Slide 1

Slide 1 text

(Home-) Office ? W-JAX 2013 Matthias Lübken Director Software Development – Adcloud [email protected], @luebken Martin Lippert Principal Software Engineer – Pivotal [email protected], @martinlippert

Slide 2

Slide 2 text

Marissa Mayer President & CEO of Yahoo! „Beginning in June, we’re asking all employees with work-from-home arrangements to work in Yahoo! offices.“ Photo-credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jdlasica/

Slide 3

Slide 3 text

„Remote work is on a rapid ascent, and not just among hot tech companies like Github, Automattic, or thousands of others. [...] Worse than simply being late to that party is to try to turn back the clock and bait’n’switch your existing workforce.“ David H. Hansson 
 Ruby on Rails creator Partner at 37 Signals Photo-credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jesper/

Slide 4

Slide 4 text

The ideal setting • The best people available on the planet • Highly passionate with a common culture • Open, honest and direct communication • Shared vision, clear goal and few management • Trust all around • One big office, no commute and travel • Everybody loves to work from
 9 – 5 • Highly creative environment • Productive for all with right amount of meetings

Slide 5

Slide 5 text

You have to choose!

Slide 6

Slide 6 text

Some choose the office ! • Face to face communication • More creative environment (?) • Social context • Water cooler kitchen talks

Slide 7

Slide 7 text

• They don’t trust their employees • They want to stay in control and want to keep an eye on everybody • It is a company policy, whether it makes sense or not • They want to save money Some choose the office

Slide 8

Slide 8 text

The agile history • Created in an office context • Work with the existing people of the company / team • Remote work was always “alien” • Most agile people don’t want to work remote Agile

Slide 9

Slide 9 text

You choose! But remember … … this is a compromise.

Slide 10

Slide 10 text

Some choose remote work • Best talents available • Family flexibility • People are different, so everybody works when he/she is energized and in the flow

Slide 11

Slide 11 text

We think… ... both ways are possible ... both ways are equally good ... each way focuses on different aspects

Slide 12

Slide 12 text

Some examples

Slide 13

Slide 13 text

Github • Biggest Git / SVN hoster • > 150 people, 2/3 remote • No managers • No deadlines • No Meetings • No workflows • Inspired by opensource work • Asynchronous discussion with pull requests & chat • Optimize for happiness with side projects • Family-friendly • Invest in internal 
 tools http://zachholman.com/posts/how-github-works/

Slide 14

Slide 14 text

Automattic • The people behind wordpress.org and wordpress.com • 190 employees • Vision: enabling people to publish • Philosophy: transparency, meritocracy, longevity • Everyone starts with support ! • Data-influenced not driven • Autonomy, empowerment and trust • Tools: P2, IRC, IM, Skype

Slide 15

Slide 15 text

37Signals • Ruby on Rails inventor. Product company: Web collaboration software • 36 employees around the world. 13 have desks at the HQ in Chicago. • Company get together • Customer support is staffed during office hours • Four hours overlap for collaboration and team feeling • 40h work week. Distributed around the clock. • Use screensharing and screencast • Weekly discussion thread: “What have you been working on”. • Office are interruption factories and remote work is almost Zen- like • Meetings are a rare treat

Slide 16

Slide 16 text

Other examples • 37Signals • Automattic (160 employees) • Genuitec • GitHub (100 employees) • Kalypso LP • MCF Technology Solutions • ProofHQ • Treehouse • Copyblogger (source) • YouNeedABudget • StackExchange (50/50) • MySQL (70/30) • GrantStreet • SoftwareMill • Mozilla • 10up • Art & Logic (70 employees) • AsmallOrange • LullaBot (35 employees) • AppendTo (23 employees) • UniversalMind (65 employees) • Basho (115 employees, 50% remote) http://scottberkun.com/2013/how-many-companies-are-100-distributed/

Slide 17

Slide 17 text

How does it work?

Slide 18

Slide 18 text

#1 You need to trust people

Slide 19

Slide 19 text

#2 Aim for total transparency

Slide 20

Slide 20 text

#3 You need a strong vision

Slide 21

Slide 21 text

#4 You need face time

Slide 22

Slide 22 text

#5 Build a remote as default culture

Slide 23

Slide 23 text

Personal lessons learned • Know how you work best • Get out of the House • Eliminate distractions • Work in a productive space • Use collaboration tools • Technology still sucks 
 (for certain tasks) • Don’t forget to call it a day • Brainstorming sessions don’t work well via Skype • Face-to-face is different than for non-remote teams

Slide 24

Slide 24 text

Conclusion • Remote work is a viable option • Remote teams can be equally good / efficient / effective 
 as co-located teams - or even better • “Do, or do not” - mixed settings suck
 
 
 Is remote work the preferred option for new companies?

Slide 25

Slide 25 text

Thanks! Matthias Lübken Director Software Development – Adcloud [email protected], @luebken Martin Lippert Principal Software Engineer – Pivotal [email protected], @martinlippert