Hey there, This week, I'm continuing the Q&A series on popular remote work questions, explaining why common advice doesn’t work, and sharing what I recommend instead. Reply to this email if you have a question you'd like me to cover next! We recently switched to fully remote, and love it! However, the one thing we are struggling with is the right format for our daily standup. What can we do to make our daily standups great? Any tool, process, you would recommend? Or Is there an alternate of...
13 days ago • 5 min read
Hey there! This week, I'm continuing the Q&A series on popular remote work questions, explaining why common advice doesn’t work, and sharing what I recommend instead. Reply to this email if you have a question you'd like me to cover next! We're a fully distributed team of 30-40 people (mostly engineers). We have an upcoming offsite, where many of us will meet in person for the first time after two years. Do you have any recommendations for an ice-breaker social activity to start with? The...
20 days ago • 4 min read
As someone who works from home, I don't have anyone to keep me in check, which makes it easy to procrastinate (especially when the project is challenging). How do you keep yourself accountable? I would truly appreciate any tips or suggestions! The most common advice you'll receive for this question is to use other people for accountability. Whether that's to join a coworking space or body doubling on a Zoom call, this advice focuses on using peer pressure to get things done. This isn't bad...
27 days ago • 4 min read
"How do you celebrate wins with a distributed team? My team has only 2 overlapping hours, and I'm looking for ways to celebrate our achievements within a small budget. What would you recommend? Small swag? Stickers? Any online presents? What activities can we even do?" I'm glad you asked! Celebrating wins is often forgotten about on remote teams, but it is incredibly important for building bonds and keeping morale high. As a team leader, first recognize that individuals on your team most...
about 1 month ago • 4 min read
Hey there, We're back after a 3-month hiatus. Hope you are well and apologies for my absence! While the media has been busy proclaiming "remote work is dead", my business has been growing like crazy. Haven't had a single free moment to write over these last couple of months 😅 Today, I'm back with the much-requested topic of why standups are outdated. This is a two-part issue. First, we'll discuss why standups suck and what you can do instead. Then, in the next issue, I'll dive into one of the...
about 1 year ago • 9 min read
Welcome back to another issue of Remotely Interesting! We recently celebrated the 2nd birthday of this newsletter 2 years 35 issues 0 to 2,399 subscribers Just want to take a moment to say thank you for all your support! I will forever appreciate the time you take to read, reply, and share my work. Every time I considered stopping, a kind comment came my way and kept me going. You all are the best! Here's to continuing the journey of revolutionizing how we live by changing how we work. Where...
over 1 year ago • 9 min read
Welcome back to another issue of Remotely Interesting! This week, we have something different. I'm kicking off a new series this year on uncommon but innovative benefits. In case you missed it, we did a series of Work Style interviews last year, profiling people with untraditional workdays. This latest series will be similar in that it will be occasional features over the next year with the goal of helping you see what unique benefits are out there and spark new ideas. This first benefit...
over 1 year ago • 12 min read
Hey there, quick note, thank you to everyone who registered to join the Work Forward Society, a community for people who want to end bad meetings and explore working async-first. Doors have closed to the founding membership. I was aiming to have 10 people join, but instead, we have 28 amazing founding members 🤯 If you want to be notified when the membership reopens, you can sign up for the waitlist here. When I ask people about the differences between remote and office work, they typically...
over 1 year ago • 8 min read
Hey there, quick note, thank you all for your responses to the last issue! Excited to announce I'm launching a community for remote workers who want to end bad meetings. We'll explore how to work in an async-first way without degrading communication and productivity. Members will get access to a community forum, weekly chat Q&A, and monthly live office hours to get your questions answered by experts (first event happening this month). The membership will start at $199/year. However, if you'd...
over 1 year ago • 6 min read