Building a Remote Team . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Chapter 1: How to Run a Remote Team . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Our Journey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
3 Ingredients of a Successful Remote Working Setup . . . 4
Learn From Others . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Chapter 2: How to Build Culture in a Remote Team . . . . 16
- Culture is About More Than Ping-Pong Tables . . . . . 17
- Culture is About How You Work . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
- Tools Allow for Collaboration and Fun . . . . . . . . . 18
- In Person Meetups are Important . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
- Local Community Sponsorship Shows Presence . . . . 23
- Trust is the Foundation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
- Getting Things Done . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Chapter 3: How to Hire a Remote Team . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Defining Characteristics of a Top-Notch Remote Worker . 27
Writing an Attractive Remote Job Post . . . . . . . . . . 29
Finding Remote Candidates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Hiring a Remote Employee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
More Remote Hiring Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Chapter 4: How Successful Remote Teams Evaluate Employees
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Make New Teammates Feel Welcome from the Start . . . 43
CONTENTS
Measure Output, Not Input . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Look to the Team for Feedback . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Ask for Self-Evaluations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Provide Feedback Often . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Trust . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Communicating in a Remote Team . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Chapter 5: How to End Internal Emails and Communicate
Effectively in a Remote Team . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
GitHub Built “Team” to Learn What Everyone is Working
On . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Treehouse Constructed a Reddit Clone to Bubble Up
Important Items . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
Automattic Created P2, a Microblog on its Own Platform 56
Zapier Utilizes a Customized Version of P2 . . . . . . . . 58
Improve Your Internal Communication . . . . . . . . . . 59
Chapter 6: How to Build Strong Relationships in a Remote
Team . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Building Rapport Remotely . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Relying on Text the Right Way . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
Asserting Yourself When Needed . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
Chapter 7: How to Run a Remote Team Meeting . . . . . . 72
Time and Meeting Frequency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Meeting Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Why Does This Work? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
How Will This Scale? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
Chapter 8: How to Run a Company Retreat for a Remote
Team . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
- Why should you do it? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
- Where should you do it? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
- How long you should do it? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
- What should you do? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82
CONTENTS - What about the cost? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
Getting Feedback on the Trip . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
Working in a Remote Team . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Chapter 9: This is What a Remote Office Looks Like . . . 88
Alison Groves, Customer Champion - Nashville, Tenn. . . 89
Brian Cooksey, Platform Engineer - Columbia, Mo. . . . 90
Bryan Helmig, Backend Engineer - Sunnyvale, Calif. . . . 91
Christopher Peters, Data Scientist - Miami, Florida . . . . 92
Craig Labenz, Full Stack Engineer - Nomad. . . . . . . . 93
Danny Schreiber, Marketing Lead - Omaha, Neb. . . . . . 94
James Carr, Systems Engineer - Columbia, Mo. . . . . . . 95
Jess Byrne, Customer Champion - Kunkletown, Penn. . . 96
Joe Stych, Content Marketer - Portland, Me. . . . . . . . 97
Justin Deal, Full Stack Engineer - Manchester, Mo. . . . . 98
Lindsay Brand, Customer Champion - Barcelona, Spain. . 99
Matthew Guay, Marketing - Bangkok, Thailand . . . . . 100
Micah Bennett, Customer Champion - Palatine, Ill. . . . . 101
Mike Knoop, Product and Partner Lead - Sunnyvale, Calif. 102
Rob Golding, Full Stack Engineer - Nottingham, UK. . . . 103
Wade Foster, CEO - Sunnyvale, Calif. . . . . . . . . . . . 104
Additional Thoughts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
Chapter 10: How to Work Faster in a Remote Team . . . . 106
Are You More Productive? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
How to Work Faster Like a Remote Team . . . . . . . . . 109
- Pull Internal Communication Out of Your Inbox . . . . 110
- Rely on the Right Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
- Use Differing Schedules to Your Advantage . . . . . . 114
- Skip the Commute . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
- Cancel Meetings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
- Think Before You Send . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
- Set Up Your Best Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120
CONTENTS - Own Up to Your Productivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122
Not So Fast… What Doesn’t Work About Remote Work . 124
The Right Reason to Go Remote? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124
Unplug . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Chapter 11: How to Find Your Optimal Work Environment
and Boost Productivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
Time of Day . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
Surroundings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Managing Your Workload . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
Chapter 12: How to Work in Different Timezones . . . . . 134
5 Pros of Remote Work, and How to Take Advantage . . . 135
6 Cons of Remote Work, and How to Overcome . . . . . 135
5 Pros of Remote Work, and How to Take Advantage . . . 136
6 Cons of Remote Work, and How to Overcome Them . . 142
Build Your Own Small World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158
Chapter 13: How to Avoid Burnout in a Remote Team . . 160
- Establish and Maintain a Routine . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
- Set and Stick to Priorities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
- Create and Keep Boundaries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169
- Take Short and Long Breaks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170
- Make Time for Human Interaction . . . . . . . . . . . 172
Don’t Flame Out . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174
Chapter 14: A Special Thanks To Those Who Share . . . . 176
Automattic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
GitHub . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
Basecamp (formerly 37Signals) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
Treehouse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
Buffer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
Help Scout . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178
Groove . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
Fogcreek . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
Stack Exchange . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179
CONTENTS
Wide Teams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
WooThemes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
Popforms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180
Scott Hanselman . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Steven Sinofsky . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
StatusPages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
iDoneThis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
HubSpot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
Remotive.io . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18