Bryson Webster accepted a remote job with a San Francisco company that allows him to continue living in Utah. BRYSON WEBSTER Online interior-design startup Havenly can't compete with Silicon Valley heavyweights when it comes to compensation, but it used to have an effective weapon in the battle for tech talent: the Rocky Mountains. The 150-person company counted on Denver's outdoorsy lifestyle to help lure people from more-expensive places. Since the pandemic spurred leading tech companies to embrace "work from anywhere" policies, that advantage is fading fast. Now that a software engineer or marketing guru can work from a creekside cabin while still pulling down big bucks from Facebook or Salesforce, smaller firms far from the coasts are feeling the pinch.