Geo-distributed Development Teams in Practice
A presentation at Drupal Heart Camp in in Zagreb, Croatia by Luka Kladaric
GEO-DISTRIBUTED DEV TEAMS IN PRACTICE Luka Kladarić @allixsenos http://luka.io
GLOSSARY • Geo-distributed • Telecommuting • Remoting • Working from home (WFH) • Digital nomad
INTRO • Dabbling with computers since I was very young • At ~13 (circa 1998) I discovered you could DEVELOP for THE WEB, never looked back
EARLY REMOTE WORK • In college teamed up with a designer friend to run a web studio • A 10 year collaboration with dozens of successful projects & happy clients • Mostly worked from our homes • Met in person only for brainstorming and the occasional work session
STUMBLING INTO REMOTE • Took a “real job” • Real job turned out to be outsourcing to a foreign company • One particularly rainy morning…
• At this point I’ve been working remotely and hiring remote workers for over 10 years… • …and I can’t imagine going back.
WHY WORK REMOTELY • A completely different approach to work from the usual office paradigm • Not for everyone • However, if you can make it work... It has some amazing upsides.
• No more commuting. Ever again. • ½ hour commute every day means you spend 10 days a year commuting. • An hour long commute means you spend more time commuting to and from work than you get vacation. • No more miserable rainy days or blizzards.
• Better (and cheaper) food than in/around the office. • Don’t have to choose where you live based on proximity to work. • And many others!
FLEX TIME! • The ability to do your work outside of fixed office hours • Comes often with the territory, but not always • Not applicable to all types of jobs • Depends how the company is structured and what the workflows & processes are like • A double-edged sword • Easy to end up working non stop
SOME PEOPLE CAN’T DEAL • Need to dress for work, go to work and be at work to do… • …work. • Part of it is just what you’re used to, part of it is just how you are or aren’t.
• And that’s fine. Nobody is saying working from home is for everyone or that companies should abandon offices en masse.
WHY I WORK REMOTELY • This changed a lot over the years… • …but I’ve always loved it • It started primarily because I really hated commuting • And then…
DEVIANTART • 100 people, ~half in Hollywood office (“HQ”), ~half remote • Engineering explicitly remote • No dev @ HQ • No two devs in the same city • Some of the best and most talented people I’ve ever worked with • Regular meetups! • Opened my eyes to fully remote companies • Learned a lot about communication, organization, results-oriented work, etc.
LEAVING DEVIANTART • Cofounded a startup in New York • Immediately clear we couldn’t hire in New York • Quickly scaled up to ½ dozen people in the Balkan region • Made a kickass product J • Meetups in Amsterdam, Berlin, New York, Zagreb… • But mostly over Skype & Hangouts
GETTING A REMOTE JOB • Depends on your field • Companies usually more open to hiring remote developers and support staff than designers and product managers (no hard rules, tho) • But really the remote jobs are everywhere when you start looking for them • Job boards, meetups, word of mouth…
JOB BOARDS • Some will mark remote-OK jobs in the UI • Some will not offer that so you’ll find something like “remote OK” in the job post itself • Even the ones that say nothing could be a remote position! • But respect the ones that explicitly say “no remote”
INTERVIEWING • Fully onsite • Phone screen, then onsite • Entirely over Skype • There are no rules. A lot of the time companies are just winging it. • This is not exclusive to remote hiring • Compensation: start high, just under what it would cost locally for them
COMMUNICATION • Gotta be fluent. No going around it. • Even if it’s your native language and you’re a shy, introverted person. Confidence makes a big difference. • If it’s a foreign language, fluency and accent make a huge difference • Affects salary negotiations
WORKING REMOTELY • No one true way, but here’s how I do it
COMMUNICATION • Communication is #1 • Need to recreate all the interactions that happen spontaneously in an office through textual communication • Put in a conscious effort to be visible, to be seen. • Themed Slack channels help • Over-communicate & be reachable and responsive
WORKSPACE • Just because you don’t travel to an office doesn’t mean you don’t need an office • Especially if you don’t live alone. Something with a door that can be closed. • Call it “the office”. Makes it easier to set boundaries and curb interruptions. • Also helps with getting into working mood, and being able to walk away from work
EQUIPMENT • Invest in solid gear for your home office • You will be glad you did • Sometimes you’ll get a budget for it, often times you won’t
EQUIPMENT • A solid desk • A good chair • A big monitor or two • A good webcam & microphone
WHY COMPANIES HIRE REMOTE • 1. Cheaper labor • 2. Can’t hire locally – market near office too competitive • 3. Want the best talent, wherever they are • Stay away from #1, be cautious with #2. The good experiences are at #3. • Avoid local job boards unless you’re just starting out.
HOW TO HIRE REMOTE • If budget is #1 reason – use a local job board. Will need to invest time into grooming into high quality workers. • Local jobs offer a kind of security remote jobs can’t compete with • People with experience expect an above-average pay • Beyond that, hire as you would normally • Perceived need for higher confidence is fake
• Hiring a few – no change in hiring process. A quick phone screen and then a full interview onsite. • Hiring a bunch – invest in a better phone screen procedure. • When hiring in a different time zone, expect people to take a certain dose of flex time. This is fine. Give them goals and deadlines and demand results. Who cares when they did it.
HYBRID SETUP • Part of the company is remote while another part is in 1-2 central offices • It can work, but the entire company needs to be on board • Committed to using written communication and scheduling phone/video calls instead of a bunch of impromptu in-person discussions • Implementation can be slow and painful, but it pays for itself immediately
HYBRID SETUP • Onsite employees will appreciate a WFH policy • A team where you can’t WFH is a team that’s working sub-optimally. • Situations in which you can’t be productive at today’s jobs have shrunk in number • Small fraction of people remote can be disconcerting and annoying • But it can also work, if people choose so
GOING ALL REMOTE • Can you have a successful company that doesn't have an office at all?
IN CONCLUSION • Working remotely is awesome • Remote workers are awesome • Give it a shot, it might just change your life
QUESTIONS?
THANK YOU Luka Kladarić @allixsenos http://luka.io
"Oh yeah, you must be way cheaper for them!" "But... how do they know you're actually working when you're remote?" "Oh I could never do that, my productivity tanks when I work from home."
These are just some of the things I regularly hear when the topic of telecommuting, "remoting", "working from home" or similar comes up. After over a decade of working and hiring remotely, let me take you on a retrospective of my experiences; what works, what definitely doesn’t, the pros and cons, how to hire remotely and how to get hired.
"What if everyone is in one office, and you're all alone on the other side of the planet?" "But I like hanging out with the people in my office, why would I give that up?"
Can you go all-in with geo-distributed development and have no developers in the office? Can you go a step further and not even have an office? Do hybrid setups work at all? Oh, we have much to talk about.
