Working Remotely
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Slides Rishi Kumar recently used in his discussion w/ mentees of The Product Mentor. The Product Mentor is a program designed to pair Product Mentors and Mentees from around the World, across all industries, from start-up to enterprise, guided by the fundamental goals…Better Decisions. Better Products. Better Product People. Throughout the program, each mentor leads a conversation in an area of their expertise that is live streamed and available to both mentee and the broader product community. http://TheProductMentor.com
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Working Remotely
- 1. Working Remotely Product Mentor Presentation By Rishi Kumar February 7, 2016
- 2. Remote For Past 3 Years Team Distributed Over 4 Offices Managed Team in India ABOUT RISHI KUMAR Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor Hands-on product leader with 10+ years of experience in the digital media and online video space. Rishi currently oversees product for a variety of brands including: Senior Product Manager TEN The Enthusiast Network
- 3. TELE-WHAT? Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor TELE The Greek word meaning “from a distance” “work from a distance” WORK + =
- 4. Telecommuting isn’t limited to one sector of the population. Men, women, parents, people without children, young and old all participate. You can work remotely only if you have organizational support WHO CAN WORK REMOTELY t Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor
- 5. Single-Site Co- Located Team Multi-Site Team Team with Satellite Workers Distributed Team TEAM STRUCTURES Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor
- 6. MY REMOTE STORY Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor Pitched working remotely and set up a 2-week trial period Established plan to make frequent visits back for face-to-face time Made sure I had the necessary tools needed to get my work done Proved that I could be trusted to work remotely
- 7. Increased productivity Happier employees More family time Less time commuting Wider talent pool BENEFITS OF REMOTE EMPLOYEES Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor
- 8. Comic by David Fletcher A single snow day can cost Northeast region employers over $1.3 Billion in lost productivity Employees who worked from home during four official snow days saved the government an estimated $32M IS YOUR WORKPLACE READY Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor
- 9. IT’S NOT FOR EVERYONE Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor Make sure you have the right people on your team: ● Strong & efficient communicators ● Resourceful individuals that can find answers for themselves ● People with previously remote experience Comic by Jerry King
- 10. REMOTE TEAMS Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor Adding more remote workers to non-distributed teams only increases problems. With enough remote workers however, you force the team to rework their habits, expectations and workflows.
- 11. REMOTE FIRST MENTALITY Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor A “remote first” mentality helps make everyone feel equal and included. There should be no advantage to being in the office, and no disadvantage to being away from the office. Communication equality is critical to making sure that remote employees don’t feel left out.
- 12. THE IMPORTANCE OF TRUST Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor Trust is the most crucial element needed for successful collaboration between teams. While trust is critical in any team, it’s particularly important when you are managing geographically and culturally dispersed teams.
- 13. BUILD TRUST WITH PERSONAL CONNECTIONS Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor Create as much face time as possible Kick-off major projects in person Go to lunch or coffee together Introduce yourself and take the time to build connections Company mentorship program
- 14. EXAMPLES OF BUILDING PERSONAL CONNECTIONS Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor Introducing employees with blog posts Making time for personal updates Online hangouts for fully remote companies Getting the entire company together Organizing fun activities
- 15. BUILD TRUST WITH VISIBILITY Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor ● Make work visible ● Visibility into upcoming projects ● Have an open-door policy
- 16. OTHER WAYS BUILD TRUST Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor Set clear goals and expectations Provide ongoing feedback Foster cultural understanding
- 17. STRUCTURE & STANDARDS Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor Remote work requires agreed upon standards and expectations ● Methods of communication ● Expected working hours ● Team Meetings & Events ● Feedback Process ● Formal onboarding process ● Acknowledgement
- 18. VOX MEDIA: CODE OF CONDUCT Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor http://code-of-conduct.voxmedia.com/
- 19. TRELLO: NEW EMPLOYEE ONBOARDING Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor Trello’s ‘New Hire Onboarding’ sample board. Onboarding is more than logistics: it’s personal Helps bring new employees up- to-speed quickly especially people working remotely who might not know who to talk to
- 20. TOOLS & RESOURCES Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor ● Chat / Group Communication Tools ● Video Conferencing ● Screen Sharing ● Boards & Trackers ● Document & File Sharing ● Other Tools & Equipment
- 23. TIPS FOR WORKING REMOTELY Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor ● Be proactive ● Be prepared ● Be professional ● Be consistent ● Be available ● Set boundaries
- 24. CONTACT ME Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor Questions? Contact me on Twitter: @rishikMBA
- 25. SOURCES Working Remotely by Rishi Kumar The Product Mentor https://www.telework.gov/ http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/08/your-money/when-working-in-your-pajamas-is-more-productive.html http://globalworkplaceanalytics.com/telecommuting-statistics https://hbr.org/2008/02/trust-makes-the-team-go-round-1.html https://hbr.org/2014/01/to-raise-productivity-let-more-employees-work-from-home https://hbr.org/2015/03/why-remote-work-thrives-in-some-companies-and-fails-in-others http://bob.mcwhirter.org/blog/2010/09/13/remote-worker-distributed-team/ http://martinfowler.com/articles/remote-or-co-located.html https://www.woothemes.com/2013/07/how-to-fight-to-make-your-distributed-team-a-competitive-advantage-not-a-weakness/ https://www.formassembly.com/blog/remote-work/ http://product.voxmedia.com/2015/10/26/9610910/better-workplaces-forge-conference https://medium.com/@Liz_Hall1/onboarding-new-hires-with-trello-ecc87e87ffd5 http://blog.trello.com/new-employee-onboarding-best-practices-for-new-hires/
Hinweis der Redaktion
- My talk today is on the topic of working remotely. I’m going to explore what structures, environment, culture and tools you need to effectively work remotely, and also manage a remote team.
- To being with, I wanted to briefly go over my background. I’m currently the Senior Product Manager for TEN: The Enthusiast Network. I work for the Sports & Entertainment division, where I oversee product for a variety of brands such as Surfer, GrindTV, SLAM, Bike, Powder and Snowboarder. I have over 10 years of experience in the digital media and online video space and for the past 3 years, I’ve been working remotely from New York. My team is distributed over 4 offices and in the past I’ve managed a remote team in India.
- There are a lot of different terms that people use to describe “remote work”, such as: telework telecommuting working from home digital nomad, etc. OPM, the U.S. Office Of Personnel Management, prefers the term “telework”, and they describe it as: a work arrangement that allows an employee to perform work, during any part of regular, paid hours, at an approved alternative worksite. So this actually makes sense when you consider the meaning of the word ‘Telework’ ‘tele’ comes from the Greek word meaning “from a distance” and when combined with “work” it means “work from a distance” No matter what term you use to describe remote work, for purposes of this presentation, we’re going to consider it as any work done from a location outside of the traditional office space. This can include working from a home office, a coffee shop, a co-working space or any other environment where you can get your work done.
- People who work remotely aren’t limited to to one sector of the population. Men, women, parents, people without children, young and old all participate. However you can’t work remotely if you don’t have organizational support. In 2013, Yahoo famously sent employees an internal memo that banned the practice of working remotely. The memo stated that “To become the absolute best place to work, communication and collaboration will be important, so we need to be working side-by-side. That is why it is critical that we are all present in our offices. Some of the best decisions and insights come from hallway and cafeteria discussions, meeting new people, and impromptu team meetings. Speed and quality are often sacrificed when we work from home. We need to be one Yahoo!, and that starts with physically being together.” I’m not sure if Yahoo’s stance on remote work has changed over the past few years, but the point is this: while lots of different people can work remotely, if your company doesn’t value or prioritize remote working, then it’s going to be an uphill climb. The only way you’re going to be successful at working remotely is if you have support from the top and a formal structure in place.
- Martin Fowler wrote an article where he describes the “The Many Shades of Remoteness” and here are some great illustrations from his article that show the many different types of team structures. Working remotely looks different for each company. If you had to narrow down the different types of remote team structures, here would be 4 good examples. A single-site team, or co-located team, is a team where everyone is located in the same physical location. This is the traditional office setup where you might be sitting right next to your team members. A multi-site team has two or more co-located groups at separate locations. For example, having your product team in Los Angeles and your development team in India. A team with Satellite workers is when you have most of the team co-located, but a few members working remotely, either from home or in another office. A distributed team is one where most people work in separate locations. People in this structure can be quite spread out geographically, and because of this most distributed teams are forced to adopt a “remote first“ mentality.
- I want to share with you all my personal story of how I was able to work remotely. Let’s go back to 2012, when I was working San Clemente, CA. Pretty much everyone on my team worked out of that same office include, including management, product, engineering, editorial, sales and advertising. The only person who wasn’t was our Creative Director who was in our El Segundo office which was about an hour car ride away. At the time, my fiancée and I were in a long-distance relationship. I was in Southern California, and she lived in Seattle, Washington. She had a great job and we weren’t sure if she was going to move to California or if I would have to move to Washington. Luckily my company had a small satellite office, only a few miles from Seattle, and I was able to convince my boss to let me work remotely on a two-week trial period. If all went well, I would work remotely on an ongoing basis by making frequent trips back to CA for some face-to-face team time. Everything did go well, and I believe one of the big reasons for this was because of how efficiently I worked with my Creative Director. We had gotten really good at communicating and collaborating using screen sharing, file sharing, and talking on the phone to get work done. Even though he was only an hour car ride away, we were technically already working remotely. For me, it didn’t matter if we were 60 miles apart or 1,200 miles apart, the quality of our work didn’t change. What also helped was that I had personal connections with everyone on my team, and I knew who to approach if I needed something done. I had already built up the necessary “social capital” and my team knew that they could trust me to get my work done. It didn’t matter if I worked from the office, from home, from Seattle or from New York. Much like my personal long-distance relationship, working with a remote team is no different. Working remotely requires effort. You need to make a conscious and concerted effort if you want to be successful at working remotely. So, just to recap my story, I: Pitched working remotely and set up a 2-week trial period Established plan to make frequent visits back for face-to-face time Made sure I had the necessary tools needed to get my work done Proved that I could be trusted to work remotely
- Here are some benefits of having remote employees: Increased productivity, due to fewer distractions and interruptions which allows people to focus on their work. Offering flexible hours leads to happier and more loyal employees. This can in turn lead to higher employee satisfaction, reduced employee turnover and fewer sick days. It also can allow for more family time, which might be important for employees that are trying to raise a family If you’re working from a home office, you spend less time commuting to work, which not only saves you money but is also better for the environment. Also, this allows people to work in spite of severe weather conditions and allows for quicker response times in case of emergencies. If you have a distributed team, then you’re not restricted by location when trying to find new candidates. This creates a wider talent pool and lets you focus on finding the best talent rather than what’s local.
- According to the research by Global Workplace Analytics, a single snow day can cost Northeast region employers over $1.3 Billion in lost productivity. And in 2014, Federal employees in Washington DC who worked from home during four official snow days saved the government an estimated $32 million in productivity losses. Winter storms can be a wake-up call for companies that don’t have a flexible workplace strategy in place. If people are already familiar with working remotely or telecommuting, then when severe weather conditions occur, they can keep on working. Having a disaster plan or more simply a plan in place in case employees are sick, is a good reason to integrate a remote workplace strategy.
- While there are some great benefits, working remotely isn’t as glamorous as you might think. Sure, the thought of working from home in your pajamas might sound great, but in reality, not everyone is cut out for remote work. Some people just perform better in a co-located environment, and need that regular in-person interaction to feel connected. It’s important to note that: a great employee doesn’t always make a great remote employee. What makes a great remote employee? Communication is the greatest challenge facing remote employees, and communication issues only get magnified when dealing with teams across different time zones. It’s really important to hire strong communicators and people who know how to communicate efficiently. Excellent communicators know how to get their point across with fewer words. It helps if you have self-starters on your team who are highly-motivated, because these will be productive employees. You also want resourceful individuals that know how to find answers for themselves. It really helps to hire people who have previously worked remotely, or perhaps have had either freelance or entrepreneurial experiences. Prior experience dealing with vendors and external clients also helps.
- I found this graph from an article by Bob McWhirter, who hypothesised that adding more remote workers to a non-distributed team only increases problems and frustration. He says, however, you’ll eventually come to a tipping point where having enough remote workers, will force you to reformulate as a distributed team and adopt a “Remote First” mindset. The team will be forced to rework their habits, expectations and workflows, and will ultimately function better because of it.
- So, I thought that was an interesting point. When there are only a few remote workers, and the majority of the team is in one location, it’s hard to realize that the people working remotely are being left out and essentially being treated as second-class citizens. You basically come to a point where the old setup no longer works. Much like we use a “Mobile First” in web design strategy, I believe teams should adopt a “Remote First Mentality” so that everyone feels equal and included. It’s not fun if your team is collaborating in a conference room, and you’re just listening on a crappy speakerphone. When there’s inequality between remote work and office work, both sides resent and distrust each other. The people working remotely feel cut-out of the action The people in office feel that remote employees are just slacking off To have truly have equality between remote and non-remote employees there needs to be no advantages for people who come into the office and no disadvantages to staying home to get your work done When I was speaking to Justin Gallagher, the VP of Product at Trello, I learned that they actually practice this “Remote First Mentality”. For example if there are 3 people that need to meet and 2 of those people sit next to each other in the same office, but the 3rd person is remote, they will all default to a video conference so that no one feels left out. Communication equality is critical to making sure that remote employees don’t feel left out. The key takeaway here is, even if you only have a small percentage of remote employees, make a conscious effort to make sure that everyone feels as if they are part of the team.
- According to a Harvard Business Review article, trust is the most crucial element needed for successful collaboration between teams. Managing remote teams is different than managing in-house teams. A relatively small problem for an in-house team, can snowball into a larger issue for remote teams - due to misunderstandings and communication issues. It’s really hard to communicate with teams without having a certain level of trust Having trust in your team means that you can rely on them. I know I can trust my team to deliver quality results on time. If someone needs to work from home for a day or for a week, I know I can trust them to get their work done without having to micro-manage. If someone on my team needs help, I know I can trust them to reach out and ask for it. Having trust in my team means I’m not second-guess everything that they do While trust is a critical element in any team, it’s particularly important when you are managing teams that are remote. Trust also helps with the collaboration process because it removes communication barriers and creates a safe and supportive environment where all ideas are welcome.
- So what are some ways that you can build trust? To begin with, build personal connections. Distance can put a strain on any relationship, therefore it’s critical to have a trusting relationship. By building personal connections you can not only boost morale, but you’ll find it’s so much easier to work together. Try to create as much face time as possible with your team. Even a small amount of face time can go a long way towards creating trust between team members. If you have a main office, and you’ve recently hired a new remote teammate, plan to have them spend their first few days or even a week at the main office. As good as collaboration tools have become, none of them are as quick and effective as being in the same room as each other. When kicking off a major project with remote teams or stakeholders, try to meet in person first. Having an initial face-to-face meeting will not only help build trust, but it’ll help your project go smoother because you have established a relationship with each other. While you’re in same location, make it a point to go out to lunch or coffee together. The more comfortable and at ease you are with your remote team, they more likely it is you’ll want to work with them. Sharing a quick meal or coffee is a great way to bond and make people feel connected. So this applies to everyone in the workplace, but it’s especially valuable for remote employees. Take the time and introduce yourself to people. Make the effort to get to know everyone. The more opportunities there are for people on your team to connect the better. Even using video chat helps to build personal connections and trust because you can see people face-to-face vs phone calls and emails. Another way to do this is by sending an email where you introduce yourself and your team members. Include a photo of each member, information about their roles, and few fun facts or some hobbies and interests. At the very least, this helps share a bit of valuable information about who the people who you might otherwise not know anything about. That way, when you need something, you know who to approach and you can still put a face to a name. If you’re managing a remote team, a good way for people to connect while also sharing knowledge and helping people grow, is to have a mentorship program within your company. Regardless of how your team communicates, teams should encourage the building of these personal connections, because it’ll help you see your teammates as people as opposed to just random names on email chains.
- Ok, let’s go over some great “real-world” examples of how companies are building personal connections with remote teams: Atlassian, the company behind Jira, Confluence and HipChat, empowers new employees to write their own introductory blog post. This post, which can include things such as hobbies, interests, is then sent out to their internal Confluence system It’s a fun and interesting way to introduce new employees to the rest of the company. Existing employees can read these posts on their own time and make the new hire feel welcome by commenting on their post. This is also a great way for people with similar interests to connect with each other - especially with team members that are in different countries. Yuri Victor from Vox Media writes that the “Editorial Products team has a meeting every Friday where we talk about what happened during the week, but the first half of the meeting is an ‘adult show and tell’ where anyone can talk about whatever they want. People talk about everything from their kids to their vacations to what class they are taking. A lot of companies bond after work (over beers), but we try to make time to bond during work because we believe it is part of our job. At the company GitLab, they hold an online hangout once a month where their team gets together, drinks their beverage of choice, and just hangs out - equivalent to an virtual office happy hour. GitHub, requires new hires to spend their first week in its San Francisco headquarters so they develop an understanding of the company’s culture. Finally at my company, I like to fly back to Southern California at least one a quarter to meet with my teams. I make it a point to coordinate these meetings when we’re doing company wide all-hands or townhall meetings as it’s a great way to see everyone in once place. These company wide meetings are a great way to share information, reinforce goals and build company culture. On our Digital team, we try to organize fun activities whenever we can. These can be company sponsored activities, like bowling or Indoor Go-Kart Racing, or just informal get togethers with the team where we can hangout and bond. It’s a great way to boost morale, get people excited and build trust within the team.
- Besides personal connections, another way you can build trust is with visibility. If I know what someone is working on, and I can see the progress that they making, then I know they are taking care of business and I can start to rely on them. Making your work visible and providing regular updates is a major requirement for building trust. On my team, we use Jira to plan, track and prioritize our tasks. We use the time tracking feature to see how many hours people are spending on projects, and use daily standup meetings plus a weekly planning meeting to keep the team on the same page. This is very helpful for us because we know what team members are working on, and when there are competing projects that require attention, it helps efficiently prioritize and stay updated on progress. Besides knowing what people are working on, it really helps to have visibility into upcoming projects. I’ve my fair share of experience where the product and engineering are the last ones to know about a particular project … and it’s due in a week, because the sales team didn’t let us know about it sooner. This does not create a very friendly working environment and actually build distrust within teams. Having a shared tool or a system where you can see upcoming and potential projects is important in creating visibility and helps give teams a little more lead time to plan. Finally having visibility as to how and why decisions are being made, helps build an environment of understanding and trust. While I’m not a fan of more meetings, certain ones are helpful. Every Monday morning, my group has a Department Head meeting where all the different departments are represented. These are valuable meetings as they give me insight to what’s going on in departments that aren’t directly related to me, and give me insight to decisions made on a company-wide level. It’s also a forum to ask questions and allow senior members of the team to get on the same page. Our CEO does a good job leading by example by creating a open-door culture at our company. He frequently says that his door is always open, and any and all comments and ideas are welcome. Complaints and problems are welcome as well, but only with proposed solutions included. He also literally implemented an open-door culture in our new office building as there are no doors in any of the office (except conference room) so as to build trust with visibility.
- So besides personal connections and visibility, other ways to build trust include: Setting clear goals and expectations: Clear goals and expectations are fundamental to building and maintaining trust, because everyone is on the same page. Also if conflict or disagreement occurs, you have clear goals to help realign everyone. In your launch meeting, you should have an explicit discussion about what you want to accomplish and what your definition of success is. Provide ongoing feedback. All teams, remote or not need regular input on how they are doing. Make a special effort to give remote teems feedback, both good and bad. Even sending a quick email saying ‘we had a great week’ or ‘great job solving that issue’ goes a long way toward establishing trust and good relationships. When things don’t work out, make sure that feedback gets delivered as well. Foster cultural understanding. When working with remote teams, you'll inevitably encounter people from different cultures. For example language and cultural barriers when dealing with international teams. This can also happen domestically when working with teams in different states. I remember getting on a conference call with someone from Tennessee once, and I was having the hardest time understanding their English because of their heavy Southern accent. In situations like these, be respectful, but don’t be afraid to ask others to slow down, speak up, or even repeat themselves. Maybe written communication like email or instant messaging would be better suited in these kinds of situations.
- In order to effectively work remotely and manage remote work, you need certain structures in place. It’s important to implement certain standards and expectations, and make sure that everyone is aware of them. These include things like: Methods of communication. This can include things like: What tools are we going to use to communicate and collaborate? What languages are we going to speak? Will English will be the standard language of communication? This important if you’re working with people in different countries. Is there a system or team calendar for example, to notify the team when you’re not available or out of the office? If an emergency happens, what’s the method of communication that will be used? Expected working hours. Define what “normal business hours are.” If you have remote people scattered in different time zones or across the world, how will that work. For example, I typically work West Coast hours because my team is in California and I like to be available when they are. When I was managing our team in India from CA, they are 13 ½ hours ahead of us. What are the expectations for being available after hours? Is there an expectation that you’ll need to respond to emails over the weekend? If you have a main office, are you expected to visit every few months? Team Meetings & Events We have a morning standup meeting everyday at 10am that everyone is expected to attend and participate in. You should establish a daily or weekly meeting that works for your team. It could be a weekly google hangout, but the important things is to make sure it’s a formal meeting that everyone is required to attend. This allows that everyone is on the same page and give people the opportunity to catch up and ask questions. In addition to this standup meeting you can ask team members to submit weekly progress reports, which can be a quick way of seeing what was accomplished and if you encountered any roadblocks. This is useful for managers who might not be part of the morning standup meetings, and helps them stay updated on the team’s progress. Have regularly scheduled team building activities, hack-a-tons and other activities that bring people together and make people feel more connected to each other. Feedback Process Establishing a process where you can get recurring feedback on performance and keep track of goals. You can do this quarterly or twice a year. Set up regular 1-on-1 check-ins and phone calls with supervisors or with people you manage so you can not only get feedback but see how they are doing and connect with them on a personal level. Post-mortems. I think it’s very valuable for remote teams to have these types of meetings after every launch regardless if the project was successful or not. Make sure you walk away with key learnings and apply those to future projects. Formal onboarding process A formal onboarding and training process. Having a process ready to go before employees start is critical so new employees have everything they need to be up-and-running on their first day. More on this in a couple slides. Acknowledgement Finally, I think it’s important to also have a system in place where you celebrate milestones and acknowledge the team for successful launches. Our HR department gives our Service Awards for individuals that have been around for 5, 10, 15 years. Also, we have a company newsletter where we announce new product launches and key wins, which helps build team morale and also showcases all the cool work that our company is doing.
- Here is an example of a company that does a really good job of setting up standards and expectations. The Product Team at Vox Media created a Code of Conduct that they use to govern their environment. Their code covers topics such as Values, Expected behaviors, Unacceptable behaviors, How to reporting a problem, Taking care of each other, Making a commitment to improvement and finally How to contribute to this Code of Conduct. They state that “We created it not because we anticipate bad behavior, but because we believe that articulating our values and obligations to one another reinforces the already exceptional level of respect among the team, and because having a code provides us with clear avenues to correct our culture should it ever stray from that course. “The contents of this code of conduct apply to our interactions in various areas of our shared professional lives, including the Vox Media offices, off-site company events, our Slack and email exchanges, social media, and industry conferences or other events where we represent Vox Media.” Having a code of conduct that formally outlines the social norms, rules and responsibilities is an excellent way to create structure for teams especially for remote teams. Kudos for them for doing this. I encourage everyone to check out this Code of Conduct, and see how you can implement something similar on your team.
- Here is an really good example of an Onboarding Process. If you’re not familiar with Trello, it’s a collaboration tool that organizes your projects into boards. There are many ways to use a Trello board, but I really like how Trello uses their own product for a pretty awesome onboarding process. Elizabeth Hall, VP of People at Trello writes that onboarding, may actually be one of the most important steps because it sets the new hire on the right trajectory from day one and gives them a great first impression of the company. Nobody wants to spend the first day of their exciting new job sitting at an empty desk, twiddling their thumbs, because someone forgot to order their computer or compile their new hire paperwork packet. Looking at the problems facing new remote employees during the onboarding process, she states that new remotely employees weren’t getting to know the rest of the company as fast as new employees who worked in the office. They didn’t know who to talk to regarding their 401k, which equipment they should purchase, or about our conference policy. They didn’t know who else was a recent hire or had been here for eight years. More importantly, they didn’t know who else had adorable cat pictures to share. Onboarding is more than logistics. It’s personal. Yes, it’s important to get your health insurance forms filled out, but companies should also use this opportunity to convey culture, history, fun company stories. Remember the goal is to make your new remote employee feel like a valuable part of the team, and make sure they are really “on board” with information. Using a Trello board helps streamline the Onboarding process, because it basically acts like a centralized to-do list, check-list and wiki, all rolled into one. It should have standard information for all information and can also include customized information depending on what department you’re in. Trello’s onboarding board has the following items: Things to do before your first day Things to do on your first day and during your first week A ‘Done’ list where you can put all of your completed items A ‘Can I have?’ and a ‘Who do i talk to about?’ list which are basically Frequently Asked Questions A ‘History Behind’ list which is a great way to share company history and company culture And a ‘Who’s who’ list which helps introduce yourself to the company. I encourage you to read Elizabeth Hall’s article about Onboarding New Employees at Trello, it’s one of the best onboarding processes I’ve seen, and it just makes so much sense.
- Ok, let’s quickly about Tools & Resources that can help you better communicate and work with remote teams. No matter what tools you choose, it’s important that everyone on your team is on board and aware of how to use them. A quick note about email. As much I dislike email it’s still the most commonly used form of communication workplace. Email is still useful for sending out status updates and communicating decisions. However, it important to make sure everyone on your team is using email efficiently. This means keeping emails clear and concise, promptly responding to messages and managing your inbox effectively. Chat / Group Communication Tools: (Slack / HipChat / CampFire / Flowdock, Yammer, etc) Most organizations use one of these tools as their primary method of communication, it’s great for keeping all team communication in one place. It’s also valuable since these archive conversations so you can go back and see what someone wrote. If you’re away from your desk you can quickly skim a thread and see what you missed. It’s also a great way not to interrupt someone, because people can respond whenever they have a minute. Tools like these: allow for one-on-one conversations, group conversations, private conversations have rooms / channels that can be setup for projects and teams most of these support integrations with other 3rd party applications that you and add-on to help you improve your experience. Video Conferencing: (Google Hangouts / Skype / Appear.in / Sqwiggle which is always-on video chat) While there is no substitute for face-to-face conversations, a video call is the next best thing. Use these liberally when you’re working remotely for meetings, quick conversations, demos, trainings. Screen Sharing Tools: (Join.Me / GoToMeeting, you can also use Google Hangouts / Skype for this) Similar to video conferencing, use these screen sharing tools for demos, trainings, conducting research and collaboration. Join.Me is one of the primary tools I use to collaborate with my Creative Director in California and really help us get on the same page. Boards & Trackers: (Trello / Jira / BaseCamp / FogBugz / Asana) These are your primary tools for project management / issue tracking / roadmapping. These are great for keeping on top of everything and knowing who’s working on what. No matter what you use, make sure you come up with clear guidelines for how to use them, and make sure your team knows the process for creating tickets and submitting bugs. Document & File Sharing: (Google Docs / Confluence / Dropbox / Box.net) It’s really important to have a centralized repository for documents and project files, so everyone on your team knows where to go. Google Docs are great because they enable multiple people to view / edit / comment on a doc at the same time which is important for collaboration. Other Tools / Resources / Equipment: Homeslice: Tool that let’s you find ideal meeting times across multiple timezones. BrowserStack: Great Testing / QA tool across multiple browsers and device types Password Manager - consider using an enterprise level tool for security purposes / also great for managing access for remote employees VPN Access - so you can access internal tools and sites from outside the office Team Wiki - for FAQs and tutorials Finally, make sure you have the right tools, this means a proper desk, comfortable chair, a headset, dual-monitors if you need them, a fast internet connection If you have a home office, great. If not, see if you can get a co-working space.
- Here is a screenshot of my team using Appear.in for video calls I personally like this better than Google Hangouts because it’s faster, and doesn’t require someone to have a Google account.
- This is homeslice.in it’s a great tool because it does the time-conversion math for you, and quickly shows you what the time is at different places super helpful for finding an ideal time that works for everyone When I was managing a team in India, I was in CA and India was 13 & 1/2 hours ahead of us. The India team worked during the day, which was my night. We agreed that we have Skype meetings at times that worked for us both. So I used to stay late and have Skype calls at 7pm my time which was 8:30am for them. remember that not everyone works in the same time zone as you, so be respectful of people’s off-hours as i mentioned before, define what the normal business hours are for your company, but once you do that, make sure you're respecting people’s nights and weekends
- Ok, so my last slide… If you take away anything from today’s talk, here are the 6 things I want you to know: Be Proactive. Master the technique of Managing Up. Keep key stakeholders especially your direct manager in the loop as much as possible. Let your manager know when you’re working on a particular assignment and offer updates without them asking them. In a remote setting, your supervisors (and teammates) will not know when you’re working on something unless you tell them and keep them in the loop. over communicate if you have to, it’s better than forgetting to mention something Being Prepared. when you’re going into meetings, make sure you’ve read the necessary documentation and are prepared. come with questions and examples. make sure you participate in meetings. yes, you’re remote, but your input is still valuable make sure your documentation and wireframes are as complete as possible when you’re presenting it, you don’t want to look bad when you’re presenting to stakeholders Be professional. Remember you’re a professional, just because you work remotely doesn’t mean you can slack off. You need to deliver results, often times with little supervision. Make sure you’re actually working when you say you are. if you’re working from home, don’t watch netflix or do laundry in the middle of the day. this goes without saying, but don’t get drunk just because you’re not in the office. be professional Be consistent. Have a daily routine. Get out of bed as if you're going into your main office. make sure you’re doing the little things like showering and getting dressed, it puts you in a professional mindset. i recommend that you have a dedicated space where you can work. it can be a home office, but just make sure you’re not working from your living room. make sure you’re on time. Being Available So this might be the most important of all of these tips. One of the most important factors in your success as a Product Manager is going to be your availability and your flexibility A sound piece of advice, is that no one should be able to tell that you're not physically in the office Keep a regular schedule so people know your working hours if you’re unavailable or have stepped out, make sure you let people know as a Product Manager you’re the focal point, or the main go-to person for a lot of projects You’ll be having a ton of conversations with your team, so make sure they are able to reach you - just as if you were in the office. Set Boundaries my final point. people who work remotely, typically work more hours it’s very easy to lose track of time and get caught up with work, especially if no one is around and since you’re likely always connected to the internet, you’ll have the temptation to respond to a quick email after hours. don’t. set clear boundaries you need to maintain a work / life balance. while it’s ok and needed on certain projects, make sure you have off-hours, and stick to those. this is key to not burning out. make sure you’re taking breaks. you can only sit in front of the computer for so long. remember, it’s a marathon, not a sprint.
- If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me on Twitter @ rishikMBA