Working Remotely
140 companies answer 6 questions
Working remotely comes with unique day-to-day challenges. From the initial step of implementing remote policy to nurturing company culture while operating remotely, we ask leading remote companies to share how they approach running their distributed teams from an operational level.
How did you implement a remote work policy?
Organically. We trust people to get their work done when they need to do it.
Organically. At first we had no choice because I was still in school. Once we realized how much more effective it was, we made the…
Initially our policies for managing our remote staff developed organically, then later we developed a more cohesive policy.
Can a remote-friendly company have a healthy culture?
Yes. It’s important to have someone manage the community and for those on the local team to stay aligned on how and when to communicate with…
Of course. There’s many examples of it. It’s not easy though. The short answer to “How?” is: a lot of thought, care, attention to detail…
This is a common critique I’ve heard — that a remote company can’t possibly have the same deep level of culture that a physical company…
How do you nurture your company’s culture in a remote work environment?
Our online forum is an important part of our company, a place where everyone can share ideas and chat—a virtual water cooler, if you will.
We focus on the pillars of our culture: Fun, Action, Communication, Transparency, Trust (FACTT). Fun – Meetups, video chats just to make each other laugh.…
We are in constant communication in email and use Google Docs to share and store ideas. “Team Calls” are essential to ensure that everyone feels…
What advice would you give to a team considering to go remote?
Commit to remote work, then figure out solutions to keep making it work. Avoid the knee-jerk reaction of just rolling it back. Trust your team…
Trust your team and communicate well. The worst thing you can do to a remote employee is micromanage them. As their boss, it’s your responsibility…
You have to commit to it as a team (and a company). There’s no half-way in a distributed team. If even one person on the…
What challenges have you encountered building a remote team?
At first, we there was a definite shift we needed to make to ensure that our virtual employees were always part of our thinking as…
Certainly, communication is vital. When you’re in the same office together, you have more natural, unplanned meetings and from those come some of the best…
(1) It is important to develop easy and effective ways to keep people connected. (2) If you work in a 100% virtual workplace, you also…
What are the most effective tools for remote team communication?
We use a variety of technologies that help us communicate. Our virtual office environment, Sococo, enables us to have visibility into who is “in the…
We utilize email, web-and-tele-conferencing, chat, and of course, telephones. Group chats that can be archived for future reference are very effective in many cases.
We utilize Zoom.us for weekly all hands, and individual teams hold their own weekly Zoom standups. Everything else is in Slack. We dislike phones and…
What has changed about how your remote team operates?
When Automattic first started, everyone reported to Matt (Mullenweg, our founder). When we reached about 50 people, we divided into teams. The teams have evolved…
We used to all be in Maryland. We had four team members in Maryland and it was really easy for us to all get together…
We are using better tools, less email, thank god – less Skype. 🙂 We are a great running team, everyone knows how the other one…
How does your team address different time zone challenges?
Currently, all of our remote employees are in the same time zone. We are a 24/7 operation so we do encounter scheduling conflicts with our…
We make sure everyone coming on board understands the different time zones. We work together to identify when the majority of workers are available and…
Being in different time zones is an absolute advantage for MustHaveMenus. Most of our engineers are nine hours ahead of the rest of the team.…