This is definitely a very useful heuristic and one I follow. I might put "Is it supported?" in the first questions group though, especially if the project is for work and you need to be able to get support/troubleshooting questions answered quickly, as opposed to a "just for fun" side project where deadlines are less prevalent.
"Keeping the heuristic as simple and concise as possible" -> this is really the crux of it. In this post I listed out pre-researched modules and use cases for them, but still basically a heuristic nonetheless.
I've found being able to migrate from coffee shop to coffee shop is very effective in helping me get unstuck from problems. Not sure if it's the 15 minute break that comes with traveling to another shop or if it's the change of scenery and atmosphere, but it really does the trick.
For pair programming you might try using Screenhero. Or screenshare using Skype or whatever IM tool you use (lag can be an issue if you have a slow network connection)
These are good ones. Also: Meetups, going to coffee shops, and joining online remote worker communities/Slack channels (although this is just online, not in person). I wfh and go to coffee shops like twice a day.
Agreed - I've often thought that having to learn these new frameworks will ultimately lead to terminal juniority. I get that each framework does things differently, and you can learn new patterns from each one, but ultimately you're just re-learning the wheel. Not advancing your skillset.
Many people do not understand UX and its role, but in my experience UX teams do not really understand how to operate within organizations and adapt to processes either.
We do have some offshore contractors who work from India which is about 10 hours difference I think. We only have about 2-3 hours overlap with them in the morning, but I find that more than adequate for communication between us.
Working that late doesn't sound enjoyable - you could try proposing 'core hours' that would overlap with EST so you wouldn't have to work that late. Something like 4 hours overlap is what I usually see remote companies requiring.
Best of luck and let me know how it goes, hope it works out for you. Working remotely is great.
First, I don't think wanting to move to Italy or Switzerland, especially because it's for your children's benefit, is a stupid thing. I wish my parents had broadened my horizons like that when I was younger.
When I made the move to working remote, I was in a position managing a team of about 6-8 developers. But I was also still spending about 25% of my time coding. To go remote, my manager thought it would be best if I cut the managerial responsibilities but still have "unofficial" leadership responsibilities as a Tech Lead.
Fast forward about 9 months or so and I would say my responsibilities are largely the same as when I was managing a team. I essentially still am managing a team (although not in title). And my manager is definitely comfortable with my moving into pure management remotely if I want to.
This is all to say that you might be surprised with how much of the leadership role you're still able to do remotely.
I would absolutely first have the conversation with your current company about seeing if you can keep your current role and just do it remotely. Not sure how long you want to be in Europe but you might consider timeboxing the remote thing so that your company - if they have any reservations - don't feel like you're making a permanent change.
Also, if you do have to go back to a more individual contributor role, you can probably still maintain some leadership responsibilities, especially if it's with your current company.
If you have to look at jobs elsewhere, focusing on finding something remote will certainly give you more freedom and I'm not sure how easy it is to apply for (on-site) jobs overseas as I've never done that before. Remote companies are usually smaller and therefore their employees wear more hats, so someone with more senior leadership level experience applying for more hands-on roles will probably (my best guess at least) not raise as many eyebrows.
I hear that - being a remote worker the social isolation can sometimes get to you.
As for online communities - I'm a member of the Remotive.io Slack group which is fairly active (it's a paid subscription). I also recently joined the workfrom.co Slack group (which is a paid group as well) and it seems to be fairly active. There's the nomadlist Slack group too (again, paid) but I haven't joined that one so can't really speak to it. Hope this helps.
"Keeping the heuristic as simple and concise as possible" -> this is really the crux of it. In this post I listed out pre-researched modules and use cases for them, but still basically a heuristic nonetheless.