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Description
Welcome to the All-Remote Snapshot, where we give you a glimpse into GitLab’s 100% remote culture, and a behind the scenes look at what drives the amazing people who work here.
If you're curious about all-remote, be sure to check out GitLab's all-remote page: https://about.gitlab.com/company/culture/all-remote/
Questions:
1. Who are you? How long at have you been at GitLab? What do you do?
2. What attracted you to GitLab?
3. Was being all-remote a big contributor to why you chose to work at GitLab?
4. What have you noticed about the all-remote culture of GitLab?
5. Can you walk us through a day in your life?
6. If you were going to give advice to someone considering working for an all-remote company like GitLab, what would you tell them?
On this episode, Charlie A., a Senior Backend Engineer at GitLab, shares her perspective and experience working and living within an all-remote environment.
A
B
A
B
So
I
come
from
decades
of
contracting,
so
for
me,
being
remote,
I've
been
remote
for
a
very
long
time
and
I've
been
a
contractor
for
a
very
long
time
and
one
of
the
things
that
I
look
at
when
I
look
for
a
company
is
what
I
want
to
work
for
the
company.
So
it's
an
interview
of
them
as
well
as
an
interview
of
me,
it's
more
you
are
skills,
fit
together
and
do
we
fit
together
and
can
we
work
well
together?
B
That's
the
question
that
we
ask
when
we
do
an
interview,
and
sometimes
it's
one
way
or
the
other,
depending
on
on
what
the
on
the
market
is
like
for
me.
Get
lab
had
ticked
all
the
boxes,
many
of
the
boxes,
because
I
looked
at
the
company
culture
and
the
flexibility
and
the
old
remote
was
a
huge
draw
card
for
me
because
I
live
in
a
rural
valley.
I
don't
have
any
offices
close
to
here,
I
think
the
Carson
City
is
40
minutes
away
and
even
then
I
wouldn't
want
to
commute.
B
So,
for
me,
it
had
to
be
remote
and
when
I
chatted
to
people
in
gitlab,
it
turned
out
that
the
handbook
was
not
an
aspirational
document.
It
was
descriptive
so,
instead
of
just
describing
how
they
would
like
to
do
things,
it
was
describing
how
he
actually
did
things,
which
of
course,
is
wonderful,
and
so
that
that
to
me
was
a
huge
draw
card.
Yeah.
A
Absolutely
yeah,
one
of
the
things
that
I've
experienced
as
being
here
is
just
how
real
and
authentic
the
values
are
and
that
the
handbook
is
that
living
involving
document
that
people
make
changes
to
iterations
to
then
build
on
it
every
single
day,
and
it's
it's
huge
and
similar
to
you.
I
live
in
a
very
rural
place,
the
last
census
we
had
a
population
of
300,
so
this
is,
it
enables
me
to
live
where
I
want
to
live
and
still
contribute
in
a
meaningful
way,
so
been
talking
about
the
all
remote
culture.
A
B
So
so
I
live
on
a
small
block.
I
was
a
small
book.
It's
it's
about
half
a
hectare
which
is
just
over
1.2
acres,
I
believe
and
we
have
94
fruit
trees
and
we
homeschool
one
of
our
children.
So
for
us,
the
flexibility
of
remote
work,
because
it's
not
just
a
flexibility
of
location,
while
some
companies
do
say
you
know
you
should
be
here
between.
B
You
know
online
between
9:00
and
5:00,
for
example,
or
95
in
some
timezone
I
have
I
have
worked
for
9:00
between
9:00
to
5:00,
doing
pairing
for
eight
hours
a
day
in
the
San
Francisco
time
zone,
which
involved
me
getting
up
at
3:00
in
the
morning.
So
that
is
sometimes
when
you
have
location
flexibility,
but
not
time,
flexibility
and
that's
okay.
That
was
just
the
way
that
contract
was
and
I
loved
it.
There
was
another
so
for
me
that
labs
the
way
of
of
having
that
time.
B
Flexibility
allows
me
to
say
drop
kids
off
at
school
in
the
morning,
so
that
one
kid
who
we
we
take
this
goal
and
then
do
the
lessons
for
the
other
one
and
my
partner
and
I
tied
team
on
that.
So
we
do
have
a
really
good
system
whereby
we
can
do
the
work
that
we
would
acquired
with
the
homeschooling,
with
maintaining
or
fruit
trees
and
appropriately
and
then
also
working
at
the
times
that
suit
us.
A
A
lot
of
people
have
asked:
how
do
you
make
remote
work
on
a
grand
scale
across
50
plus
countries
and
handling
all
these
time
zones,
and
what
has
rang
true
to
me
is
something
you
said
at
the
end
on
trust
and
empowerment.
If
those
elements
aren't
there,
it's
interesting,
because
if
those
elements
aren't
there,
it
doesn't
really
work
well
in
a
co-located
space
either.
So
it's
not
all
that
radical
that
it
needs
to
work
well
in
an
all
remote
setting.
A
It
just
needs
to
work
well
in
any
setting
it's
just
much
easier
to
extrapolate
that
and
see
the
power
of
it.
When
you
have
people
distributed
all
over
the
world.
Much
like
you
I
prefer
to
work
a
little
later
in
the
day
and
shift
my
day
that
way,
and
you
won't
just
through
a
day
in
the
life
to
some
degree,
but
is
there
any
cool
anecdotes
or
examples
for
the
power
of
structuring
your
day
that
you
do
things
a
little
differently
than
you
would
be
able
to
otherwise
yeah.
B
B
One
of
our
favorite
things
to
do
is
when
we're
up
having
a
leg
stretch,
break
which
of
course,
is
really
important
to
do
anyway
and
I
get
my
gum
boots
on
and
we
walk
around
the
property,
and
so
we
do
a
circuit.
We
check
all
the
buds
we
check
for
fungal
activity.
We
check
for
things
that
need
pruning.
B
We
check
for
roots
growing,
where
it
shouldn't
be
that
sort
of
thing,
so
it
gives
us
a
way
to
be
really
present
on
our
property,
but
also
do
the
things
that
we
need
to
do
anyway,
which
is
to
stretch
your
legs
and
and
get
out
of
those
the
weeds
of
whatever
problem
you're
working
on
and
maybe
have
a
bit
of
a
cognitive
break
from
that.
So
it
works
exceptionally
well,
and
it
also
means
we
can
be
present
where
we
need
to
be
present.
Yeah.
A
Absolutely
if
you
are
giving
someone
advice
that
we're
considering
working
for
Gill
lab
or
any
other
all
remote
or
remote,
first
company,
what
bits
of
advice
would
you
give
them
and
have
you
run
into
any
challenges
that
you're
still
working
on
solutions
like
it's,
not
necessarily
all
rosy?
What
are
the
things
they
need
to
be
aware
of
and
weigh
there's
pros
and
cons,
yeah.
B
B
In
order
to
have
those
things
you
can
start
doing
them
in
an
office
and
it
sort
of
hinges
on
you
being
all
co-located,
but
I
feel
like
as
as
you
go
remote,
you
start
writing
more
things
down.
You
start
to
note
things
are
a
synchronous
lis,
because
you
don't
know
when
the
other
person
say
gonna
wake
up
or
if
they're
even
around,
because
you
can't
see
them.
You
can
maybe
put
something
into
into
a
chat
program
or
you
can
put
things
into
into
our
issues,
for
example.
B
So
there's
impeccable
communication
is,
is
that
I
think
the
backbone,
the
trust
and
communication
of
any
relationship
really,
but
when
it
comes
to
working
environment,
it
makes
it
much
much
easier
to
to
do
what
you
need
to
do.
You
know
exactly
what
you're
doing
and
you
see
the
roadmap
of
where
you
are
going.
B
So
if
something
went
wrong,
they
had
call
me
and
I've
always
sort
of
had
that
leadership
position,
and
here
it's
the
the
the
the
code
base
is
so
large
and
the
and
the
company
is
so
large
that
being
able
to
say
it's,
okay.
For
me
to
not
know
this
and
it's
okay
for
me
to
ask
somebody
else
and
not
feel
bad
about.
It
has
been
a
big
one
and
it
and
the
problems
of
course,
are
Enterprise
problems.
B
So
they're
not
you
know,
you
know
we're
dealing
with
with
a
large
number
of
users
so
and
a
large
product
so
making
sure
that
we
communicate
even
more
tightly
with
all
different
parts
of
the
of
the
company
and
making
sure
that
everyone's
communicating
well
with
each
other
across
departments.
I
guess
you
could
call
them.
So
that's
that's
to
me.
Is
it's
okay
to
not
know
everything,
because
in
this
kind
of
setting
it's
impossible
for
one
person,
you
know
everything.