60 seconds with Dinesh Jangra

In the latest of our 60 seconds with series, we speak with Dinesh Jangra, Partner, Head of Global Mobility Services to find out a little more about his working from home experience and how his team have adapted in the current climate.

3 facts about Dinesh...

• Very few people actually call me Dinesh - it’s a school/ work thing. Family and friends call me – Dino (which I prefer).
• I speak fluent German and have studied, lived and worked in Germany. I have even prepared German income tax returns for mobile employees!
• My passion outside of work is my family and photography. I think my Facebook profile will clearly show these two passions are combined often.

What is your home-working set-up like?

A bit of context first...in our home there is my wife, our daughter of 2 years and 8 months and I. My mother-in-law was with us at lock-down so she’s stayed too. My wife has a demanding role also and we sort of went with me upstairs and my wife downstairs. We do rotate depending on calendars. Upstairs (my usual desk in pic) is where the video calls and conference calls are more easily done. Downstairs is better to keep an eye over our little one and access all important snacks.

During the warm weather I did camp out in the garden for a couple of days. This was nice but much louder as my daughter’s slide and play area was right next door!

What practices work well for you that you think might work well for others?

 You have to plan your day. What things need to be finished today is the first thing I ask myself and I will literally book myself out to do those things. 

We do team video calls 3 times a week and that has been really important to make sure we are all interacting as a team together.

How do you stay positive, motivated and productive in such an environment?

 The lock-down has impacted every aspect of our life and well-being -physical and mental. I will be honest and say the first month or so was hard. Lots of unknowns and lots of adjusting going on in all aspects of life.

Key to staying positive is having the right mind-set – what new opportunities does this new environment bring professionally and personally? This is key – focus on those rather than the negatives – this has to be done actively as I think naturally our minds drift more to negatives.

What routines do you practice that help to keep you in the right frame of mind for the working day?

 Transitions are really important as working from home continuously has blurred those altogether. So it’s important to ritually switch on and off work.

I read this somewhere and found it works – put your laptop away, your mouse etc etc at the end of the working day (clear the desk!) and then take it back out and set up as you start up the next day. Those small moments will help in transitioning you in and out “of work.”

During this time, what would you say has been the biggest challenge for you?

 Balance – without question. Doing my job and caring for and giving time to family has been a real challenge. It seems counter intuitive as they are only metres away but as there are so many calls, so many meetings at times I literally have not left my desk for a very long day. I have tried to improve this – making time for lunch and taking breaks to chit chat with my own family without feeling bad about it. Key to this is diary management – give yourself breathing space. At one point I was talking to my own household via WhatsApp more than when I was 7 miles away in a central London office! I found that hard.

 What are your top 3 tips for others working from home?

• Plan your day - give yourself breathing space
• Be disciplined - focus on what you have to do each day and get it done
• Pick up the phone – rather than send internal emails (colleagues and clients)

What stories or experiences can you share (good or bad!) about working from home?

 Take exercise. It makes all the difference. You will feel better, think better and have a better mood. I try and do 20 mins each day but usually manage it 5 out of 7 days. It is essential!

How have the services that you offer to clients changed/ adapted during this crisis?

Quite a lot of the work we do is in arrears, tax reporting for employers and employees around globally mobile employees. For this reason a lot of the core workload hasn’t really changed. COVID itself, has created new technical complexities.

Employees who are repatriated sooner than planned, working from home (in a country different to the one that was in the original plan) or starting assignments and roles virtually in lock-down. We have been helping our clients understand the tax and payroll considerations here – so a different kind of advice and technical analysis.

We are also now talking to more new targets and customers than I think any time since I joined Crowe!

Below is our most recent edition of Mobility Mondays - released every week and aimed to provide discussion around topical concepts within mobility planning.