Mostly around communication. Slack and IMs and video chat are great and all, but you can move way more information and have it be received much more clearly in person. There also can be a feeling of isolation, depending on how teams are structured and how many employees at the company are remote.
Also, there is no "going to the bar after work for a couple beers", which for many is fine. But still humans require some measure of being physically near other humans, so you need to be much more proactive about socializing and seeing friends/family. If you aren't diligent about this you can become kind of a hermit. If you have young kids this is probably not a big deal, you'd be too busy anyway.
Plus, like I mentioned before, you're now on the hook for the office space. Working remotely can lead you to justify paying for more house or apartment than you otherwise would have, because "well I need an extra room for my office". The freedom it affords is quite nice, so many would probably be fine with the extra outlay. But you should be clear about what you're paying for, and why.
Hey there. Those are some awesome points you make and something we definitely try to be mindful about at buffer. Before I jump into them I'd love to note something about the parent post which talks about cost being the reason. While cost was definitely something looked at, I feel like the overall decision was much greater than that. It was a commitment to being a fully remote team. Like the post mentions, mixing remote and non remote might not be a great idea since communication can suddenly happen off the remote channels. And that's lost information. (That's just one reason :D ) It's perfectly natural for that to happen and ensuring we all truly embrace remote working was I believe the true deciding factor for this. Cost was mostly an awesome justification point to close the case.
So about the disadvantages :).
Having worked in multiple types of non remote places (closed plan, open noisy, open quiet), my feeling so far is that the information flow has never been inferior. It's been equal and in many cases better. A lot of this boils down to the hiring process that buffer has where over a 45 day trial period, we ensure people can handle this type of work style. A lot of the focus during this period is communication. Even the parts about isolation. We like to ensure that people have found their stride in this aspect and they know how to handle it. So far, I believe it's worked. When I have something immediate to ask, I jump on slack. When I have something I'd like a more asynchronous communication to happen around, we use discourse. Our team discovered that we are more productive by ditching the daily video call in favour of using a daily updated Dropbox paper. So that's how we've tackled this very valid concern and so far, it feels like it's working well.
About being diligent about not turning into a hermit, spot on! Many of the team members take breaks during the middle of the day to shift locations, do a run, or even pop into a fitness training/yoga session. It's encouraged and it works well.
About being on the hook for office space, if a co working location works for you (or sharing office space) buffer even offers to reimburse this (including additional net connectivity that you might need to get to ensure smooth communication as you move around).
So yea, all valid concerns and these are how we move around them. Would love to hear your thoughts on this. It's a lot of work for sure, but we do love it and we all jump in to make sure everyone has a good time. The company is extremely supportive and I think that's essential for remote working environments like this :)
Regarding coworking reimbursement, what are the bounds? It's possible that you could easily go over your prior office expense of 7k/mo.
The average WeWork space is 600-900 USD/month for a single-person office in NYC and SF. And there is a lot of turnover amongst coworking businesses that offer space for any cheaper. So, below 600/mo does not seem to be viable, at least in these two markets.
If you offer to reimburse all employees' coworking leases, at an average of 600-900/mo, then your total office expense would exceed your prior 7k/mo after about 10 employees.
Automattic, another distributed company, offers a stipend of 250/mo toward coworking rent. Basecamp (aka 37signals) offers 100/mo. In both cases, these are certainly better than nothing but are only a fraction of the market rate.
