David H Hansson from the former 37 Signals team shared a post recently about how hybrid work is remote work’s evil twin. And his message was – either pick remote or fully on-site. Don’t bother with anything in the middle.
It’s been a while since I’ve seen DHH’s posts floating around in the ether. I have a lot of respect for all he’s done. He and his partner Jason Fried are a case study in content marketing as they’ve built a brand around sharing extreme points of view.
This post is a great example of that. It makes for an entertaining read.
I just don’t think it is right.
I think there’s a lot of ways hybrid work is way better than either alternative. And I’ve spoken to many others over the past months who feel similarly. As with most things in life, there’s nuance and a middle path.
But – and here’s the lesson – balanced points of view rarely provide entertainment value. They don’t attract attention.
So, if you want to create popular content, take a page from DHH’s playbook and take an extreme point of view. Ignore the nuance. You’ll attract both the lovers and haters – but you’ll win the attention game.
However, there’s limited, maybe even negative, correlation between what gets attention and what is right, wise, or useful.
So just make sure you’re clear about what game you’re playing.
And where that path leads.
