Ask HN: How has working remotely for long periods affected your social skills?

I often work from coffeshops or other places in order to maintain some level of social interaction, as little as it may be. I suppose when I do go into the office for a meeting, we all sort of speak the same language and have similar personality types so there are no issues socially; I don't have to put up a super social extroverted front to talk physics (I'm a scientist). I don't live with my SO but we video chat frequently, which also helps.

Not at all (>6 years). But this is heavily dependent on your personality. You can lead rich social life but be complete recluse at work, 100% focusing on what you do. Or you can work remotely from some exotic place, bumping at new interesting people whenever you walk out of your apartment for trivial stuff like buying food or stretching yourself.

Whenever I feel lonely I can throw a party with a mix of people of various backgrounds as well.

I've got a wife but no kids, and have been working entirely remote for 9 months. The 3 biggest changes I've noticed:

- I have to remind myself to slow down when talking to people. I think this is a result of having to think/talk through issues on my own during the day. Pairing with team members has helped this a bit.

- I had to make a real effort to see my friends more often, loneliness set in heavily despite having a spouse. Picking up a social hobby, rock climbing in my case, has also helped.

- If living in an area without a strong software community, exchanging ideas and "talking shop" goes away. Learning and professional growth is now done entirely remote as well. Try and stay in an area with regular meetups or some sort of interaction with other engineers if you growing as a technical contributor is important to you.

I do get back to the office 3 times a year, but it's definitely changed my normal social patterns. I still strongly prefer full time remote to having to commute even once or twice a week, but I now use that commute time for socializing and hobbies instead. Good trade off for the added bit of loneliness in my opinion, although I'm not sure my answer would be the same if I didn't have my spouse to keep me company.

* I also moved from Chicago to a town of 15k in Upstate NY

I'm probably right in the middle on the introvert/extrovert scale, so it's been mostly nice, but how isolated I'll feel will depend on the org I'm working in. More video with more people? More 1 on 1s with other remote folks? That's been great for me. But when I'm one of the only remote people, and everyone else is in the office, it ain't great.

Remote work has also made me really value the coffee shop as a place to meet friends, meet up with friends, and be around the noise of people being people.

Edit: it's also worth noting that I don't think remote has changed how I'm social. It's just been a different social setting, and I'm happy to say I'm mostly able to adapt to it. It needn't be isolating, and it can open up energy for you to be more social in other parts of your life.

I worked remotely for a year, from home and a couple of coffee shops. It certainly made me a calmer person, and keeping myself away from mundane office conversations (and mundane tasks) refreshed my senses and added to my happiness. I lived alone in a flat in a nice part of London and regularly visited the gym and played tennis, which provided enough social interaction for me, in addition to a few weddings and birthdays dotted throughout the year. I built https://usebx.com during this year, with the help of a couple of contractors, who also worked remotely. I now do have an office, but still work remotely most days, and encourage my employees to do the same. I'll only go into the office if a client wants to visit. The set up works rather well. The one thing I struggled with initially was routine - I could easily code till 5am, and sleep till 2pm, then not be able to get into a good sleep, work or social routine for a week. Now I force myself to finish at a reasonable time so that I can be continually productive over time, not just productive for that one day, while enjoying other aspects of life as well.

I left a corporate consulting career because I was burned out and started writing iOS apps from home. 5 years later the app business has been very successful for me but it has been the loneliest thing I have ever done. I use co-working environments when I can but generally people keep their head down in these too. I do relish the chance to interact socially with people now and I appreciate how valuable it is these days. This is the main reason I am probably done with apps, I'm looking for a more interactive role now.

27 single male, been working remotely for around 3 years. I would say it affected me slightly at first. I realized after leaving my office job that a fair amount of my social interaction was off-the-cuff activities with coworkers. Which I obviously wouldn't be around for anymore.

I basically had to learn to take more initiative when it came to arranging to hang out with people. I did and things have been going great since.

With remote work you definitely have the opportunity to isolate yourself on accident. So you have to been conscious of that and take action when you notice it.

I live alone now. But in the beginning of my remote career I had roommates. Roommates, who are actually your friends, are a great way of avoiding social isolation in the remote setting. And if they all have office jobs, you get the house to yourself all day!

HN generally doesn't like humour - but this resonates with a lot of people who have worked at home :

http://theoatmeal.com/comics/working_home

FWIW I did it for a while and even though I had some social contact at the time it really wasn't enough and I did get a bit weird.

Working remote causes you to trust people based on results not on spec. This can impact your interactions when you expect things like followthrough, consistency, demonstration of commitment, attentiveness to your communications, being on-task, and work quality where these things work a bit differently IRL and you are more prone to be exposed to intermediate work products rather than incremental or final.

I am not the demographic you are looking for answers from, but I will note that if you are introverted or socially challenged in some way, being removed from 40+ hours per week of social friction at the office can actually improve your ability to connect socially at times and places when you want that to happen because your internal quota for social stuff was not long ago used up and burned to the ground, making yet one more conversation start with getting on your very last nerve and go downhill from there.

When I worked remotely I had a better social life. I don't enjoy a lot of the communications at a typical office and I find them very draining so I don't do much in the evening or over the weekend. While I worked remotely I was alone during the day but I had energy and interest in meeting people in the evening.

I have a great spouse with three wonderful kids. I enjoy alone time but the isolation should be taken very seriously. The days will be reduced to animated emojis and clever gifs. And the days blend together.

Socializing becomes this activity that you have to be proactive for otherwise you’ll find yourself in some dark places asking a therapist how you arrived at this low point.

I worked pretty much entirely remotely for 12 years. Remote work was a trade off. I got to live where my wife wanted while working for interesting companies, doing interesting things.

I made friends all around the world but I know relatively few people where I live. I’ve had to go out of my way to have social hobbies in order to meet people. With a family and a remote job (calls to the other side of the world do not happen in 9-5 hours), that wasn’t always possible.

Over all, I’d say my social skills did not suffer but my social life did and my sense of connection to where I live was perhaps less than it might have been otherwise.

Now I have my own business I’ve rented an office in town and am building a co-located team.

There are many benefits to remote work but, after more than a decade of it, I think I’m realistic about its downsides too.

I've been working remotely for the last 13 years. Still doing it. Feels like Robinson Crusoe sometimes, but look at it from the positive side: don't have to deal with annoying co-workers (like I used to, long ago)

Background: I've worked remotely for 2 1/2 years. Before that, I worked in an office. Before that, I worked in retail. I am married and live with my wife in a 25ft Airstream.

Personally, I find that I am more careful with who I spend time with. I try not to read a lot of news and outside media to in order to focus on doing things I love and work on my craft (Development, photography, and video). I haven't found any changes with my confidence in speaking to others, and the way I look at it, unless you're are a complete recluse, you'll always interact with other people.

My wife and I spend a lot of time in campgrounds and in nature, so I do cherish the time I get to talk to people, even if that time is brief. After being on the road for almost a year, I reconnected with some old friends for a weekend on Albuquerque and had no social issues.

I find that creating a regime and structure is the only way to be able to work remotely in a sustainable way.

I have work hours and none work hours. I have a work out routine that makes me wake up early in the morning, which in turn makes me sleep at a reasonable time

I give myself lunch breaks that I use to go to the grocery store buy ingredients and cook good food.

I make plans for my after work hours to see friends, attend meetups..etc.

Working in an office setting you are forced into a structure, with working remotely you have to create your own structure.

My partner and I both work remotely. We are lucky to be close to downtown Vancouver. We can take a SeaBus into town and venture to one of the many co-working facilities if we feel we would like to work in a more bustling environment. My partner has a dedicated desk at WeWork. I prefer the home office because I love being around our plants and I am prone to random bouts of meditation.

Remote working has allowed me to flourish socially. I have a recreational hockey team, we are part of a nice Yoga community, and given that we spend lots of time around our neighbourhood, we have met many friends, from the lady who cleans our building to the dude who owns the coffeeshop. Soon, I will be volunteering at the local hospice.

When you decouple social contact from work, the onus is on you to find a healthy replacement with the extra time and flexibility that remote life affords you. As is often the case when starting something new, you may find the first leap into a new social scene to be a harrowing experience. But it is rewarding! Much of this is because we live an urban life-style. I imagine being in a sub-urban neighbourhood might be much tricker to manage, as the people and amenities are further away. Consider how likely you are to stay working remotely. Perhaps a more "vibrant" area of town that allows you to walk to wonders might suit you better?

As an interim solution, my partner and I have both found that scheduling purely social calls, or 'no agenda, just banter' group video chats to be a fruitful means of connecting with the people with which we work.

I'd say it made me more outgoing. If I wasn't, I wouldn't meet anyone! Especially when I was single I got in the habit of starting conversations with people (both men and women).

I also make a habit of going on walks in the neighbourhood. I'd find it harder to be self employed if I lived someplace I couldn't do that. But when I step outside there are parks full of people.

When I first moved out on my own I got terribly lonesome, until I started going to cafes. Talking with the staff at a local cafe is actually a good way to get a small dose of socialization each day.

I found, surprisingly, that I didn't need deep social connection on a daily basis, but I did need some social contact. In other words, for filling that need, a 3 min chat with a barista was as effective as an hour with a close friend.

I've been working remotely for a number of years and it has not affected my social skills at all AFAICT. But that's because I have a very full life outside of work, that involves a lot of social interaction.

I've worked remotely (with a 12-hour time difference!) from a home office for 3.5 years. Initially my wife and daughter were home much of the time, but for the past 1.5 years it's been just me, as my wife is working part-time and my daughter is in childcare.

I wasn't a particularly social person originally, but working alone has made me even more insular, and less inclined to join in social situations. It ended up with me feeling lonely and unhappy. I was considering quitting my contract, although similar work is difficult to find where I'm now living.

So two weeks ago, I started working in a shared workspace, and I will try that for a few months to see if it helps.

My guess is that every person has a different buffer of how long they can do without regular human company during the day, and I'd exausted mine. Having a family helps, but may not replace professional company where you are discussing things about your dayjob.

One year, live with my wife, no, social skills have not declined. I am as charming as ever.

I'm a bit of an outlier (autistic and extrovert). Every attempt at remote work or freelancing so far has been a disaster for me: I could neither build enough structure at home to get consistent results or even consistent working hours, nor put in enough effort to have satisfying amounts and quality of social interactions. The lack of constant swapping of ideas was also a major pain. YMMV.

Been a freelancer for 10 years, I got really good at socializing. I think when you are forced to interact with others you develop passive-aggressive patterns, build up stress, machiavellianism and so on. I can also see how people who work fulltime often don't have the energy for anything but alcohol. Meanwhile I do all sorts of things with other high energy people. I am not trained in corporate socialization or other weird stuff. So, I'm great.