Remote vs Remote: What is what...in a short read

Over the last few years, we saw an influx of companies going remote in different ways. While Covid accelerated this transition, Remote working is actually not new at all. It just became more known and adapted, and lately even needed.

Remote work, however, is an oversimplified term as there are so many ways to work remote. Think about remote first, remote by design, all remote, dedicated remote, hybrid remote, work from anywhere and there are probably more flavors around there, So what is the difference and why is it important?

Understanding the way a company does remote is incredibly important as it impacts your every day of work and life. A remote by design company will operate very differently from a company that was pushed into remote work over the last year as they first designed their company around being remote and the latter had to adjust ad-hoc. In this short article, I’ll try and shine a light on what some of the most used names mean and some pro’s and cons while we are at it.

Remote by design or all remote.

This indicates that a company was started with working remotely in mind. The communication channels and best practices are designed to be optimal for the business. The culture is built to be remote and everyone is tuned in. Building a company like this takes a lot of initial effort but is rewarded twice as hard. More on this later on.

Remote first or dedicated remote

This indicates that the company has a focus on remote, or better said, they operate as if everyone is remote, but they might have offices or hubs where people can come together to meet, collaborate, etc. This is often a company that still uses remote by design practices, but they offer or expect people in certain roles to be in the office. An example is companies where they utilise offices to train interns, or they have more junior level people that need guidance.

Remote:?

Often a company that did not start remote, but embraced the changes in the world. Think about saving overhead (costs of infrastructure), pushed by Covid, growth (easier to hire in other countries) and so on. Some companies even decided they will not relocate people anymore and let them work where they live.

Often the downside of a company that went remote later is that the communication channels, best practices, and culture are still very?much based on how they used to be (office based). Driving the change to remote is tough, it takes a mindset shift, implementing other tools, redesigning communication channels, best practices, and the biggest challenge... a complete shift in culture. Companies that struggle with these adjustments are now going to a hybrid (best case) or in-office (worst case) environment.

Hybrid:

A tricky combination of remote and office. The reason I say ‘tricky’ is because it’s incredibly hard to create a culture that is both remote and office based.

The success of a Hybrid company lies in the way they solve the main challenges around communication and culture. That challenge is to make sure that people that are remote are not feeling left out. An example: Imagine being in a meeting while you are at home, and the majority of the team is in the office. Conversations will naturally be mostly focused on the people ‘in the room’. Small things like audio clutter will make the person at home not heard. Audio clutter is when people in the room are having conversations that are hard to pick up for the microphone for the remote person. But also when the person at home is speaking, but the audio is not getting through due to conversations in the office. A way to actively approach this is by ‘forcing’ everyone in the meeting to sit separately on their own laptop.

Another challenge is the water cooler effect. The water cooler, coffee bar, canteen or even the hallway is the perfect spot for people to meet other people, to be ‘present’ and get noticed, Let’s call it gaining exposure. Some of the most interesting conversations and ideas are born in places where people come together or walk into each other. Being remote while others have ‘access’ to this exposure can be limiting the information flow towards you and even career limiting. Out of sight, out of heart is a Dutch saying that is very true here.?While making sure there is enough ‘face time’ with leadership, the team and even other teams can help you, it will never be equal. Stepping into a Hybrid company as a remote person is a risk you have to assess. Another downside is that you’ll often have to adhere to office hours.

Before you say 'are you losing those ideas and conversations in a remote setting?' I can tell you that this is not the case. However, it really depends on how the remote company enables people to collaborate and implements that in their culture.

The way we structure ‘remote’

In some companies remote simply means you work from home, that’s it. This means that you basically adhere to ‘old fashioned’ 9 to 5 days. Especially in customer-facing companies or roles, this happens a lot. But it also happens a lot in hybrid environments. People at home work at the same times as people in the office. Now, there is nothing wrong with this, it’s the most simple version of remote: you work from home.

A variation on this is where people in the company's main timezone, for instance, a US-based company, work 9-5, and people outside of that timezone adhere to the main timezone. This is something you see in tech companies that outsource to India for instance, where the Indian employees work in the evenings to ‘sync’ with the main timezone,

A more healthy version is a company where everyone works 9-5 in their own timezone. This is a very basic form of asynchronous remote. While there might still be a main timezone, the people outside of that main timezone do not have to adjust. They use their overlap with the main timezone to have meetings, but have a normal 9-5 ish day.

The ultimate version, in my opinion, is asynchronous or async remote.

This is where a person can work at the times that they want. Think about moments/times that you are most productive. Some people just work better in the evening, some rather split up their days in blocks of 2 hours, some need a flexible day as they have to run a family as well. In this version people do not need to adhere to certain work schedules, they do not need to attend every meeting, and they heavily rely on written communication and collaboration. To be able to work in this way a mind shift is needed. A mind shift that is often lacking in an office or sync setting:

To be successful in an async setting, text and documentation are incredibly important, and thus written communication. While you are awake and working, your colleague might be sleeping and your manager might be taking a walk, getting their kids from school, and so on. As you do not necessarily know what they are doing, you need to make sure your communication is short, clear, and concise so they have the least possible confusion or questions. Why? Because they’ll have to wait till you are ‘online’ again as well. Documentation becomes more important as well. Again, this is a time saver for the above reasons. It has to be clear and concise so you are not depending on others. Async work can be very slow if your communication skills and best practices are not fine-tuned. However, when executed right, it’s actually faster. The reason is simple.

When you trust people to do their job, and you trust them to do it when they feel most productive, you basically give them their life back which repays itself in not only productivity, but also loyalty. - Mark 'Doobles' Deubel

Then we have companies where you can work from anywhere. They can use any of the above sync/async versions but are free to travel for X amount per year.

I think by now it’s quite clear which one I prefer. This is why:

When I started out, I worked on a ship, 12 hours a day, 7 days a week. It’s the ultimate version of working ‘office based and synchronous’. Over time I went to more normal 9-5 roles that were in-office, and the result was always the same. I wasn’t always feeling productive, I missed out on events as I had to work 9-5, and I wasn’t able to go for a quick errand during work hours. It also meant that the proximity effect was very obvious.

When I joined my first remote-first company it was remote by design, but they had offices. While it was absolutely great to have more freedom to schedule my own days, it was still very clear that being in the office, or in the proximity of leaders, was beneficial. Meetings were also important to be present at, which led to less flexibility. It was still a very positive experience and so vastly different from working in sync in the office.

And then I joined my current company. An all remote and async company.

The key differences with the previous company were that I do not need to be at every meeting as they make sure everything is documented. This opens up my schedule to a more creative approach. Leadership is also remote, so the proximity effect loses its value and overall collaboration is higher. Going fully async seems a small tweak, but I always like to say that Async-remote gives you your life back. You are in control, you work when you’re most productive and thanks to that you are actually more productive.

Do you have questions about remote and sync/async? Let me know!

As usual, my opinions are my own and not that of my employer