Remote: Office Not Required by David Heinemeier Hansson, Jason Fried
While this seems like a timely read in the midst of the COVID-19, I happen to work in a group that is largely remote during normal operations as well. I thought there were some really great insights into what has worked for 37signals for managing an almost entirely remote workforce. One item that made a lot of sense once I heard it, but had never really thought about consciously, was the need for your workers to have overlap in their scheduled work time. A huge benefit of a remote workforce is being able to work around life events – their example was a plumber coming over – there is no disruption in your work. This can actually lead to a significant decrease in productivity if your team is never “online” at the same time – if someone works 8:00a-4:00p, and their team member works the equivalent of 5:00p-1:00a, you’re likely looking at an entire day delay to get any questions answered.
4/5 stars for me – only reason I didn’t go 5/5 is that some folks would have no need in reading this. A couple of my notable highlights:
At 37signals, we’ve found that we need a good four hours of overlap to avoid collaboration delays and feel like a team.
Letting people work remotely is about promoting quality of life, about getting access to the best people wherever they are,
The new luxury is the luxury of freedom and time. Once you’ve had a taste of that life, no corner office or fancy chef will be able to drag you back.
The Personal Blog of Sean Goodwin 