Going Remote — Transitioning to Remote Work in a Time of Crisis.
Remote Working
Last week, we went remote. It happened so fast most of us, though expecting it, didn’t think it’ll happen so soon. Everyone went about their businesses and tried to complete their tasks at the start of the week. Nevertheless, the conversations around Covid-19 hung heavily in the air. The least show of any symptom closely related to Covid-19 was accompanied by disapproving stares and unfriendly statements.
So on Tuesday afternoon, Sena (Our CEO) called for a meeting with the team leads. The agenda: should we go remote to protect the staff but keep work running?
We started the conversation with Melissa (Our HRM) sharing with us some approaches that another company had taken and suggested we try the same thing.
Sena took over and asked us some heavy questions to find out if going remote was really the way forward.
Why do we want to go remote?
“It is a safer bet amid the spreading Corona Virus pandemic. Since a lot of our people commute to work via “TroTro” which is a very ideal environment for easy spread of the virus.”
“Besides, we’ve spent the past two years preparing to go remote. Our culture has already been a “communicate via Slack or Basecamp” one. We rarely have conversations about projects in person unless it’s critically necessary. So this is the perfect time for us to trial this remote thing and see how it can help us work better and most especially, attract and work with talents from all over the world.”
Are we ready to go remote?
This question went around the table for each team lead to answer how well they performed against a checklist Sena wrote out on the board. The checklist was:
Answer: “Yeah, we think we are ready. Though we will prefer a few days in, a few days out for the remote trial. So we get to connect with people at least two days out of the five and work remotely for the rest of the three.”
“We all have stable internet, we’ve done this remote work at least once before, our team is performing pretty well and we can use this time to judge their capabilities better. Since we’ll be out of the office, it’s the results that will talk and that can help us see who should stay and who should get help.”
How do we start working remotely?
“Well, let’s just start. We have had experience running several experiments with our work processes and flows, this is just another experiment we can run. We can do this in batches, starting with the team leads and bring on other team members as we move along.”
We spoke about the pros and cons of running in batches or running some days remote, especially with the looming pandemic and the way it is spreading. Eventually, Melissa made us understand that the best way to approach this was to go all-in for a specific number of days. She advised the number of days that add up to the period within which the President recommended social distancing.
So we opted to try out remote working for the next one month. Not in batches, not a few days in, a few days out, but a full-blown remote working schedule with the whole team. Melissa and Emelia (Our Admin Lead) got tasked to come up with the logistics we’ll need and a remote working guideline for the team to use.
The guideline was to cover:
- day-to-day expectations of the team,
- working hours & break period (we settled for 8–5 & 12–1 for consistency),
- team communications and collaborations,
- performance management and a
- highlight of tools and how we’ll use them during the period.
When do we go remote?
Half of the team leads agreed we start next week. Melissa came in with “no, if we want this to be a partial solution for the social distancing initiative, let’s start tomorrow. “
Sena concluded by saying “let’s schedule a meeting for the team to inform them and we start tomorrow.”And we went off to get ready for the meeting.
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In an hour’s time after the initial team leaders meeting, Sena met the whole team in the lounge. He started with small talk just to get everyone to relax and explained what would happen tomorrow.
He made us understand what it means to work remotely, what he expects of us, what we need to be successful and how we will be supported to go and to stay remote. At least for the next 30 days. Melissa, Emelia and a few of the other team leads added a few words of encouragement and tips to close the meeting.
The team leads then met their team members to give them directives on how the team workings will continue remotely. And that is how QodeHub went from being partially remote to being fully remote in less than 24 hours.
These are some thoughts about the first day of being remote from the team:
“The first day was hard for me. I had to reboot my system to adjust to the new schedule of doing strictly 8 am — 5 pm since we had been running a Flexi-work schedule prior to going remote.” — Enam (Digital Marketing Strategist)
“My first day was somewhat great. However, it was less productive because I experienced internet connectivity issues. With all these said, I still love remote work.”- Prince (Lead Mobile Dev)
“The day started off early for me, I was able to make it for team leads standup which was really great. I was able to complete 3 guidelines. After these, things kind of slowed down for me, but it’s all good.” — Larry (Lead Web Dev)
“My first day of remote work was scary. I knew I was prepared, but I was overly concerned about hitting deadlines, not letting internet lags delay me or anything. I was just paranoid about everything. It ended not in tears.” — Perry Tintin (Social Media Executive)
“I had gotten used to getting to work at 10 am so, full disclosure, I started work at 8:30 am instead of 8:00 am. I’m sure people didn’t really notice; not that I’m complaining. I worked until 5:30 pm. It did very little for productivity, but hey, it helped me sleep that night.” — Franck (Lead Web Designer)
“My first day of remote work proved to me I was born for this moment. The thought of maximum efficiency straight out of my bed was bliss, and it was a liberating feeling.” — Kweku Li (Social Media Executive)
If you’re considering remote for your team, you need to acknowledge that you need a plan to move with. You need not have everything figured out, you can start by ensuring your team checks off at least 4 factors on the checklist and then work onwards from there.
Take it easy, have the conversations, be ready to invest some money into making it work, then watch and see how it evolves.
We’ll continue our #30DaysRemote campaign to keep you updated on our journey to #remotework. Remember to follow our social media channels to stay updated!
Stay safe and observe all precautionary measures against the Covid-19!
Glossary
Trotro — public bus & mini-bus transportation in Ghana.
Written By: Enam Ami Agbozo (Team Lead, Digital Marketing & Content).
