These are scary times.
Real worries about our own health, the health of loved ones, the global economy, and our particular employment situation are combined with expert recommendations for most of us to restrict many normal stress-relieving activities.
For our part, Freedom has already instituted a travel restriction and work-from-home policy, and in many ways, work is a welcome distraction from thinking about more serious issues.
The nature of our work made me consider writing a post about how the current moment perfectly illustrates the need for Digital Asset Management—in particular given the surprising number of knowledge workers who evidently find remote work a novel challenge. But while true, this article seemed too much like profiteering.
Instead, I decided to share quick thoughts about working remotely in general for the neophytes. When I founded Freedom, I went from a full-time in-office executive role to a 1-person organization working from home full time. That was a system shock. We are social creatures who will do crazy things if isolated. Like paying for WeWork office space. But I figured out how to be productive, and while that experience is a distant memory now, I can share some pointers.
Slack Not Video Conferencing
I’ve seen a lot of chatter about learning video conferencing etiquette, but I’ve never felt particularly more productive on a conference call with video than without. We can all talk on the phone. In all but the most sophisticated video setups (which you probably don’t have running in your makeshift home office), video conferencing introduces bad camera angles and lags that eliminate the benefits of high-touch interaction while enhancing the distracting anxieties. While I don’t have data, I’ve observed enough clients with a “video-on” culture and versus those with a “video-off” culture to at least anecdotally support my thesis that video conferencing is mostly useless.
What I did find extraordinarily helpful is when my partner Aaron joined and added HipChat to our technology toolkit. We’ve since migrated to Microsoft Teams, and I’ve used Slack with clients and some volunteer organizations. Those of you who have used these tools don’t need me to evangelize. Those of you who have not been exposed think I’m crazy for proclaiming a slightly modernized instant messenger as a game changer. But it is. Set up your various working groups as channels and find the balance of when to interrupt your coworkers versus let them come to information in their own time. Somehow this combination creates collaboration and connectedness while still allowing for heads-down productivity.
Separate Work from Life
There is plenty of real research that has been digested into think pieces about looking at screens just before bed or working in the bedroom. You’ve already seen and ignored this research and don’t additional need nagging here.
But working remotely full time makes the blurry modern line between work and life blur even further. And it’s not healthy. Take advantage of the lack of commute to start or end your workday earlier but also remember to actually start and end your workday. If you have space, work somewhere physically separate from where you relax. And while you should remember to get up and stretch your legs from time to time, you should probably leave the dishes, vacuuming, and laundry for outside of work hours—just as if you were at the office.
Don’t Confuse the Current Situation with Normal Remote Work
This last point is for any employers or employees who are evaluating the current forced remote work and finding it lacking. This situation isn’t normal and shouldn’t be used to judge remote work in general. The difference between integrating a handful of remote employees or a 1-day-per-week remote work policy and the current situation is stark. Schools around the world are closed suddenly without backup childcare, so parents are juggling in a way they wouldn’t normally. Employees who might thrive with occasional remote work and those who are not so inclined are all being suddenly forced to full-time remote work—not to mention remote everything else with social distancing protocols. Everyone has real reason to be worried and distracted in the current crisis. Too many of us have to actually worry about or care for ourselves and others.
So cut yourselves and your team some slack if you aren’t mastering Slack immediately. This is everyone making the best of a bad situation. Stay safe, and before you judge remote work to be a disaster, try it while not in the middle of a disaster.