Remote work is the most important workplace innovation in history. It will deliver the largest quality of life increase across the next decade and help companies become far more effective and efficient.

Failing to adapt could destroy them

Current events have highlighted this and accelerated the need for companies to have a remote work strategy immediately. Companies without one right now are suffering operationally and putting their team members at risk. Having the ability to operate remotely efficiently and effectively could be the difference between companies making it through unforeseen circumstances or not.

Interest in remote working tools has exploded in the last week

This chart illustrates the growth in the number of companies signing up for our waiting list in the first few days of March. While certain companies sit idle others are accelerating towards this new trend by embracing remote work as an opportunity to build for the future.

The Rationale of the Switch

‘Disaster continuity’ will become a frequent discussion on company boards ranging from the earliest startups through to the largest companies on the planet. The ability to continue operations despite large-scale unforeseen events will be seen as critical and not doing so would be an existential threat to the business. Companies who do not learn the lessons of currents events will be in trouble whenever the next issue happens where their competitors are more prepared than they are and can continue to operate without disruption.

Operate remotely is easy with the right tools, mindset, and approach

As long as a company does not try to replicate synchronous working conditions remotely, handicap their workers by implementing it badly, or not giving them the tools and equipment they need to do great work.

Below are the tools we have used personally to successfully operate as a remote team for the last several years:

1. Virtual Tools

The right virtual tools are the ones your team already understands. Empower people to do great work and they will deliver. Trust them to perform and they will excel. That starts with the things they expect and want to use to do the best work they ever have.

💬 Communication — Slack

Slack is the right tool for this. It is the product people are most familiar with and it is the one they want to use. We have tested every single available product for instant messaging and Slack is the most intuitive.

Slack enables your team to stay on the same page while maintaining a system of record for all communication relating to any product, team or issue.

🤝 Collaboration – GSuite

Docs, Sheets, and Slides, editable by anyone, fully available to collaborate and work together on at any time, all available in the cloud from anywhere in the world, while maintaining a historical record of all alteration made and by who.

GSuite is the all-in-one productivity suite you need to keep everyone working on the same page.

📝 Documentation — Notion

We use Notion for everything from our project management, task lists through to our organizational guides to using our internal tools. It enables us to organize all these things most easily and make them immediately accessible to anyone who needs them.

Notion helps our entire organization organize and operate efficiently.

🗣️ Meetings – Zoom

Zoom is the best video conferencing software on the market. It will enable your team to have the highest fidelity calls virtually which is critical for understanding and ensuring every message is communicated and received clearly.

If in-person meetings are the optimum form of communication, Zoom is the software product that lets you get closest to that.

🗣️ Video — Loom

Loom is a superpower. The newest addition to our stack which grows in important daily. It lets us record our screen, record their front-facing camera, and narrate video all at once with no switching apps or upload required. We use it to give feedback while working on documents or respond to customer inquiries.

Loom enhances the way we communicate internally by letting us share feedback asynchronously making us far more efficient.

2. Physical Tools

While the virtual tools that have enabled high quality, frictionless remote work were critical to enable remote work at scale there is a growing realization that there is a missing half of remote work. This is characterized by products and services which focus on the experience, culture and human connection of being a remote worker.

📈 Performance — Lattice

Lattice is a people management platform that helps us develop our engaged, high-performing teams. It lets us combine continuous performance management and employee engagement in one solution rather than trying to make several tools work together while not achieving the desired effect.

Lattice helps us build the culture our remote team needs to grow and do great work.

🛠️Equipment — Firstbase

Getting a remote team setup is hard, expensive and time-consuming. We built Firstbase as an internal tool to make sure that our team had everything they needed to do their best work at home in our last company. We discovered that every remote team struggles with this as well and offered it to other people as well.

Firstbase ensure your workers are safer, more comfortable and productive at home than they would be in an office.

Any of the 255m Desk jobs globally Could be Remote

A few years ago only a very small number of jobs could be done remotely. The technology to enable workers to link into the systems they needed did not exist so they were tethered to the offices where the servers for the business were.

That is not the case anymore. The internet changed this dramatically, and though it has taken a long time for reliable cloud infrastructure to emerge, super-fast fiber broadband effectively means that any of the 255m desk jobs globally could be a remote role.

The future of remote working

Remote working will continue to explode as more people want to operate remotely. Tools that enable this will accelerate this transition and within 20 years the majority of people will be remote workers.

Companies who do this well will ensure they can cope with the demands of the modern workforces and any unexpected events that happen in the coming years.

Companies who don't are in trouble

Need help Developing a Remote Strategy?

Reach out to us and we would love to help you figure out what you need.

We built an all-in-one provisioning platform that lets companies develop a remote work strategy instantly.

We provide all the practical equipment remote workers need at the touch of a button. Firstbase takes care of everything as a monthly subscription per worker, including delivery, upgrades, maintenance, repairs, and collections when a worker leaves. We help you:

• Be more cost-efficient
• Comply with regulation
• Save time on onboarding
• Slash your real-estate costs

Sign up for a demo of our platform here