Remote First

Welcome to another episode of Remote First Podcast! In today's episode, we have the pleasure of speaking with Chase Warrington. Join us as we uncover the fascinating world of asynchronous communication and gain valuable insights from Chase Warrington's expertise at Doist.

Chase Warrington, the Head of Remote at Doist. A groundbreaking company that is revolutionizing the way we communicate and collaborate. Whether you're a remote worker, a team leader, or simply intrigued by the changing landscape of work, this episode is a must-listen. 

[rebroadcast: The following episode was one of the most popular episodes since the start of our podcast. We have decided to share this content again because we believe it is still relevant and valuable in the current context .] 

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In this episode:

[05:43] The concept of working 100% asynchronously and eliminating real-time communication

[11:12] The importance of getting more data and tackling tasks asynchronously first, then synchronously

[18:04] Why you should focus on hiring in a specific time zone or region to simplify communication and collaboration

[27:47] The importance of flexibility and freedom

[31:47] Clear and well-written English communication is crucial during the hiring process

Connect with Chase 

As the pandemic forced us to adapt to new ways of working, many organizations have embraced the benefits of flexible work arrangements. But as we continue to navigate the remote work landscape, there's still a lot to learn. Let's dive in and learn how Dropbox is designing a virtual-first work culture.

Today, we have Alastair Simpson, VP of Design at Dropbox, a company that has undergone a complete transformation since 2020. He will share his insights on the company's complete shift to a virtual-first work culture. Tune in to today's episode to learn more about Dropbox's virtual first work culture.

[rebroadcast: The following episode was the most popular episode since the start of our podcast. We have decided to share this content again because we believe it is still relevant and valuable in the current context .] 

In this episode:

[05:13] Why companies should put the customer at the heart of everything they're doing.

[07:55] The behavior change challenge in embracing remote work culture

[16:50] How to reduce unnecessary meetings

[21:36] How has Dropbox implemented a virtual first approach to work

[28:54] The importance of in-person interaction and meetings in remote work 

Connect with Alastair 

‍Welcome back to Remote First Podcast. Today, we are discussing how to embrace hybrid work and how companies can effectively navigate the transition to this new work model. With many companies exploring hybrid work as a potential long-term solution, you will learn valuable insights on how to embrace remote work while still maintaining productivity and employee satisfaction.

To have this conversation, we have Claire Donald as our guest today, VP of Engineering at Moo. She will share her knowledge and experience in leading Moo's successful transition to remote work. 

In this episode:

[6:39] The meaning of hybrid work and how companies can embrace it progressively

[15:23] Training and guidance for remote employees 

[20:08] How to navigate training and communicate challenges in a hybrid workplace

[23:24] Why hybrid work is not a dirty word

Connect with Claire

Welcome to today's episode of Remote First Podcast. We will discuss Human Design and how it impacts the work of teams and organizations. To have this conversation, we have Lena Thompson, human design consultant, and keynote speaker.

In this episode, Lena will explain how understanding our unique Human Design Energy Type can help us channel our energy for optimal productivity — along with some tips on how each type can be more productive at work.

In this episode:

[01:30] What is human design, and why is it important to your work?

[08:01] How to best channel your energy and utilize it for optimal productivity

[10:34] Learn about the different Human Design Energy Types

[27:44] The importance of slowing down and taking time for yourself

Connect with Lena Thompson

If we keep talking about where people are working, we're never going to stop having this fight about home office versus office. So, we need to shift the conversation to what really matters: how we work.

Today, we have Laurel Farrer, the Head of Workplace, and a Principal of Strategy and Operations at GitLab, who has been a remote work thought leader for almost a decade. GitLab has been able to grow as a company at an accelerated rate that is record-breaking and much of that is because of the ways that they work, which is TeamOps.

Tune in to hear all about GitLab’s new way of working that is critical for the success of any team regardless of their workplace model, creates operational efficiency, allows decisions to be made very effectively, and gives everyone an equal voice in the team. 

In this episode:

[01:25] Laurel’s journey of advocating for Remote Work and the future of work

‍[05:43] How GitLab retired the Head of Remote role

[10:54] What TeamOps is all about

[15:54] The 4 principles of GitLab’s effective decision-making model

[21:18] Self-management and autonomy are critical for distributed teams

[27:42] Laurel’s wish in 2023 for psychological safety in a distributed world

Connect with Laurel Farrer

Employee experience is crucial and, as we enter the “year of employee experience and retention”, it has truly become the foundation for a company’s success, especially a remote or hybrid one.

Today, we have Sophie Bieber, Head of Global Employer Branding at SAP, a massive tech company that established a dedicated, cross-functional team to support and guide the company towards the Future of Work.

Tune in to discover the lessons SAP has learned with the Pandemic about hybrid and remote work, as well as the ways that having a team dedicated to making the Future of Work a reality can impact the employee experience.

In this episode:

[01:42] SAP’s experience going fully remote during the Pandemic

[05:43] The office is no longer the default and SAP employees get to choose what works best for them

[08:37] The ways SAP gives each team the resources and support they need

[16:26] The Future of Work team and its impact on Sophie’s experience as a leader at SAP

[23:49] Employee experience is crucial

Connect with Sophie Bieber

We are facing a prolonged period of high uncertainty with a world post-COVID, a war between Ukraine and Russia, a recession, “the great resignation”, and, more recently, massive layoffs in big tech companies. Navigating all of that is not easy.

So, today, we have Michelle Labbe, the Chief People Officer at Toptal, a company that even before the pandemic was already one of the world’s top remote work employers and provider of top remote talent.

We are discussing the current state of affairs, how that has impacted Toptal and remote work in general, the best practices Toptal has in place to weather this storm, and what we can expect to see for remote work moving into 2023.

In this episode:

[06:47] The demand for remote talent since the start of the pandemic

[09:29] Are contractors the future of remote work? How post-pandemic layoffs are affecting culture and changing remote teams

[15:43] Ways to support your remote employees once they’ve been laid off

[19:26] How the latest layoffs have started a trend among remote workers

[24:32] Ideas and strategies to improve employee retention

[28:47] The pros and cons of remote and hybrid work on the employee experience and retention

[35:53] Michelle’s wish for 2023

Connect with Michelle Labbe

Tune in to discover more about how Airbnb is creating the future of work and is leveraging its existing business model to try and revive tourism, as well as work through the complexities that every employer has to take on to enable their employees to live and work anywhere.

Today, we have Q Hamirani, the Global Head of the Live and Work Anywhere Program at Airbnb.

In this episode:

What if I told you that remote doesn’t always come first?

The way to build a solid remote-first work culture is to create a culture that fits the medium rather than forcing the medium to fit the culture.

A lot of companies are trying to take the things they used to do in an in-office culture and put them into a remote work environment. It turns out, that those things don't translate very well into this new medium of working remotely and, ideally, asynchronously.

‍So today, we have Kapil Kale, Co-Founder and COO of Tremendous and former COO at AngelList, who has built a profitable and sustainable remote work culture at both those companies.

In this episode, we're chatting today about the principles for designing a culture optimized for remote work, the differences between remote and hybrid work in 2016 and 2022 and tapping into the global talent pool through remote hiring.

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There is a true meeting mania in many organizations and workplaces today. With the rise of remote and hybrid work, having multiple meetings every day has become the norm and this is clearly taking a heavy toll on workers everywhere.

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Today, we have Stephanie Dismore, the Managing Director of HP in North America. She is passionate about the health and well-being of HP’s employees and is helping pave the way to the future of hybrid work.

‍In this episode, we talked about this meeting mania and the impacts it has on employees around the world. We considered the challenges involved in how we engage in the corporate world and thought up some solutions to make hybrid meetings more inclusive.

Most importantly, Stephanie shared with us how she is tackling this mania as an employee health and wellness issue and how she is changing the meeting culture and mindset at HP by giving employees the autonomy and flexibility to figure out what works for them.

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We’ve all probably suffered through the dreadful reality of having too many meetings on our plate, and it’s even worse when they’re all live and close together. Thankfully, there is now a better way to do meetings.

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In this episode of the Startup Series, we have Raphael Allstadt the Co-Founder of tl;dv, a company and product that are challenging the old ways of thinking about meetings and improving the meeting culture in remote companies.

Tune in to learn all about this tool and how it is helping make remote work work, by solving the problem of knowledge management and transparency when it comes to content in video format, and by changing the role of meetings in remote companies.

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Welcome to another episode of the Startup Series. Discover how the startup 5Mins can help build a culture of learning in your remote-first organization.

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Today, we have Saurav Chopra, the founder, and CEO of 5Mins. This startup is a bite-sized learning platform that focuses on building a learning culture within teams and organizations.

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In this episode, we talked about the key principles of learning, how to overcome the fundamental problems with learning at work, and how to unlock the full potential of individuals within your organization by nurturing curiosity to build a culture of learning and innovation.

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Discover how Slite is bringing clarity and efficiency with async thread-based decision-making. Despite being a mouthful, it brings so much value.

I'm excited to bring back the Startup Series. Today, we have Christophe Pasquier, the founder, and CEO of Slite. The startup is a knowledge and communication platform where remote teams make decisions and share knowledge. ‍

In this episode, we talk about asynchronous communication, work culture, and how Slite improves the way remote teams work together.

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Today’s episode is a very special one for me because it is my first ever solo episode. So, I wanted to take the time to give you the knowledge and tools you need to really dig deep into the topic of asynchronous work and make the best use of it in your company.

There’s so much more you can do with async work than simply recreating the office online. So, to make your work fully independent and still be able to work with people from all over the world and in any timezone, it is necessary to think about async work as a culture shift within your organization.

Tune in to learn what async work really is, how it’s being used in different organizations, the five principles of async, and the philosophy that will help you better implement it.

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In this time of remote work, companies big and small all over the world have been making the switch and becoming either fully or partially remote. However, the systems these companies are using hold them back from success and end up making their people feel undervalued, micromanaged, and burnt out.

But that's not a failure of remote work, that's a failure of business management because recreating the office online is NOT ENOUGH.

Today, we have Morgan Legge, the head of Organizational Change, Holacracy Coach, and much more at Convert, a trailblazing conversion optimization SaaS company.

In this episode, we talked about Convert’s (and many other companies’) solution this: Holacracy, an organizational operating system “made for remote work” that empowers the people closest to the work to make the decisions, removing hierarchical roadblocks to the company’s success, and allowing them to make the most out of asynchronous remote work and communication.

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The Digital Economy has brought with it a new reality in which you can now work wherever you are, as long as you have the skills. This has created a lot of opportunities everywhere, but none have the potential to benefit from it as much as refugees, 70% of whom live in countries that have restrictions around their right to work.

To explore the challenges refugees face when seeking work and how remote work can completely change the narrative of employment for refugees, in today’s episode we have Lorraine Charles. She is the Co-Founder and Executive Director of Na'amal, a non-profit organization that provides refugees and other vulnerable populations training in marketable skills required in the global labor market and links them to these jobs.

Tune in to learn all about this amazing organization and how you can be a part of changing the lives of refugees worldwide.

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We're already in a global labor market, and most people just don't know it yet. Remote work has leveled the playing field, and now to get (and keep) the best talent, companies need to change their old practices and pay their workers the right way. It’s time to pull up the band-aid and make the switch.

Today, we have Sondre Rasch, the Co-founder, and CEO of SafetyWing, a company of over 100 employees hiring entirely remotely from all over the world. Its mission is to build a global social safety net for remote workers and teams.

In this episode, we talk about the different possibilities to handle pay when hiring globally, debunk the arguments for paying different salaries based on the worker’s location, and bring up some hard truths about the new reality of work and management in the remote workspace.

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The rise of Remote Work is transforming the way companies are hiring. Businesses are no longer hiring talent where their headquarters are, they’re hiring talent where the talent is. This creates the need for companies to deliver a globally consistent employee experience, and to equip all of their employees with the optimal workspace at home, wherever they may be.

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Today, we are discovering a new Startup for Remote Work: Hofy.

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In this episode, I’ll be chatting with Sami Bouremoum, the CEO of Hofy, about this new reality for businesses and employees, what really matters when setting up a home office, dealing with local regulations, and much more.

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Virtual Reality and the Metaverse is transforming the way we work and interact virtually. Can you imagine sitting down for a virtual meeting, looking to your right, and actually seeing and interacting with the colleague next to you?

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I want to talk more about the future of Metaverse and for that, I’m bringing Ed Greig as a guest in today's episode of the Remote First Podcast. Ed is the Chief disruptor at Deloitte Digital UK and we’re going to discuss Metaverse technologies, the opportunities, and benefits of the Metaverse, and some of his team's latest experiments working in the Metaverse.

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In the past two years, we've seen many companies experiencing remote asynchronous work for the first time. But many people still have questions and concerns around remote work and async work. What are the pros and cons? When is it time to go async? What systems do you need in place for it to actually work?

Today, we have Julia Szatar from Loom, Ryan Burke from Qatalog, Nathan Barry from ConvertKit, and Samantha Fischer from Okta joining us in this conversation.

In this episode, we’re discussing one thing, ‘should most remote work be asynchronous?’

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Onboarding is the process of integrating new hires into an organization or company. For some, that only takes one day of orientation, however as the pandemic emerged, many companies have become creative and found ways to transition effectively to a remote-first setup, including the onboarding process of new hires. One of them is Cimpress.

Today, we have invited Brittany Sohns. She is the manager of Remote Onboarding and Learning & Development at Cimpress. A manufacturing company that was a remote adverse company in the past but has successfully transitioned from office-centric culture to a remote-first culture.

In this episode, Brittany shares how she strives to create the best work experience through developing their own 100-day remote onboarding experience.

Startup for Remote Work Series // As you know, our host loves discovering new products and services designed to change and improve the way we work. Which is why we are continuing this series to discuss specific remote work challenges that need solving and feature a startup just doing that. This week, listen to Euan Cameron, CEO of Willo, an Asynchronous Video Interviewing Software. Mind blown right? And you thought you had Async all figured out...

Show Links

Tracy Hawkins's role at Twitter evolved quickly as the company itself transitioned to a distributed-first culture. Work Transformation to call it right. One year after committing to offering WFH permanently, how does a company like Twitter adapts their ways of working to enable people to work in symbiosis wherever their location. So much to learn from this discussion as we talked about workplace experiences, async work, focus weeks, mental health and the growth of her work transformation team. 

Ressources mentioned:

What a year it's been! In this episode, I am welcoming you back in Year 2 of the Remote First Podcast and sharing my predictions for year 2022. Working in the Metaverse, Working from Anywhere, the new Purpose of an Office and the impact of Remote-First work on the future of education

It is also a great occasion to pay tribute to 28 incredible industry leaders who have taken part on the podcast and sharing with you our favourite moments so you know where to catch-up some episodes you might have missed last year. 

About the Host

Daphnée Laforest is an executive consultant on a mission to help company leaders, people ops and teams, drive a company-wide shift toward remote-first ways of working. Within 10 years of experience in fully distributed companies, she played key roles in establishing scalable workflows for growth, facilitating business decisions remotely through workshop & trainings and building internal products dedicated to digital-first teams.

Alastair Simpson, VP of design at Dropbox, has been leading the company towards their virtual-first transformation. It being Design-Led is quite unique yet it makes so much sense. 

In this episode, Alastair and Daphnée talk about why we need to unlearn the way we know work and how to do that. Alastair walks us through the exact framework Dropbox used for their digital-first transformation.

About Alastair Simpson

Alastair Simpson is a leader and mentor, serving as VP of Design at Dropbox. He loves working with multi-disciplinary teams to solve complex business and interaction design challenges.

The narrative is changing. Instead of conversations in pockets about ‘the future of work’ it’s now: how do we let our remote team thrive? Or how do we even survive working remotely? In this episode, Dominic Price and Daphnée talk about hiring and onboarding remote team members, shaping the new normal, and mental health.

Connect with Dom

Buffer is a fully remote company that is recognized for their culture & openness and transparency. Especially when it comes to Salaries - a topic that is quite a debate recently as companies are looking into the longer term impact of remote work. This week I have the pleasure to chat with Jenny Terry, Director of Business Operations at Buffer.

In this episode you will hear:

• How Buffer set their formula to adjust the salary with benchmarking and bands.
• If employee get a salary decrease if they change location
• The challenges and benefits of transparent salaries
• Why Buffer chose to go with transparent salaries - building trust
• Gender-pay gap analysis
• Average salaries of men across the company compared to women
• People new to WFH experienced that productivity often goes up when people are working from home.
• Giving equal benefits around the world

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How do you set the foundation to enable a team to go through hyper-growth entirely remotely? While recently founded in 2019, Hopin has always been fully remote. In 2021, the team quadrupled its size and to do so, they've put together a team dedicated to support this growth which Camilla is part of. 

In this episode you will hear: 

• The Vibe Team at Hopin 
• The Pillars of Internal Communication in a fast growing Remote-First company 
• Picking the right tools that will allow your company to scale 
• That influencing change in ways of working is like an internal marketing campaign 
• The importance of Story Telling in the Remote World 
• About the quarterly interactive business review and kick-off event at Hopin 

Links: 

Season III is getting started with the top companies who have drawn the best remote-first practices. Gitlab famously opened their Handbook at the most important time when everyone needed to learn all about remote work. They also gave birth to a new role : Head of Remote which has been trending in organisations wanting to succeed in their transition to a remote-first company. This week I am discussing with Darren Murph about what it is to be a head of remote and if you need one in your own organisation to set the foundation work of a remote-first mindset.

In this episode you will hear:

• Why gitlab opened their handbook
• Hybrid on paper sounds like the best of both world
• Why having a leader to implement and maintain a remote-first way of work is crucial
• How the open-source world influence the mindset of transparency needed in remote work
• In a remote-setting, there is no place for unspoken rules, everything needs to be written down

Links: 

This week episode we dive deep into the "culture code" at Hubspot which helps build a culture that enables people to do their best work in their location of choice. Be it @office, @home or in a flex mode, employees at Hubspot can choose which mode works best for them. Eimear Marrinan, Director of Culture at Hubspot explains how they do it so you can too!

Learn more about Hubspot Hybrid work