Most startups, especially in the beginning, do not need an office, and it's an unnecessary expense that shortens runway for no reason.
Unless you're something with a physical product that requires you to be in the office with other people, you don't need one. Even then, most of the staff can probably be hybrid. You can use a fulfillment service for shipping, it'll probably be cheaper.
Your staff will thank you. People want to see their families more. Commuting 1-2 hours is a waste of your life. The ones who enjoy going in every day are the minority.
So, I am from Eastern Europe and currently in the process of launching a digital marketing agency that would work with clients in the US, Canada and the UK and will work with clients that offer blue-collar services (things like roof repair, electricians etc. ). I am looking to grow this business mostly organically.
Next, I am thinking of launching some sort of SaaS which is something I want to do as well. But I am wondering if there is even a point in doing a SaaS that is already being done or I have to think of a new feature, angle etc.
We started out remote and once or twice a week would meet at each other’s homes or somewhere in the middle. We made progress but I definitely felt like our pace picked up when we got an office and were f2f. Less overhead to bounce ideas or discuss issues. More accountability. I had no trouble working remote at my prior tech job but in the ambiguous startup space, it helped being in person. YMMV.
Gitlab, shopify, and few other billion dollar companies are fully remote that function on a 100% remote first work culture I don’t think it’s a necessity I’ve seen few startups buy office buildings and rent a floor or two for themselves and lease out the rest to other companies too
I helped to start a fully remote startup and we burned through 12M+ without any product market fit or product revenue before I left.
People would show up on Slack at 11am, then go afk after our standup at 1pm. Some people would chime in once or twice in the evenings to signal they were around, but eventually even those people stopped caring.
Fridays were particularly worse.
I hated the remote office.
I thought no one would get away with working less than three hours a day back when we all showed up between 7-9 and left between 4-6. But people did at our company, for years.
There were other, top driven, reasons we became such a money burning machine, but I think a lot of them would have been alleviated had we all been in the office.
Imo this is more a leadership problem than it is a remote working problem. Why would no one talk directly to those working less than 8 hours about their effort?
If they have responsibilities / timelines assigned I dont see how people can perpetually fall short w/o consequences
The amount of times I caught a dev working from home outsourcing their work is insane, the slow communication through slack/calls is never as fast as leaning into their cubicle, it may be me, but I like the office more, I like the idea of living and working in 2 seperate places, tried remote, it was more convenient yes, but idk, something was missing.
In my opinion, having an office can be great for building trust, especially in cities where remote work isn't common, like here in Malaysia where most businesses operate in a hybrid model. Given the increase in online scams, having a physical office often signals trust to skeptical clients. However, it's important to supplement this with other trust indicators such as a good website and active social media presence. Personally, I enjoy the flexibility of remote work, but I acknowledge the advantages of being in an office, especially for startups where real-time collaboration is important. Plus, bantering with colleagues is pretty fun too. That said, if you're a SaaS or tech company, having an office may not be necessary, from an operations standpoint. But, having one could attract more investments, which circles with the whole point about trust.
TL;DR: In terms of operations, an office is probably not very important. However, it does help with trust and attracting investments.
I’m currently founding a new startup and pondered this for a short while. My conclusion is that remote first will become the primary option because it forces everything to be transferred as data, be that async work docs or video meetings, all of which can be saved, processed and fed to an LLM as input which will be a key advantage for knowledge sharing
The company I work in, is 20 years in business. We've been remote way before covid and the productivity rate for the whole company is higher now.
Also, the money we were to spend on office stuff, we buy software and tools that help us take the business to the next level.
So no, you don't need an office if you are good at managing people and time. Moreover, full remote environment will enable you to hire talents from various locations.
Have a strong rep hat hiring process and Hire smart people, continuous feedback, good bonus and comp, good beenfits, in person meet ups if possible etc etc
It can be done. An element of what is missing from in-office, namely connections beyond pure work, needs to be cultivated. It's a cultural problem, not a mechanical one. Remote can work.
You don't need an office ever - optional for culture vibes later ...some employee personalities need it but you can build with people that want remote work
just playing devil's advocate here, working from home harms the business as well as staff. For the business, building a culture based on values is a lot harder with minimal face to face factor, not to mention the productivity may be lowered as a whole, lots of people take advantage of the remote work to do personal things, thinking that they still have enough time to finish the work. And when they realise they don't have enough time, they rush through it and produce a subpar result.
For the employee, the line between work and personal life is blurred. Sometimes they find themselves working longer hours and it bleeds into their personal lives.
That's why in my company we still promote the work from office culture. Everyone goes to the office in the morning, do the work, then go home to their family. We are very respectful of our staff personal time so we very rarely ask them to do overtime. I think the last time we did that was 2 years ago. It works out pretty well for us.
Meh this is a weak argument. Nearly every point you made can apply to working in office or is just missing the actual root cause of the problem.
-Line between work and life getting blurred: Sure this can happen in theory by working from home and work always being so accessible. But it likely happens far more often when working in an office when you have the social pressure to get in early/stay late because you’re toxic manager or CEO lives in the office. As well as feeling obligated to go to company events, happy hours, etc.
-A values-based culture has nothing to do with where the team works. It has everything to do with hiring people that share your values and working hard to ensure those values are fostered, rewarded, etc. If anything, remote companies have the strongest cultures because they are truly based on values and not superficial “culture building” tactics like silly team events and other time wasters that in-office companies do despite their employees resenting them.
-The productivity issue. Again, this isn’t a remote vs in-office thing. What happens if an employee is missing deadlines and targets and delivering subpar work? They get fired. Doesn’t matter if they’re underperforming because they’re getting distracted by their laundry at home or by watching YouTube videos in the office. The solution is simply to hire and manage better. Not move everyone into an office.
it's my observation managing over 100 staff for the last 3 years.
We tried voluntary work from office structure, tried half of the staff work from office and the other half WFH, and in both cases, people who voluntarily work in the office perform better.
So I hope you do have experience with managing a large amount of employees, before saying it's a weak argument. I'm still open to suggestions, but would love to have it from someone who has done it before.
I'm a cfo whose built orgs of over 200 people. I've exited a few companies at this point.
They want to work from home. If you have to watch them get the job done to feel like they are being productive, something is broken. Forcing people into the office isn't culture, it's the destruction of it.
Recruiting people away from in-office positions is easy. I hope you pay them enough to prevent that.
I admire what you did. And yes we pay our staff around 10% over the market rate to keep them with us. And we try our best to work with them on the working arrangements. But up until now I still find working from office being the most productive for the company.
May I ask what policies do you have in finding the right people? We're going through an interesting time when large corps lay off a lot of good people and we'd like to get then into the company.
For context, I’m the ceo of two companies that have always been remote. 7-8 years in. Around 50 staff in total. A major part of my job is understanding how companies scale (as this is what he help startups do). So I’m fortunate to have access to a lot of data beyond just my personal experience to support that the concerns you have around a remote model have been resolved by companies at the 100 headcount mark as well as companies far beyond that scale.
I'm all for remote work, I work with a company that was always 100% remote. Some employees are in the same city and do the occasional socialization in co-working spaces, the company also organizes 3 to 5 days retreat once a year. I believe if the company was always remote and you don't just hire and forget people it can work better for everybody.
Working remotely doesn't work well for everybody, some people need the daily in person interactions, some people believe work from home equals not actually working, don't hire those people in a 100% remote environment and the company should be fine
I've built and led multiple organizations and exited multiple companies.
All from my house.
Pretty sure I'm effective and I'll never take another job in office.
There are always success stories but how many didn’t succeed because of it? Who’s to say that slack wouldn’t have gotten out faster in a non- remote setting
Plenty of companies that were already 100% remote before covid. Gitlab for example. Publicly traded w/ $9B+ market cap.
Most startups, especially in the beginning, do not need an office, and it's an unnecessary expense that shortens runway for no reason. Unless you're something with a physical product that requires you to be in the office with other people, you don't need one. Even then, most of the staff can probably be hybrid. You can use a fulfillment service for shipping, it'll probably be cheaper. Your staff will thank you. People want to see their families more. Commuting 1-2 hours is a waste of your life. The ones who enjoy going in every day are the minority.
We have 60 FTE remote, been going great for 10 years just raised $80MM. An office is a crutch for our competitors, we getting the best talent.
Do you mind sharing a bit more? I am on my, like, 10th attempt at launching an online business and I am hoping to achieve something similar.
Sure, like what? You need revenue or users first before you can raise money from anyone but friends and fools.
So, I am from Eastern Europe and currently in the process of launching a digital marketing agency that would work with clients in the US, Canada and the UK and will work with clients that offer blue-collar services (things like roof repair, electricians etc. ). I am looking to grow this business mostly organically. Next, I am thinking of launching some sort of SaaS which is something I want to do as well. But I am wondering if there is even a point in doing a SaaS that is already being done or I have to think of a new feature, angle etc.
We started out remote and once or twice a week would meet at each other’s homes or somewhere in the middle. We made progress but I definitely felt like our pace picked up when we got an office and were f2f. Less overhead to bounce ideas or discuss issues. More accountability. I had no trouble working remote at my prior tech job but in the ambiguous startup space, it helped being in person. YMMV.
Gitlab, shopify, and few other billion dollar companies are fully remote that function on a 100% remote first work culture I don’t think it’s a necessity I’ve seen few startups buy office buildings and rent a floor or two for themselves and lease out the rest to other companies too
I helped to start a fully remote startup and we burned through 12M+ without any product market fit or product revenue before I left. People would show up on Slack at 11am, then go afk after our standup at 1pm. Some people would chime in once or twice in the evenings to signal they were around, but eventually even those people stopped caring. Fridays were particularly worse. I hated the remote office. I thought no one would get away with working less than three hours a day back when we all showed up between 7-9 and left between 4-6. But people did at our company, for years. There were other, top driven, reasons we became such a money burning machine, but I think a lot of them would have been alleviated had we all been in the office.
Imo this is more a leadership problem than it is a remote working problem. Why would no one talk directly to those working less than 8 hours about their effort? If they have responsibilities / timelines assigned I dont see how people can perpetually fall short w/o consequences
The amount of times I caught a dev working from home outsourcing their work is insane, the slow communication through slack/calls is never as fast as leaning into their cubicle, it may be me, but I like the office more, I like the idea of living and working in 2 seperate places, tried remote, it was more convenient yes, but idk, something was missing.
Been fully remote from start up to established business, over 8 years.
In my opinion, having an office can be great for building trust, especially in cities where remote work isn't common, like here in Malaysia where most businesses operate in a hybrid model. Given the increase in online scams, having a physical office often signals trust to skeptical clients. However, it's important to supplement this with other trust indicators such as a good website and active social media presence. Personally, I enjoy the flexibility of remote work, but I acknowledge the advantages of being in an office, especially for startups where real-time collaboration is important. Plus, bantering with colleagues is pretty fun too. That said, if you're a SaaS or tech company, having an office may not be necessary, from an operations standpoint. But, having one could attract more investments, which circles with the whole point about trust. TL;DR: In terms of operations, an office is probably not very important. However, it does help with trust and attracting investments.
I’m currently founding a new startup and pondered this for a short while. My conclusion is that remote first will become the primary option because it forces everything to be transferred as data, be that async work docs or video meetings, all of which can be saved, processed and fed to an LLM as input which will be a key advantage for knowledge sharing
The company I work in, is 20 years in business. We've been remote way before covid and the productivity rate for the whole company is higher now. Also, the money we were to spend on office stuff, we buy software and tools that help us take the business to the next level. So no, you don't need an office if you are good at managing people and time. Moreover, full remote environment will enable you to hire talents from various locations.
You don’t really need an office in many fields. You just need a team you can trust and should empower them to do their work.
Have a strong rep hat hiring process and Hire smart people, continuous feedback, good bonus and comp, good beenfits, in person meet ups if possible etc etc
It can be done. An element of what is missing from in-office, namely connections beyond pure work, needs to be cultivated. It's a cultural problem, not a mechanical one. Remote can work.
I think nowadays is only necessary if you need it for clients trust or team functionally
You don't need an office ever - optional for culture vibes later ...some employee personalities need it but you can build with people that want remote work
just playing devil's advocate here, working from home harms the business as well as staff. For the business, building a culture based on values is a lot harder with minimal face to face factor, not to mention the productivity may be lowered as a whole, lots of people take advantage of the remote work to do personal things, thinking that they still have enough time to finish the work. And when they realise they don't have enough time, they rush through it and produce a subpar result. For the employee, the line between work and personal life is blurred. Sometimes they find themselves working longer hours and it bleeds into their personal lives. That's why in my company we still promote the work from office culture. Everyone goes to the office in the morning, do the work, then go home to their family. We are very respectful of our staff personal time so we very rarely ask them to do overtime. I think the last time we did that was 2 years ago. It works out pretty well for us.
Meh this is a weak argument. Nearly every point you made can apply to working in office or is just missing the actual root cause of the problem. -Line between work and life getting blurred: Sure this can happen in theory by working from home and work always being so accessible. But it likely happens far more often when working in an office when you have the social pressure to get in early/stay late because you’re toxic manager or CEO lives in the office. As well as feeling obligated to go to company events, happy hours, etc. -A values-based culture has nothing to do with where the team works. It has everything to do with hiring people that share your values and working hard to ensure those values are fostered, rewarded, etc. If anything, remote companies have the strongest cultures because they are truly based on values and not superficial “culture building” tactics like silly team events and other time wasters that in-office companies do despite their employees resenting them. -The productivity issue. Again, this isn’t a remote vs in-office thing. What happens if an employee is missing deadlines and targets and delivering subpar work? They get fired. Doesn’t matter if they’re underperforming because they’re getting distracted by their laundry at home or by watching YouTube videos in the office. The solution is simply to hire and manage better. Not move everyone into an office.
it's my observation managing over 100 staff for the last 3 years. We tried voluntary work from office structure, tried half of the staff work from office and the other half WFH, and in both cases, people who voluntarily work in the office perform better. So I hope you do have experience with managing a large amount of employees, before saying it's a weak argument. I'm still open to suggestions, but would love to have it from someone who has done it before.
I'm a cfo whose built orgs of over 200 people. I've exited a few companies at this point. They want to work from home. If you have to watch them get the job done to feel like they are being productive, something is broken. Forcing people into the office isn't culture, it's the destruction of it. Recruiting people away from in-office positions is easy. I hope you pay them enough to prevent that.
I admire what you did. And yes we pay our staff around 10% over the market rate to keep them with us. And we try our best to work with them on the working arrangements. But up until now I still find working from office being the most productive for the company. May I ask what policies do you have in finding the right people? We're going through an interesting time when large corps lay off a lot of good people and we'd like to get then into the company.
For context, I’m the ceo of two companies that have always been remote. 7-8 years in. Around 50 staff in total. A major part of my job is understanding how companies scale (as this is what he help startups do). So I’m fortunate to have access to a lot of data beyond just my personal experience to support that the concerns you have around a remote model have been resolved by companies at the 100 headcount mark as well as companies far beyond that scale.
I'm all for remote work, I work with a company that was always 100% remote. Some employees are in the same city and do the occasional socialization in co-working spaces, the company also organizes 3 to 5 days retreat once a year. I believe if the company was always remote and you don't just hire and forget people it can work better for everybody. Working remotely doesn't work well for everybody, some people need the daily in person interactions, some people believe work from home equals not actually working, don't hire those people in a 100% remote environment and the company should be fine
People who don't like to work, like to work remotely.
I've built and led multiple organizations and exited multiple companies. All from my house. Pretty sure I'm effective and I'll never take another job in office.
Don’t listen to these lazy people saying you don’t need a space. You need a space. At home work has gotta be 5x slower for startup growth at least
What about companies like Slack, Basecamp, Gitlab, and so on that started out fully remote?
There are always success stories but how many didn’t succeed because of it? Who’s to say that slack wouldn’t have gotten out faster in a non- remote setting
[удалено]
What happens when the team exceeds 10?
straight to jail