Building trust with coworkers I will never meet, ever.−フルリモートで同僚と信頼関係を築くには

こんにちは。株式会社Colereでコミュニティマネージャーをしているnatsukiです。今回は、デザイナーのSandraが書いてくれた記事です！

当時のColereメンバーは、知り合い経由のリファラルでジョインしてくれることが多かったのですが、SandraはColereの中に直接の知り合いはいませんでした。さらに、母国語は日本語ではなく、居住地も国外です。（とはいえもちろん日本語もペラペラなんですよ！）

今でこそ母国語を日本語としないメンバーが複数活躍しているColereですが、Sandraがその初めのひとりです。

当時は、実は私もとても緊張しました（笑）。けれど、仕事のクオリティの高さに加えて彼女のすばらしい人間性もあり、いまではサービス開発チームに欠かせないメンバーとして日々活躍しています。

「知り合いゼロ・フルリモート・時差あり」のColereでSandraがどうやってチームメンバーと関係を築いていったのか、Sandra目線の記事でご紹介していきます。いいことばかりでなく、フルリモートで仕事をするデメリットについても言及してくれています！

※日本語もとても上手なSandraですが、あえての英語記事です。

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Fully remote: building trust with coworkers I will never meet, ever.

Imagine this: all of your coworkers live inside of your computer screen. You interact with all of them either through video calls or instant messaging, but never in person. These are people you’ve never seen in your life, and will probably never ever see. With remote work becoming the new normal in the post-pandemic era, this might be the new type of co-worker relationship for more people to come.

You might then wonder: How does that work? How do things get done? How can you build trusting relationships, let alone a sense of community and culture?

I’ve been part of a fully remote company, Colere, for the past 6-months, and I am convinced that full remote work has the possibility to offer a sense of community, greater work-life balance, more autonomy, and more income potential. Which are all things that motivate me to do better work.

Full remote has surprisingly worked out well (for now)

It is a project-based environment.
At first, I was only introduced to the immediate project team I worked with. It wasn’t until I worked on different projects that I became familiar with more co-workers. But during each project, I was able to build a deeper relationship with each remote co-worker. One by one, I ended up knowing enough people to form a sense of belonging to a community.

Community engagement is being built deliberately.
Colere does a lot of online activities to bring the company together, including company-wide sharings, birthday celebrations, life update sharing, etc. It is surprising how through connection intentionally with people, you can actually feel that you know others personally. Perhaps I am already having a glimpse of what facebook’s metaverse is visioning to provide.

How does teamwork function?

Logistics is set up so that everyone knows where to communicate and store information. I find this crucial because if the team doesn’t know where to communicate, it’d turn into a disaster where you spend more time trying to figure out the situations than getting work done.

Consistent communication channels
Scheduling is always done through google calendar and "spir" (schedule voting service), video conferences are always done through google meet, instant messaging is always done through Slack, and documentation is always done on Notion.

File management
All files are stored on google drive, with a good filing structure. Not only does a good filing structure makes it intuitive to know where to save files, but it also makes it easier for everyone to find the file and documents they need.

Deliberate scheduling
Scheduling needs to be done by deliberating since that’s the only way for teams to group and make progress. Whether it’s weekly meetings or meetings on the go, each project team plans how much and often they’d meet based on their own situation. Once there’s a calendar invite set, everyone will then be using the link provided in the calendar to the group when the time has come.

Official Language (s)
While English is the “official language”, knowing that not everyone has the same language proficiency, different languages can be used in different project teams, while the company utilizes translation technology heavily. (ex: online translation services like "deep L", Slack bot translator, etc.) And of course, emojis.

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But oh the downsides about working full remotely…

Having visibility becomes difficult when everyone is working project-based.
It is hard to see each other’s workload, especially there are a lot of people that work in Colere as a second job. It’s also, ore difficult to know what other projects are going on because everything is done online, you can’t just casually run into a coworker and chat about what they are busy with. On top of that, without an overview of what’s going on in the organization, it’s harder to imagine where the organization is headed.

Changing communication habits takes time.
Everyone would have to plan their communications. For example, if anyone forgets to plan to respond time when starting a discussion. Progress could get derailed pretty fast since more than likely the conversation will go slower than you think. Also, because there’s less “small talk time”, it will be harder to start difficult conversations, such as: difficulties people face when working, doubts about directions organization is going, etc. In the end, you will have to rely on people bringing things up proactively.

Challenges when you work globally.
Then you have a bunch of people constantly trying to figure out time zones that work for everyone. Another interesting struggle I observed working at Colere is that everyone, regardless of their language background, continuously feels guilty for using languages that other people aren't familiar with. (The main language in Colere is English and Japanese) But it does take extra effort to make sure that people with different language backgrounds are all on the same page of understanding.

Tips to build that trusting teamwork.

Expectation management through onboarding.
It’s important to know that full remote work takes more proactive communication efforts. If a new team member is aware of where and how to make communication from the beginning, the more likely they will be able to catch up well at first and stay on board.

Chatting in public.
It will make it easier for people to catch up on what is going on in the organization, so then they can position themselves to be useful to the rest of the group.

Reveal concerns and needs.
When in doubt, communicate your concerns, even your needs. That’s how you actually save time. Since all work is done online and touchpoints and scattered further apart, by communicating potential hurdles, there are more chances for the team to avoid roadblocks.

Don’t be afraid to be autonomous.
Full remote work also means that there’s not going to be a person standing behind to give you instructions all the time. Being more autonomous and agile is crucial to making progress happen. When not sure, raising doubts is also part of autonomy. Instead of relying on one manager, it makes more sense for everyone to take part in project management when all working remotely on projects.

Assume kindness.
It’s easy to lose context when you’re not working with the team side by side, and it could get more complicated if the team consists of people from different professional and cultural backgrounds. But assuming that everything the other team members do is with kind thoughts will help start a good discussion. The more we understand each other’s intentions, the more trusting relationships we will have.

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In the end, not only do I have the opportunity to work with a very diverse group of people, but I also became a better collaborator during the process of working remotely. With better collaborations, there’s sure to be a more interesting and meaningful impact to be made through our work. And I believe that’s worth everything to look forward to.

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この内容については、何人かのメンバーと一緒に直接Sandraから話を聞かせてもらう機会がありました。Sandraから出てくる視点は大切な示唆にあふれていて、これからColereコミュニティを育んでいくうえで宝物になる内容だと感じたことを覚えています。

ともに仕事を進めるメンバーといかに信頼関係を築いていくのか。共通の想いやビジョンへの共感を持っているのは大前提として、フルリモート（しかも世界中）だからこそのひと工夫も必要です。

Colereはこれからも工夫や挑戦を続けて、新しい仲間を迎えるたびにまた信頼関係を築きながら進んでいきます。