Distantjob Podcast

Craig Brown is a veteran of software product development that has experience leading and managing global software product development teams spanning four continents, 8 cities and hundreds of team members. His new baby is the Everest Engineering team, a modern software product development consultancy that delivers innovation capability out of India to the Australian tech industry. In this episode, we talk about a wide variety of topics, but fundamentally: leadership. What should cultural and language differences mean for leaders of distributed teams? Once you get down to it, what are the Agile and Scrum principles that really matter? What should your remote team do when they have a crisis on their hands? And why and how should leaders ask stupid questions? And teach others to do the same!

Adii Pienaar is the founder of  Conversio  and lives in Cape Town, South Africa. Prior to Conversio, Adii was the co-founder of WooThemes /  WooCommerce . Today Adii is a family man (which is why Conversio is a life- and family-first company) who enjoys running, reading and wine. In this episode, we talk about the philosophy of leading from first principles. We explore how to act in order to prevent your employees from burning out (more common than you think in highly motivated remote teams) and how a leader can be consistent while still striving to learn and being open (even eager!) to change his or her opinion. And for the people who want to up their hiring game, we discuss the questions and tests that enable Adii to hire for culture and value.

Is the remote work world biased against older and more experienced professionals? Or is it a problem with startup culture? DistantJob founder Sharon Koifman and podcast host Luis discuss how to fight ageism and embrace the wisdom that comes with experience in this special episode. Sharon Koifman believes every company, from the biggest enterprise to the newly-launched garage startup, should have access to world’s top talent. That’s why he used over 10 years of experience in tech industry recruitment & HR to create DistantJob.  This episode is a free-flowing conversation where Luis and Sharon discuss the age barriers that new companies erect and what they should change to avoid missing out on some seriously talented older professionals. We talk about lessons from Sharon’s father, and we finish with Sharon dispensing some leadership advice to his younger self, that little whippersnapper!

In this episode, we talk about how he works from home while managing several facets of a tech company spread across three countries and timezones while simultaneously dealing with US clients. We explore the importance of getting FaceTime when hiring and why it’s important to find a time in the day for the whole company to sync, even if only briefly. And, among other things, we speculate on how AI could help us verify the experience and skill set of potential hires.

Maya MiddleMiss is the CEO of BlockSparks, a startup focused on creating creative communications for the blockchain world . She's also a freelance writer and creator, obsessed with crypto, blockchain, and technology. She gets fascinated with the technological changes influencing our society and impacting our future.  In this episode, Maya shares how she got started in the world of cryptocurrencies and what we can do to use technology to our advantage. She believes those who are afraid of learning and trying something new, haven't realized how easy it is to connect with people who will literally give you a step-by-step guide on how to do the thing(s) you're afraid of. 

Jamon Holmgren is the Co-Founder and CTO at Infinite Red, a consultancy where they design, develop, launch, and support mobile and web apps. He's a software developer, husband, and father of four. His life-long obsession with coding has taken him from running large excavation equipment to framing houses to 3D CAD design, until he eventually landed on a career in software.  In this episode, we talk about a wide variety of topics, but fundamentally: leading a fully remote team. What is it like to lead remotely? What are the downsides? How do you manage your time efficiently? And, how do you measure your team's performance?

Welcome to StaffITRight, a Podcast by DistantJob! This Podcast aims to be a treasure trove of tools and resources for people who are on the quest to learn about how to build and manage remote teams. That’s right, this podcast is about people working together on great projects, through the magic of the internet – no office required. Here, we interview people who’ve built and managed remote teams and even full companies – and found great success!

On the second episode StaffITRight, the official podcast of DistantJob we interview Trevor Longino, le enfant terrible of the marketing world. 

In this edition of the StaffITRight podcast, presented by Distantjob.com , we talk to Ana Guerra, who was responsible for Social Media Marketing and Partnerships at Xbox.  During her stay at Microsoft Portugal, Ana found herself interacting with on-site colleagues, but doing the bulk of her work remotely, with a team that was physically located in another country. Here we talk about how she managed that situation and her advice to managers who want to integrate a remote superstar into their local teams!

In this episode of the StaffITRight podcast, we talk to Radical Inclusion’s Stephan Dohrn. Stephan has been helping remote teams do their best work for over a decade, and his experience has led him to focus on each individual as the building blocks of a top-performing remote team. In our conversation, we talk about building trust, connection, responsibility, and accountability, among many other things. All without ever stepping foot in the office.

In this episode of the StaffITRight podcast, we talk to our very own Jennifer Kostel. Jenn is a multitalented individual who has a portfolio that ranges from teaching languages and yoga to acting and managing accounts – but the common denominator in all her endeavors was the ability to build rapport with the people she dealt with. And now that she’s focusing on remote work, this skill proves to be more crucial than ever! We go into detail on Jenn’s previous remote work experiences, how to avoid remote work burnout, the importance of owning your mistakes, and much more – listen and prepare to be blown away!

In this episode of the StaffITRight podcast, we talk to Laurel Farrer. Laurel is a remote work strategist and advocate who works with companies to strengthen communication and develop long-distance management strategies. She has written about remote work for several publications and education platforms and has advised US governments, business conferences, and industry leaders on the topic of remote work.  We cover a wide range of topics during our conversation, including good stand-ups and bad stand-ups, how to be a leader instead of a boss, how to figure out if the remote approach is working for your business and specific conversation scripts that you can use to make clear to your remote employees what are your expectations of their work.

In this episode of the DistantJob podcast, we talk to Joel Martinez. Joel Martinez is a Senior Developer at Microsoft, a prolific writer, and a huge advocate for remote work. During our conversation, we talk about how to stimulate focus on a team, how to know if a team is ready or not to work remotely, what can remote employees do to be proactive in showcasing their work, and much more – Joel is a true practical expert in the field. Audio Player

Among many other things, we talk about how Buffer’s focus on transparency allows their teams to generate unprecedented value; why empowering people only works when it’s in service to generating said value; and how you need to be creative when adapting leadership lessons to remote teams.

This episode touches on how the importance of treating remote employees just as if they were regular, co-located employees; how negative emotional states can be more prevalent during online communication and how to manage them; and on the best formula to get honest, actionable feedback from your team members. But that’s not all, of course – this is one of the wider-ranging DistantJob podcasts ever!

Victoria talks to us (among many, many other things!) about what top performers come looking for when they consider joining your company; the importance of virtualising small workplace rituals; and how to build and benefit from a company with a network structure, as opposed to flat or hierarchical. (DJ Podcast drinking game: have a drink whenever Luis mispronounces “hierarchical”! Such is life.)

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Todays’ guest, Marcello Bonatto, leads Re:Coded, a non-profit that helps people from war-torn countries learn the craft of IT and work remotely with Western enterprises, bringing value into their lives and communities. But don’t be fooled into thinking that we’re going all touchy-feely about how remote work is helping to turn the world into a better place. There’s plenty of that, but there’s also some very practical advice about how to invest in your employees education, and how to account for cultural differences when hiring and managing remote workers. As usual, the podcast goes into a lot of different subjects, so start listening and find out what can YOU apply to your business, today.

Todays’ guest is Gonçalo Silva, CTO of Doist. Obviously, we dig into the importance of checklists and process in managing remote teams, but we also talk about a lot of other things, including, but not limited to: how to test potential employees for remote skills; what are some good ways to document decisions in a way to have a single source of truth; and what an 80-year-old book can still teach us about management, even when it comes to the Future of Work.

Todays’ guest is Christian McCarrick, VP of Engineering at Auth0 and host of the SimpleLeadership Podcast. Christian has been a technology leader for almost two decades, and through his Simple Leadership Podcast, has learned from dozens of the best in the industry.  We dive into topics as varied as how to make sure to hear the opinions of introverts in your team, how to write like a leader and beat the Slack “rumour mill,” what’s the difference between brainstorming for discussion and brainstorming for decision, and much more!