Book: Remote: Office Not Required by David Heinemeier Hansson. Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️.

The interesting part of reading this book is that I’m currently living most part of it in the past 2 years. :)

The book itself is a little bit outdated as it was written in 2013 and we had a very different scenario then. They mention it in the first chapter, BTW.

I found it to be a little repetitive as well, they are not very pragmatic about the content and decided to mention things over and over again so you can open the book in any particular chapter and use it as a reference (at least that’s what I felt).

Considering all of this, the book is not bad at all. I got some interesting thoughts about my current working environment after reading it. :)

Here are my raw notes about the book:

  • An office is a place nobody wants to go to get stuff done, it’s a place of interruptions
  • If you can’t trust your employees are working and not slacking, you’re a baby sitter, not a manager
  • Learn to trust people you work with or find other people to work with
  • You’re working remotely but it does not necessarily mean you’re working from home. You can work from a coffee shop, library, or even a park. — 💭 LOL. Those people have no idea of how it works where I live
  • Most people WANT to work. If you don’t have a fulfilling job, you don’t need remote work, you need a new job
  • Security guidelines for employees: long passwords (password manager?), Encrypted filesystem, auto-lock, remote wipe for phone/tablet.
  • Have a single chat for people to discuss whatever they want as a team, just to shoot the breeze and post cat gifs
  • Progress is a Joy best shared with coworkers. Weekly work snippets are a good way of doing that
  • Instead of asking: what did you do today? You expect them to describe to their co-workers the work done
  • Meetings should be great but they’re often overused and we usually don’t find them productive. If meetings are the default way of discussing things, something is probably wrong
  • Social interaction is still important in remote work. You don’t need to have social interaction with your coworkers only. Attend to nearby social interactions and choose different places to work
  • When you’re working remotely, it doesn’t matter if your coworkers are working from their home or a different country
  • Don’t use remote work to pay smaller salaries, you can earn money with something else. Pay a big city salary to everyone and let them feel valuable. They will not find better deals where they live
  • Give real-world problems in interviews not just “puzzles”
  • When and where people are doing the work is irrelevant most of the time
  • Bring people together from time to time is important; it’s a way to transform names into real-world people
  • Don’t add roadblocks to your employees, give them space to try things, make mistakes, and improve. They should have access to all the data and systems necessary.s
  • When meetings are scarce you will value the time together — 💭 confirmed with Doist retreat, we really value the time we spend together once a year
  • Structure your day to work better. Split work and play so you can focus and relax. Clothes may help with that.
  • You don’t have to be fully remote to enjoy the benefits of remote work. You can work in the office in the afternoon and use the morning to work from somewhere else