Back in 2019, the shortage of highly skilled tech workers caused “extreme concern” for 79% of CEOs — and it’s only gotten worse. It’s now essential for startup leaders to invest in their remote developers’ experience not only to retain them, but to benefit from a higher quality of work, psychological safety, and engagement.

The US resignation rate hit an all-time high of 4M in April 2021. In July, job openings peaked at 5.8M positions, the cherry on top of hiring challenges. Unfortunately for tech startups, the Great Resignation isn’t evenly distributed across all sectors.

With the rise of remote working, many businesses are navigating entirely new opportunities and challenges. Commit’s Sarah Marion sat down with Katie Wilde, VP of Engineering at Buffer (both organizations are remote-first) to talk about how to have hard conversations, build resilient teams, and promote positivity as a remote-first organization.

With the rise of remote working, many businesses are navigating entirely new opportunities and challenges. Commit’s Sarah Marion sat down with Katie Wilde, VP of Engineering at Buffer (both organizations are remote-first) to talk about how to have hard conversations, build resilient teams, and promote positivity as a remote-first organization.

“Silicon Valley is moving to the Cloud” – In a recent interview by Bloomberg, Andreessen said remote work and distributed companies in the post-covid world are moving Silicon Valley to the cloud.

Mass adoption of remote-first working will be a huge driver in how the next generation of employees, particularly startup engineers, evaluate career transitions. Some go so far as to argue that the career transition will be relatively simple—the most talented people will pick up and go directly to their current employer’s competitors if they can’t work remotely.

Onboarding is one aspect of the employee experience that often gets overlooked, especially for early-stage startups that have no official HR function. Why? Founders care deeply about recruiting the best people, and setting them up for success, so it’s not that onboarding doesn’t matter to them. It’s because of recency bias.

One August in the 1990s, I drove across Canada, from Calgary to St. John’s, Newfoundland, with a good friend. I have so many fond memories of the journey: our debates about how to solve the world’s problems, the lengthy and reflective conversations, and the notable random people we met along the way.

At Commit, we are working to help enable more people to work remotely. While I often hear people worry about the lack of socialization when you aren’t in an office anymore, as someone who works from home every day, I’m continually looking for ways to resolve this.