►
Description
Remote Teamwork how to thrive in a post-office world - Jessica Reeder
A
A
So
you
probably
already
know
this
gitlab
is
one
of
the
world's
largest
all
remote
organizations.
So
we
have
1300
team
members
who
are
across
65
countries
and
regions
throughout
the
world,
and
we
work
with
100
000
different
organizations
and
beyond
the
full-time
employees
of
git
lab.
There
are
thousands
of
code
contributors
who
use
the
product
and
contribute
to
it
while
they're
building
their
own
projects.
So
it's
a
big
global
effort.
That's
constantly
happening
asynchronously.
A
One
of
the
things
that
drew
me
personally
to
gitlab
is
the
company
culture.
So
I'm
going
to
talk
about
this
a
little
bit
more
later,
actually
quite
a
bit
more
later,
but
the
leadership
at
gitlab
has
made
a
big
investment
in
creating
a
strong
functional,
remote
culture
and
that's
really
paid
off.
So
these
are
just
three
of
the
ways
that
we
were
recognized
in
2020
for
essentially
having
happy
employees,
and
I
think,
that's
important
to
recognize.
A
Even
before
the
pandemic.
Gitlab
saw
a
need
for
organized
thinking
about
the
future
of
work,
and
so
that's
where
I
come
in.
My
team
exists
at
gitlab
to
understand
remote
work
to
codify
best
practices
and
to
try
to
predict
what
the
future
is
going
to
look
like.
So
we've
been
very
effective,
especially
led
by
darren
murph
our
head
of
remote.
We
have
case
studies
and
strategies
that
are
now
being
taught
at
harvard
business
school
in
syed
and
other
leading
schools.
A
Personally,
I've
been
working
remotely
for
15
plus
years.
I
joined
git
lab
in
march
of
2020,
specifically
so
that
I
could
work
on
remote
work,
because
when
I
started
it
really
wasn't
a
career
opportunity,
and
now
it
is.
I
would
love
to
make
the
rest
of
my
career
focused
on
creating
strong
remote
practices
for
companies
that
are
doing
a
mix
of
different
strategies
and
structures
throughout
the
world.
There's
a
lot
of
work
to
do,
and
in
march
2020
and
february
2020.
A
I
want
to
give
you
some
statistics,
so
this
is
before
the
pandemic,
so
in
early
2020,
all
the
way
back
to
maybe
2017
2015
even
get
lab
and
other
organizations
were
trying
to
evangelize
remote
work.
We
wanted
to
convince
people
that
it
was
the
future,
and
so
we
did
some
studies,
and
so
these
are
statistics
for
people
who
were
working
remotely
at
generally
at
all
remote
companies.
So
77
of
people
said
that
they
are
more
productive.
A
Now
we
are
well
into
the
global,
remote
work
experiment
and
we're
seeing
something
else
happening,
and
I
think
it's
very
important
to
recognize
this.
70
percent
of
people
reported
that
they're
working
the
weekends
69
percent
of
people
are
burning
out
and
63
percent
of
people
are
discouraged
from
taking
time
off.
I
just
want
to
let
these
sink
in
a
little
bit,
because
this
is
really
unfortunate,
but
this
is
where
we're
at
right.
Now
we
have
70
of
people
around
the
world
who
are
burning
out,
and
that
is
unsustainable.
A
That's
not
how
we
want
to
continue.
So
if
you
are
feeling
like
this,
I
want
you
to
know
that
you
are
definitely
not
alone,
it's
happening
everywhere.
The
reason
for
this
is
obvious.
This
is
not
really
well
planned,
remote
work.
This
was
crisis
induced
working
remotely.
Most
companies
didn't
have
time
to
execute
a
remote
transition
strategy,
so
we've
been
in
crisis
mode
and
we
cannot
do
that
forever.
A
I
want
to
give
you
the
other
side
of
things
so,
like
I
said,
gitlab
has
been
an
all
remote
company
for
a
long
time
and
I
feel
that
it
has
a
very
strong,
remote
culture.
So
I
wanted
to
just
document
my
day
for
you,
so
this
is
monday,
so
I
worked
from
10
a.m
to
6
p.m.
That's
generally
my
hours,
sometimes
nine
to
five.
You
know
whatever
needs
to
be
done,
had
30
slack
messages,
which
is
a
little
busy
for
me
four
meetings.
A
So
since
it
was
monday,
I
had
my
manager
meeting
our
one-on-one
and
we
just
you
know,
connect
about
everything
coming
up
in
the
week.
Then
I
met
with
a
partner
on
a
project
that
we're
doing.
Then
I
had
a
coffee
chat
which
I'm
going
to
mention
again
later.
Coffee
chat
is
a
30-minute
chat
with
anyone
on
the
team
just
to
socialize
and
connect
as
people
and
not
talk
about
work,
and
then
I
had
a
team
sink
and
I
want
to
let
you
know
that
this
was
an
optional
team
sink.
A
This
is
important,
so
the
meeting
was
completely
recorded.
The
slide
deck
was
distributed
ahead
of
time,
and
so
I
had
the
option
to
attend
or
not,
and
I
decided
not
to
attend-
and
I
watched
the
video
later
so
just
dropping
a
little
seed
there
about
what
meetings
are
going
to
look
like
as
we
talk
through
this.
We
work
in
gitlab,
so
I
had
15
open
issues,
kind
of
a
lot
five
different
documents.
A
I
was
contributing
to
only
three
emails,
I'm
quite
proud
of
that
and
a
long
walk
and,
of
course,
all
of
this
in
my
own
home.
So
when
an
organization
has
a
mature
remote
culture
and
strategy,
it
can
be
a
very
positive
experience.
It
can
be
a
very
normal
work
day,
so
I
want
to
actually
give
you
a
little
bit
of
structure
a
little
bit
of
theory
to
think
about
remote
teams.
A
You
are
somewhere
on
this
continuum.
Every
team
is
right,
so
at
gitlab
these
are
our
five
main
categories
of
remote
team
structures
that
we've
identified.
There
are
actually
ten
that
we
we
have
named,
but
these
are
the
five
big
ones
and
the
no
remote
and
all
remote
are
the
easiest
to
understand.
So
no
remote
means
that
nobody
is
working
remotely
everyone's
in
the
office.
All
remote
means
that
everyone
is
remote
where
it
gets
interesting
is
in
the
middle.
A
So
your
summer,
probably
in
one
of
these
right
now
remote
allowed
means
that
most
people
are
in
the
office
most
of
the
time,
but
some
people
are
working
remotely
some
of
the
time.
Remote
first
means
that
most
people
are
working
remotely
most
of
the
time.
Some
people
are
in
the
office
some
of
the
time
and
then
in
the
middle
we
have
hybrid
remote.
This
is
the
most
common
structure
that
we
are
seeing
pop
up
and
for
good
reason.
It
makes
sense.
Theoretically,
it
makes
sense
financially
for
companies.
A
What
it
is
is
that
you
have
a
group
of
people
who
are
in
the
office
basically
all
of
the
time
they
primarily
commute
to
work
and
they
work
in
the
office.
And
then
you
have
a
group
of
people
who
are
remote
most
of
the
time,
so
they
work
remotely
primarily
and
generally
those
two
groups
have
completely
different
work
experiments
and
that
makes
it
challenging.
A
That
is
one
of
the
biggest
challenges
that
teams
will
have
to
solve
in
the
upcoming
years.
We're
heading
into
a
time
when
companies
are
going
to
experiment
with
hybrid
remote
structures,
and
those
of
us
who
are
in
those
teams
are
going
to
have
to
solve
some
challenges,
to
make
sure
that
we
have
a
good
experience.
A
That's
what
I'm
talking
about
today.
So
I
want
you
to
recognize
that
remote
is
always
transitional.
So
you
may
start
at
one
place
on
the
team
structures
that
I
just
showed
you
and
you
may
end
up
in
a
different
place.
Many
of
us
started
in
2020
with
one
type
of
team,
and
now
in
2021
we
have
a
very
different
attitude
and
very
different
experience
of
remote
work
and,
what's
going
to
happen
by
the
end
of
this
year,
we
don't
know
even
for
an
all
remote
company,
like
gitlab,
we're
constantly
learning
constantly
iterating.
A
This
is
a
new
field
and
it's
a
new
way
of
working,
so
we're
learning
by
doing
and
your
team
will
also
learn
by
doing
what
I'm
hoping
that
you'll
get
out
of
this
talk
is
a
few
strategies,
a
few
tips
that
you
can
take
back
to
your
team.
So
I
know
that
we
have
a
mixed
group
here.
We
have
some
people
who
are
individual
contributors.
A
We
have
some
managers,
I'm
going
to
offer
a
range
of
different
suggestions,
strategies
tips
that
you
may
be
able
to
use,
and
I
hope
that
you'll
just
screen
cap
the
slides
and
take
notes
and
find
one
or
two
things
that
you
can
take
back
to
your
team
and
attempt
to
implement
that's
my
goal
for
today,
and
I
hope
we
accomplish
it.
So,
let's
start
with
meetings.
A
If
there
is
one
thing
that
people
ask
me
about
in
every
talk
and
every
consultation,
it's
meetings
and
there's
a
very
good
reason
for
that.
I
think
for
most
of
us
as
soon
as
we
went
from
in-person
work
to
remote
work.
Probably
the
first
thing
that
you
experienced
was
that
your
calendar
filled
up
with
meetings
and
that's
what
happens
when
you
work
remotely
you
sort
of
want
to
just
copy
and
paste
the
old
way
of
working.
A
So
if
you
have
a
question
for
someone,
you
need
to
discuss
something
you
say:
hey,
let's
jump
on
a
call,
let's
have
a
meeting,
but
the
problem
is
that
we
just
end
up
having
too
many
of
them.
They
grow
and
they
take
up
our
whole
calendar
and
then
there's
no
time
to
get
your
work
done,
which
then
leads
to
working
longer
hours.
So
why?
I
think,
there's
a
couple
of
reasons.
A
First
of
all,
we're
humans.
We
like
to
talk
to
each
other,
we're
social
we
like
to
communicate,
face
to
face,
and
so
when
we
have
something
to
discuss
and
we're
not
sure
exactly
how
to
do
it,
we
call
a
meeting
so
that
we
can
work
through
it
together
as
humans
in
a
social
environment,
of
course
that
multiplies
quickly
and
suddenly
it
is
no
longer
productive
at
all
and
then
second,
I
think
that
we
call
meetings
because
we
don't
know
how
or
else
we
don't
trust
that
we
can
solve
problems
asynchronously,
sometimes
that's
really
valid.
A
So
if
you
need
to
brainstorm
something
or
if
you
have
to
have
a
difficult
conversation,
it's
much
easier
to
have
it
in
a
meeting,
but
most
of
the
time
we're
just
defaulting
to
our
old
habits.
So
I
want
to
encourage
you
to
do
something.
This
actually
happened
to
me
this
week.
Somebody
messaged
me
and
said:
hey:
are
you
available
at
3
30
to
talk
about
this
urgent
problem
and
3
30?
That
was
the
middle
of
my
focus
time,
and
so
I
said,
do
we
have
to
talk
synchronously?
A
Can
we
resolve
this
asynchronously
and
we
were
able
to
so
we
put
the
meeting
on
the
calendar
as
tentative,
and
then
we
attempted
to
work
it
out
in
a
document
and
in
the
end
the
meeting
was
cancelled.
That's
the
biggest
thing
that
you
can
try
to
do
say:
hey.
Can
we
talk
about
this
asynchronously
instead,
then
at
gitlab
we
have
a
little
rule,
which
is
that
every
meeting
needs
to
have
an
agenda.
A
A
If
you
get
an
invite
for
a
meeting
and
it
doesn't
have
an
agenda
at
gitlab,
you
are
allowed
to
say
no
thank
you
because
every
meeting
is
required
to
have
an
agenda,
and
so
we
think
of
it.
This
way
is
it
more
rude
to
skip
a
meeting
that
is
not
relevant
to
you,
or
is
it
more
rude
to
invite
people
to
a
meeting
that
is
not
relevant
to
them?
We
think
it's,
the
latter.
We
think
that
it
is
less
considerate
of
people's
time
to
call
a
meeting
without
them.
A
A
So
we
think
that
meetings
are
something
that
we
can
just
continue
doing
the
same
way,
but
I
want
to
let
you
know
and
suggest
to
you
that
it
requires
a
complete
rethinking
and
reimagination
of
every
element
around
meeting
culture
and
if
there's
one
thing
that
you
can
try
with
your
team
right
now,
it's
rethinking
how
you
do
meetings
easiest
way
to
do.
That
is
actually
to
have
stronger
documentation.
So
most
companies
that
we
talk
to
they
have
a
project
management
system,
there's
a
chat
tool,
communications
procedures,
document
library,
digital
asset
library,
etc.
A
But
you
don't
have
a
centrally
located
up-to-date
handbook.
Gitlab
is
the
opposite.
We
have
an
extremely
large
handbook.
That's
actually
available
online
transparently,
feel
free
to
google,
get
lab
handbook
and
check
it
out.
It
would
be
probably
over
10
000
pages
if
it
was
printed
and
it's
updated
constantly
by
the
entire
team.
A
So
when
you're
in
an
office,
if
you
have
a
question,
you
know
you
either
call
someone
schedule
a
meeting
or
you
just
pop
by
their
cubicle
their
desk
and
you
say:
hey.
I
have
a
question
and
you
just
answer
it
quickly
that
doesn't
really
work
asynchronously,
whether
people
are
on
different
time
zones
or
they're,
just
not
at
their
desk.
Every
question
that
you
have
becomes
a
delay,
and
this
slows
down
the
course
of
work
to
the
point
where
you're
not
really
able
to
function
without
working
synchronously.
A
So
in
order
to
work
asynchronously,
you
need
to
be
able
to
look
up
the
information
on
your
own
and
the
only
way
for
that
to
work
is
with
documentation
so
think
about
how
you
can
start
now
with
just
documenting
a
few
processes.
Next
time.
Someone
sends
you
a
question
if
the
information
isn't
documented
somewhere,
when
you
answer
it
copy
and
paste
your
answer
and
document
it
somewhere
and
that's
how
you
start
just
start
small
and
start
building
and
start
documenting
things
now,
and
you
will
eventually
end
up
with
a
resource.
A
A
It's
not
a
project
management
system,
it
isn't
documentation,
it
doesn't
really
have
a
great
search
function
and
that's
partly
because
we
don't
really
chat
in
the
same
way
that
we
document
so
make
sure
that
you,
you
know,
consider
whether
you're
really
doing
the
right
thing
when
you
are
doing
your
work
in
your
chat
tool-
and
I
have
to
say
I
do
this
all
the
time.
I
am
very
guilty
of
doing
work
in
the
chat
tool
and
I
have
to
be
reminded
to
move
things
over
to
project
management.
A
So
it's
hard
to
do,
but
one
thing
that
we
have
at
gitlab
is
a
forcing
function.
We
have
set
up
our
slack
so
that
it
automatically
expires
all
messages
after
90
days
and
what
that
means
is,
if
you're
talking
about
something
important.
You
know
in
your
mind
that
it
will
not
be
preserved
if
you
talk
about
it
solely
on
slack.
So
when
something
important
happens,
the
conversation
moves
over
to
the
project
issue
or
the
to
the
document
so
that
it
is
being
documented
in
a
place
that
will
last.
A
This
doesn't
mean
that
you
can't
mention
work
things
in
your
chat
tool.
Of
course,
you
can
talk
about
work
in
your
chat
tool,
but
make
sure
that
meaningful
discussions
and
things
that
need
to
be
saved
are
happening
elsewhere,
and
so
I
want
to
also
remind
you
that
chat
is
a
gift.
It
is
an
opportunity
for
us
to
be
people
with
each
other.
If
we're
only
talking
about
work,
then
we
lose
the
chance
to
connect
as
people.
A
A
A
Well,
then,
why?
Don't
you
just
measure
whether
the
work
is
getting
done
and
leave
your
employees
alone?
Don't
monitor
employees?
If
you
find
that
your
employer
seems
to
be
monitoring
you
too
much
micromanaging,
you
then
feel
free
to
push
back,
there's
a
lot
of
good
research
that
recommends
that
employers
not
micromanage
and
not
monitor
people
on
the
job
instead
measure
results
instead
of
attendance,
because
that's
what
really
matters
it's?
What
you're
doing
is.
A
A
This
photo
at
the
top
left.
That's
sid
c
randy,
as
you
probably
saw
at
the
start
of
today.
That's
the
ceo
of
git
lab,
and
I
have
no
idea
what's
happening
in
this
photo,
but
it's
a
relatively
normal
site
for
us
to
see
at
gitlab.
We
intentionally
create
opportunities
for
informal
communication
and
we
encourage
people
to
be
open
and
be
expressive
and
be
their
full
selves
at
work,
because,
ultimately,
you
want
to
know
the
people
that
you
work
with
and
if
you
don't,
you
start
to
get
lonely.
A
A
It
can
get
very
lonely
if
we
don't
create
opportunities
to
connect
with
each
other
to
be
our
full
selves
to
be
people.
So
it
has
to
be
part
of
your
day-to-day
that
you
just
make
time
to
be
friends
with
the
people
that
you
work
with.
Here
are
a
few
ideas.
These
are
just
a
few
of
the
things
that
we
do.
You
might
want
to
just
screen
capture
this
slide
and
try
some
of
these.
A
A
Amas
pizza
parties
trivias
bring
your
children
and
have
introduce
them
to
each
other
on
a
zoom
call
scavenger
hunts,
whatever
you
can
really
think
of
to
intentionally
create
opportunities
for
informal
communication
and
then
meet
in
person
too.
If
you
have
the
opportunity
to
do
so,
try
to
meet
in
person.
I
have
this
photo
here.
A
It's
actually
a
bit
of
a
sad
image
for
me,
because
I
started
in
march
of
2020
at
gitlab,
and
I
was
very
excited
to
go
to
the
company
retreat,
which
was
going
to
be
in
prague,
but
of
course
it
was
cancelled
due
to
the
pandemic.
I
knew,
though,
that
there
would
be
another
one.
I
knew
that
in
maybe
nine
months
or
so
there
would
be
another
opportunity
and
for
it
happened
that
way,
there
will
be
another
get
lab
gathering
sometime
later
this
year.
A
We
hope
so
make
sure
that
you're
also
creating
opportunities
for
people
to
meet
in
person,
so
remote
leadership
is
interesting.
First
of
all,
I
want
to
also
show
you
this
photo,
which
I
love
this
photo.
So
this
is
a
photo
of
our
chief
marketing
officer,
todd
barr
and,
as
you
can
see,
he's
wearing
a
formal
blazer
from
the
waist
up
and
then
from
the
waist
down
he's
in
shorts
and
he's
on
his
treadmill
walking
the
dog,
and
I
want
to
outline
that
for
a
couple
of
reasons
number
one.
A
This
is
a
leader.
This
is
a
an
executive
who's
showing
his
real
life
in
remote
work.
Executive
sponsorship
of
remote
culture
is
essential,
but
it
also
needs
to
be
something
that
involves
people
throughout
the
organization,
so
establish
a
team
for
remote
culture,
and
this
is
something
you
can
suggest
you
can
do.
You
can
take
back
to
your
team
right
away.
Anyone
who's,
passionate
about
making
remote
work
better
at
your
organization
can
be
part
of
this
strike
team,
and
all
you
need
to
do
is
start
with
one
problem
and
suggest
a
solution
to
it.
A
But
they
will
not
do
things
perfectly.
We
need
to
all
as
much
as
we
can
be
transparent
and
open
with
each
other.
Try
to
build
trust,
try
to
build
understanding
because
it
will
be
challenging,
but
the
outcome
will
be
so
worth
the
challenges
if
you
find
yourself
in
a
place
where
you're
not
sure
what
to
do.
Go
back
to
your
company
credo
your
mission
statement,
your
values,
your
culture,
whatever
it
is
that
brought
you
to
the
company
that
you're
at
in
the
first
place
rely
on
your
company
values
to
guide
you
to
the
right
decisions.
A
So
these
are
git
labs,
values,
collaboration,
results,
efficiency,
the
next
one
is
actually
diversity,
inclusion
and
belonging,
iteration
and
transparency.
These
are
our
values
and
your
company
may
have
its
own
version
of
this.
What
are
values
exactly?
They
are
a
system
of
shared
ideas.
They
help
us
know
how
to
act
in
a
given
situation,
so,
in
other
words,
our
values
create
our
behaviors,
because
we
use
these
ideas
to
help
us
decide
what
to
do.
Ultimately,
the
behaviors
that
you
choose
add
up
to
trends
across
your
company
and
that
in
that
way,
values
support
business
strategies.
A
So,
when
you're
going
through
a
challenge
in
a
remote
transition,
you
find
yourself
unsure
of
what
to
do
or
how
to
move
forward.
Go
back
to
the
ideals
that
your
company
is
based
on.
What
would
the
best
choice?
Look
like
based
on
the
values
that
your
team
shares?
How
can
we
act
in
a
way
that
moves
everyone
toward
the
outcome
that
we
all
want
to
achieve,
and
how
can
you
make
suggestions
for
things
to
work
better,
based
on
the
system
of
values
that
exists
already
in
your
company,
whether
you're
working
remotely
or
in
an
office?
A
It
doesn't
matter
learning
how
to
work
remotely
is
just
logistics,
understanding
the
impact
of
your
work,
making
sure
that
it
brings
something
positive
to
the
world
that
is
living
by
your
values
and,
ultimately,
that's
what
matters.
So,
if
you
find
yourself
in
a
difficult
position,
don't
worry
rely
on
your
team
and
you
will
find
the
answer.
A
Of
course
we
have
a
couple
of
additional
resources
to
help
you
with
that,
so
that
you're
not
fully
alone.
So
please
help
yourself
to
this
document.
So
this
is
the
remote
playbook
by
gitlab.
You
can
google
it
right
now.
I
would
I
want
to
say
that
probably
about
100
thousand
people
have
downloaded
this
so
far.
It
codifies
a
lot
of
our
best
practices
for
remote
based
on
running
this
all
remote
organization
across
many
years.
A
So
please
help
yourself
to
it's
absolutely
free
to
download,
and
I
hope
that
it
will
add
to
what
I've
covered
today
and
give
you
some
more
tips
and
strategies
that
you
can
try
to
use.
Also,
if
you're
at
the
manager
level,
we
have
a
course
on
coursera
again.
This
is
offered
free
to
all
learners.
It
takes
about
10
hours
and
it
will
guide
you
through
transitioning
a
team
to
remote
best
practices.
A
And,
finally,
if
you
have
more
questions,
I've
saved
a
couple
of
minutes
now,
where
I
would
love
to
answer
them,
and
then
you
can
also
reach
out
to
me
on
twitter
or
on
linkedin,
and
I
would
love
to
talk
to
you
some
more.
So
I
hope
that
this
has
been
helpful
to
you
all,
but
I'd
love
to
take
just
a
moment.
If
you
have
questions
and
you'd
like
to
drop
them
in
the
chat,
I'm
going
to
stop
sharing
my
screen
in
just
a
moment
here
and
I'll
see
if
there
are
any.