Home Alone: secrets for working remotely
Even once the pandemic is over, the employees of many companies will keep working from home. We spoke with game industry representatives and found out how to stay productive when we're near our soft beds, maintain contact with our colleagues, and keep our body from languishing from lack of physical activity.
Karl Von Glahn
Release Manager/QA Manager, Kongregate
● For me, keeping a normal schedule is important. Get up, shower, get dressed, go on walks.
● Take plenty of breaks.
● I have a little thing I put on my desk so I can stand and work for some part of the day.
● Find a spot for your cat to sit near you for scratches.
Sarah Beuter
Head of Localization, Gameforge
● Get to work the same time you normally do. Finish your work around the same time you would leave the office and take your breaks as you would in the office: this helps you stay focused and avoid blurring the lines between work and off-work too much.
● I've heard from some that it helps to walk around the block for the time your commute normally would take to prepare and free your mind from or before work. =)
Tamara Tirjak
Senior Localization Manager, Frontier Developments
● Communicate more: more often and in more detail. This helps everyone on the team stay on the same page and stay connected. After all, we humans are quite social creatures who don't usually do well in isolation. Apart from strictly work-related discussions, I find it important to also find a medium to replace the casual social encounters normally happening in the kitchen, around the coffee machine, in the cafeteria, or in the pub after work.
● Get some exercise. I set an alarm on my fitness tracker to warn me towards the end of every hour if I haven't made 250 steps yet. And I just pace up and down in the living room, maybe making a phone call in the meantime, or thinking about what to write in the email I might be working on.
● Get the most out of it. You save some time every day by not having to commute. You also have a lot more spare time that you now spend at home, rather than going out. What are you going to do with this "extra" time? Learn a new language? Do an online course in programming or drawing? Sign up for an online yoga studio, and develop a new healthy habit? Clean out your garden shed at last? Use your time at home well.
Balthazar Auger
Senior Game Designer, Nimble Giant
● Teams should hold check-in / check-out meetings to let people know when they should start / stop working.
● Likewise, teams should set aside a 1-hour block in their calendar for lunch, so that everyone sticks to the same schedule.
● If you're in a call and you don't need to be doing something on-screen, take that opportunity to stand up and walk around: your back will thank you for it in the long run.
● Try to keep the number of official communication channels for chats / voice calls to a minimum, since it's tiring to chase people around WhatsApp / Slack / Discord all the time. Pick one and try to stick to it.
Olga Borisova
Localization and Content Manager, Zeptolab
● Dress like you're going to the office. We're creatures of habit, and there's nothing more relaxing than your favorite blue pajamas. Besides, if you look good, you'll feel more confident in video meetings.
● Planning helps you get everything done. I've got a notebook where I write down my to-do list for the day. I do this by hand with pens of different colors to make looking at the challenges ahead more enjoyable. It's impossible to store everything in your head, and when you're working remotely, you don't have a colleague passing by in the hall to remind you about a task. That's why planning is everything.
● Another important element is information. Working at home can turn into an endless spiral of work: you'll be in touch 24/7, so you'll have to eat lunch without tearing your eyes away from Slack. Provide yourself with the opportunity to switch off from work by scheduling breaks for lunch, a walk, or a foreign language lesson on Google Calendar. You don't have to specify exactly what you're doing. Just be concise and write the word "Busy." In Slack, you can set your status with corresponding emojis for this purpose.
● The most important thing is staying in touch with your colleagues! They miss you too. ;)
Mikhail Borisenko
Project Manager, Prime Games
● Break up your work with little tasks, like getting some tea. This helps me reflect on what I'm doing and concentrate on my priorities.
● Air out your apartment: fresh air and a slightly cool temperature help you fight off drowsiness and prevent you from getting too relaxed.
Bart Roozen
Junior Producer / Product Manager, Iceberg Interactive
Ask about how everyone slept. Any infections in your local area or family? Get some fresh air every once in a while. Eat freshly cooked meals. That kind of stuff. Mental wellbeing to prevent cabin fever.
Robert Hoischen
Lead Designer & Producer, Camshaft Software
● Fixed times and structure do help with this, where they can be implemented. Make sure to not waste the most productive time of the day answering the odd email or other messages that come in. Shut off (physically if necessary) everything that is not first priority. Accept that there are fewer work hours due to the circumstances, but that can be made up for in part through setting aside this quality work time. Getting shit done feels good, and who doesn't need a bit of "feels good" in these times?
● Eliminate all potential distractions and focus on a single thing, even if it is just for 30-45 minutes at a time. Finding this quality time not only makes you get things done, but it is good for mental wellbeing too. It is so easy to do a little here, get distracted, do a little here, get called to lunch early, then not really get back to anything substantial... That makes for a miserable experience where the feeling of not getting anything done mounts and ultimately destroys your mood and morale.
Kanako Iriguchi
Localization Manager, MIXI
● I try to encourage my team to have business calls since messaging with chat tools all the time can be time-consuming with all the typing.
● Also, those living by themselves may feel lonely or isolated so just talking in general can be a good breather.
Christian Haja
Head of Business Development, SEAL.GAMES
● Communication: To keep up a routine, we switched from bi-weekly physical to daily digital stand-up meetings. Besides that, we have every team member online in Slack and actively encourage to make use of voice or video communication for work.
● Organization: A cool-headed producer dedicated to managing tasks is gold.
● Stability: The news reports on COVID-19 and the economic stress multiple times a day. We try to balance this situation, which can potentially lead to depression, by having fun at daily lunchtime video conferences. Also, we adhere to full transparency about the financial condition of our studio. It is important that every team member knows that his or her job is safe.
Alan Miranda
Owner and CEO, Ossian Studios
● My advice is to have good organization (clear tasks) and have managers keep a much closer eye on tasks and communication. I find that communication takes 2-3x more work remotely than it does in an office. There is also a greater chance for misunderstandings, so managers have to make sure everything is perfectly explained before people work on stuff. Definitely more work, but in my opinion a good manager should be doing that in an office anyhow!
● Managers also need to look ahead for problems. Because of time differences between people, you also have to factor in backup directions because you can't clarify with someone about a situation. So, "If A, then do this. But if B, then do this."
● You also have to ask yourself about the ways that someone could misunderstand the instructions (what might sound ambiguous) and clarify those parts, even if it sounds redundant or like a parent talking to a child. It's a bit paranoid, but it prevents someone from wasting hours or a whole day because you're unable to confirm something (and email can sometimes be ambiguous).
● I always find it's best to use voice calls to discuss something, especially to clear up problems, instead of email or messages. You'll figure things out 10x faster that way.
David Cremades
CMO, From the Bench
● I have been working remotely for more than a month now with 2 kids at home, 5 and 9 years old. Working at home with kids cannot be the same as working in the office if you have to take care of them and help them out with their school tasks. This month I have spent more time with my children than I have in a long time, so leverage this time to enjoy it with them and not suffer through it with them.
● Try to plan some original activities for the kids to keep busy. In my case, I proposed they create a YouTube channel talking about tabletop games. I'm helping them with it, but they are excited about the project and creating their own content!
Julio César Marambio Ramírez
CEO & Lead Designer, Octeto Studios
● Schedule a time of the day to check emails: this helps you focus on reaching other daily goals, away from the distraction of the constant flow of messages.
● Avoid unnecessary meetings: virtual conferences can take a lot of energy, so we try to take it easy and meet only when absolutely necessary.
● Hang out: since we are not in the office, we don't get to feel the general vibe and everyone's individual mood, so it's good for morale to leave some time just to hang out and small talk from time to time. See each other's faces and laugh together. That's a fundamental part of being a team, so we can't lose that
Christoph Hombergs
Head of Operations, Sandbox Interactive
● The most important part, if you can somehow implement it, is a separation between "workplace" and "home." In an ideal world, you have a dedicated room for an office. If your living situation doesn't allow for that, at least try to have two separate PCs: one for work, one for your own leisure. This physical separation of work-related things and, you know, private things helps you actually relax once you're done with work for the day.
● The most difficult part when transitioning from an in-office to a remote-work situation, though, is the change in communication. If you're sitting next to your team, you are used to having small chats in between, be they work-related, or just a joke to share. Especially in a communications-related department, and of course depending on team composition, this is a big change. So we actually have a Discord channel where we hang around, to simulate this situation as much as possible. The withdrawal of those small snippets of communication will make meetings longer and more convoluted and will also deplete team-spirit.
● Speaking of team-spirit, I've found that it helps to have little game activities with my team every now and then. The internet has so many great platforms, and it doesn't always have to be a full-blown PC game. It could always be as simple as a game in Tabletop Simulator or Cards Against Humanity. Something with a low barrier of entry, where you can do something after work. Especially in these days of social isolation, activities like this are a boon.