Speaker 1: Welcome to How I Work, a show about the tactics
Speaker 1: used by the world's most successful people to get so
Speaker 1: much out of their day. I'm your host, doctor Amantha Imber.
Speaker 1: I'm an organizational psychologist, the founder of behavioral science consultancy Inventium,
Speaker 1: and I'm obsessed with finding ways to optimize my work day.
Speaker 1: Today's show is a best of episode because I've been
Speaker 1: taking a few weeks off over summer to recharge, and
Speaker 1: so I've been going through the last two and a
Speaker 1: half years of doing How I Work and picking out
Speaker 1: some of my favorite interviews to re share with you.
Speaker 1: So very excited about two Day's interview. It was one
Speaker 1: of my favorites from twenty to twenty. And my guest
Speaker 1: is Darren Murph as git Lab's head of Remote. That
Speaker 1: is what Darren does. That is his actual job title.
Speaker 1: And if you've never heard of GitLab, it's the world's
Speaker 1: largest all remote company with over thirteen hundred team members
Speaker 1: across over sixty seven countries with no company owned officers.
Speaker 1: So Darren has spent his career leading remote teams and
Speaker 1: charting remote transformations, and he also is the author of
Speaker 1: git Lab's Remote Playbook, which I definitely highly recommend checking out.
Speaker 1: Darren also holds a Guinness World Record as the planet's
Speaker 1: most prolific professional blogger, having published ten million words. Now,
Speaker 1: before I head to Darren, I just want to say
Speaker 1: a big thank you to everyone that has been leaving
Speaker 1: reviews in Apple podcasts orever you listen to this show.
Speaker 1: It's so appreciated. It's just amazing getting listener feedback. It
Speaker 1: really is totally wonderful. And if you yet to leave
Speaker 1: a review, I would be so so so grateful. If
Speaker 1: maybe today is the day that you might take, you know,
Speaker 1: five or ten seconds out of your date to leave
Speaker 1: a star rating or write some words helps other people
Speaker 1: find the show, and it's really just lovely getting feedback
Speaker 1: on your own work, to be honest. So on that note,
Speaker 1: let's head to Darren to his about how he works. Darren,
Speaker 1: Welcome to the show.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having me. It's a pleasure
Speaker 2: to be here.
Speaker 1: I'm so excited to be talking to you. I was
Speaker 1: just saying that before we started recording. You've just done
Speaker 1: so many interesting things, and I feel like I've got
Speaker 1: a billion questions and I'll probably get through about one percent.
Speaker 1: But I want to start fortune this mini article about you,
Speaker 1: And in the article you said, what we're seeing now
Speaker 1: isn't remote work, it's crisis induced work from home. And
Speaker 1: I want to know what is the difference.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's accurate. So remote work, when it is intentionally structured,
Speaker 2: is life's greatest cheat code. It enables you to accomplish
Speaker 2: your bucket list decades before anyone else would if they
Speaker 2: were beholden to a rigid commute and they were simply
Speaker 2: trying to wrap what is their life around the rigidity
Speaker 2: of a daily commute and a trek into an office.
Speaker 2: But what we're experiencing right now is not that we
Speaker 2: have all been thrust into our homes by a tragedy
Speaker 2: COVID nineteen. And on top of us being in our homes,
Speaker 2: none of us are adequately prepared even going out for
Speaker 2: dinner or drinks or going to get groceries. All of
Speaker 2: this is more complex right now. We're all a lot
Speaker 2: more isolated. There are a lot of things happening outside
Speaker 2: of our control that many people are conflating with remote
Speaker 2: work because it is their first experience with remote work.
Speaker 2: But I assure you it is not the same. And indeed,
Speaker 2: I've been encouraged by some people saying even though I'm
Speaker 2: working remotely during a pandemic, there are some things that
Speaker 2: are very encouraging, and frankly, I can't imagine going back
Speaker 2: into the office full time, and that encourages me because
Speaker 2: if people can find the silver lining in remote work
Speaker 2: and work from home, now, just imagine how amazing it
Speaker 2: is once travel restrictions are lifted.
Speaker 1: It's going to be quite amazing. I must say, I
Speaker 1: feel like I was thinking about the sea out of
Speaker 1: the day. I used to travel work probably once a week.
Speaker 1: I'd be at airport about once a week, and I
Speaker 1: was thinking, gosh, I barely remember what an airport or
Speaker 1: a plane feels like. That's just going to be such
Speaker 1: a novelty whenever restrictions are lifted. And in Melbourne at
Speaker 1: the moment when we're recording this, we're in stage four lockdown,
Speaker 1: so things are pretty full on here now. When it
Speaker 1: comes to remote work, you literally wrote the book on it.
Speaker 1: So get Lab, where you're head of remote, has a
Speaker 1: remote working handbook which is such a good read. I'm
Speaker 1: going to link to it in the show notes, and
Speaker 1: I want to pull out some of the things that
Speaker 1: I quite liked that were sort of like some little
Speaker 1: surprising gems. And then I want to hear from you,
Speaker 1: what are some of your favorite pieces of advice or
Speaker 1: tips from the handbook, because there's just so much in there.
Speaker 1: So some of my favorites were to adopt a self
Speaker 1: service and self learning mentality, which I really like because
Speaker 1: I feel like often and I've experienced this myself with Inventium,
Speaker 1: which I've been my innovation consults here that I've been
Speaker 1: running for the last fourteen years, where you can sort
Speaker 1: of sometimes make poor recruitment choices and people come in
Speaker 1: with that sort of helpless mentality and ask everyone else
Speaker 1: for advice as opposed to sort of taking things on
Speaker 1: board themselves, which is critical in a remote environment. I
Speaker 1: love make documentation everyone's responsibility, and that again I think
Speaker 1: have a three thousand plus page handbook where I imagine
Speaker 1: everyone has documented rules and practices and all sorts of
Speaker 1: things like that there should be no unwritten rules in
Speaker 1: remote culture. I might even get you to just talk
Speaker 1: a bit about what you mean there. And also one
Speaker 1: of my favorites encouraging the use of emojis so that
Speaker 1: you can communicate emotion, which I thought was really cool.
Speaker 1: So I don't know if you want to comment on
Speaker 1: any of those. They were some of my favorites, but
Speaker 1: I also want to know what some of your favorite
Speaker 1: things are in that handbook.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love all of those. It is so hardening
Speaker 2: to hear someone articulate those back. It's incredible. Documentation is
Speaker 2: the superpower of remote teams, and it's non negotiable. Just
Speaker 2: to give you an example during the course of this interview,
Speaker 2: there are dozens, maybe even hundreds of people inside get
Speaker 2: lab and outside of get lab that are able to
Speaker 2: move their projects forward based on things that I have
Speaker 2: written down. So although I am conversing with you, my
Speaker 2: knowledge is at work with people all around the world
Speaker 2: able to tap into that and use it to move
Speaker 2: their projects forward. This is the power of documentation. Instead
Speaker 2: of someone having to tap me on the virtual shoulder
Speaker 2: and ask me a question, I'm able to proactively answer
Speaker 2: everything that they're asking with a link and in the
Speaker 2: get lab way of working, if someone were to genuinely
Speaker 2: ask me something that is net new and is not documented,
Speaker 2: I would of course get them that answer, but then
Speaker 2: I would immediately document it so that anyone else who
Speaker 2: has this question going forward would simply be able to
Speaker 2: find it online. This is a much more inclusive way
Speaker 2: to communicate and to scale knowledge, But it definitely takes
Speaker 2: a special type of person who thinks this way, because
Speaker 2: the human default is that is to default to synchronicity
Speaker 2: and to default to async feels a little bit awkward
Speaker 2: at first. Oftentimes it feels a bit cold until you
Speaker 2: realize that by doing so, you're making everyone else's day
Speaker 2: much more efficient, and you're giving them more time back
Speaker 2: to spend with their family, with neighbors, with community members,
Speaker 2: all of which is a much more useful way to
Speaker 2: spend time when you're talking about the net impact to
Speaker 2: society versus asking someone a question for the five hundredth time,
Speaker 2: I was going to highlight a few of the favorites
Speaker 2: of mine, you listed a few favorites of yours. The
Speaker 2: get Lab values page is an absolute treasure trove. If
Speaker 2: you google get lab values, you'll find six core values.
Speaker 2: Probably words you've heard before, things like iteration, collaboration, results,
Speaker 2: but all of those terms in a vacuum can mean
Speaker 2: something different to each individual. Underneath each value are thousands
Speaker 2: of words called sub values, which substantiate and explain how
Speaker 2: each of these values are lived with no physical building
Speaker 2: that we commute into each day. There are a couple
Speaker 2: of these that, when strung together, are incredibly powerful. So
Speaker 2: a few of these in a row that I love
Speaker 2: are kindness, assume positive intent, no ego. No ego is
Speaker 2: a huge one. Don't let each other fail. Blameless problem solving.
Speaker 2: This is amazing because it enables you to solve every
Speaker 2: problem knowing that there's not going to be blamed. There
Speaker 2: is no agenda. We are simply trying to solve the problem.
Speaker 2: And although this sounds extremely simple, this is very much
Speaker 2: against the grain in most corporate structures. And the last
Speaker 2: one that I'll share right now is short toes. This
Speaker 2: is the one that caught my attention when I first
Speaker 2: came to get LAB. I saw short toes and thought,
Speaker 2: what in the world could that mean? Well, I get lab.
Speaker 2: It's not possible for you to step on anyone's toes
Speaker 2: or contribute to someone else's domain because everyone has short toes,
Speaker 2: and that creates a welcome atmosphere for all of us
Speaker 2: to put forth our best knowledge, regardless of what department
Speaker 2: of the company we're in.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I read that short toes one myself. And I'm like,
Speaker 1: hang on, what's that because the rest are kind of
Speaker 1: like you assume that you know what they mean. I
Speaker 1: do like that short toes one too. Now, you mentioned
Speaker 1: the idea of synchronous versus asynchronous communication, and I know
Speaker 1: you've spoken about what companies that truly want to do
Speaker 1: remote work well need to do is replace the default
Speaker 1: of synchronous communication. Can you explain what you mean by that,
Speaker 1: like how companies do default to synchronous communication and what
Speaker 1: are the steps that a company needs to take to
Speaker 1: not do that because it's so well entrenched into most
Speaker 1: company cultures.
Speaker 2: Yeah, to better understand this, you really have to go
Speaker 2: all the way back to grade school. If you think
Speaker 2: about it. Early on. In our classical education, children are
Speaker 2: contained within four walls and a roof. We are conditioned
Speaker 2: from birth to operate in a synchronous manner in what
Speaker 2: is essentially an office for children. We are taught no
Speaker 2: other way, and so it's quite unusual to move projects
Speaker 2: forward or to build relationships when you aren't in the
Speaker 2: same place at the same time. You may hear things like, oh,
Speaker 2: but I prefer synchronicity, I prefer to be together, and
Speaker 2: most of that is because people don't have a solid
Speaker 2: baseline of how this could work well in any other fashion.
Speaker 2: So synchronicity is the default for a lot of people.
Speaker 2: They feel like reaching out and having conversations with people
Speaker 2: or tapping someone on the shoulder. It feels very productive.
Speaker 2: It makes you feel like you're contributing meaningfully to the organization.
Speaker 2: But in truth, these types of meetings and ad hoc
Speaker 2: interruptions are massively disruptive to the bottom line. They're massively
Speaker 2: disruptive to people's mental health. It's very difficult to get
Speaker 2: into a state of flow and make meaningful progress on
Speaker 2: any line of work if you're continuously being interrupted. There
Speaker 2: is a reason that Google is a machine and not
Speaker 2: a person, because if someone just essentially taps you as
Speaker 2: Google all day, you're going to get tired of answering
Speaker 2: those queries at some point. So it's a fundamentally more
Speaker 2: inclusive way to communicate your knowledge and to scale your
Speaker 2: knowledge by writing it down once so that it can
Speaker 2: be interpreted and used a limitless amount of times. But
Speaker 2: it takes a culture that is understanding of that. And indeed,
Speaker 2: if you look at the get lab onboarding process, we
Speaker 2: lay out guides that explain exactly how to adopt a
Speaker 2: self service mentality. We even have a handbook guide on
Speaker 2: how to use the handbook. We have another guide on
Speaker 2: how to search the handbook. We are very prescriptive and
Speaker 2: articulate about the information infrastructure that we have set up.
Speaker 2: We essentially see the handbook as yet another product or tool.
Speaker 2: And so if you were coming into any company, you
Speaker 2: would expect an onboarding to get used to a key
Speaker 2: tool to do work, and we see the handbook as
Speaker 2: a key tool to do work.
Speaker 1: That's really cool. I want to talk a little bit
Speaker 1: more about meetings, and obviously at git lab you default
Speaker 1: to documentation instead of meetings, which I think is such
Speaker 1: a key like such a key point for listeners who
Speaker 1: are thinking how do we truly go remote to really
Speaker 1: think about because we are so conditioned to defaulting to meetings,
Speaker 1: it's the easiest thing to do. And I want to
Speaker 1: know when you do have meetings at get lab, what
Speaker 1: are the different rules that you have in place, because
Speaker 1: I know there are some rules and guidelines for having
Speaker 1: meetings at get lab. Imagine that it is quite a
Speaker 1: significant thing if you're invited to a meeting it get lab,
Speaker 1: given it's not the default. Is that fair to say?
Speaker 2: It is fair to say, and there is some context
Speaker 2: you need to understand here. It is easier for us
Speaker 2: to get away with this at get lab because people
Speaker 2: self select into get lab. You opt into get lab
Speaker 2: even in the interview process. You know what you're getting into.
Speaker 2: Everyone can read our handbook before they even apply here,
Speaker 2: and so people come here because they want to work
Speaker 2: this way. It is their default. And so we have
Speaker 2: a like minded group of people that want to have
Speaker 2: a bias towards a synchronous. In fact, bias towards a
Speaker 2: synchronous is one of the sub values of our diversity,
Speaker 2: inclusion and belonging value because it allows for a more
Speaker 2: inclusive course of voices to contribute to a project. So
Speaker 2: there's a five step process that, of course we have
Speaker 2: documented on questioning every meeting. The first is what is
Speaker 2: the outcome I am trying to achieve that has led
Speaker 2: me to a desire to schedule a meeting. You need
Speaker 2: to write that down and articulate that. Number two is
Speaker 2: can the desired outcome be broken down into smaller tasks?
Speaker 2: If you can break things down to more incremental pieces,
Speaker 2: it's more likely that you can accomplish each individual element
Speaker 2: of that through an asynchronous means. Number three is can
Speaker 2: the desired outcome be achieved or work towards by dog
Speaker 2: fooding and using a get lab issue or merge request. Now,
Speaker 2: this is where it's important for me to point out
Speaker 2: that all of get lab uses get lab the product
Speaker 2: to collaborate. It is the heartbeat of our asynchronous workflow.
Speaker 2: So if you don't have a tool like this, you
Speaker 2: will need one. It is extremely hard to lean fully
Speaker 2: into a synchronous using a hodgepodge of phone calls, carrier pigeons,
Speaker 2: and email. You're going to need a tool at the
Speaker 2: heart of it. The fourth one is am I trying
Speaker 2: to gather consensus? If you are consensus gathering can be
Speaker 2: done asynchronously. Anyone can open up a get lab issue
Speaker 2: or a mural board or a Figma board and gather
Speaker 2: input and consensus, and then you can save the meeting
Speaker 2: until the decision making needs to occur. And even that
Speaker 2: decision making, which is step five, we ask people to
Speaker 2: consider can the decision be made asynchronously? And if it cannot,
Speaker 2: then we default to a synchronous meeting, but we will
Speaker 2: reserve that for the very end, and then if we
Speaker 2: have to have a meeting, we make it quite difficult
Speaker 2: for this to happen. Every meeting has to have an
Speaker 2: agenda attached to the calendar invite, so that temporal documentation
Speaker 2: takes place live during the meeting, and then the meeting
Speaker 2: organizer is responsible for transcribing and contextualizing any takeaways from
Speaker 2: that meeting into the get lab handbook, so that the
Speaker 2: most amount of people can benefit from the knowledge that
Speaker 2: was gained in that meeting. It takes a cultural mindset
Speaker 2: company wide for this to actually work and be meaningful,
Speaker 2: but our people fundamentally believe that synchronous time is very
Speaker 2: precious and we would rather reserve that for informal communication,
Speaker 2: for coffee chats, for team wide trivia sessions and scavenger hunts,
Speaker 2: things that help us build bonds as a team, than
Speaker 2: just another work meeting. Now, of course we still have
Speaker 2: work meetings, but if we're rigorous enough to cut our
Speaker 2: meetings down by even fifty percent, most people listening to
Speaker 2: this would think, Wow, if I could have fifty percent
Speaker 2: fewer meetings, I think my zoom fatigue would go away.
Speaker 2: So we're not trying to eliminate meetings We're just trying
Speaker 2: to have a thorough process so that you question it
Speaker 2: because if you're going to have to write down the
Speaker 2: takeaway anyway, we would love for you to start by
Speaker 2: writing it down instead of doing double work with a
Speaker 2: meeting first and then writing it down.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this has so many good tips in there. I
Speaker 1: must say something that we've tried at INVENTINGUM, which I
Speaker 1: got from a guest I had on the show maybe
Speaker 1: a year ago. Brian Scutemore from one eight hundred got
Speaker 1: chunk over in the States, and he says that he
Speaker 1: won't accept a meeting unless it's got a PAYO, which
Speaker 1: stands for purpose, agenda and outcomes. So a little bit
Speaker 1: of crossover with what you've described there and something we're
Speaker 1: kind of experimenting with at the moment at invent Him.
Speaker 1: I mean, granted we don't have that many meetings, but
Speaker 1: if someone sets a meeting, they need to have a
Speaker 1: payout otherwise they can't put the meeting in the diary,
Speaker 1: which just acts as a nice little barrier for people
Speaker 1: to think, do I actually need this meeting or could
Speaker 1: this be done some other way. I want to pick
Speaker 1: up on a couple of things that you said there
Speaker 1: when you were describing that process, and you said you'll
Speaker 1: deliberately recruit people who have a bias towards a synchronicity
Speaker 1: or a synchronous communication. How do you assess that in
Speaker 1: a recruitment process.
Speaker 2: We hire for managers of one, and if you google that,
Speaker 2: as you would expect, you'll find a leadership page that
Speaker 2: lays out what a manager of one looks like. We
Speaker 2: hire for that, and we tell people straight up that
Speaker 2: you're going to be writing a lot. And it's pretty
Speaker 2: obvious early on whether someone is going to thrive in
Speaker 2: an environment like that, so we're just open about it,
Speaker 2: and we say, do you love communicating this way? Is
Speaker 2: this how you prefer to work, because this is how
Speaker 2: we work work. All of our interviews are done over zoom.
Speaker 2: There is no in person element, so again, you're not
Speaker 2: going to accidentally end up here. You're going to be
Speaker 2: pretty sure of what you're walking into. But mostly we
Speaker 2: look for great storytellers, people that love to think through
Speaker 2: problems and communicate with high detail and low precision. We
Speaker 2: can do writing exercises, but a lot of this just
Speaker 2: comes through in storytelling. We love to ask questions of
Speaker 2: tell me a time when you worked remotely, when you
Speaker 2: moved a project forward, when you were in one place
Speaker 2: and your cohorts were in another. And for some people
Speaker 2: they answer, I've never been able to work remotely, That's
Speaker 2: why I want a job here. But you can actually
Speaker 2: dig a little deeper and say, well, have you ever
Speaker 2: worked on let's say, a presentation while you were on
Speaker 2: an airplane, or while you were in a hotel conference
Speaker 2: center and the rest of your team was at work,
Speaker 2: or the rest of your colleagues at university were in
Speaker 2: the library. And then they'll usually say, oh, yeah, I
Speaker 2: actually do have an example of that. It's like, well,
Speaker 2: that's remote working. You might not have considered it remote working.
Speaker 2: Indeed it was remote working. And we also like to
Speaker 2: pull up our values page and in there you'll notice
Speaker 2: a subvalue that says culture fit is a bad excuse.
Speaker 2: What that means is we try to hire for values fit,
Speaker 2: which is to say, we want to make sure the
Speaker 2: get Lab values resonate with anyone joining the company, and
Speaker 2: then we invite them to bring one hundred percent of
Speaker 2: their full culture to make our culture better. So we
Speaker 2: don't want to hire for culture fit, we want to
Speaker 2: hire for values fit. And then increase the diversity of
Speaker 2: the culture that comes along with that.
Speaker 1: I like that distinction. Now, something else that you mentioned
Speaker 1: is that if you're a completely remote company, it's really
Speaker 1: important that you've got the right kind of software or
Speaker 1: technology at the heart of that. Can you talk about
Speaker 1: what sort of features does this key piece of software
Speaker 1: need to make it work.
Speaker 2: To do this right. It's roughly fifty percent tools and
Speaker 2: technology and fifty percent culture, so you have to have both.
Speaker 2: You can have all of the right tools, but the
Speaker 2: leadership doesn't really embrace it, and it will probably falter.
Speaker 2: You could have the best intentions of the world, but
Speaker 2: as I mentioned earlier, if you're trying to do it
Speaker 2: all over email and phone, you'll probably struggle. I generally
Speaker 2: recommend to minimize your tool stack if you're transitioning into remote.
Speaker 2: Get Lab really only uses four key products across the company. Now,
Speaker 2: some of our departments use certain things like MARKETO and
Speaker 2: Marketing Operations and Salesforce and things like that, but for
Speaker 2: all of our team to collaborate as a team, we
Speaker 2: use g Suite, we use Zoom, we use get lab
Speaker 2: the product, and Slack for informal communication. So that goes
Speaker 2: to show we really don't use Slack for work. We
Speaker 2: expire our Slack messages after ninety days so that it's
Speaker 2: only useful for informal communication. We want the work to
Speaker 2: happen and get lab so the key piece there is
Speaker 2: make sure you have a project management and collaboration tool
Speaker 2: that strongly supports asynchronous inputs and workflows. Get Lab is
Speaker 2: what we use. There are a host of others, but
Speaker 2: it's on your IT and operations team to thoroughly vet this.
Speaker 2: And I would say do a tools audit and make
Speaker 2: sure that you have something there. And then of course
Speaker 2: you have to document how you want people to work
Speaker 2: in it. It has to be a user guide on
Speaker 2: how to get work done so that everyone is leaning
Speaker 2: into that same product instead of fracturing work and splintering
Speaker 2: it here, there and everywhere. It really is key to
Speaker 2: get universal buy in, and it takes time. For transitioning companies,
Speaker 2: it takes time. It is a very jarring thing if
Speaker 2: you are used to working one way and now you're
Speaker 2: working another. But for those companies that want to put
Speaker 2: in the effort now, in six to twelve months, you'll
Speaker 2: be so thankful that you did, and you'll only wonder
Speaker 2: why you didn't start this earlier. The truth is, everything
Speaker 2: I'm saying is not remote exclusive. It is required in
Speaker 2: a remote setting, but even if you go back to
Speaker 2: being a co located company or a hybrid remote company,
Speaker 2: all of this will make your company more cohesive and
Speaker 2: more disciplined.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Now you mentioned culture, and I imagine this is
Speaker 1: probably one of the questions you get asked the most.
Speaker 1: How do you create a corporate culture without a physical office?
Speaker 1: You know, especially for people that have never met their
Speaker 1: coworkers face to face, which I imagine for a lot
Speaker 1: of listeners would kind of blow their minds, even though
Speaker 1: for you, this is your world. So what are some
Speaker 1: of the key steps to building that corporate culture.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's two things I want to mention here. One
Speaker 2: is paradoxical and one not so much, So I'll start
Speaker 2: with the latter. In person matters. A lot a lot
Speaker 2: of people assume that because get lab is all remote,
Speaker 2: we never ever get together in person, and that's not
Speaker 2: actually true. We get the entire company together for a
Speaker 2: week long retreat, We go on excursions together, we build
Speaker 2: bonds together. It's such an important week people will mark
Speaker 2: it off as if nothing can touch this, and when
Speaker 2: we hire new people, we proactively give them the next
Speaker 2: available contribute and they they love it. They look forward
Speaker 2: to it. I know when I joined the company, it
Speaker 2: was one of the first things that I wanted to know, Hey,
Speaker 2: when is the next get Lab contribute? I can't wait
Speaker 2: to meet everyone. So forecasting in a post COVID world
Speaker 2: where travel restrictions are lists lifted and we can do this,
Speaker 2: I would say for leaders, make in person a core
Speaker 2: part of how you build strategy. But with a hybrid
Speaker 2: or all remote company, you're going to need to be
Speaker 2: more intentional about when and where travel happens and how
Speaker 2: you facilitate those very important in person interactions. So bottom
Speaker 2: line there is don't try to do this without ever
Speaker 2: seeing anyone. We are relational, communal beings and in person
Speaker 2: matters a lot. So here's the paradoxical one. The further
Speaker 2: away you are as a team, the more you need
Speaker 2: to let go as a manager and allow people to
Speaker 2: simply be where they are. So instead of having lots
Speaker 2: of virtual happy hours and things of that nature, which
Speaker 2: by the way, we do it get Lab, we prefer
Speaker 2: to structure and atmosphere where people can do their work
Speaker 2: very efficiently and then leave war as soon as possible.
Speaker 2: We want people to be able to go back home,
Speaker 2: engage with their family, engage with their neighbors, engage with
Speaker 2: their community. That is what matters to them. They have
Speaker 2: specifically chosen to work here so that they can be
Speaker 2: in a place that matters to them, So we want
Speaker 2: to empower them to be in that place as much
Speaker 2: as humanly possible. So how that pours back into culture
Speaker 2: is that I see a NonStop photo role on our company,
Speaker 2: slack of pictures and stories and videos of people that
Speaker 2: are making meaningful impacts in societies all over the world.
Speaker 2: We have people in over sixty five countries. It is
Speaker 2: so fascinating to see how each person chooses to engage
Speaker 2: and interact in each of their communities. And when I
Speaker 2: see that that builds culture, that tells me this is
Speaker 2: exactly who this person is. The more curious and the
Speaker 2: more interesting the person is on your team for us,
Speaker 2: the more it builds culture. So it is paradoxical that
Speaker 2: we would encourage you to spend more time outside of
Speaker 2: work to actually pour back into company culture. But when
Speaker 2: you hire a team that is specifically looking for that,
Speaker 2: that is indeed what happens.
Speaker 1: I find that quite interesting because I can imagine that
Speaker 1: what you've described would make you feel very connected to
Speaker 1: people that you're not seeing face to face on a
Speaker 1: daily basis, and you know, maybe just seeing once a
Speaker 1: year or once a quarter face to face or something
Speaker 1: like that. And I'm kind of thinking about how you
Speaker 1: say you recruit for values as opposed to do they
Speaker 1: fit with the culture, And I imagine what happens. I
Speaker 1: mean when I think about culture as a psychologist, I
Speaker 1: think about, well, it's a set of norms and behaviors
Speaker 1: and so forth. It's almost through And can I correct
Speaker 1: me if I'm getting this wrong, But because you're recruiting
Speaker 1: people that have these really core values that get lab ofspouses,
Speaker 1: then that's where the behavioral norms are coming in, because
Speaker 1: you know, they do prefer this way of working. They
Speaker 1: value things like kindness and humility and things like that,
Speaker 1: and they then become the culture. Almost Does that make sense?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's accurate. It's culture. Really in a remote setting,
Speaker 2: culture is essentially equal to the values, because in most
Speaker 2: co located spaces, culture is roughly defined by the paint
Speaker 2: on the wall, the color of the lights, and the
Speaker 2: brand of the coffee. That flavor of culture has always
Speaker 2: been at risk of coming undone, and now in a
Speaker 2: remote setting, it's glaringly obvious that that was never a
Speaker 2: great way to define culture. It's really about how people
Speaker 2: treat each other and how we see the world. And
Speaker 2: when you write that down, you can interview for it,
Speaker 2: and you can ask people does this work for you?
Speaker 2: And so culturally it ends up working out that we
Speaker 2: have people that generally we love and get along with
Speaker 2: because they share our values, and values and culture are
Speaker 2: very tightly connected, especially in a remote company.
Speaker 1: And how would that work then if we've got listeners
Speaker 1: that largely office space but at the moment are working
Speaker 1: from home and they want to shift towards more of
Speaker 1: at least a hybrid remote way of working, but they're
Speaker 1: worried about, well, how do they maintain the corporate culture
Speaker 1: when they don't have the benefit of actually going back
Speaker 1: to square one with everybody and recruiting for people that
Speaker 1: genuinely have the same values. What do you recommend that
Speaker 1: people do in that scenario.
Speaker 2: It's a lot to unpack. I would start by acknowledging
Speaker 2: that we're in a pandemic. So culture even in a
Speaker 2: well fine tuned remote setting looks different in a pandemic.
Speaker 2: It is much less about company wide rah rah right
Speaker 2: now and more about let's make sure each other are okay,
Speaker 2: that we have the time, the space, whatever it is,
Speaker 2: we need to just be okay. The bar is different
Speaker 2: right now. Being okay and bonded as a team is
Speaker 2: a fine bar. You don't necessarily need thousands of raw,
Speaker 2: raw champions for your culture right now, So we'll start there,
Speaker 2: but forecasting in a different space when we can get
Speaker 2: back to that. It really comes down to leadership. Thriving
Speaker 2: as a remote worker. You can only get so far
Speaker 2: as an individual, and then there's a certain point where
Speaker 2: the gate has to be lifted up and the rest
Speaker 2: of that liberation in that atmosphere it has to be
Speaker 2: enabled by leadership. It has to be enabled and modeled
Speaker 2: by leadership. And frankly, now is as good a time
Speaker 2: as any for leaders to question their values. To open
Speaker 2: their website, look at what the values say and ask
Speaker 2: themselves are these still relevant for the post COVID universe.
Speaker 2: This is a massive sea change. This is a complete
Speaker 2: re architecting of how many digital firms are going to
Speaker 2: look and do work. Going forward, things might be different.
Speaker 2: I encourage leaders to write down what's it like to
Speaker 2: work here at my company, and if you're not thrilled
Speaker 2: with the answer, you might need to change some things
Speaker 2: coming out of this now. For individuals who might not
Speaker 2: be in that leadership perspective, this is now a very
Speaker 2: important time to get introspective and make sure that the
Speaker 2: go forward plan at your company aligns with what you
Speaker 2: want culturally. I do expect globally some short term attrition
Speaker 2: as these shifting sands happen. People are going to take
Speaker 2: a look at what the go forward plan is for
Speaker 2: their company. And some people are going to say, you know,
Speaker 2: I opted into a more rigid culture, a more co
Speaker 2: located culture. This isn't going to work for me. I
Speaker 2: may need to find a different place that is more
Speaker 2: aligned with the current season of life that I'm in.
Speaker 2: Some people are going to see this as an incredibly
Speaker 2: progressive thing. They're going to celebrate it, and they're going
Speaker 2: to be grateful that we're finally ushering ourselves into the
Speaker 2: future of work. It's a strange and unfortunate way to
Speaker 2: get here, but we're here nevertheless. So I wouldn't say
Speaker 2: you have to satisfy one hundred percent of your workforce,
Speaker 2: you just need to be extremely articulate on what the
Speaker 2: go forward plan is and then help people that are
Speaker 2: going to be on board with it, and then for
Speaker 2: those that don't want to be there, maybe even look
Speaker 2: to how the airlines have done voluntary exit packages. This
Speaker 2: is an amazing time. These are not usual times. There
Speaker 2: are not there's not a playbook for how this is
Speaker 2: going to work out, So some extreme circumstances could see
Speaker 2: their way to fruition.
Speaker 1: Something I hear from a lot of clients that I'm
Speaker 1: speaking to is, well, you know what about those serendipitous conversations,
Speaker 1: Like they talk about the example of Steve Jobs, you know,
Speaker 1: having the central kitchen and bathrooms. It picks hard to
Speaker 1: create those serendipitous moments where ideas spring from from like
Speaker 1: what do you say to that? And how like what's
Speaker 1: the remote work equivalent of doing that?
Speaker 2: So the funny thing about this story is that's not
Speaker 2: serendipitous at all. It was literally planned. This is the
Speaker 2: definition of planned innovation. The lobbies, the hallways, the restrooms,
Speaker 2: the physical architecture of this building was specifically planned so
Speaker 2: that people would talk to each other. That's the exact
Speaker 2: opposite of serendipity. So in a remote setting you also
Speaker 2: have to plan for engagements and interactions. Now this becomes
Speaker 2: a lot more obvious if you have a tool like
Speaker 2: get lab at the heart of your workflows, because anyone
Speaker 2: can put down just a one sentence idea and then
Speaker 2: share it company wide with a single link, and the
Speaker 2: amount of feedback and incubation that can happen on that
Speaker 2: is far more than you would get from just one
Speaker 2: or two people randomly in a hallway. It is a
Speaker 2: far more inclusive and expansive way to incubate this type
Speaker 2: of innovation. You simply need a tool at the heart
Speaker 2: of it to make it possible. So it sounds a
Speaker 2: bit paradoxical, but you really do have to work to
Speaker 2: plan innovation. And if you take a hard look at
Speaker 2: any office that's ever been invented, office lobbies, office cafeterias,
Speaker 2: these were intentionally designed structures for informal communication. So in
Speaker 2: a remote setting you have to recreate that. We use Slack.
Speaker 2: We have topical channels where people can talk about specific things,
Speaker 2: whether it's mental health or hiking, or a certain product
Speaker 2: that kind of thing, or you can put meetings on
Speaker 2: optional meetings with agendas that people can contribute to asynchronously,
Speaker 2: so you have to plan for it. Remote makes you
Speaker 2: be intentional about a lot of things that you're able
Speaker 2: to take for granted in a physical space. But I
Speaker 2: assure you, somewhere before you showed up at the office
Speaker 2: there was some planning done to help encourage that type
Speaker 2: of thing.
Speaker 1: I love that answer. I think that's so good, and
Speaker 1: it just makes it like it like for me, I
Speaker 1: imagine you know all is get Lab employees commenting on
Speaker 1: things that if it were just like a conversation in
Speaker 1: some kitchen somewhere, they wouldn't have had the opportunity. So
Speaker 1: it's almost like it just sounds like a more sensible
Speaker 1: and better way of doing these conversations.
Speaker 2: It is. It's well, it's the opportunity and abundance versus
Speaker 2: scarcity mindset. And so for years people have thought two
Speaker 2: or three people that happened to run into each other
Speaker 2: in a hallway and have this amazing idea, Well that's
Speaker 2: the new baseline. That is the gold standard. But when
Speaker 2: you think about it, well, number one, it was only
Speaker 2: three people, So what if that idea could be made
Speaker 2: even better if three thousand people had access to contribute
Speaker 2: to it without negatively impacting the schedule of any one person.
Speaker 2: And then the other thing is you're not requiring people
Speaker 2: to be available and online at the exact same time.
Speaker 2: So running into each other in in a hallway, I
Speaker 2: get it. I've been there. It is a pretty cool
Speaker 2: moment when it happens, but it's an even cooler moment
Speaker 2: when it happens in a remote setting, and you can
Speaker 2: get a ton more feedback. You just have to create
Speaker 2: the atmosphere where it works hundred percent.
Speaker 1: And you mentioned that you use slack, but just for
Speaker 1: social purposes, not for work purposes. Can you talk a
Speaker 1: bit about how you have gone about creating the equivalent
Speaker 1: of water coolored conversation and just those social connections when
Speaker 1: a lot of people would never have met in person.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the water cooler is yet another thing that is
Speaker 2: intentionally designed in a physical space, and so if you
Speaker 2: want that in a remote space, you have to intentionally
Speaker 2: design it. There are a certain set of forcing functions
Speaker 2: that we enlist to ensure that we remain remote first.
Speaker 2: And the reason the word forcing is there for a
Speaker 2: reason because these are not natural. Necessarily, they are not
Speaker 2: the default. Sometimes they feel a bit awkward at first,
Speaker 2: but nevertheless they ensure that we retain and remain in
Speaker 2: our remote first workflows, so inspiring our Slack messages after
Speaker 2: ninety days is one of those. If you know that
Speaker 2: your work is going to vanish after ninety days, then
Speaker 2: it's a pretty great forcing function to start the work
Speaker 2: where it's going to end up, which is in a
Speaker 2: get lab issue or a get lab merge request. So
Speaker 2: if we don't do long, lengthy work in Slack, the
Speaker 2: only thing it's useful for is quick pings to usually
Speaker 2: direct people's attention to a get lab issue or informal communication.
Speaker 2: And this solves another major issue for remote teams, which
Speaker 2: is where do we just converse as humans, not as colleagues,
Speaker 2: but as humans. Well, if you aren't using Slack or
Speaker 2: teams for work, now you can just converse as humans.
Speaker 2: The great example I have of that is we have
Speaker 2: a parenting channel, and now that so many parents have
Speaker 2: children at home, they're dealing with remote learning for the
Speaker 2: first time ever. A lot of our parents are doubling
Speaker 2: as teachers aids at the moment. This is an amazing
Speaker 2: medium where all of our parents can come together and
Speaker 2: share tips all around the world of how they're doing it,
Speaker 2: and they can trade shifts and work across teams. It's amazing.
Speaker 2: I don't think this would exist if Slack was primarily
Speaker 2: for work. People might not feel ass comfortable being themselves
Speaker 2: and bringing things up, like hey, I'm a parent and
Speaker 2: I need some help. But because we don't really do
Speaker 2: work in there, it's a perfect place for that. This
Speaker 2: is yet another example of not really reinventing the wheel.
Speaker 2: A lot of companies use Slack and Microsoft teams, but
Speaker 2: if you just use it slightly differently, now it becomes
Speaker 2: this amazing enabler for remote work.
Speaker 1: I think that's really interesting, and I think a lot
Speaker 1: of listeners will have Slack that they use for work
Speaker 1: and for social But I really do like the idea
Speaker 1: of just kind of segmenting that out and just kind
Speaker 1: of keeping it clean what it's used for. Something you
Speaker 1: have said, I think I read it in I can't
Speaker 1: remember whether it was your read me page, which I
Speaker 1: do want to talk about. You said that being booked
Speaker 1: at one hundred percent is a risk. Can you explain
Speaker 1: what you mean by this and how you avoid you
Speaker 1: avoid that?
Speaker 2: Yes, so that was on my read me page. So
Speaker 2: being booked at one hundred percent is a risk, and
Speaker 2: I've always thought this. It has always driven me mad
Speaker 2: to have a booked, a fully booked calendar, because most
Speaker 2: the work that I'm most proud of has always come
Speaker 2: during long, uninterrupted blocks of time. And there are a
Speaker 2: bunch of Ted talks and Simon Sinek and why work
Speaker 2: doesn't happen at work. There's a bunch of supporting evidence
Speaker 2: of why this is. But about a year ago, someone
Speaker 2: asked me if I had heard of Kingman's formula, to
Speaker 2: which I replied, no, I have not, So I googled
Speaker 2: it and it's the mathematics behind this notion. And I
Speaker 2: was so excited to finally find someone that is intelligent
Speaker 2: about math, that put actual data in numbers behind something
Speaker 2: that I've long since known was true in my heart
Speaker 2: of hearts. The crux of this is if you have
Speaker 2: your entire day pre booked with meetings, it leaves no
Speaker 2: room whatsoever for real life to happen. So if anything
Speaker 2: at all happens, if your child stubs their toe and
Speaker 2: you need to go address that, even for eight minutes
Speaker 2: of your day, it has a massive oftentimes catastrophically negative
Speaker 2: impact on your mental health, on the schedules of many
Speaker 2: other people, and there's this cascading set of effects that
Speaker 2: could go well beyond the day for a simple eight
Speaker 2: minute ordeal at home. So I view that is a
Speaker 2: massive risk. And if you extrapolate that over an entire company,
Speaker 2: if you have everyone booked at one hundred percent, where
Speaker 2: is the room for ingenuity? Teams are worried about serendipitous conversations.
Speaker 2: Let me tell you, being booked at one hundred percent
Speaker 2: is a guarantee that your company is going to have
Speaker 2: no innovation and no serendipitous conversations because there's no time
Speaker 2: for that. So we actively block our schedules. At get lab,
Speaker 2: everyone has a public calendar by default. We encourage people
Speaker 2: to go in there right as they're onboarding and block
Speaker 2: out things like hours that you want to take your
Speaker 2: kid to and from school, or hours that you prefer
Speaker 2: to exercise, or hours that you prefer to be away
Speaker 2: for lunch. Anything you can think of, feel free to
Speaker 2: block it. And when people book meetings and you see
Speaker 2: something like hey, I'm exercising, you really do think twice
Speaker 2: about booking over that. Because the golden rule, would you
Speaker 2: really want someone to book a meeting time with you
Speaker 2: if you were doing something that was important to your
Speaker 2: personal life.
Speaker 1: I love that. It's funny. Like I myself, when I'm
Speaker 1: looking at my calendar, I have my work calendar and
Speaker 1: my personal calendar in GCL, and I sort of never
Speaker 1: know whether to kind of merge the trees so that
Speaker 1: people kind of know what I'm up to and maybe
Speaker 1: not to book over. Yeah. I think that's really interesting, and.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a common issue. And I will say one
Speaker 2: thing that can help with that is a tool called clockwise.
Speaker 2: They allow you essentially it merges the two calendars, but
Speaker 2: whenever you have a personal stop, it will just say
Speaker 2: busy on your work calendar. So not everyone is comfortable
Speaker 2: being completely transparent about what is blocking, but at least
Speaker 2: it automates the blocking process. So, look, your personal life
Speaker 2: is a big deal. I've there's a book called Time
Speaker 2: Off by John Fitch, and in it he says that
Speaker 2: your rest ethic is just as important as your work ethic.
Speaker 2: And this is for the core of it. For me,
Speaker 2: it is just as important for you to put meaningful
Speaker 2: attention on when you're going to rest as it is
Speaker 2: when you're going to work. It's just think of it
Speaker 2: as inhaling and exhaling. If you only do one or
Speaker 2: the other and never do the opposite, at some point
Speaker 2: this becomes a problem, and working and resting follows the same.
Speaker 2: For Jaggery.
Speaker 1: I like that a lot. Now, I do want to
Speaker 1: talk about your read me page, which I'm going to
Speaker 1: link to in the show notes. What it reminds me
Speaker 1: of is I've heard Adam Grant talk about the idea
Speaker 1: of creating a one page operating manual which answers a
Speaker 1: few different questions around I think you know what your
Speaker 1: strengths and weaknesses are, what your pet peeves are, how
Speaker 1: to get the best out of me, how to respond
Speaker 1: to feedback those sorts of things, and it's something that
Speaker 1: you can then share with your teammates so that you
Speaker 1: can work more effectively together. I think that I'm sort
Speaker 1: of paraphrasing that somewhat accurately, and I feel like your
Speaker 1: read me page is kind of like an operating manual
Speaker 1: to knowing how to work with you, or be it
Speaker 1: one that is very, very detailed, which I love. Can
Speaker 1: you talk me through well, I guess for people that
Speaker 1: you know, I'm assuming that people will probably follow that
Speaker 1: link after hearing us talk about it. But for those
Speaker 1: that haven't been to your read me page, what does
Speaker 1: it look like and how did it come about?
Speaker 2: That is a very accurate description. Essentially, my read me
Speaker 2: page is an operating manual of how you can quickly
Speaker 2: get up to speed about working with me. It explains
Speaker 2: how I like to be communicated with, what I hope
Speaker 2: to earn in working with you, and what you need
Speaker 2: to know about me, things like personality type, my working style,
Speaker 2: when I generally prefer to work, and there are some
Speaker 2: videos and links that have been written about me so
Speaker 2: you can find some additional context. This is useful for
Speaker 2: many reasons, but it goes back to scaling knowledge. If
Speaker 2: you're working with me for the first time, we've never
Speaker 2: met in person. We might not even know what each
Speaker 2: other looks like. It's probably going to take quite a
Speaker 2: few hours at best to build some sort of rapport,
Speaker 2: and there will be a lot of answering questions back
Speaker 2: and forth for each other to get an understanding of
Speaker 2: each other. This allows for a much more efficient process.
Speaker 2: You can read this entire page in roughly two minutes
Speaker 2: and you'll learn more about me than it would take
Speaker 2: you two weeks to learn this in person. I've been
Speaker 2: around enough and heard enough feedback that I feel like
Speaker 2: I can write this down and just get straight to
Speaker 2: the point. And an operating manual about people, if you're
Speaker 2: willing to put it out there, is super beneficial because
Speaker 2: other people then come to you and they know exactly
Speaker 2: how to make your day more efficient, and then conversely,
Speaker 2: they have a better understanding of how you're reacting to them.
Speaker 2: So where did this come from? Two places? One the
Speaker 2: get Lab ceo. If you look up the Getlab ceo page,
Speaker 2: he lists out very similar things, even talking about his
Speaker 2: common flaws, things that he has received feedback on time
Speaker 2: and time again that he's still actively working to improve
Speaker 2: upon as a human being. And I thought, well, if
Speaker 2: our CEO could model that type of thing, maybe I
Speaker 2: should write something like that as well. There's also a
Speaker 2: gentleman named Jeremy on our team who created or read
Speaker 2: me about himself that I used as a template and
Speaker 2: I built on that. So kudos to Jeremy for writing
Speaker 2: that down first. Read me's for people aren't necessarily new,
Speaker 2: but I think read me as an operating manual within
Speaker 2: a remote setting is incredibly powerful, especially for people that
Speaker 2: aren't drafting on in person relationships. When you're genuinely working
Speaker 2: with someone that's net new, it's a big deal.
Speaker 1: I want to know for people that are thinking, oh,
Speaker 1: that sounds like a great idea, I'm going to create
Speaker 1: my own operating manual, what are some of the key
Speaker 1: questions that people should be answering about themselves to make
Speaker 1: it really useful.
Speaker 2: So the cool thing about anything in the get lab
Speaker 2: handbook my read me included it's all creative commons and
Speaker 2: all open source, so you literally can copy and paste
Speaker 2: it and change it up and use it as a
Speaker 2: template without even asking for permission. But the core areas
Speaker 2: that need to be in there are about you, what
Speaker 2: you think you are, what matters to you, what makes
Speaker 2: you a person, And then another second on how you
Speaker 2: can help me, and then another section on your working style,
Speaker 2: one more section on what you assume about others, one
Speaker 2: on what you want to earn, and then communicating with me.
Speaker 2: This is a really important one, especially in a remote setting.
Speaker 2: I really like a synchronous communication. I really like written communication.
Speaker 2: If you can engage with me over text instead of
Speaker 2: jumping straight into a voice or video call. I generally
Speaker 2: prefer that that is not the case for everyone, and
Speaker 2: this is why it is very useful to have that
Speaker 2: written down so so that there are as few misinterpretations
Speaker 2: as possible.
Speaker 1: Now, I have a couple of final questions for you
Speaker 1: in the time that we have. My first one is
Speaker 1: what companies do you look to for inspiration on remote work?
Speaker 1: Because I think before I discovered you and get Lab
Speaker 1: via one of my teammates, Charlotte Rash, I got a
Speaker 1: lot of my inspiration definitely from the guys at base
Speaker 1: Camp and also Matt Mullenwig at Automatic and I'm wondering
Speaker 1: where where do you look who else is doing it well?
Speaker 2: Those two for sure. Shopify is another one that I've
Speaker 2: been very encouraged by. They have made a move what
Speaker 2: they're calling digital by default, and it is really hard
Speaker 2: to transition to remote first or all remote, especially if
Speaker 2: you had a co located culture. And they're doing it
Speaker 2: as well as any company I've seen at that size.
Speaker 2: The being very open about it, very transparent about it,
Speaker 2: and they're putting wellness front and center. I'm very encouraged
Speaker 2: by that. The folks that doist have also open sourced
Speaker 2: a lot of their knowledge, which I think is amazing.
Speaker 2: And there's another startup called Almanac. They're essentially building a
Speaker 2: knowledge base and they're going to have version control in
Speaker 2: this as well, so that you can use this to
Speaker 2: build your own company handbook if you're a bit overwhelmed
Speaker 2: thinking how can I replicate the get lab handbook for
Speaker 2: my company? Almanac allows you to pull from open source
Speaker 2: templates from the world's best knowledge, so you don't have
Speaker 2: to start from scratch. So I think what they're doing
Speaker 2: is incredibly powerful and it could not come at a
Speaker 2: better time now that so many companies are suddenly remote.
Speaker 2: So go to Almanac, and they have done the legwork
Speaker 2: of finding the world's best open source knowledge on all
Speaker 2: of this. And I'll close with one other thing, and
Speaker 2: that's a ton of small companies you've never heard of,
Speaker 2: but will in five years. I think what will happen
Speaker 2: is in five to eight years, it's going to seem
Speaker 2: like an overnight phenomenon that the percentage of all remote
Speaker 2: companies is going to skyrocket. It's going to seem like
Speaker 2: it happened overnight. But indeed what is happening is they're
Speaker 2: all being born as startups in twenty twenty, when you
Speaker 2: can't go to an office. They have no other choice.
Speaker 2: So they're simply building and scaling their team all remote,
Speaker 2: and they're never going to know anything different. And then,
Speaker 2: of course some of them are going to grow and grow,
Speaker 2: and then there will be a few massive exits and IPOs,
Speaker 2: and it will seem to the mainstream that overnight this
Speaker 2: became some amazing phenomenon. But pay close attention to the
Speaker 2: small companies, the five, ten, fifteen, fifty person companies that
Speaker 2: are doing this all remote. What they are writing down,
Speaker 2: what they are building right now is a model for
Speaker 2: how to do it, and a lot of that actually
Speaker 2: can be scaled up and extrapolated even into larger legacy organizations.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's such a good point. Now, something about your
Speaker 1: background that I learned when I was researching you is
Speaker 1: that you were managing editor for n Gadget for part
Speaker 1: of your seven and a half years working there, and
Speaker 1: you were the global editor in Shape a tech radar.
Speaker 1: So I feel like I'm a bit of a geek
Speaker 1: when it comes to gadgets, but you're clearly at a
Speaker 1: whole other level. I want to know what are some
Speaker 1: of your favorite gadgets that you're loving right now, you
Speaker 1: know that help you be better at remote work, or
Speaker 1: more productive, or just happier in general.
Speaker 2: I love this question. So right now, the more monitors
Speaker 2: the better. I have this immense workstation. It looks like
Speaker 2: something out of NASA, like I could launch rockets to
Speaker 2: space from here. The more screen real estate the better
Speaker 2: it allows me to space things out, and it gives
Speaker 2: me the way I look at it as mental space
Speaker 2: and screen real estate space are very closely correlated, So
Speaker 2: the more space I can have, the better. I also
Speaker 2: love my sony mirrorless camera if you go to my
Speaker 2: read me. In fact, I have my entire videocam setup
Speaker 2: and I love it. It's much better than a webcam.
Speaker 2: I do a lot of interviews and it's fun to
Speaker 2: tinker with this. Yob, the CEO of remote dot Com,
Speaker 2: has an even more amazing setup. Be sure to check
Speaker 2: out the remote dot com blog for a look at
Speaker 2: what he uses. I think this is a fun new
Speaker 2: space all time. My favorite gadget is the MacBook Air.
Speaker 2: It fundamentally reshaped computing. It's still one of my favorite computers. Ever,
Speaker 2: I still keep one around as a secondary. I think
Speaker 2: it's like ten years old now or something. It is
Speaker 2: amazing how productive it still is. My all time favorite
Speaker 2: moment from covering technology for almost a decade is being
Speaker 2: at what became Steve Jobs's final product keynote. So I
Speaker 2: was fortunate to be in the auditorium for many of
Speaker 2: the iPhone launches and the Mac launches, and it was special.
Speaker 2: They didn't invite very many editors to those events and
Speaker 2: I was able to be there in person with what
Speaker 2: became the final keynote from Steve Jobs and still have
Speaker 2: the lanyard from that event, So very cool. Lots of
Speaker 2: great memories from that era.
Speaker 1: Wow, that's quite amazing. And I did say that on
Speaker 1: your red me page there is literally list of your
Speaker 1: whole remote office setup, which was really cool. Is there
Speaker 1: are there any gadgets that I guess sort of sit
Speaker 1: outside of the office or things that just you enjoy
Speaker 1: using for life, Like something I got recently is a
Speaker 1: smart skipping rope and I can't remember the name of
Speaker 1: the brand. I got it on the Apple Store, speaking
Speaker 1: of Apple, and it basically counts the number of skips
Speaker 1: that you do, which I'm currently getting a lot of
Speaker 1: joy out of every morning. I'm going to do two
Speaker 1: hundred skips and that will kind of warm me up
Speaker 1: to do my home gym. I'm really loving that at
Speaker 1: the moment. Is there anything in your life, maybe outside
Speaker 1: of your office, that you're liking from a gadget point
Speaker 1: of view, that's.
Speaker 2: A great question. I'm going to bend the answer to
Speaker 2: this somewhat, and I realize that this is sort of
Speaker 2: a North American centric answer, But I have a few
Speaker 2: credit cards that give me amazing perks at hotels and
Speaker 2: airlines around the world. So for me, wanderlust is in
Speaker 2: my DNA, and so when I'm not working at home
Speaker 2: in a workspace that I've defined, I want to be
Speaker 2: somewhere else. I want to be on the road. I
Speaker 2: want to be exploring a new place, exploring a new culture,
Speaker 2: and I want to travel as efficiently and as luxuriously
Speaker 2: as possible. And there are some fun credit cards that
Speaker 2: allow you to earn points and buy free travel. It's
Speaker 2: amazing what you can do if you start digging down
Speaker 2: that rabbit hole. I actually spent a stint at the
Speaker 2: Points Guy. They are the go to resource on all
Speaker 2: of this. So my fun out of office gadgets would
Speaker 2: all be related to airline travel. I have a backpack
Speaker 2: that I think is very efficient that we could nerd
Speaker 2: out on for a while. But most of it comes
Speaker 2: back to committing to an airline, sticking with them, and
Speaker 2: then enjoying the perks that come from that.
Speaker 1: Okay, but tell me about this backpack. I want to
Speaker 1: nerd out on this backpack. Phase.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a mountain hardware. It's mostly designed for mountaineering.
Speaker 2: It's designed for actually climbing mountains, but I have repurposed it.
Speaker 2: It has great accessibility at the very top. And when
Speaker 2: you think about conventional air travel, when you slide your
Speaker 2: backpack underneath the seat, a conventional backpack, the zippers don't
Speaker 2: really open up in the right way. You have to
Speaker 2: pull it all the way out and then unzip it
Speaker 2: around the front and then you can get to what
Speaker 2: you want. But this backpack is expressly designed to be
Speaker 2: accessed from the top, and so I just love the
Speaker 2: organization and the compartmentalization because it works really well when
Speaker 2: you have one shoved in the overhead and you don't
Speaker 2: want to pull the whole thing down, or you have
Speaker 2: one shoved under the seat in front of you. You
Speaker 2: might can tell that I'm a million mile around Delta,
Speaker 2: and I really do spend a ton of time in planes,
Speaker 2: and so something is nuanced in that really does improve
Speaker 2: my quality of life.
Speaker 1: I can totally understand that I do not have the
Speaker 1: ideal back for flying with Darren. My final question if
Speaker 1: people want to learn more about what you are doing
Speaker 1: and connect in some way, what is the best way
Speaker 1: to do that.
Speaker 2: You can find me on Twitter and LinkedIn. I'm at
Speaker 2: Darren Murph on both of those. If you google get
Speaker 2: Lab Remote Playbook. I authored that. I also authored Living
Speaker 2: the Remote Dream. This was a guy that I wrote
Speaker 2: after I set my world record at ngadget and had
Speaker 2: about a month off to travel between roles. So check
Speaker 2: that out on Amazon and if you don't love it,
Speaker 2: send me a note and the next round of ice
Speaker 2: cream is on me.
Speaker 1: That's awesome. I'll link to all of that in the
Speaker 1: show notes. Darren, it has just been fascinating talking with you.
Speaker 1: I've loved chat. Thank you so much for your time.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, thank you so much for having me. I appreciate
Speaker 2: the time.
Speaker 1: That is it for today's show. If you enjoyed my
Speaker 1: chat with Darren and know someone else that you think
Speaker 1: would find it, really useful, why not share the episode
Speaker 1: with them? Just hit the share icon in wherever you
Speaker 1: listen to this podcast from and it's as easy as that.
Speaker 1: So that's it for today's show, and I will see
Speaker 1: you next time.