City Café: Gonçalo Hall shared tips and tools for remote work
In the seventh edition of City Café, Gonçalo Hall, consultant and specialist in Remote Work, focused his presentation on a current theme: remote work. In a webinar format and with more than 100 participants, the founder of the “Remote Work Movement” shared several useful tips and tools for teleworking.
The most recent edition of the City Café had new characteristics compared to the traditional format of this initiative. The activity promoted by the Municipality of Porto and Porto Innovation Hub (PIH) revolutionized the traditional informal meeting for a coffee break, with the Municipality’s teams and the general public, thus giving rise to a sharing of knowledge through the webinar format.
The guest of honor was Gonçalo Hall, who shared several tips and tools to make teleworking profitable, at a time when a large part of the active population, worldwide, is forced to work from home.
Through the live broadcast of the session, Gonçalo Hall started by addressing the main advantages and disadvantages of this new type of work.
“On the positive side, we have the freedom to live and work from anywhere, with fewer interruptions, more time to dedicate to the family and our hobbies and the possibility of being able to have our own space, made by us. On the other hand, the main challenges to this ‘digital nomadism’ are loneliness, the difficulty of communicating with our bosses and co-workers and the ability to measure productivity”.
Gonçalo, an outspoken supporter of remote work, admits, however, that there is evidence of an “increase in productivity, for the company, estimated at 30 to 40%, compared to the traditional work model”.
However, the City Café guest recalled that teleworking “does not solve all of our problems”, despite being “increasingly desirable for employees of the companies that make it possible”.
Among the necessary tools are: computer, good internet connection, a workspace, mouse and keyboard, monitor and headphones with microphone. Only then will it be possible, according to Gonçalo Hall, to take advantage of other digital tools such as email, Whatsapp, Skype, Google Hangouts, Google Sheets, Slack, Twist, Teams, Trello, among others, that take advantage of the Cloud and shared tasks, inside and outside the working teams.
The secret lies in maintaining “healthy routines”, from setting a “social time” – coexistence between co-workers – just as it would happen in each office. That is, “don’t forget to have coffee with your colleagues, book a beer together at the end of the week, socialize beyond work”, warned the expert.
Among other recommendations, after the Question & Answer period, this time via live chat, the City Café guest also highlighted the need to dress like he was going to work – despite staying at home -, making a list of the main tasks daily, take continuous breaks, stay in contact with your team (preferably on calls and with the camera on), not forgetting the time needed for the family, especially the young ones, and for the recommended physical exercise.
* The “City Café | Remote Work: a new way of working ”can be reviewed in its entirety through the following link.