Regarding telecommuting to Europe from North America, my gut response is "Nope -- wouldn't work."

That's based on my experience while working in Germany in 1980 -- at 4pm on Fridays, we would down tools (well, step away from our keyboards) and have a wonderful little party with snacks, beer and wine. The artificial pecking order would disappear, and we'd all chat as equals, hearing about the news, the families, our plans for the weekend.

My brother is currently working in Italy, and described a colleague who talked about who she knew in the business on their first meeting. He thought that was odd, then as he met more people discovered that this was a way of people showing their bona fides.

Thus, from these scant two examples, I'm left with the impression that social relationships appear more important in Europe than they are in North America, which would suggest that telecommuting (working without much face to face social interaction) wouldn't work.

The other, relatively minor detail is that Europe is six to ten timezones ahead of North America, so unless one was working on a totally independent project, it would be a graveyard shift kind of job.

Alex / talexb / Toronto

"Groklaw is the open-source mentality applied to legal research" ~ Linus Torvalds

In reply to Re^2: How do North Americans find Europe as a workplace? by talexb
in thread How do North Americans find Europe as a workplace? by talexb

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