
Tips on improving communication with your remote team - Fermin
https://blog.clubhouse.io/fostering-communication-in-remote-work-an-interview-with-megan-berry-961ef96a8a13
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kaikai
This article focuses on 100% remote teams, but I'd also love tips on working
on partially remote teams. Here's some things that have helped my team and
others are my company, which is spread across a few timezones:

\- If anyone is remote for scrum, everyone is remote. Having one group of
people in a room together with a few people video conferencing in is terrible
for the remote folks. Instead, have everyone call in from their computers. It
helps keep people from excluding those who are behind the screen.

\- Get an occasional virtual coffee/tea with your workmates. Getting to know
each other as people makes small conflicts and friction far less likely to
turn into grudges.

\- Pay attention to timezones. Even if the main office has more people, share
the pain of bad timing across the team. Don't make the same person stay up
late or get up early every scrum.

\- The little things really matter during video calls. Don't eat near the
microphone, circle back around to people who may have been interrupted, make
sure everyone can hear clearly.

\- Make an extra effort to get feedback and input from people. Especially for
less outgoing or assertive folks, it's harder to break in to conversation on
Slack or calls than in face to face interactions. Asking "[name], what are
your thoughts?" a few times a call goes a long way.

~~~
Fermin
That's a great suggestion for a blog post, we have something similar that
describes how we became a (partially) remote team:
[https://blog.clubhouse.io/how-clubhouse-became-remote-
friend...](https://blog.clubhouse.io/how-clubhouse-became-remote-
friendly-36e1f3fe4404)

We have someone working in Australia, so it mentions how we were able to make
that work, and how we had to start being mindful of timezones.

It discusses some of the challenges that we used to face and how we overcame
it — including audio/video difficulties (which we still haven't fully
perfected) We're also going to be writing something about working remotely
next week.

I do like the virtual coffee/tea idea, I'll probably pitch it to the squad and
see what they think.

~~~
kaikai
The virtual teas are fantastic is you make a habit of them! We just started
using DonutAI to link people up across the company. It's also a great way to
build cross-team empathy, since it's easy to forget how much everyone
contributes when you don't see their work every day.

~~~
Fermin
Nice! I heard about you guys on a producthunt newsletter (I believe) on neat
remote working tools!

~~~
kaikai
"we just started using" not we just started ;)

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pgeorgep
Working remotely, I've learned it's essential to ask more questions. Things
get lost in translation through Slack messages and Trello card.

When in doubt, ask a million questions!

~~~
Fermin
Yeah, I tend to just poke people on video chats if it's something that needs
to be addressed.

Sometimes the back and forward comms in Slack or any other project management
tool (I use Clubhouse) can be a bit slow, so it's best to just get the
person(s) and ask.

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ivanbakel
Was hoping for better coverage from an employee-perspective. You can't
reasonably expect to have 1 on 1 meetings each week with your coworkers, but
you can be expected to have to rely on them for making new features - even
when remoteness makes communication slow enough to delay your work.

OT: Holy heck, did every other sentence need some kind of emphasis? Block
quote, bold text, related image, tall header spacing - is this disruption in
reading, because it certainly felt like it.

