Sqreen-from home
“Hey Alison, what’s Sqreen’s remote work policy?”
While Sqreen is remote-friendly, we aren’t a 100% remote company. That put us in a bit of a pickle as we couldn’t find any great examples of companies with hybrid remote-office policies that we could learn from.
So we decided to share our own internal approach, lest it can help others.
Why do we need a remote-work policy?
In 2019, and particularly in a startup, it’s wishful thinking to believe that the work can be contained neatly into one physical location or timeframe.
Prior to formalising this policy, our team already occasionally completed work from home, in transport, while away on trips, on the weekends — from anywhere where there was an internet connection. As such, it made little sense for us to have a rigid ‘office-only’ philosophy.
Furthermore, our product is geography-agnostic, and so are we.
At Sqreen, our remote philosophy in a sentence is: The work > where you do the work.
General principles
It’s important when we talk about remote work to separate two concepts:
- [Office] Sqreeners who are based at a Sqreenhouse most of the time.
- [Remote] Sqreeners who are based somewhere other than at a Sqreenhouse most of the time.
The specifics of each [Remote] Sqreener’s arrangement vary from person to person but follow similar principles of responsibility, fairness and finding a balance between what’s good for the Sqreener and good for Sqreen.
Our remote policy in detail
If I’m based in a Sqreenhouse, can I work from home?
The short answer is yes, of course you can.
The long answer is that you can certainly work from home ad-hoc as needed to accommodate life admin or anything else that might be happening that day (welcome a contractor at home, sign for a package, facilitate logistics etc).
If you’d like to work remotely in a more regular manner (once a week for example), aim to do so on Tuesdays or Thursdays and privilege Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays in-office. This allows for easier organization of meetings, onsite interviews etc for the team.
Does Sqreen hire full-time remote Sqreeners for tech roles?
The short answer is yes we sometimes do. In fact, we currently have a remote Java role open.
The long answer is that right now we have a preference for our product and engineering Sqreeners to be based in Paris. Which is why we offer advantageous relocation packages and handle right-to-work paperwork for developers outside of France to join Sqreen.
What if relocation isn’t an option?
If relocation is not an option, we’ll hire remote-based Sqreeners upon certain conditions:
- Their willingness to work on the French timezone (again, right now)
- Their ability to travel to Paris for the first 1–2 weeks onboarding
- Their ability to spend time regularly in Paris (at least 1 week per quarter)
As we grow, and our organizational capability grows we’ll evolve this approach.
Does Sqreen hire full-time remote Sqreeners for non-tech roles?
For now, we’ll consider these on a case-by-case basis. Things that will go into our decision will be about the nature of work (can an account executive or recruiter be as effective without physically interviewing candidates or meeting clients face-to-face?), the interactions with the team and the amount of complexity it will add to other Sqreeners’ day-to-day work.
Do we work with remote freelancers?
Yes we do, for short-term or recurring but occasional well-defined work.
How to make remote work a success at Sqreen
We believe that successful remote work requires approaching it with intention, good communication and a lot of trust on both sides of the equation.
We keep our system flexible and simple, and apply these basic rules:
- Add your remote days to the shared calendar in advance
- Remind the team as FYI the day before and also about any particularities:
E.g. from 9–11am I’m going to concentrate on XYZ and I’ll be cutting email / Slack notifications so if it’s urgent, call my cell
- Say hi on Slack when you log in and feel free to share photos of your home office, your pets or even your lunch!
- Call often and choose video over voice calls as much as possible
And you, how does your company handle remote work?
