the very first blog
by Konstantin Petrov
All of us. Me, my peers. Even our manager! People from other teams also.
I wake up one hour later, and prepare full breakfast for my family. I eat with my wife and daughter, not in a hurry. After, I go to the working room I made on the first floor — it is a small isolated room. It has a standing desk and a nice chair. I greet my teammates to make sure they know I am available. We start some chats, but not that much as in person.
I don’t spend time walking around, setting up my place, taking off street clothes. Remote mode of communication makes small barrier for people — they tend to put some more effort themselves before asking questions. I like it this way.
Calls and meetings over remote connection is great. I can open a window, I can sit as I like, and no one is going to stop me from using my computer to take notes. With addition of good meeting rooms hardware we have now sound is great.
Being remote is helping other peers to structure their work also. People starting to plan beforehand, and they tend to write their problems down at least in chats, some in emails. Cool!
As a result, we are all happier than before. Most of the people say that they achieve more on the days they are working from home. There are some difficulties. Children want to play, it is hard to stay away when family nearby. Lunch can easily take more than an hour, especially for those who like to talk.
Of course someone needs to be in the office each day, so this person takes care of all incoming problems. I personally found it wrong. The work never required physical presence, we are software developers after all. There shouldn’t be obstacles for staying home while working.
Onboarding for new members will be hard! No, it just needs to be different than now. We need to fix our procedures, that is true.
Please, for every big meeting be in the office! That is already proven wrong and unneeded. We aren’t in the office for many occasions and with new conference room equipment it works just fine.