Remote work isn’t just here to stay, it’s becoming the new norm. A way of working that people love and strive for.

Not just the people who work 100% remotely today either. We’re all exposed to remote work on a weekly - if not daily - basis.

Whether it’s a meeting where someone joins from home or another office. Collaborating with a vendor who works in another location. Or working from home or a co-working space part of the week. We’re all increasingly exposed to forms of remote work.

And the tools are here to help. Productivity tools have caught up to the remote trend. Remote integrates seamlessly into our work lives. Thanks to the likes of Slack, Zoom, Google Hangouts, G Suite, Office 365, Evernote, our partner on the survey Miro, and the slew of other ever-expanding and new cloud collaboration tools.

But the tools aren’t enough to make remote work. There are behavioral changes that organizations and people need to make in order for remote work to be successful. We’ll cover tips from remote workers on how to best work remotely, plus all the other juicy insights we learned about remote work and meetings.

Remote work is on the rise

Remote work isn’t a new thing. It’s been on the rise for years.

63% of US companies now have remote workers, according to a 2018 Upwork Study.

Gallup’s State of the American Workplace Report found that 43% of employees work remotely at least some of the time. And among those who work remotely at least part of the time, the percent of employees who work remotely 100% of the time is now 20%, up from 15% four years prior.

People are increasingly attracted to remote jobs, with 37% saying they would switch to a job that gave them the ability to work off-site at least part of the time.

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The largest remote work community in the world and remote job board We Work Remotely shared insights with us about the remote work trends they’ve seen since 2013.

WWR is the top destination for posting remote jobs. And they’ve seen a huge increase in the number of jobs posted on their site over the last 6 years - from just over 300 in 2013, to nearly 2400 in 2018.

Number of jobs posted on WWR

There aren’t just more remote roles out there. Companies are increasingly going fully remote themselves. In 2014, only 2% of roles posted on WWR were from fully remote companies with no headquarters. In 2018, 16% of posted roles belonged to fully remote companies.

Percentage of WWR roles at remote companies (no HQ)

AngelList, a site for startups, investors, and job-seekers looking to work with startups, has also seen a surge in remote jobs.

29% of all the startups with roles posted on AngelList live in August 2019 were hiring remote roles. That’s over 7600 startups hiring remote roles, more than 1500 of which are mostly or fully remote companies themselves.

And it’s likely we’re about to see even more remote roles in the market.

According to AngelList, younger startups are more likely to hire remote than more established companies. In August 2019, 31% of companies younger than 2 years old had at least one open remote role, compared to 26% of companies older than 2 years.

The younger startups of today are much more likely to be remote friendly as they grow.

Companies with one or more open remote role on AngelList

AngelList has even hired someone to lead their efforts on remote work, pointing to a focus on the growing category.

And millennials are leading the charge when it comes to remote.

Millennials prefer working for companies that provide flexibility

Fifty percent of millennials consider flexibility of hours and the location where they work to be very important when choosing whether or not to work for an organization.

They also expect to stay at jobs with more flexibility for longer, according to the 2018 Millennial Survey Report by Deloitte.