> But I have yet to see anything close to the kind of collaboration and connection that is possible in a collocated environment.
The head of data science came over to my flat for an afternoon on two separate occasions in the last year.
Without a shadow of doubt, those were the most productive meetings I’ve had in the last year.
And that included full afternoon workshops in a rented meeting room with the executives.
Co-located collaboration doesn’t need to mean “working in the same building which the company is paying rent on”.
If we had a bigger team, hell, I’d be happy for them to all come over and hang at mine for an afternoon while we get stuff done. I’d buy coffee, order some food, make copious cups of tea for everyone! Put on some records, show off my synths. Make a fun day out of it.
So, I agree. Colocated collaboration is important.
It doesn’t need to happen in a stuffy open plan office though!
Alternatives do exist… but the “suits” will never, ever, agree to things like this ^
Completely agree that this kind of collaboration can (and probably should) be done in new ways.
I do think this kind of focused work is distinct from the kind of hallway catchups that happen organically that just don’t in a remote environment, but even just having a standing “we all meet at <place> at <interval>” would go a long way.
The head of data science came over to my flat for an afternoon on two separate occasions in the last year.
Without a shadow of doubt, those were the most productive meetings I’ve had in the last year.
And that included full afternoon workshops in a rented meeting room with the executives.
Co-located collaboration doesn’t need to mean “working in the same building which the company is paying rent on”.
If we had a bigger team, hell, I’d be happy for them to all come over and hang at mine for an afternoon while we get stuff done. I’d buy coffee, order some food, make copious cups of tea for everyone! Put on some records, show off my synths. Make a fun day out of it.
So, I agree. Colocated collaboration is important.
It doesn’t need to happen in a stuffy open plan office though!
Alternatives do exist… but the “suits” will never, ever, agree to things like this ^