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There is a BIG difference between in-person and via Skype. I have seen this before on several occasions in industry and it simply does not work as well. I doubt it'd be different in academia. It's much harder to integrate a remote worker into a group, especially if they're in a different timezone. I suspect there would have to be a very compelling reason for most supervisors to agree to this. Maybe they'll do it, but you better be pretty special.

I think that would be entirely up to whoever is funding and or supervising it. I doubt that many would wish to do so as there is little opportunity for direct supervision or keeping track of the activities of the post-doc. It would seem to depend on an inordinate amount of trust.

If you were the funder, you should probably establish some very regular means of communication to see that your resources aren't being wasted.

Such a thing might be more reasonable if the post-doc and the PI had a regular relationship in the past so that trust was already established.

I don't think there is anything wrong with such a thing, I just don't guess anyone would be interested in supervising it. Interesting, but unrealistic.

If you are a postdoc for industry, many things are possible. If you are a postdoc in a University or research institution, your institution is subject to rigorous control, which includes financial transparency and visa compliance. Sure, these problems may be solvable for Prof Famous joining the University of Notmuch. But bending those rules for an average postdoc is extremely unlikely. Finance won't like paying a guy who is not physically on-site for some work which is basically a couple of telephone calls per months. Such schemes are often used by dishonest PIs for tunnel research funds to their relatives or close friends, and they are always a subject of extra scrutiny and extra attention. Finance and HR will not support you or your PI in this, and this alone is the reason why such scheme — although theoretically possible — will not really happen.

I know anecdotal answers aren't always approved of on Stack Exchange, but I do know of post-docs who have arranged to work remotely as standard within the same country (the UK), with occasional physical visits (on average once a week or less) due to independent instances of the two body problem for the PI and the post doc.

It's just about conceivable that the same kind of arrangement could be made internationally between countries with sufficiently integrated travel and financial systems (I'm thinking specifically of EU-EU here).

One thing that hasn't been mentioned in other answers is that the university may have rules that require postdocs to be physically present. Mine does, so this kind of thing would be out of the question. I have no idea how common that is.

I also agree with other answers that say working with an advisor long-distance would be a huge disadvantage. I am a mathematician.

It is possible for a postdoc to be at a different university from the grant-holder (PI), and supervised virtually as a result. It probably requires an unusual source of funding, and entails either frequent visits or else a co-supervisor/collaborator based at the postdoc's institution.

1. An example

Here is an old job advert from the CGSP/CPSM, a Canadian research project in social policy. One can find by a little googling that one of the appointees is based on another continent, where they are co-supervised by a professor who is not listed as a collaborator or partner in the CGSP/CPSM. So their supervision by the PI would be mostly virtual (apart from one workshop planned as part of the programme).

In the job advert, you can see some very careful wording about supervisors and co-supervisors to permit exactly this to happen.

2. Something similar in mathematics?

In fact I know the PI in the example above (that's how I heard about it at all). She told me that those postdocs were in some measure based on the Fields Institute postdocs in mathematics.

Academics apply to organise "thematic programs" at the Fields Institute, and the institute hires postdocs to work on those programs. The organisers could be anywhere in the world. The postdocs also aim to work with faculty at "sponsor universities" of the Fields Institute but still, many of these are physically quite distant. But there are workshops and lecture courses every month or two to bring people together physically. So in practise the supervision is not very virtual.

3. Appendix

Of course it can happen that a PI or postdoc has an extended visit at another university or institute, or that the PI moves and it's not possible for the postdoc to follow. If one wanted to see the different ways a "virtual postdoc" could go in practise then those cases might be the place to start.

A research group or a PI typically wants a researcher who is more committed to the group and to his/her research projects. In-person presence means you are committing your life for the duration of the post-doc to that:

• You're moving to a different city or a different country.


• your daily routine will be very different.


• your circle of human interaction will be people in your research group, department and university (well, not only them, but for most of the day).


• You will be literally, physically, available for your research group members to walk in and bother you with things.


• You will (possibly) be eating and drinking together and perhaps even the same food with your research group colleagues.


• You will endure the same environmental, technical and political inconveniences as your research group colleagues.

So it is an entirely different experience than a "virtual" post-doc. It is also why most institutions and researchers are skeptical or not willing to consider such arrangements.

I'm a postdoc in computer science, working remotely for a UK university, from a different continent.
However, I've been a postdoc for 2 years and it's just the last 3 months of my contract that I've arranged with my supervisor to do remotely, before that I was in the UK.

I'll add my direct experience to the chorus: being remote is hard, for motivation, for having constructive meetings, for being part of the community... there are conceivably tasks that can be done remotely, but research where you need to discuss hard problems with a supervisor are just not well suited for remote work.
A few weeks at a time are manageable, but longer term is a bad idea. On the other hand, I think being on-site once a week or so, is very manageable.
There are also a few administrative obstacles:

• The terms of a fellowship / visa limit how long you're allowed to be away from the UK (it happens I'm not affect by that as I'm an EU citizen, but a friend of mine from Canada is).




• There's a university policy that says that all academic staff have travel insurance when they travel: in this case I'm away without "travelling" and when I travel to the UK I'm at my official workplace, so why would they give me a separate insurance?




• There could be more that I've avoided from doing the remote thing less than 3 months, and other constraints in other countries... I just mention the UK ones I know as examples.