Working Remotely

There is no ‘policy’ at ICUC, it is simply a reality for us, we have no office building.  At ICUC, remote work is part of…

We make a call about whether a position is virtual as we shape the job description. While the majority of our jobs are flexible location,…

We have always worked remotely.  In fact as a start-up not having to fund an office was financially very helpful.

This takes intention and effort because it is easy to let the days roll by focused on projects and milestones. The team should have a…

Yes definitely, but communication is key. As a group we all understand the culture of the company and what that means, what our core principles…

A remote company can absolutely have a healthy company culture. It’s important to keep the conversation about culture active. We try to broach the topic…

The best thing we do, I think, is our yearly meetup. It’s a very democratic meetup, meaning that we vote on everything—where we want to…

We make sure to all get together as a company on a regular basis.  For example, we have two team members that live out of…

Annual company retreats, weekly Google hangouts (non-work related), and gif battles on Slack.

The most important keys to successful remote work are: Building trust between employees. Creating really good systems for accountability, as you won’t have the benefit of…

It’s not as hard as it sounds.  There are definitely obstacles but if you have great, highly accountable and responsible people working for you, where…

Make sure work obligations are completely understood, that communication capabilities and a robust technology infrastructure are fully embedded in the organization, and that you have…

This is true for any hire, but particularly true for remote hires: hiring the right person is critical to success. We have added many steps…

It’s not for everyone. We’ve had a few employees opt out because they really wanted to be in an office with their team, but this…

Personality conflicts are particularly difficult to resolve remotely. We’ve found that when a team is having a hard time seeing eye to eye, the only…

Communication is key on our teams. We use Slack as a central hub for daily communication, with clear channels to help team members know what…

We track projects and tasks in Asana. Most of our communication happens within Asana by commenting on specific tasks. Outside of that, we constantly use…

Our team uses Skype, Jing, Trello and Pivotal Tracker to communicate. We try not to use email, because information tends to get lost and inboxes…

The most noticeable change for me has been the size of the company and the effect that has on team (and inter-team) dynamics. When I…

We are constantly looking for new and better tools for sharing and communicating information, which is great because the technology supporting virtual work is only…

We have much more discipline and structure in place for managing various processes. 

We offer some flexibility in work schedules so that team members can have somewhat of a normal schedule, but we also require work hours to…

Thankfully this isn’t a big issue, but as our team grows, it will become a challenge. More clearly communicating goals and aligning team members will…

This is likely the largest challenge we face as a remote company.  I don’t like making people stay up late or get up super early…