I keep reading online about how remote teams are so great, but in real life they are tough as fuck and require 5x the discipline and communication skills of in-person teams.
If you're the only remote person, you're excluded from everything and there's probably no Slack or equivalent group discussion. I'm doing partially remote and I use that time to get done with some things that need more focus, but if I was fully remote I'd have big issues getting all the information I need.
I am the only remote person at my work. Sometimes I feel there's too much going on on Slack at the same time, and I haven't had any issues getting the information I need in a long time. There's always exceptions. Even though we've hit a few bumps in the road before we got to where we are now, I think it can work even for a 'traditional' company like ours (as long as you obsess about procedures and keeping things documented and in writing, which we've always done).
This is definitely true. It's taken us many years to develop practices and most importantly a nose for the type of people that can thrive working remote. It's definitely not for everyone.
A lot depends on the people and the job the team is doing. I work 100% remote, but it happens to be on software that is for web-based collaboration, so the challenges of remote work are benefits to us (at least in terms of dogfooding our products).
Also adjust that 5x number based on how many hours apart your time zones are. Remote in the same time zone is really not as bad compared to even just 3 people on different continents trying to collaborate.
absolutely! Ability to work remotely well is another bullet point on hiring requirements. It's not for everyone and you have to have a good culture around remote working at the company in the first place.
And side note: The common wisdom about don't be the only remote person on a team is true. I've done it, and it absolutely sucks.