Remote work has recently become a very hot topic. It imposed a drastic change in many companies, but some of us, including me, are used to this arrangement. For the last year I was working 100% remotely in a US-based startup and today I want to share with you 5 traps, that I fell into while doing so, but luckily was able to prevail.

Trap #1: Have no idea when to start and stop remote work

Software engineers working remotely are mostly lucky enough to have a very flexible working schedule. There is no specific start hour (as long as you don’t miss important meetings) and they are free to finish a bit earlier, if they will work a little bit longer the next day. As a result, mornings tend to become more and more lazy. I remember showing up at daily 9:00 AM meetings fully dressed, showered, with stomach full of scrambled eggs only to slowly shift towards having a call wearing pyjamas and laying in the bed. As a result I needed to go AFK right after 9:00 AM to prepare myself, eat something and BOOM - more time from my most productive period of a day was passing by. There was unfortunately another side of this coin. When my work finished, I just switched to different tab on my browser (usually Facebook, YouTube or Netflix). After 15 minutes I was tempted to check another pull request, revisit a problem I didn’t manage to finish or reply to an email. Back then, when somebody had asked me how many hours a day I was working, I wouldn’t have been able to answer.

How I’ve fixed that:

• I implemented a simple morning/evening routine for every day: go to bed at 23:00, wake up at 7:00 AM, shower, prepare food and start work at 8:00 AM.
• After work, I disable all notifications and I am very clear with my colleagues about being reachable only in case of extremely important matters.
• I started marking the end of work not by switching browser to another tab, but by closing laptop and going for a short walk or cooking something (an activity completely unrelated to any electronic device).

Trap #2: Focus on looking productive, rather than being productive

Don’t get me wrong - I was productive from day one of my remote job, but I was also spending a good portion of my mental power on how to actually look like a productive software engineer, which can be a challenge when you are sitting alone at your home office. With time, I understood, that good remote organizations have to cultivate one important value - trust. They should hire largely based on trust and they should fire, when trust was repeatedly violated. This allows to take pressure off from leaders as well as individual contributors.

How I’ve fixed that:

• I am now honest with myself: during 8 hours of work I won’t spend exactly 8 hours on writing code. Nobody will. I need to take a small break every once in a while to digest a problem. I need to wait for a code to build. I need to help my colleagues. I need to read a short article about software engineering to broaden my view. I need to drink some tea. I need to go to a toilet. I need to attend a meeting. I need to simply spend 10 minutes to write something nice to my girlfriend on Facebook. And you know what? It’s fine - as long as I deliver.
• I started to personally measure my productivity in order to know when it’s going down and then act rapidly. For me, story points delivered each sprint in combination with reviewed pull requests is a good measure. The worst metrics in my opinion are time and number of commits pushed to repository.
• I trust all my team members and expect them to trust me.

Trap #3: Assume that in-person communication is the same as online communication

I’ve recently read a book called “Talking to Strangers” by Malcolm Gladwell. In it the author explains how shitty we are at understanding each other even when we stand few centimeters apart. Strip us from subtle body language cues and facial expressions by means of online messaging and voilà - you have a recipe for slow and painful disaster. When I started my remote adventure I thought that everyone is only demanding something from me. My coworkers seemed pissed, even robotic at times. “Do they even smile?” - I thought regularly. In addition I had sooo many questions. Specification was always incomplete, directions from seniors were fuzzy and code base - well, just huge.

How I’ve fixed that:

• It sounds trivial, but there are two ways, which I use now to convey my feeling about something online (to replace my body language and facial expressions) - emojis and gifs. Believe me, they can do wonders.
• When written conversation is taking too long I do Skype video call (having camera on at all times is crucial).
• To avoid missing bits of information in the middle of feature development, I encourage over-communication among team members: “Over-communicate. It’s better to tell someone something they already know than to not tell them something they needed to hear.” - Alex Irvine.

Trap #4: Don’t use true benefits of remote work

After getting over the trap #1, I rushed to the nearest coworking space and rented a desk there. For the next week I was waking up at the same time as in my previous job. I was commuting at peak hours, often being stuck in a traffic jam. I had my lunch at a nearby restaurant (only this time all by myself) and later I was going back home. Peak hours and traffic jam again. How was this new status I acquired - a 100% remote worker - different? The routine was killing me.

How I’ve fixed that:

• I realized, that true benefit that remote work gives is a space for being more spontaneous and flexible in everyday life. So I started to explore it. I visited my parents house numerous times during the week simply by working from train. I travelled to different city just for fun to deliver features during the day and play and meet people during the evening. The change of surroundings inspires and motivates me, so there were days when I worked from home the entire morning, later few hours from my favourite restaurant only to finish on a balcony with a nice city view. Frankly, I’ve forgotten what traffic jam is, because I was commuting, when everyone was just starting to think what to eat for lunch. Now I am controlling the schedule instead of schedule controlling me.

Trap #5: Forget about proper remote work setup

Let me debunk a common myth of a remote working developer sitting in a cafe all day long or delivering important bug fixes from a beach. This is what my friends thought of me when I told them about my new job. Well, I became a bit sceptical about this image, when my back and ass hurt like hell after just few hours of sitting on wooden chairs, which most cafes have. When I realized I can’t leave my laptop near a window table all by itself before going to a toilet, fearing that somebody will steal it I was, uhm, irritated. But when most of WiFi networks were unstable and overloaded I was fully pissed - it was too much. The reality once again proved to be much different than collective imagination of people.

How I’ve fixed that:

• Before I decide to spend even few hours to work in a new public place I always do research in terms of WiFi and chairs.
• I started appreciating WiFi stability more than its speed.
• I invested in high quality headphones, which suppress noise.

No matter if you're looking for remote work or not these 5 job interview tips can help you to be in front of competition. Also, Buffer - a remote first company - recently published excellent article with 40 lessons from 4 years of working in such way. You surely can learn a lot from their insights too.