Like peas in a pod: How to thrive when home is your HQ
Can collaboration, connection and culture happen remotely? Check, check and check.
Here at Xero, we lovingly refer to our very first remote product pod as our WilderXeros. Based across the most weird and wonderful crevices of New Zealand, they’re a shining example of how geography is no more than a moot point when it comes to doing the best work of your life. Today, we’ve coordinated time zones to catch them in one virtual place so they can share why remote working is so conducive to the three C’s: collaboration, connection and culture. Let’s dive in.
Tell us a little about what you all do here at Xero
Julian: I’m Julian Robinson, a senior engineer. I started nearly three years ago as the first external hire into a new remote pod — an experiment if you will. I actually wrote about my time starting during COVID. I’m based in Dunedin and I’ve probably only been to the office less than 10 times, ever.
Brennan: Are you still an experiment after three years, Julian? I would get that checked out [laughs]. I’m Brennan Martin, a senior product designer in the practice space and have been at Xero for a little over a year. I actually started in the office in Auckland — before going remote while still in Auckland, just to test it out — and then I moved to Tauranga.
Michelle: I’m Michelle McGuinness and I’m a product owner. I’ve been with Xero since March of last year.
Bevan: I’m Bevan Dunning, the development team lead for the WilderXeros — so I look after all the engineers, make sure they are growing as individuals and help maintain a high-performing product delivery team. My wife and I just had a baby three months ago, actually, so remote working has definitely been very helpful for that.
How have you found the transition into fully remote working?
Julian: When we started, it had real challenges which I think was just a symptom of the time. Working remotely wasn’t the norm and the culture of every organisation was still very much ‘in the office’, so for me, who was the remote experiment, it was really hard to keep across what was going on, especially across teams. Sometimes it felt a bit isolating. After the last year, everyone has had a dose of working remotely and it’s much easier to facilitate fully remote working.
Let’s talk about video fatigue. Is that really a thing working remotely and how do you combat it?
Bevan: Oh, it totally is, but I feel that we’ve overcome it just with ways that we work. One of the biggest tips I give new WilderXeros about this is that you don’t have to have your camera on if you’re just going to stare at your own face on a screen all day. Most of the tools we use are set up in a way where we can still communicate without having to use the camera if it’s giving us face fatigue.
Brennan: There was a major subtlety that changed it for me: not using over-ear headphones. They make me feel like I’m in a virtual meeting. So, when I’m in a room with just my laptop sound, and other sounds coming from everywhere else, it’s almost like — I don’t even know how to explain it — replicating a real office environment.
Julian: It’s funny you mention that, Brennan, because it was one of the things I did early on. I don’t wear any headphones or microphones or anything like that. A bunch of us went out and bought webcams with better quality mics, so we could just sit here and chat away. You can look around, walk around if you want, and you don’t feel as tethered to your laptop.
Michelle: I’ve actually got a dedicated office — we turned our spare bedroom into one, so I’ve got the three monitors and all the rest of it. Also, I don’t always stick to it but I try to finish every meeting five minutes earlier so I can get up to go and hang the washing on the line or make a cup of tea. It helps me to recreate that office feel.
Is there a set way that you build routine and structure into your day?
Bevan: It’s funny you should say that because working in a product delivery team, software engineers often need uninterrupted time to focus and be productive. Often an office environment is not ideal for this type of work anyway, especially with open plan offices. So remote is inherently better for these kinds of roles. Software engineering, however, is a team sport and requires high levels of collaboration. At Xero, we equip team members with the tools available to enable this remotely.
Julian: The key thing for me is having a dedicated spot and a desk setup. When I’m at the desk, I’m working, then at five, I close my laptop and walk away. I’m quite lucky as I have two kids that come in at five o’clock and scream, ‘Dad, it’s tea time! Come on!’.
Brennan: I think everyone that goes remote falls into the trap of crawling out of the bed in their pajamas, getting a cup of coffee, and then just logging into their computer at first. It starts as simply checking some Slack messages and the next thing you know, it’s midday. So, I’ve trialled with this. For a while I was chunking my day up into two hour bursts of work, with a one-hour break, and working longer days in that style. Now, I just replicate what I would otherwise do. I get out of the house every day before I start working — that’s ‘the commute’. Then, I get dressed like I would at work, I put the good pants on, you know? Some shoes too. Play squash at lunchtime. What I’d normally do.
Squash at lunchtime is the dream. What other life hacks does remote working afford you?
Brennan: Running errands is so easy now. The other day I took my stepson to go get his learner’s license — we went at some arbitrary time, like 11 o’clock on a Tuesday, and we were the only people there. Normally it would be on a Saturday morning and you’d have to queue for an hour.
Julian: Kids are probably the big ones, because my wife works from home as well. You can probably hear them tearing around the house? [pan crashes in the background]. Our little micro-interactions are awesome. They know that if I’m in the home office, I’m working, but when I go out there to make a cup of tea, they’ll be laying down drawing or doing a puzzle and I can just sit down with them while the jug boils and have a chat. I really love that.
Michelle: I’ve got two dogs, and trying to get them out for a good run in the winter after a day at the office is a nightmare. Here, though, I can disappear off at 4:30pm, run them up to the park, and actually still get there in daylight. If I was in the office, I wouldn’t get home until six after the commute. Dinner would be the first hassle, and then it’s school homework and bedtime. Remote working gives me so much more balance and control.
What are some things to be mindful of for remote working?
Julian: Great question. The time — it can really get away on you. You sit down and start for the day and suddenly it’s 4pm. I think it’s the lack of movement around you. Like in an office, when a colleague goes up to the kitchen for a cup of coffee you say, ‘oh, I’ll go have a chat with them.’ Right? There’s lots of little breaks and micro-interactions like that when you have other people around.
Brennan: People often say, ‘I want to work at home because I don’t get interrupted’. In our case, though, sometimes those interruptions are quite healthy. If you just sit there for six hours in a row, you kind of want someone to come and poke you and say, ‘hey, do you want to chat about this API?’
Now, I rudely call people on Slack without asking, because if I say, ‘I want to chat about something’ they’ll reply, ‘sure, chuck something in my calendar next week.’ So, for those I need to speak to a lot, I simply remind them that they can always decline my call — I won’t be offended — but it’s my version of virtual shoulder-tapping.
Do you all feel that you’re respected with autonomy and agency in your work at Xero?
Michelle: Definitely. At my last place, it was a different matter, but I feel at Xero, there’s very much an element of trust. You’re trusted until you lose it. So long as you’re getting your job done, there’s a respect there that it doesn’t matter if it’s nine to five or if it’s early morning, whatever, it’s your job to keep that trust.
Brennan: This whole idea of remote working where you feel almost guilty, or that you should be staring at your computer every second, that’s not the case now. An example is three jobs ago — about six years ago — when I would take one day off to work at home. If I took too long to respond to a Slack message or an email, I’d feel like I was being naughty. They would say, ‘where are you? What were you doing? You’re supposed to be at your computer at home.’ Xero has never made me feel like that, which is amazing.
What advice would you have for someone thinking of joining Xero remotely?
Michelle: Know that it’s awesome. Acknowledge that it’s going to be an adjustment — and you need to adjust your working practices — but that it’s actually really rewarding to be able to do it.
Brennan: How long do you have? [laughs] I could write a book. Honestly just try it out! I mean, Julian has been an experiment trying it out for three years now.
Julian: [laughs] My advice? Be okay with not knowing stuff. You’ll need to actually reach out to people to find things and to say: ‘I’m asking a silly question because I don’t know, or I want more information, or I think there’s something there, but is there more if I keep pulling at that thread?’
So, there you have it — straight from the WilderXeros themselves. If you’re looking for a great, flexible and impactful job working in product and tech, apply for a permanent remote role at Xero today.
