Month: August 2011

On working hours

I’ve recently started advocating for flexible working hours in all the offices I can get my foot into.  With our recent power cuts there was an extra possibility for a few companies to try remote working and more flexible schedules.  It went very well with some, and so well with others.  The lack of self-discipline is often mentioned as a primary roadblock to such flexibility.  I used to agree with that.  But now I don’t.  I think that internal company communication tools and channels have a much larger impact on whether flexible schedules and remote work will work or not.

Why am I suddenly speaking about flexible hours?  Because I came across this blog post by Zach Holman, one of a few GitHub employees.

By allowing for a more flexible work schedule, you create an atmosphere where employees can be excited about their work. Ultimately it should lead to more hours of work, with those hours being even more productive. Working weekends blur into working nights into working weekdays, since none of the work feels like work.

Read the whole thing, it’s not that long and it is well written.

Day in brief – 2011-08-16

On working remotely

Here are a few notes on working remotely from a person who has first hand experience with that:

In terms of communication I think remote employees are a massive benefit to a company, it is easy in an office to forget about proper communications channels because you can bypass them and tap somebody on the shoulder, which leads to confusion as people are now out of the loop and without information they need to work, this problem becomes even worse as your company grows. Working remotely is impossible without proper communication channels, seperate mailing lists for different working groups, bug trackers, project management tools and chat rooms for quick messaging. Everyone will be forced to use these as a part of their daily workflow which helps combat the usual lack of adoption with office tools, when I am working remotely I feel a lot more confident I know what I need to do than in an office. There are times when its easier to work face to face particularly with more high level discussions and planning so I make sure to use as much of my time visiting the office to get these done.

I wish more people considered it.

Looks like me

Have you ever seen a picture or a drawing of a person that you thought looked like you?  I’ve asked around and seems to be quite a rare occasion.  Well, the other day I came across a drawing which seems to be of me.  Or of my inner me.  Or of a person I want to be.  Either way, I relate to the drawing.

The drawing was done by a well known artist Jason Seiler.  There are quite a few more in his blog.