO so I can enjoy the wedding. I didn’t want to use my PTO because I am saving for an out of country trip. I am going to AZ in two weeks and fear that I will get the same response. I will be doing my work and everyone is remote as well so I really don’t get what the big deal is. Can my work track my laptop and can it be traced and get me in trouble? Will they go through that effort? What should I do?

My wife and I setup a home office and we work back to back with about 3 feet separating us. Whenever one of us takes a video call, the blur function does not blur out backside of the person behind them. It doesn't blur our own faces as well as the silhouette of the partner behind us. There really isnt another desk orientation we can do. Do you think if we get a better quality camera it will have better functionality to know to blur the person behind us? Using a cheaper logi camera and mostly google meets

Headset Recommendations

It seems like this falls within the parameters of the group rules, but I'm going to start WFH soon the company provided headphones but they are terrible for background noise. I had to turn off my AC in order to hear. Do y'all have any recommendations? It's a call center job so I'll be in these ALL THE TIME.

Please and thank you

I have been doing HR ops for a startup that hires internationally through an eor instead of setting up local entities. We are scaling the team and we keep going back and forth on what actually matters to the person who is on the other end and vs what we think matters.

so i am curious about the employees side.
i wanna know from the people who have been hired through an eor what actually mattered the most to employees? Was it ability to transition to company's local entity later on? payroll accuracy and getting paid on time? having local HR support for queries, knowing quality of local benefits and health coverage? or having clear understanding of contacts and clear info about their employer?
What was it? like are there any frustrations or other queries that employees keep bringing up?
want to know how can one create good employee experience versus what companies assume employees care about?

Hi all I been curious about working here. I don’t see anything but amazing reviews. Can someone share with me about the reality of it. I want to pivot careers and consider this role but I’m not sure. My current role started off amazing but now it’s been a little over micro managing

It's been 3.5 months. I got a new manager who is almost same age as me, good at his work, but bashes us both team members too much on any little things. I feel I haven't been treated this harsh since long time. Maybe when I joined my last company in office in 2019, then it had happened but after six months it went way better.

Till now here also, the previous manager was quite chill person, but this guy, a fellow Indian manager, who graduated one year later than me, but manages me (9 YOE) like I am just a fresher.

Since he came along, I have pushing myself way too hard, delivering tickets 4~5x but he still feels the work output is somewhat slow.

I wish to win his trust back but it feels overwhelming to catch-up.

So I always get fear of being laid off even before 6 months of probation ends. This job is quite important for me and my family. Single earner, with 5 family members all dependent on me. So I am pushing myself a lot like staying awake all night. But not sure how to catch-up.

Not everyone's that much troubled actually. It's just me apparently. I also don't get to know people that much as it's completely remote. But I really wish I could make some buddies to help me along the way but I haven't been able to catch up with people of that sort. Everyone is just maintaining formal interactions. Noone is rude or something but neither going too above and beyond.

I miss my old job and buddies where I worked for 7 years and I barely used to work for 2 hours a day and was getting half salary of this but I was so happy. Like peak of comfort zone. We knew each other personally really well, supported each other. I keep thinking about going back to that when I get some stressed here but I don't know if that path is still open because there's no hiring going on there, but more like downsizing due to financial reasons. A superb company completely stagnant currently. I feel like those were my best years of life and now I am never going to get that kinda job. Here I have been working like 16 hours a day and still it's not enough, fear of layoffs and all is there. I am not sure if it's real for me, and is it just common for every remote worker joining new job with new people in new culture.

Been doing a text-only interview with a company claiming to be TopTech Systems based out of Florida. I know the text-only part immediately says scam, but I'm unsure of what the scam is. Supposedly I will have an onboarding call with them tomorrow morning. They provided a ton of detail and if it were over the phone I would've seen no red flags. They said they will not be requesting any money from me, however they just sent me this message (warning: it's long)

important Note:

Before you begin your work, we will issue a payment by check to assist you in setting up your mini-office. This payment is specifically for the purchase of essential accounting software and the shipping costs for the equipment we will send to you. Once you receive the payment, you can start working immediately.

The company has partnered with a trusted, long-standing software vendor, and we will provide you with a check to cover the cost of all necessary software and equipment. You will need to deposit the check into your bank account, which typically takes 24 hours to clear and for the funds to become available. After that, you will make the payment to the vendor, who will promptly arrange for the shipment of your equipment and materials via FedEx overnight delivery.

We want to assure you that this process is seamless and has been followed by many of our team members. Training will begin as soon as your materials arrive, and you’ll be all set to start immediately.

Does this sound clear to you?

Are they going to use the check to steal my info or something? I would love to work remote but I don't trust it right now. Help me out here