I banned my employees from coming to the office yesterday.

Not for their safety. For mine.

I can't stand seeing people be productive in person.

It's distracting.

I need to imagine them struggling at home to truly appreciate remote work productivity.

My CTO works from a sailboat.

Sometimes he disappears for weeks when he drifts into international waters.

His Slack status just says "lost at sea."

But his code commits arrive mysteriously at 3am.

Infused with salt water and desperation—a testament to remote work productivity even in extreme conditions.

My office is now just me sitting alone.

I replaced all employee desks with mirrors.

So I can practice making eye contact.

A skill I've forgotten after three years of Zoom meetings—the backbone of effective remote work.

I tried forcing everyone back last month.

My head of design showed up wearing a green screen suit.

"So I can change backgrounds in real life," she explained.

That's when I realized the benefits of remote work productivity were irreversible.

I told my team the secret to maximizing remote work productivity.

You need three things:

1. A comfortable chair
2. Fast internet
3. The constant fear that everyone thinks you're not working

The third one is the most important.

My remote workers deliver twice the output of office workers.

Because while office workers chat by the water cooler,

Remote workers are panic-responding to Slack messages at midnight.

To prove they still exist—boosting remote work productivity through existential dread.

Office culture is dead.

I attended its funeral via Zoom.

I was cooking dinner and doing laundry during the service.

Maximum efficiency.

That's the future of remote work productivity.

Remember: Your most valuable office perk isn't the free foods and snacks.

It's the ability to mute yourself while screaming.

The ability to work from bed while pretending you're at a desk.

I call it "authenticity"—the hidden champion of remote work productivity.