Vanya Wryter Consulting Services

Tag: remote work

  • Yummy Benefits of Remote Work and Travel

    Yummy Benefits of Remote Work and Travel

    One of the very best benefits of remote work is saving time commuting to and from work daily. The tradeoff is one big in-person meeting once a year so you can interact off screen. It’s an opportunity to socialize without checking what time your virtual meeting ends. Kind of like the yearly Christmas party, but better, because you stay in a nice hotel and (depending on how well-traveled you are) get to visit a new city.

    The benefits don’t end there. You also have three meals a day – paid for at the company’s expense. The downside of this setup is it’s a little restrictive – you eat when it’s time to eat, and you eat where they’ve decided you’re eating. If you’re a free spirit, that can be a downer, but this is a great convenience if you like a well-planned life! The benefits of meals provided by the company only continue from there.

    Benefit 1: Breakfast

    If you’re always in a hurry in the morning, or you hate putting together a million items for a quick breakfast, then breakfast is your first bonus of the day. When you get to the meeting room, an assortment of pastries and fruit and a variety of tea is there to greet you. Coffee is just caffeinated or decaf (unless you run out to Starbucks first). When you’re done eating, you can leave your dishes around and they’ll magically disappear.

    Benefit 2: Try new food recommendations

    You’ll have opportunities to try new cuisine. If the style of cuisine is not something you’re familiar with, your coworkers will be eager to help with recommendations. You may also find yourself eating food that you should be familiar with, but it looks different, like a salad that you need to cut. How often do you eat your salad with a knife and fork? Always be ready to try something new!  

    Benefit 3: Fine dining

    If you haven’t experienced fine dining, you’ll have more tales to add to your life experience. A coworker said she chose risotto as her main dish because she didn’t know what to pick. She’d never experienced fine dining before. I recommended the sablefish or duck because I’d had sablefish several times at restaurants. Later, I realized this might have sounded like I was a regular at four and five-star restaurants. Oops. I’d forgotten to add that those experiences were all company dinners. 

    Key Takeaways

    Remote work can be isolating. You don’t see your coworkers during your regular workday. This routine changes when you travel for your yearly in-person team meeting, which is like a mini-vacation away from home. One of the highlights is the delicious food and the plentiful opportunities to try new dishes. This is definitely a perk of remote work for a company.

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  • 6 Tips for Travel Team Get-Togethers If You Work Remotely, Part 2

    6 Tips for Travel Team Get-Togethers If You Work Remotely, Part 2

    If you’re an extrovert and love to travel, a week-long, expenses-paid business trip to a resort town is paradise. If you’re an introvert, “team bonding” and “hanging out all day with your coworkers” sounds intimidating. 

    There’s a reason you love remote work. You’re in the safety of your own world and most communication takes place via DMs through your fingertips. Going from rarely seeing your coworkers to seeing them all day?😲Let’s not think about it.

    But here we are, at our annual remote team, in-person get together. As you prepare for your first company meeting, consider these tips if you’re with your coworkers in person for the first time. If you’ve read part 1, continue with part 2.

    Tip 4 Start a routine if your days are not routine

    The daily routine of remote workers, especially those who work from home, is a little different from those who work on-site at an office. If you work in person, you’re accustomed to following a routine before you leave home, when you’re at the office, and before you leave the office.

    If you work from home, it’s not a big deal if you don’t have time to pack your lunch. You can scrounge around to see what you can find in your kitchen. If you feel too hot or cold, you can take a few steps to get to your bedroom and do a quick outfit change. 

    When you’re working for a week in person, you need a whole new routine. You may need to bring your laptop because you can’t leave it at your home office. You have to remember to bring any critical medications because they won’t be just a few steps away.

    Before you go on your trip, take notes about what you’ll need to bring. Once you’re at the hotel, write notes or set reminders on your phone to remember what you need to do or what you need to bring to your first meeting. These tiny points will help your day to run more smoothly during your work week away from home.

    Tip 5 Prepare to challenge yourself

    Challenge yourself. Always. This is a powerful goal, whether you work in person or remotely. You’ll have many opportunities to challenge yourself, whether it is to have long conversations, try treetop excursions, sample new food, go on a scavenger hunt, or make a presentation in front of a group. 

    Extroverts love to meet new people, so hanging out with your teammates from breakfast to bedtime is fun. You have an abundance of opportunities to get to know your coworkers.

    For introverts, being with your teammates for several days can be exhausting. You’re socializing with almost complete strangers, making small talk, or diving deep into topics such as family. You’ll need to be your extroverted self. 

    No matter how social you are, there is something new to try. It’s a chance to work and have fun at an all-expenses paid vacation. 

    Tip 6 Nurture those connections

    Now that you’ve had the chance to connect with your teammates in person, keep the connections going. Follow up on conversations you had during your get-together. Ask your coworker if they checked out that TV show you recommended.

    Depending on how much you enjoyed socializing with your coworkers, you might find it lonely to return to working on your own. Or you might enjoy returning to working on your own again. It’s a bit of an adjustment for remote workers to go from working alone, to being surrounded by your coworkers all day, and returning to solitary work again.

    On the bright side, you’ll have made new connections or deepened relationships with coworkers you work with regularly. Your family and friends will also be excited to hear about your working vacation!

    Key Takeaways

    Spending several days with your coworkers can be a fun experience. It’s a chance to meet them in person and leave the house to go to work. If you’re an introvert, seeing your coworkers all day could be overwhelming, but following some tips can turn this trip into a memorable working vacation. 

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  • 6 Tips for Travel Team Get-Togethers If You Work Remotely, Part 1

    6 Tips for Travel Team Get-Togethers If You Work Remotely, Part 1

    If you’re an extrovert and love to travel, a week-long, expenses-paid business trip to a resort town is paradise. If you’re an introvert, “team bonding” and “hanging out all day with your coworkers” sounds like an intimidating situation. 

    There’s a reason you love remote work. You’re in the safety of your own world and most communication takes place via DMs through your fingertips. Going from rarely seeing your coworkers to seeing them all day?😲Let’s not think about it.

    As you prepare for your first company get-together, consider these tips if you’re meeting your remote coworkers in person for the first time.

    Tip 1: Preparing for a new routine

    Onsite workers are accustomed to preparing to leave the house daily to get to their job. Monday to Friday, you prepare your outfit, pack your lunch, and prepare what you need for work. If you work from home, you won’t be accustomed to this. You don’t need to decide on an outfit or pack your lunch. You can conveniently roll out of bed and start work wearing your house clothes!

    So before you venture off to a week-long work trip, think about all the things you use as part of a daily routine and make a list of what to pack. It’s your chance to dress up for work, so you may want to dust off some of your fancier clothes. Of course, check they still fit you and they don’t look out of style.

    Also, pack the usual things you’ll need for your trip, such as sunscreen if you’re going somewhere warm, pack your toothbrush, and research some customs for where you’re going, such as tipping at your hotel.

    Tip 2 Getting to know who you’ll meet

    Introverts enjoy remote work for a reason. It can be overwhelming to go from virtually meets on a screen to seeing people in person. You’ll discover that people seem different in person. They may be taller or shorter than you expected. They won’t disappear after you press the exit button on your screen. You may be seeing them all day, for many days.

    You want to avoid awkward situations, such as facing a teammate and not knowing who that person is. If possible, search through your company’s website, LinkedIn profiles, and Slack profile pictures to learn names and memorize faces. Learn what you can about their role at your company. These lifesaving bits of information are important for Tip 3, when you need icebreakers to start a conversation.

    Tip 3 Prepare for unexpected social opportunities

    A company get-together is less awkward if you’ve been working at an office. You now have a chance to have a longer conversation with the coworker you usually pass in the hall. You’ll less likely to have an awkward moment, such as meeting a coworker for the first time while you’re dressed in your pajamas. Yes, this situation can happen.

    If your coworker’s flight arrives late and you’re already getting ready to retire for the night and you’re sharing a two-bedroom suite. Half asleep, your hair a mess, you introduce yourself to that teammate from another department you never had a reason to DM or speak to until now. 

    Extroverts can converse anywhere with anyone. Introverts who work remotely will have a harder time starting a conversation with coworkers they haven’t meet, or haven’t spoken to too often. Standing in front of you is a live person and you need to reply immediately. You can’t Slack your reply in the chat later when you’ve figured out what you want to say.

    Here’s the secret: let the extroverts talk first and carry the conversation. Have a few conversation starters on hand in case you need them, such as “Have you visited (the place you’re at) before?” or “How was your flight in?” or “What are you thinking of ordering for dinner?”

    Key Takeaways for Part 1

    Spending several days with your coworkers can be a fun experience if you’re prepared. It’s a chance to meet them in person and leave the house for work. If you’re an introvert, seeing your coworkers all day could be overwhelming, but following some tips can turn this trip into a fun working vacation. For more tips, return for Part 2.

  • Best Types of Companies for Remote Work

    Best Types of Companies for Remote Work

    Remote work has been around for as long as we’ve had the technology, but 2020 made work from home (WFH) a household word. Before the worldwide pandemic that forced businesses to close their doors, many startups already offered remote work. Without a physical office, expenses were reduced. Remote work also offers many other advantages to certain types of companies. Let’s take a closer look at five types of companies that offer remote work.

    1 Technology Companies

    Technology companies (tech) are great for remote work because they tend to have the latest technology. Tech companies include software development companies, IT companies, companies that sell electronics, artificial intelligence or computers, and website development companies. These companies have the ability for their employees to communicate through virtual meetings and communications applications such as Slack. 

    During the pandemic, tech workers were more easily able to make the transition to performing work tasks from home, since the majority (if not all) of their tasks were completed using technology. 

    2 Customer Service Companies

    Customer services companies that offer services via online platforms such as chatbots are suitable for remote work. Customer service workers must be familiar with technology and have internet access to perform the tasks. Many businesses that hire customer service workers have customers from multiple time zones. To provide 24/7 service to these customers, they hire employees from different time zones to cover a wide range of work shifts. Similar to tech companies, customer service employees can communicate with supervisors or coworkers with communications software.

    3 Education Companies

    Education companies and companies that provide online education are perfect for remote work. These companies provide e-learning platforms for companies and educators. The course content is designed electronically, and IT programming is also handled online. Educators who use these platforms to design courses or offer tutoring work remotely to provide the content. The education is available at any time to anyone anywhere in the world with internet access. 

    4 Creative Agencies

    Creative agencies offer remote work for those interested in graphic design, advertising, marketing, and content creation. Work is completed through online collaboration and communication tools. Some agencies hire employees from the same city, while others hire freelancers from other cities in the same country or around the world.

    Key Takeaways

    Work from home has become possible because of the collaborative platforms and communication applications that we now have available to us. Many startups start as remote work companies, saving on the costs of having a physical office. In particular, companies that work with technology, customer service, and education, as well as creative agencies are well suited for remote work.

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  • Dealing with 4 Challenges of Remote Work

    Dealing with 4 Challenges of Remote Work

    Remote work, also called work from home (WFH), became a popular term after the pandemic, but many workers have been working from home long before 2020. Some people love WFH and will never return to commuting or working at an office.

    The perks of remote work are numerous, but the lifestyle isn’t for everyone. The main difference is that WFH easily blurs the lines between work and home life. It’s easy to check work email while having breakfast in your pajamas or throw a load of clothes in the laundry in the five minutes you have before a meeting starts.

    Remote work also comes with its unique challenges. If you haven’t tried work from home yet, consider these four challenges before you start. If you work from home, what do you think about these challenges with the lifestyle?

    Lack of in-person interaction

    You might think it’s a nice break from your coworkers if you’re working from home. No more co-workers interrupting your work to ask annoying questions. No more distracting noise from an open-office design layout.

    For those who love socializing, you will miss having lunch with a co-worker who is your friend. You’ll miss the conversations you have whenever you collaborate with a team. You’ll have virtual team meetings, but you must stick to the topic and finish on time before people leave for other meetings.  

    Remote work is perfect for those who love to work without interruption. You can avoid water cooler conversations with coworkers (although you might have them with those you live with). You can work in peace and get what you need done on time. The time you save from your commute is spent finishing work early so you can do other things after work.

    A workplace that you live in

    Working from home is quite literally working from your home. It may be difficult to draw a distinct line between your home life and work life. A home office with a door that you can open and close helps to create a physical separation between your two lives, but if your desk is in your living space, such as your kitchen, that distinction is harder to make.

    You may be expected to check your work emails first thing in the morning, as well as in the evening. Remote companies with staff that live across the country function best when people are more flexible about when they work and when they check messages. You may need to be more adamant about your office hours and when you check messages if you want set hours away from work.

    Work may also feel more intrusive because your coworkers have a window into your personal life when you have a virtual meeting. They can see what you have along one wall of your home office. They can hear if your children are talking loudly in the background.

    Living where you work has its perks. You don’t have to spend time packing your lunch the night before. No trying to figure out what food is good to transport in your lunch bag and convenient to eat in the office. It will be like eating at home on the weekend.

    During coffee and lunch breaks, you can be more productive: you can throw a load of laundry in the washer, take out the trash, or dust off some furniture. Best of all, if you have a flexible schedule and if you’re drowsy, it’s easy to take a comfortable nap.

    Different dress code

    Remote work is very easy on your clothing budget. You can wear the same clothes that you wear on the weekend to lounge around the house. Or you can dress up in office wear if that’s your preference to get in work mode.

    The only time dress code matters is during virtual meetings when you are on camera. You may want to dress up a little and wear a sweater or shirt instead of your hoodie for a meeting with new clients or company members you don’t work with regularly.

    New level of IT skills

    “Avid problem solver” will become one of your top job skills. As a remote worker, you’ll encounter tech issues with internet availability, virtual meeting mic or camera issues, or other issues with your computer. 

    Without someone from the company IT department to save you, you’ll need to resort to your resourcefulness to fix those tech issues. Either you’ll be calling favors from friends and family, or reading up on technology so you can become your own expert.  

    Key Takeaways

    Does working from home appeal to you? Those who prefer it love the flexible work hours, the short commute, and the relaxed dress code. With today’s technology, remote work will continue to be an option for the workplace.

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