Exactly one year ago, after 12 years in San Francisco, I moved back to France.

Life since has been a whirlwind: selling the condo, moving a container overseas, rediscovering French culture (I had to relearn to say "Bonjour" before talking to anyone), finding a school for the kids, buying a house, renovating it, and finally settling in.

Recently I retold the story of how that came to be and I realized I never shared that in writing, so there you go.

The decision

In 2013 I joined Square and moved from Paris to San Francisco (story here). In 2021, when our second kid was born, my wife and I agreed that we would move back to France so that our kids could grow up close to their cousins & grandparents. We gave ourselves a deadline: 4 years later, when our first born would reach 1st grade (CP in France, when kids learn to read).

LeakCanary contingency

I assumed this would mean the end of my time at Square, and I'd need to find something else to do. One of my silly ideas was to sell backend tools on top of LeakCanary, and to do that as well as maintaining it without friction, I would need to move LeakCanary to an open source foundation. So I worked on my own form of "lysine contingency" and reached out to Matthew O'Connor, an engineering-friendly exec at Square, who helped me kick this off with lawyers.

We never actually moved LeakCanary, for various reasons, one of which being that he suggested that I could stay with Square, working from France. Finalizing the move took a good year of admin & legal work, right in time for our planned deadline. I'm incredibly thankful to Matthew for making it happen.

Working from France

Before the move, I was already working 100% remote (RTO is bullshit). The main challenge working from France is the timezone difference: 6 hours with NYC, 9 hours with SF.

The interesting thing is that timezone overlap is mostly needed for meetings. Engineers tend to do their best work during long uninterrupted stretches, so working from France gives me more uninterrupted focus time than I had before.

I kept normal office working hours, and I have open slots for evening meetings twice a week, from 7:30pm to 9:30pm.

The timing also lined up with how AI has changed software engineering: I can work autonomously, at the edge of our systems, without much need for coordination. Before AI, I would sometimes get stuck and have to wait for someone to be online and help me understand a system, debug or perform some action. Today, I can unblock myself, and confirm my understanding asynchronously when the domain experts come online.

Conclusion

A year in, I don't regret the move for a second. Our kids get to grow up close to family, and I was able to keep doing work that I genuinely enjoy. It turns out a nine-hour timezone difference isn't nearly as limiting as I once assumed.

Engineers need uninterrupted focus more than timezone overlap, and AI has only shifted the balance further in that direction. I hope more engineering organizations embrace that reality, not just to retain people through life changes, but to hire great engineers wherever they live.

If you're thinking about making a similar move, don't assume the answer is "no." Ask the question. It may take an executive sponsor and a year of legal work, but it might be more feasible than you think.

If you have questions about how it's working in practice, feel free to reach out on Bluesky.