Managing remotely, while remotely managing

Managing remotely, while remotely managing Lindsay Holmwood  @auxesis

! About me Worked in and lead distributed software engineering
teams for 8 years

! About me Lead teams with follow-the-sun coverage

! About me Currently at Envato leading distributed team of
15,   growing to 20

The journey  0. Fundamentals 1. Starting out 2. Growing the
team 3. Scaling to the whole org

You Org Technology Practice

No management buy in? Don’t even bother.

Outsource Working from home Distributed

Distributed? • Geographical • Temporal

1. Starting out

All remote, or no remote

Create a level playing ﬁeld

Hybrid is hard

Regular face to face catchups. Ideal: once a quarter

Regular face to face catchups. Likely: once a year

Establish rituals

Priming

“exposure to one stimulus inﬂuences a response to a subsequent
stimulus, without conscious guidance or intention”

Say silk ﬁve times.

Now spell “silk”.

What do cows drink?

If a red house is made with red bricks, a
blue house is made with blue bricks,   a pink house is made with pink bricks, a black house is made with black bricks, what is a greenhouse made with?

Priming to reinforce segmentation

Segmenters Create partitions between work and home

Segmenters Use rituals to reinforce boundaries

Establish rituals Wear shoes while working

Establish rituals Diﬀerent devices

Establish rituals Walk around the block

Establish rituals Standing desks

Integrators Blend home and work life

Integrators Strong desire to blur the domains

Integrators Easily transition between domains

You Integrator Segmenter

Integrators are more accepting of segmenters than vice-versa

Integrators need boundaries too, and strategies for disconnecting

Segmenters report higher levels of job satisfaction compared to integrators

How does this impact working remotely?

Remote working naturally lends itself to integrators

Integration is a slippery slope to burnout

Christina Maslach

6 contributing factors 1. Workload 2. Control 3. Reward 4.
Community 5. Fairness 6. Values

6 contributing factors 1. Workload: Too much Too complex Too
urgent Too awful

6 contributing factors 1. Workload: The amount of work to
complete in a day The complexity of my work The intensity of demands from customers The ﬁrmness of deadlines The frequency of surprising, unexpected events The opportunity to settle into a comfortable groove The frequency of interruptions in my workday The proportion of my work time spent with customers The amount of time I work alone The amount of time I work with other employees

Understand your relationships with work

Promote a culture of segmentation

Multiple internet connections Dongle with lots of data

Multiple internet connections Don’t skimp on quality (fast upload a
must)

Multiple internet connections Have backup equipment

Multiple internet connections Move to areas with NBN

Increase the size of your hiring pool Parents re-entering the
workforce

Increase the size of your hiring pool People priced out
of major cities

Increase the size of your hiring pool People with caring
responsibilities who can only work part time

Have a second monitor See screen + video at the
same time

Instant messaging Non-negotiable, primary comms method

Instant messaging Your lifeline to your team.

Instant messaging Scheduled do not disturb time

Instant messaging Announce start/stop

Ceremonies: Daily standup Rotate the facilitation responsibility

Ceremonies: Retrospectives Discuss and refactor practices

Leadership participation Show endorsement. Build empathy.

2. Growing the team

The basics Even more important!

The basics Bring in coaches to observe and facilitate.

Hack: Greet everyone to " check

Hack: Ask questions in the negative “Does anyone disagree?” not
“Do we all agree?”

Ceremonies: Daily standup Keep time boxed to 15 minutes

Ceremonies: Daily standup Walk the wall

Team design: Time zone coverage How many time zones? How
much time zone overlap?

Team design: Time zone coverage Add people in new time
zones in pairs.

Team design: Time zone coverage Beginning & end of day
standups.

Team design: Time zone coverage Record crucial meetings.

Team design: Antipattern: Forcing everyone to work at exactly the
same time

Team design: Antipattern: Communication in physical spaces that excludes remoters

Team design: Antipattern: Activities that exclude remoters (use of whiteboards)
(in-person icebreakers)

Google Quick Draw

Team design: Deﬁning question How would this decision make me
feel if I was not working in the office?

Leadership participation Show endorsement. Build empathy.

3. Scaling to the whole org

What does it take to make distributed teams a ﬁrst
class citizen in the organisation?

The executive and management working remotely at least 2 days
a week.

Guilds Share lessons learnt with other teams

Feedback loops Keep refactoring your ways of working.

Permission to halt # Make it culturally acceptable to halt
meetings that aren’t remote friendly

Feedback loops “What got us here won’t get us there."

Thank you!  (and questions?)

Thank you!  (and questions?) Liked the talk? Let @auxesis know.

Stock photos from Fonts Junction from League of Movable Type
Fanwood from League of Movable Type

Learn more ◦ When work takes over your life (podcast) 
WorkLife with Adam Grant ◦ 36 Great Tips for Online Meeting facilitation (infographic) ◦ Banishing Burnout: Six Strategies for Improving Your Relationship with Work (book)  Christina Maslach and Michael P. Leiter ◦ Template “My Relationship With Work” survey (worksheet)  (make a copy and ﬁll out every month)

Tracking your relationship with work over time

Tools for remote working ◦ GroupMap  Excellent retro + meeting
facilitation tool ◦ Mural  Collaborative online real-time white boarding that doesn’t suck ◦ Trello  Go wild and create a Trello board for all your meetings!

Managing remotely, while remotely managing

Managing remotely, while remotely managing

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