"Remote work" rules!
I wish there was some kind of 'pound-for-pound' fight where I could prove that my way of working remote will beat the trad'l in-person mgmt style every time
I’ve been working fully remote as an independent contractor ever since January 2021. And I love it.
Working remote gets a lot of shit lately in social media where folks declare things like “Remote working has failed”.
And so i’d like to clear the air that I think they are completely wrong.
Rather the only thing that has happened… is that it has revealed the weaknesses in these people’s management style or the team they have.
I, on the otherhand, feel like I am perhaps 2-3x more productive and efficient than I have ever been in my entire 20+ year career. And I was a pretty efficiency-oriented person beforehand… so it wasn’t an easy base to improve from.
What my hypothetical “Challenge” would look like
I’d lay down the gauntlet with something like this….
I think I can manage more breadth & with better depth than anyone using traditional management techniques.
What this means?
It means I can manage lots of folks doing lots of different things and I can manage them well, ie. I can respond quickly when they get blocked or have questions and i can dive deep into details.
Now, the reality is that it’s nearly impossible to set up a controlled test
Everyone manages different things and different people so a fair test is actually impossible.
It’s kind of like when you ask who the best UFC fighter is in the world? Well everyone has different weight classes, etc
But I kind of think of it as being ‘pound-for-pound’ the most efficient mofo out there.
I’ve worked with some great folks over my years.. folks that have managed much more scope than me and made a lot more money.
Are some of them perhaps smarter? Yes.
Are some of them perhaps better strategists or have a better management style? Yes.
Can they manage more shit than me as efficiently as i do? No. Or at least I’d be willing to bet that they cannot.
Remember…. this isn’t about who is smarter or works harder… it is about who has the most optimized process. I view it as being a war of ‘processes’ and not who is the better ‘individual.’
For example… one method that folks mention is “Getting Things Done” and I also have read it about it a bit. And I think my method destroys this method.
So an experiment could look like:
1- Find someone good at this method with roughly similar experience and intelligence as me.
2- Give us both a similar project with similar size scope, but the other person works from an office whereas i work remote.
3- We both conduct the project according to our own method and we see who kicks who’s ass.
My money’s on me babyyyyyy. LOL
First some context on my years managing the old way
I’ve probably had 100+ direct reports managing ‘the old way’ during the first ~20 years of my career from 1999 till 2020. This included:
I spent 7 years in strategy consulting and made it to the level below partner at age 30
I managed a $50m+ revenue business for Visa Inc (all Issuing products in ~15 Eastern Europe and CIS countries)
As CEO of Groupon Ukraine I took it from a $20k/month business to a ~$700k/month and 100+ employee business at its height (and before it then came crashing down lol)
I ran about half the Lazada product team (~10 PMs) during the years of 2015-17 (note that these were the years Lazada was the clear #1 player in SEA… ie. bigger than Shopee)
And I did all of this the old way. Meaning i’d do weekly one-on-ones, didn’t really use a project management system, etc.
And honestly…. I wouldn’t really have considered myself that much more efficient than any good manager.
Then I began working remote in early 2021
Working remote happened to coincide with a few other major changes in the way I worked.
I worked as a consultant/contractor rather than an employee.
Mainly because I wanted to pick and choose the things I did and who I did them with.
I started hiring a lot of freelancers from Upwork & Fiverr to work with me.
I was introduced to Clickup, the project management system
These 3 things together revolutionized my efficiency
Why?
Contracting meant that I needed to be able to work with clients all over the region as the market in Thailand was too small. And so working remote was key.
Working with folks from Upwork & Fiverr was key because:
They were highly adaptive & responsive. Mainly because they needed to be since they wanted good reviews.
They knew I could let them go anytime i wanted.
Compare that to trying to get employees with bad habits to change (a waste of time in my view).
Clickup was the platform that allowed me to work assynchronously with extreme efficiency.
Rather than having say a max of 7 direct reports… i realized that with the system I came up with I could manage even up to 30-40 people directly.
And without killing myself.
There are many articles i’ve published in the past on this blog (like this one below) about how I use Clickup if you’re interested.
The question I like to ask folks that say ‘Remote work’ sucks is… Why?
Or another way I like to word it is…
If you and I were given the same exact project…. and I was operating using my system of remote work (Upwork freelancers + Clickup)…. where do you think you would beat me?
I asked one friend who is a peer (and has managed a fair number of folks over his career) not long ago and we had a good debate.
Point 1: He said that his physical meetings were faster to get alignment
My rebuttle: I mentioned that I get this same alignment with a daily 15-20 minute standup that the team calls into. And that we have calls to hash out key topics.
Point 2: He said that he can just grab someone when he needs something
My rebuttle: I mentioned that almost everything anyone does is a Clickup task and there are very few things that I ever need to just ‘grab someone’ to do.
As that generally means things are disorganized.
But if I did need to do it…. my teams are trained to keep Slack and Clickup notifications clear… so if I created a new task I could have them on it fast.
Point 3: He said that he could create culture better
My rebuttle: I mentioned that my philosophy is that teams do not need this ‘culture’ and my past 3 years are a perfect example of it.
Everyone just follows the process and gets their stuff done.
And they know that the rest of the team is all gonna be responsive and have a good attitude as they all follow the process.
So work is enjoyable. And there is little politics because people don’t even really know each other that well.
No, we’re not friends… we just get shit done.
Wanna talk about remote working strategies?
If so, join the Picnik group: Strategies on Remote work
What is Picnik?
Picnik sets up 1-1 calls between folks that join the group that can last between 10 - 30 minutes (length is up to you). And right now each person gets 1 meeting per week.
And so you get engaging conversations and meet interesting people that have some of the same interests as you.
And the great part is.. it’s free!
Plus…. i’ll also be doing some calls, so maybe we’ll end up chatting! What can be better than that! haha
Hopefully chat with you soon!