Mittwoch, 13. Februar 2013

Remote Working #1: Primer

I'll start remote working soon and I thought about starting a series on this topic for a while. This series will be a mixture between a diary and tips/lessons learned. It will evolve with my experience and may change over time.

So, let's get a little context into this. I Co-founded PicturePlix two years ago and it was clear that I would leave Munich in 2013. We all agreed that this was a topic we would dicuss when the 2013 arrives and we did. We decided to try remote working without much experience in this field. We don't know the parameters yet, but the idea is to work from Vienna, my new home, and visit Munich once a month for two or three days. There is no timezone difference and 400km in between, so the distance is not that big and we will not face timezone problems.

My setup in the new flat is a 10qm² office all to myself, currently loaded with all the stuff which is not sorted out yet. I'll have 100 MBit internet through tv cable and a power lan to get the signal from the living room to the office. I already heared from different people that power lan might not be so great but will test it nonetheless and see how it works out.

My overall idea is to work as closely to a "normal" workplace as possible, meaning I'll eat breakfast, dress and do everything as normal and then instead of commuting I'll step into my office. I'll have lunch with my family but will keep the interaction with them through the day as minimal as possible, especially in the beginning.

In my opinion this is essential because we are all not used to me working at home over a long period and need to adjust. It makes things easier to have clear rules to get a feeling. If everything is working out great, I have no problem with an interuption once in a while because of something important (as a matter of fact, I get private calls at work which is somewhat the same).

For my office I think about getting a standing desk. I have some stuff saved from our old flat and will try to build one similar to the one Colin built. I don't know how I will be using it because I would like to sit and stand equally, not standing all day. Maybe I'll use two monitors at different parts of my desk with two keyboards so I can just move my laptop if I want to stand up (or sit down).

I'll add a whiteboard for sure and I think about getting one or two posters from Busy Building Things. I don't know about my technical setup right now I guess I'll just see what I need and iterate till I have a freaking awesome office. I am already thinking about music, maybe a file server (Rasperry Pi anyone?) and much other stuff which could be a nice feature. But these are all nice-to-have things.

For now I'll focus on getting an environment where I can focus on my work. Because that's what an office is for!

Next time I'll write about the first week. What worked, what didn't.