Ask HN: My company is forcing remote work. How to be effective?
6 comments
It sounds like you do a great job communicating regularly in your typical in-person environment.
I previously worked at an "old-school" company where everyone on the team would work remote 2-3 times a week. We'd also collaborate closely.
One thing that we naturally did was pair off on projects, so on a given week (or month), two people on the team were working on closely related things. On days when we'd work remote, it was easy to switch to talking to your partner on video chat / slack /email. I found that coordinating with just one other person for most of the meetings is easier and more dynamic than trying to bring in everyone.
I previously worked at an "old-school" company where everyone on the team would work remote 2-3 times a week. We'd also collaborate closely.
One thing that we naturally did was pair off on projects, so on a given week (or month), two people on the team were working on closely related things. On days when we'd work remote, it was easy to switch to talking to your partner on video chat / slack /email. I found that coordinating with just one other person for most of the meetings is easier and more dynamic than trying to bring in everyone.
Analyze your 'meet in person or in group interactions' to see if those roles can be dealt with via e-mail, e-voice conference, or other interactive group collaboration. The use of many of these has been driven by Covid-19.
In truth, all word processing, coding, meetings etc all have online means to do this that give a high degree of close collaboration.
It would seemd a suite of these aps that you all use would work. There will be a learning period, but it is quite doable, as you have all the tools in use now..
Been remote 7 years, here's something I wrote about it recently: https://joecortopassi.com/articles/rules-for-remote-work/
1. Communicate early and often.
You are so easily forgotten when remote, whether it’s on purpose or accident. Send lots of emails and slack messages throughout the day, even if they totally aren’t necessary. Most people’s thought of remote is “when I’m sick or lazy, I just say I’m working from home and take a day off”, by over-communicating you make them realize your situation is different
2. Set clear start and stop times.
When it’s your start time, sit down and open your laptop. When it’s your stop time, close your laptop and walk away. Every time. It’s too easy for work time to slowly bleed into life time, then you end up working 12 hour days with only 4 hours of output to show for it
3. Have a place to ‘focus’.
Everyone has different boundaries when it comes to normal work, but make sure you have an area that everyone understands you aren’t to be bothered unless the house is burning down. Doesn’t mean you don’t work where ever is comfy, just have a place you instinctually go that tells yourself and others “stuff just got real, I have to be heads down for a bit”
1. Communicate early and often.
You are so easily forgotten when remote, whether it’s on purpose or accident. Send lots of emails and slack messages throughout the day, even if they totally aren’t necessary. Most people’s thought of remote is “when I’m sick or lazy, I just say I’m working from home and take a day off”, by over-communicating you make them realize your situation is different
2. Set clear start and stop times.
When it’s your start time, sit down and open your laptop. When it’s your stop time, close your laptop and walk away. Every time. It’s too easy for work time to slowly bleed into life time, then you end up working 12 hour days with only 4 hours of output to show for it
3. Have a place to ‘focus’.
Everyone has different boundaries when it comes to normal work, but make sure you have an area that everyone understands you aren’t to be bothered unless the house is burning down. Doesn’t mean you don’t work where ever is comfy, just have a place you instinctually go that tells yourself and others “stuff just got real, I have to be heads down for a bit”
thanks, especially like the start/stop times item. that's a problem for me.
Hope this helps!!!! Here's a free guide on managing remote teams: https://knowyourteam.com/m/managing_remote_teams
thanks, that was helpful
Coronavirus plan came down from on high today and mandated that anyone who does not need to be in the office to get their work done start working from home.
My group (about 10 people) is very much a "meet in person" team so this will be new to us.
We currently manage work through weekly planning meetings, daily check ins, a kanban board, and github. Lots of 1-1 and group meetings to talk through problems, review code, etc.
For communication tools, we have skype chat, conference call lines, and email.
What are the best practices we should get into to make this effective?