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Comment by BorisBorisov91 | Hacker News Reader

I agree completely - people are unfortunately biased.

But the candidate will go to interview with the hiring manager at some point, this cannot be avoided. Then it is in the best interest of everyone to get those things out of the way as early as possible.

It's also a cultural thing, I believe. I have lived in Denmark the past ~10 years, and in Denmark the human part is very important for building trust - seeing the person, talking with the person. Denmark is not so big on long contracts, it's more about the personal relation.

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> But the candidate will go to interview with the hiring manager at some point, this cannot be avoided.

This is not true, in my experience. Most of the people I have worked with remotely did not meet their manager before hire. The decision was based on resumes, project work, emails, and phone calls. I first met my boss in my first remote job almost 6 months after starting the job.

Denmark may very well be different. And that will make it harder for you to write a product that works worldwide, if you are building a product that matches the culture in Denmark.

Great feedback, thank you, @codingdave! It is the first time I hear about someone being hired without meeting their manager. Do others have the same experience? Please let me know!

I'm working remotely for a telecom, which has a strong remote-worker culture. Some people do go into the office periodically, often in a "hotel" arrangement where your desk is for the day, but I don't. There is an office near-enough that I could, but nobody on my team or related would be there.

I had three interviews, four if you include the chat with the in-house recruiter I started with. The first of the three formal interviews was the hiring manager, by phone. Second was in-person, with a future (possible) colleague. The third was with the manager's own boss, Director in this case, again by phone.

It all went well enough apparently, though have met many of my colleagues in person since then. As a rule though, I'm remote by default. It's all online chat, conference calls, screen shares and so on.

i find that very unusual. when working with someone, making a personal connection is the first thing i want to do.

that said, we don't do it in Free Software and Open Source contributions either. we send in our code, talk to someone who reviews the code via issue trackers, chat and email and we see each other after a few years at a conference.

so yeah, we build a virtual connection, not a face-to-face one. and while it has been shown that occasional in-person meetings are very good for team building in companies and FOSS projects, we do know that it can work well without.

in fact, FOSS contributions are a strong indicator for a good remote worker.

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