[RightWingRabble]

One of the benefits of software work is its asynchronous nature[0]. Unfortunately, it requires a certain amount of trust that engineers aren't extended in these days of Scrum micromanagement. If managers could get past that, imagine the possibilities. Engineers could work on your product round the clock. Things would get fixed and progress made while you sleep.

[0]: Hardware isn't software. I can see where that might be an issue.

[philbo]

I'm fortunate enough to have joined a team where this frequently happens. We have people in pacific, eastern, european and antipodean timezones and things often pan out like you describe.

It requires everyone to be both conscious of and conscientious towards other people's working hours, so flexibility is key. People get up early and/or stay up late to attend the (few) regular meetings that we have.

Sometimes I work late on a Thursday to get something reviewed before the reviewer's week ends. Other times I put hours in on a Sunday so that the review can happen before I start work proper on Monday morning.

There is a lot of shared trust required for it to work and I can see that it might not work for every team. But it's definitely working for us.

[tdb7893]

Ya, I have experienced times where it has worked but I don't remember a time it has worked better than collocating a team. There seem to always be some inefficiencies introduced but it really speaks to the professionalism of the team members when it works