For the past six years, I worked at a tech startup based out of New York City. When I joined the company in 2018, I worked out of the office five days a week. I’d walk out of the elevator every morning and was hit by that unmistakable office buzz: whispers of deals about to close and the latest office flirtation.
I felt incredibly connected to my coworkers.
We had office rituals and inside jokes. We chose to spend time together during lunch breaks and after work. We found an old grungy pub with great gazpacho and would help each other with our dating profiles. We genuinely enjoyed each other’s company, which made even the hardest work days more enjoyable.
When COVID hit in 2020, like most tech companies, everyone went remote. It was hard to adjust to working through a screen all day, every day, but we made it work. We found new ways to stay motivated through better work-life balance and connected through virtual happy hours. We cut out paper turkeys together before Thanksgiving, threw virtual baby showers, and put “just because meetings” on each other’s calendars to catch up and commiserate. We still cared about each other, and the bonds we formed from our time in person over the years helped us to still feel connected.
As people started returning to the office in 2022, I decided to move from New York to Denver, meaning I would be a fully remote employee. I figured I had been remote for years at that point, and it was working, so this move wouldn’t impact my workplace satisfaction. I was wrong.
The company changed, and so did I
Being a remote employee as coworkers returned to the office was extremely challenging. We went through five layoff rounds in just one year and that resulted in a lot of people that I knew and loved being laid off.
It also meant new faces, but this time, these weren’t people I shared years of in-person rapport with before going completely virtual. These were strangers, and I found that meeting them and working with them through a screen kept them as strangers. We would try our best to get to know each other and trust each other online, but it’s hard to really know someone and to feel comfortable with them when you don’t get any face-to-face time. People emit energy and physicality that gets lost behind a screen.
Due to budget constraints, travel was restricted, and my company didn’t prioritize bringing remote workers together throughout the year to strengthen ties. I no longer got the “in-between meetings” conversations where we learned about each other’s lives, laughed together, shared how our day was actually going and made time to connect outside working hours.
All of that was replaced by the obligatory two-minute check-in at the beginning of the video call, during which everyone says, “I’m good,” and jumps into the agenda.
The disconnect didn’t help my morale at work
I started to feel isolated, lonely, and disconnected from my coworkers. This not only impacted my personal connections but also made me feel less valued professionally and less connected to the company’s mission and goals.
An often underrated part of business is personal trust and camaraderie. Do I trust that this person cares about me? Do I want to spend my time talking with this person? I found — after years of being completely remote and new faces coming into the business — that my answer was changing from yes to no. Ultimately, this lack of trust and camaraderie led me to quit my job.
As I enter the job market now, I hesitate to apply for remote-only positions unless the company is invested in bringing remote employees together at key moments throughout the year.
From my experience, I know how difficult it can be to form meaningful connections with coworkers that you only interact with through a screen. When work gets frustrating, and I feel lonely or isolated, I find coworkers an invaluable support system.
I want to prioritize personal connections throughout my career, which means stepping out from behind the screen and being together.
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