Working fully remote: the dream or a nightmare
Will working from home make you a happier, more engaged employee? Maybe.
When I tell people I’m fully remote they have one of two reactions: they imagine some nightmarish trapped-at-home scenario where human interaction is nonexistent, or they dream of a life unchained from “the morning routine”. After about six months as a fully-remote employee, the result is somewhere in the middle.
How did I get here?
Similar to most newly graduated folks, I had no idea what I wanted to do next. I thrashed between pathways forward, from graduate programs to interviews with Google and the like. I almost ended up in the United Kingdom at business school. I even considered staying at school working for my data science professor, after a scarring interview with a hotel reservation company sent me reeling.
After applying to some-50-odd companies, which I now realize is typical, I landed at a startup in Boston and had that “I have no idea what I’m doing” moment. It took me about six months to fully understand the job and become a functioning member of a team. The soft skills of working in an industry setting, like properly wording an email or hitting the reply all button, aren’t taught in academia and certainly took time to master.
