{"id":74,"date":"2019-10-08T15:21:00","date_gmt":"2019-10-08T15:21:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/employer-blog.arc.dev\/?p=74"},"modified":"2025-06-11T12:28:43","modified_gmt":"2025-06-11T04:28:43","slug":"normalizing-hiring-outside-silicon-valley","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arc.dev\/employer-blog\/normalizing-hiring-outside-silicon-valley\/","title":{"rendered":"Normalizing Hiring Outside Silicon Valley (Andreas Klinger of AngelList)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>Remote work is almost like a spectrum. It\u2019s not like you either work remote or you don\u2019t work remotely. It\u2019s more your company might be in one place, it might be in multiple places, or every employee might be in multiple places, almost like a spectrum from being like everybody at the same spot to, like, how distributed are you\u2026<\/p><cite>Andreas Klinger, Head of Remote at AngelList<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>Today on the show we have\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/andreasklinger\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Andreas Klinger<\/a>, the Head of Remote at AngelList, and one of the founding team members of Product Hunt. We talk about why hiring Silicon Valley engineers is now mostly a liability, how to systemize trust within remote teams, why onboarding is super crucial for remote teams, and so on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In this interview, we also mentioned two great resources: Andreas\u2019 blog post\u00a0<em>\u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/klinger.io\/post\/180989912140\/managing-remote-teams-a-crash-course\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Managing Remote Teams \u2013 a Crash Course<\/a>\u201d<\/em>, and his\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=EKSGhOBnRPw&t=10s\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">talk at the Running Remote conference<\/a>. If you\u2019re not familiar with these, be sure to check them out!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you\u2019re enjoying the podcast, please consider leaving a review on\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/outside-the-valley\/id1481937930?ign-mpt=uo%3D4\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">iTunes<\/a>!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The podcast is also available on your favorite players:\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/outside-the-valley\/id1481937930?ign-mpt=uo%3D4\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">iTunes<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/podcasts.google.com\/?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy50cmFuc2lzdG9yLmZtL291dHNpZGUtdGhlLXZhbGxleQ%3D%3D&hl=en-TW\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Google Podcast<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/castro.fm\/podcast\/5a2c6978-e8e7-4f02-a47d-ca3474778329\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Castro<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/overcast.fm\/itunes1481937930\/outside-the-valley\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Overcast<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/show\/5qzXgcHzieXIRtXglSmUE8?si=rMPobXZtQwSU0wQ3grTAxA\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Spotify<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.stitcher.com\/podcast\/outside-the-valley\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Stitcher<\/a>,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/player.fm\/series\/outside-the-valley\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Player.fm<\/a>, and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/tunein.com\/podcasts\/Technology-Podcasts\/Outside-The-Valley-p1251704\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Tune In<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Looking for top talent fast? See how <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/arc.dev\/\">Arc<\/a><em> can help you:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>\u26a1\ufe0f Find developers, designers, marketers, and more<br>\u26a1\ufe0f Freelance or full-time remote + fully vetted<\/em><em><br>\u26a1\ufe0f Save up to 80% with global hires<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/arc.dev\"><strong>Hire top talent with Arc risk-free \u2192<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"topics-also-covered-on-the-podcast-episode%3A\">Topics also covered on the podcast episode:<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>01:02 \u2014 What is \u201cHead of Remote\u201d?<\/li><li>02:00 \u2014 Why remote work came naturally to Andreas<\/li><li>04:37 \u2014 How investors\u2019 perceptions about remote work have changed over the years<\/li><li>06:24 \u2014 Why building an engineering team inside Silicon Valley is now questionable<\/li><li>11:08 \u2014 Is there such a thing as a \u201cnetwork effect\u201d in remote work?<\/li><li>15:45 \u2014 Why Andreas wrote\u00a0<em>Managing Remote Teams \u2013 A Crash Course<\/em><\/li><li>19:48 \u2014 Systemizing \u201ctrust\u201d inside a remote team<\/li><li>23:35 \u2014 Why onboarding is crucial for new hires<\/li><li>28:37 \u2014 Why you need to \u201crefactor\u201d your organization every few months<\/li><li>35:04 \u2014 The misperception of the \u201cdigital nomad\u201d trend<\/li><li>40:30 \u2014 Is \u201cremote readiness\u201d is a thing?<\/li><li>43:40 \u2014 How to start transitioning into a remote team<\/li><li>47:12 \u2014 Andreas\u2019 general advice to those who want to start\/scale remote companies, especially regarding hiring<\/li><li>50:30 \u2014 Why pair programming is an underrated way to assess your remote candidates<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"mentioned-resources%3A\">Mentioned Resources:<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><a href=\"https:\/\/angel.co\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">AngelList<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.producthunt.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Product Hunt<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/rrhoover\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Ryan Hoover<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"http:\/\/seedcamp.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Seedcamp<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/runningremote.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Running Remote<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=EKSGhOBnRPw&t=10s\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Andreas Klinger\u2019s talk at Running Remote<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/andrewchen.co\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Andrew Chen<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/andrewchen\/status\/1013877294820134912?lang=en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Mullet model<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"http:\/\/remotive.io\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Remotive<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/klinger.io\/post\/180989912140\/managing-remote-teams-a-crash-course\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Managing Remote Teams \u2013 A Crash Course<\/a>\u00a0by Andreas Klinger<\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/zapier.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Zapier<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/arc.dev\/blog\/podcast-ep3-toggl-krister-haav-7t1m8gx48p\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Creating a Fun and Playful Culture in Remote Teams with Krister Haav<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/toggl.com\/startup-simulator\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Toggl Startup Simulator<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/jasonfried\/status\/1019248980809715712\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">\u201cYour company should be your best product\u201d<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/levelsio\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Pieter Levels<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/levelsio\/status\/1143515689635864576\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Pieter Levels\u2019 tweet about \u2018digital nomads\u2019<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/nickfrancis\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Nick Francis<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.helpscout.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Help Scout<\/a><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"full-transcript%3A\">Full transcript:<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Hello, world. Welcome to another episode of \u201cOutside the Valley,\u201d a podcast where we interview remote startup leaders, workers, remote work advocates, and companies who thrive outside of Silicon Valley. This is a podcast where remote teams can learn what works and what doesn\u2019t so you can do it right. \u201cOutside the Valley\u201d is brought to you by Arc, the remote hiring platform that enables companies to easily hire remote software engineers and teams. I\u2019m your host and producer, Jovian Gautama.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Today on \u201cOutside the Valley,\u201d we have Andreas Klinger, head of remote at AngelList and one of the founding team members of Product Hunt. We talk about different topics such as why building an engineering team in Silicon Valley is now mostly a liability, how to systematize trust within remote teams, why onboarding is super crucial for remote teams and so on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In this interview, we mention two great resources. They are a blog post written by Andreas titled \u201cManaging Remote Teams: a Crash Course,\u201d and his talk on the Running Remote conference in Bali this year. If you\u2019re not familiar with these two, be sure to check that out at our show notes where you can find the links. Here we go. Andreas, welcome to the show.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Hey, thanks for having me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Thanks for having me. How\u2019s it going, man?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Very good. I just realized I\u2019m calling in from West Coast America, and you\u2019re like in Taipei, like we\u2019re too doing this around the world which is awesome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Right. So for the listeners, it\u2019s now 7 a.m. here in Taipei, Taiwan, and in Pacific Time, what time is it there?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s 4 p.m. here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a04 p.m. Cool. Yeah. So the joy of remote work, am I right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Absolutely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Right. So for the listeners here, if you are not following Andreas Klinger on Twitter, you are missing out. Andreas tweets a lot about remote work and he was the founding team member and CT of Product Hunt and currently the head of remote at AngelList. So Andreas, just to start a bit, your title, like, head of remote is very special. Before we go there, tell us more about your experience on remote working.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0So I have been running remote teams like quite some time in my life. I don\u2019t know how many years. The title, head of remote, is actually super confusing. Like, nobody really knows what it means including me. It\u2019s, I think, I realized a better framing would have been head of remote products, because my job is basically within the talent department of AngelList to improve products for remote teams and remote work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So for those who don\u2019t know, AngelList right runs one of the largest job marketplaces for startups. And like, basically, if you wanna find a job in any startup out there, it\u2019s a high chance that they\u2019ve posted on AngelList. And we also have the largest job board for remote work by a large margin. And my job is to actually just improve the product to be more suitable and more useful for remote work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Product Hunt has been here for a while now. So when you joined Ryan Hoover to work on Product Hunt, can you share a bit more what was the landscape of remote working at that time? I guess that at that time, remote work wasn\u2019t really a thing that makes sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, it depends on point of view. Like I almost have it the other way around, like beginning of this year when I started doing this job for\u2026like I started focusing on the head of remote role at AngelList, I had like this weird epiphany where I realized there are consultants for remote work. And until this moment, for me, remote work was just a thing that\u2019s completely normal. Like it\u2019s kind of\u2026 For me, like, I thought it was like consultant for remote work is kind of like being a consultant for standing desks. It\u2019s kind of like I agree with you it\u2019s a good thing, more people should do it, but I don\u2019t really know what you\u2019re consulting until I\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Like now I kind of get it. Now I get it. Like the more I see how much information gap there is actually, I get it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>But for me, it was almost like remote work isn\u2019t anything crazy or special. It\u2019s completely normal. Like, we have laptops. We have the internet. We are working online, right? It\u2019s the most natural thing for us.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>So back then when I joined Ryan, I actually expected, and he as well, to some extent, that Product Hunt will be a side project in a way, like it would be a successful side project that\u2019s [inaudible 00:04:50] right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And it almost became a company by accident by the fact that it just started working really well. And at this point, we\u2019ve already set up, fully distributed. So there wasn\u2019t really a point to change that. So, back then I had already a lot of people I admired when it came to remote work like the folks Buffer. I\u2019m a long-time friend and fan of them, and a few others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So remote work for me back then wasn\u2019t really a new thing. I have been doing it in my company before and so on and so on. And I have to honestly say I wasn\u2019t even aware that it\u2019s such a big deal in a way. And, for example, we got our first larger investments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>One of the investors actually said something along the lines of \u201cHey, now you\u2019ve raised a few million dollars. Now you can finally get an office and become a real\u2026get everybody over and become a real company.\u201d And I was like, \u201cWait, what?\u201d \u201cYeah, I think we are already a real company.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>I\u2019m not sure how startups work, but I think we\u2019re operating a real company, right? But the same investor now tweets on\u2026like promotes remote work a lot on Twitter. So it\u2019s kind of funny how times change here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Right, right. Exactly. So yeah, I think a lot of this remote work, friends so to speak, is to just get traction in the next couple of years in, like you mentioned right? Before VCs ask you like, when will you be a real company and get an office that we work or something like that, but how about now? How do you see the investment landscape, this part of investment landscape now, that distributed teams are getting more and more popular because I\u2019ve read a lot of stories about startups, distributed startups, having\u2026it\u2019s easier for them to raise funds nowadays compared to even like two or three years ago. So what\u2019s your thought on this?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0So this is almost like multidimensional. But I think I agree with you, kind of like remote work hit like a critical point in a way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>It just became like this thing, all of a sudden. It\u2019s not like that it\u2019s new. It just, like, reached its critical amount in a way, right, the critical amount of attention, where it becomes like an actual topic to a lot of people who didn\u2019t realize and didn\u2019t look before.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>When it comes to investment, specifically, you almost have to segment between different regions. So when we speak of investments, most of the mindset actually comes from the valley.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For example, accelerators like Seedcamp have been doing investments in company that had, I would say, not co-located setups really, really early. So they had like investments where the founders were in America, but like a part of the team was in Eastern Europe or somewhere else like\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0I see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0\u2026a bunch of their, like, larger successes were like this kind of setup.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>I also strongly believe that remote work is almost like a spectrum. It\u2019s not like you either work remote or you don\u2019t work remotely. It\u2019s more your company might be in one place, it might be in multiple places, or every employee might be in multiple places, almost like a spectrum from being like everybody at the same spot to like, how distributed are you, right?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>And on that spectrum, like, especially Silicon Valley, the common wisdom was its power law. So you either win or you don\u2019t. And if you win, no costs matter. And if you lose, nothing matters, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So this was like the argumentation for Y2K to pay a lot of money for talent in the Valley and all this kind of stuff and why it\u2019s okay to get everybody over. Even in the Valley, a lot of the VCs, like in a few years ago, already started to invest in companies where only the founders, or only the founders and the sales team come to America, but the actual engineering team stays somewhere else now because they already had an established team in India, Eastern Europe, or Latin America, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So this already was like kind of becoming more and more normal. The thing now is what\u2019s shifted and I think this is also like where a little bit the hype of remote work in the valley came from.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>It got to the point where it\u2019s almost questionable to start your engineering team in the Valley.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>This is now me personally speaking and not making a judgment about like other investors or VCs. If a founder comes to me and says that she wants to start in San Francisco and hire all their engineering in San Francisco, my initial question will be \u201cWhy? Like, how can you almost like justify this in front of your\u2026?\u201d this is a liability. This is no longer an advantage but it used to be an advantage to being the pool of the best people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now it\u2019s a liability because you will hire people who are less experienced for a lot of money, which is by itself fine, power law and all, but you will have people who have like a very low retention. You will hire people who will leave after one and a half years, and you constantly would have this constant hire. It\u2019s very expensive hiring going on. So the question here is almost like can you justify this and no longer like, is this the best approach? But, like, to me even like, can you even justify this in front of investors or peers?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So this is, I think, also like, the mentality, like together with the whole housing crisis in San Francisco and all this kind of stuff, right, where a lot of other investors got the POV, \u201cHey, actually, it doesn\u2019t really make sense to fight in the same little few square miles for engineers. And unless this one startup happens to be this one really, really cool thing, hyped thing that every engineer wants to work on right now, it\u2019s really, really unlikely that you can actually attract the talent. And it\u2019s worse, it\u2019s really, really unlikely that you can keep them because sooner or later, Google or anybody else, like one a half years later, will come and just like drop stock and everything on them and basically effectively double their salary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So if you have an area where the average retention rate is like one-to-one a half years, and most of the people you actually hire end up being as average as globally, it\u2019s very, very questionable if you should do that. So, right now there\u2019s this shift in investors\u2019 mindset. And I think more and more people tend to agree with this POV. Unless you\u2019re like this one hyper-bold flyer who can just like\u2026like basically unless you just say like, \u201cNo, this is the way how I do it and like everybody else, screw you,\u201d and you manage to actually be this one company every engineer wants to go to, you might not actually\u2026like you shouldn\u2019t do it, period. You shouldn\u2019t actually consider it. You might hire a few people in San Francisco, you might hire but you should actually just hire good people where you can.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Right. This is interesting because it reminds me of the thing that you mentioned in the Running Remote conference back then because like remote work is a natural evolution of digital work. Now if we look a step further than that, this is also enabled because all of these global talents actually have the resources to learn programming from the best courses out there. It\u2019s made them like on an equal footing with these Silicon Valley, kind of like to my next question.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I think, like you mentioned, a lot of startups, they want to have either their business development teams in San Francisco or their founding team in San Francisco. I think Andrew Chen calls this the Mullet Model. Now that we have, the remote work is more trending upwards. And Silicon Valley is famous for this network effect right? It\u2019s almost like\u2026 This sounds very corny, but it\u2019s almost like the Hollywood of tech hub, because it\u2019s more like really like who you know there, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes, I agree.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0And then do you see this network effect either, I\u2019m not sure if diminishing is the right word, or do you see, like, is their so-called \u201cremote network,\u201d so to speak, because I see there\u2019s a lot of\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/arc.dev\/blog\/online-developer-communities-czs8emm24m\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">remote communities<\/a>\u00a0out there. Remotive has one, AngelList has one, we in Arc also has one. So do you see this like just getting stronger and diminishing the Silicon Valley network effect?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes, and no. It depends for what, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0So first of all, I don\u2019t believe that there is, for example, like when it comes to investment, I don\u2019t believe that there is a Silicon Valley scene, a New York scene, a European scene, blah, blah, blah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>I believe there\u2019s one global startup scene, and you have different, I would say, hubs with different up-link. So Silicon Valley has by far the strongest up-link, but a lot of the people that you would associate with Silicon Valley actually don\u2019t live here anymore. They moved somewhere else and they\u2019re just like brand-wise still very close to here.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>And in a reality, it becomes much more like do you have a good uplink to this scene? And if you have a good uplink, you might live somewhere else. In reality, being in the Valley, gives you a lot of, I would say, falls, verification almost, like being\u2026 Like I know this is really extremely. For me back then it was harder to get, what I would say, famous or like well-known people from here, from the Valley, on a phone call or like a Skype call back then. Like, it was that long ago. Yes, that long ago, Skype<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It was like harder for me to get them on a Skype call than to actually, when I was here, to just meet them for coffee, which was completely absurd, because a Skype call is 15 minutes, right? Getting to meet somebody for coffee is at least half an hour if not one full hour. But it was actually easier to do that in person for some reason because there\u2019s this\u2026back then, maybe still, I don\u2019t know, this kind of like buyers that is like a self-selection process just by the fact that you\u2019re here, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So there\u2019s still the fact that it\u2019s easier to access the network if you have regional proximity. That being said, it\u2019s nowadays not only regional proximity. You can have other levels of proximity. You can have like proximity through knowledge or topics. So for example, if you are a very, very good content writer about a very specific topic, you know, that also like investors are interested in, they are more than happy to connect with you. So like that\u2019s a proximity you can build up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I think it\u2019s possible to raise from outside. And I think like a lot of companies do that very successfully. I still believe it\u2019s easy to do it here. That doesn\u2019t mean that the whole company needs to be here, right? It might be enough if a few of the founders are here, which leads to the next obvious question, should every company raise money? And especially should every company raise money from Silicon Valley venture capital? I personally believe no. The question is do you even want that nowadays?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, I totally agree with the proximity thing. And it kind of depends on what you are there for. For example, I found a lot of\u2026not a lot of, but some of my podcast guests are through Twitter, actually. I just find you with Twitter and you wanna be on our podcast. And yeah. And also, like, there\u2019s a lot of, like, remote work \u201centhusiast.\u201d It sounds really weird?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0I know what you mean. Yeah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, and that you can oh, there\u2019s this aspect of remote work, or distributed teams, or team management, that you never considered before and you can immediately jump into a conversation with them. And it\u2019s not weird at all. So yeah, I think also that\u2019s a good case for like remote networking\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes, I believe that Twitter is the protest version from like what they just described for proximity through knowledge, right, or interest, proximity through interest. And I think Twitter is like a very productized version of that. You don\u2019t need to read long blog posts or books or anything and you can instantly connect with people and ask questions or jump into discussions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So yeah, I fully agree. I would also highly recommend anybody who tries to build up reputation and in a lot of cases, networking is much more about your own reputation than your access, you know, because like the access comes through reputation. Twitter and content and blogging and all this kind of stuff is a very, very easy hack to actually get reputation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Cool. And speaking about content, so it\u2019s kind of leaked to my next question, so I think a while ago, is it last year, you wrote something about managing remote teams on your blog?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0And this is also the\u2026 Like, the core point of the presentation when you were in the Running Remote conference in Bali, during this year, right? And I really like\u2026 For listeners, I\u2019ll put the link on the show notes. I really like this type because it\u2019s concise and tackles a lot of questions that we never\u2026and like if you\u2019re new to remote work and never considered it before, or like for example, what is a hybrid team, what is a distributed startups? Can you give us a bit more background about that blog post itself, what triggers you to write it and then the most important thing that you think the listeners should take away from that?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, yeah, fair enough. The main reason why I write that blog post\u2026 I am a horrible writer. Like, I need forever to write a post. I have so many spelling mistakes. It\u2019s like borderline questionable, like to the point that you even\u2026to the point that I should get maybe a refund from my high school, you know, like that bad. And I also have this tendency of trying to add everything I\u2026 I kind of like to explain A, I actually need to explain B, and to explain D, I need to tell you about F, and G, and H, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0So it becomes longer and longer, and longer. You know this is like the reason why this one is basically an eBook. But the main reason why I actually write them even if I\u2019m not really good in it is I start to repeating myself in one-on-one discussions. So I had, like back then, friends of mine reaching out to me asking for recommendations for remote teams. And I almost at one point I had like a notes file where I was like talking to a friend of mine and, like, on the right side of the screen I had like my notes, and like literally reading from the notes, and I was like, \u201cThis is not efficient. There has to be a better way. Maybe we have the technology to build a better way, you know?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Who knows?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0So I decided to put like everything in the blog post. I don\u2019t know, like, I think the biggest take away from it, actually, I don\u2019t know, it\u2019s like structure you\u2019re thinking about remote work. So I strongly believe it\u2019s you have to see it almost like as a spectrum. It\u2019s not like you work remote or not remote. It\u2019s like how distributed your team is, as we said before, right? And like hybrid setups are a real thing and might be needed. So but like what do you need to consider, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0And then all of the first-degree and second degrees of implications of remote work. So, like, reduce to the primitives, what does remote work mean?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>It means that people might not be able to instantly constantly go back and forth, you know. They\u2019ll have like different hand-over processes. Like you need to be more aware of like, how can you enable people actually to work autonomously, right? How can you enable people to be productive on their own? If they constantly have to wait for other people, they get really, really frustrated really, really quickly.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>And there\u2019s a few nuances around all of this. There\u2019s also like a few nuances around communication. But all of this comes out of primitives, in my opinion, with reduced effects. It\u2019s more important to me that people understand like, what is the fundamental differences, you know, and what falls out of that, and like, how to think about that, than to just\u2026 Like, it\u2019s more important to me to make people understand how I think about this, than what I think about this, if this makes sense, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So this is where the whole blog post came from, similar with the Running Remote conference, where I did the keynote. It was more like here\u2019s a few principles that I strongly believe in and like, what are the conclusions? Like what can you basically draw out of that?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. One of the most interesting thing or one the most interesting nuggets on the blog post and the presentation is that how you describe trust, right, trust in remote teams and the concept of trust battery. So in my opinion, I think a lot of company sees trust as this very abstract thing. It\u2019s like the \u201cculture thing.\u201d So we have a culture that trust each other to do work and that just ends at that. But you talk more about systematizing the thing. Can you share a bit more about that?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, fair enough. So the reason like\u2026so most of the stuff I try to describe around that is actually just basic good management. A lot of people have very different understanding of what that means, right? And you could proxy the word trust here with a word like authority, for example. But again, it\u2019s a biased word. A lot of people have additional opinions, like, what authority means. Like a lot of people assume authority means authority above other people, and so on and so on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>The reason why I like the concept of systematizing trust or thinking about trust is we assume that trust is a natural thing that you either trust somebody or you don\u2019t. Like, it\u2019s very binary in our thinking, right? But in reality, it\u2019s not. Like, you trust somebody about different things very differently. This trust might change over time and you might trust different people fundamentally different, right?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>So the problem you have as a manager is if somebody joins your team, they have not established themselves on this like weird multidimensional map of, like, this web of trust between people that haven\u2019t established themselves. So what you usually kind of do is you try to connect them with people that can talk with people and just hope that they like\u2026like, you know, like, and if after a few months kind of or found their place and people started trusting and to do more and more. The thing is with remote teams is you need to be very aware how you, like, what kind of things you wanna\u2026for example if somebody joins, what do you want her to be able to do from day one? What do you actually expect her to be able to do from day one on? You know, what are your expectations? What is your comfort zones?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>Basically, how do you structure and systematize your own trust? Like how do you give trust? How do you verify trust? How do you wanna receive trust and all this kind of stuff? It\u2019s basically this whole web between people is what the fundamental building blocks around any team work is.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>The weird thing about this is that we think of it as a purely naturally evolving thing, which a remote team kind of, I mean, it\u2019s always true. But like for me, trust starts earlier. For me, trust starts with the fact that I trust you to push code to GitHub. That\u2019s already like a trust, you know. I trust you to deploy servers. Like in a lot of companies, I would not allow you to deploy to the servers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A lot of other companies, there\u2019s a whole process around that, you know. In our company, for example, I would just allow you to do that because I have A, B, and C, in place, right? And so on and so on. Like basically, systematizing processes, systematizing authority, systematizing your whole management principles is where it is kind of roots in, you know?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I personally like the framing around trust because in the end, everything here is trust. Every process we have in place, roots in the fundamental trust between people, any enabling we have between people, fundamentally roots in trust between people, any authority autonomous work. Any happiness in teams, fundamentally, roots in trust, any positive culture as well, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Right. Yeah, I totally agree with that. And also speaking about building trust from day one, and also this is something you also mentioned on your writings in things that are mentioned by the previous guest on this podcast is that the importance of onboarding. Every successful remote company that I know, they really have a robust onboarding process in place, like, almost over the top to be honest. Like, for example, Zapier, I think they have the so-called onboarding B&B or something. Toggl also have that. I\u2019m just curious, in your opinion, like, how do you describe how onboarding shapes the roles of a new hire?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0And then I wonder if you can share a bit more about the onboarding process that you had when you were in Product Hunt or now in AngelList?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes, more than happy to. So where does this all come from right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>Like in remote teams, you need to be more actively thinking about processes. You need to be, like we called before trust, but like you need to think about like all your processes, who does what? Who can make which decisions? What decisions do you expect people to do? And so on and so on.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>Like you, by default, are more aware about this stuff because for you, it\u2019s more expensive to just monkey-patch or like hotfix, you know, any process problem you have with just a random meeting. Like normal companies like co-located companies, if they have a problem, they do like a quick meeting and fix the problem, most likely not effective. And most likely, it\u2019s actually not like removing the systematic problem in their process. It\u2019s just like a hotfix monkey patch to keep stuff going. And all of a sudden, you have like meetings all day, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0In a remote team, you can\u2019t do this because meetings are just very, very expensive. It\u2019s exhausting, expensive and so on and so on. So what you have is you have like all these processes, so when you actually onboard somebody to make them effective, you wanna like teach them about your processes, how things are done and all this kind of stuff, you know?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And more importantly, you wanna give them the tools that they can do it on their own pace and their own time as autonomously as possible because again, it\u2019s very expensive for you to have somebody sitting with this person four hours, five hours a day. Because this person like if, like, honestly, if you sit in a hangout that\u2019s longer than one hour, you\u2019re borderline going insane anyway, right? Now imagine if you would have like full onboarding boot camps just in hang out, you would go crazy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So instead, what you do is you try to find a process that people can act autonomously in their onboarding, which can be handbooks, for example, that\u2019s very famous for a lot of remote team. So you have a very good handbook they can read on their own pace.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It might also be onboarding around\u2026like in engineering teams, it\u2019s very, very common to have very, very good tooling in place in remote teams that guide first-timers to the right solution. So you have Lintest, telling you you\u2019re doing something wrong. Static code analysis telling you if you do something insecure, you know. You have these patterns you can follow, you have this way to start ABC, you have this way to test everything, you have this way to deploy everything. Everything is kind of like put in a shape already so that this guides you to like a solution. And in reality, what most companies do not realize, especially startup is if you join a company, you decide in your first few weeks if you\u2019re actually going to stay or not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0You know, what I mean?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>Most people who will leave, will leave very, very quickly, like they will leave after one to three months. They would just say, \u201cOkay, this doesn\u2019t work. I tried it, it doesn\u2019t work,\u201d right? Beginning, they\u2019re very hopeful and they just like, hope that something changes, maybe if you\u2019re lucky. But it\u2019s kind of this phase where you mess up, you know? It\u2019s like this onboarding phase, is this first weeks.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>It\u2019s, in remote teams, where people maybe realize that remote work is not for them because they feel, for example, isolated and you didn\u2019t have an eye for that, like you didn\u2019t watch out for that. So you need to find a part in your onboarding but make sure that you realize and you handle the situation, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It might be that moment where people realize that they cannot really change anything in a company because everything is decided by somebody else. So how do you fix that? You know, like you basically\u2026these first weeks are the most crucial phase for any employee. And any investment there is usually money well spent, and in my opinion, it\u2019s also one of the reasons why remote teams have very good retention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, it\u2019s interesting that we talk about it this way which reminds me. I think it\u2019s an article by Jason Fried from Basecamp is that you have to see your company as a product, like work on that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0And the thing we\u2019re talking about, it\u2019s just similar to what he was talking about SaaS onboarding for clients, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0If we don\u2019t do onboarding right, it\u2019ll churn in a couple of months or so. So, yeah, there\u2019s\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0There\u2019s more analogs in this metaphor, actually. I have a similar thing in here. For example<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>I strongly believe if a company or organization that is growing, you need to re-factor this organization every few months.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0I see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0You need to re-factor like intentionally, not just like casually, \u201cNow we have a problem, we fix,\u201d but like, intentionally be like, \u201cOkay, this works for us because we\u2019re like five people, but this might not work with 20 people.\u201d But that\u2019s okay, you know. But, like, when we hit 10 people, when we hit 15, people, we need to intentionally re-factor. There\u2019s a lot of stuff around like decision making, like how do you slice the work? How do you slice the teams? Who makes decision? What kind of decisions do you delegate?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Howard is supposed to make all these decisions. This is a continuous process. And if you are working in a growing startup, usually, in the beginning, you just think at some point you would have this figured out. In reality, as long as you grow, you constantly need to re-factor, so you constantly need to improve this. And the only way that you don\u2019t have to improve this anymore is because you\u2019ve found like a place where you stagnate, right, or because the company goes out of business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is the only like situations in my opinion where you don\u2019t have to improve or iterate on this kind of organizational process. So I think the analog to a product is very, very good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>It comes down to also branding. Like how well is your brand received. Like, as a remote team, if you invest in public perception, like in brand, this is like the best hiring hack you can do easily, like the inbound you will get out of this is worth any investment.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>And so on and so on. It\u2019s not only that, it\u2019s like the whole UX, like how easy it is for an employee to give feedback to the decision makers. Like it\u2019s there, like, do you have like the suit company have like the equivalent of like an intercom Help Desk, you know?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Like, how would I as a nobody in this company actually give feedback to decision-makers in the world? It\u2019s like, okay, you know, thinking of your companies and progressing is one of the most healthiest thing you can do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, that\u2019s a fantastic analogy. For the next question, I want to touch a bit about there\u2019s something that actually I remember a lot just from your talks and from your articles about the innovation versus iteration. I actually kind of agree with that and draw there some example. So, you mentioned that innovation is better when you\u2019re in person and iteration is better when you are remote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0So I chat with the CEO of Toggl, Krister Haav, a while ago. Do you know that Toggl has this cool game called the startup simulator?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0No.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0This is super funny. So it\u2019s super funny. And then so basically, he mentioned that the team created it when they were on their retreat, right? And it\u2019s super funny and with the like 8-bit-Atari style, graphic and whatnot. And one thing that he mentioned is that it\u2019s probably not doable when they\u2019re not in person because there are a lot of nuances. Especially like humor, right? Jokes, like especially when you\u2019re zoom, when you\u2019re like, uncomfortable, like 20, 30 people and someone laughs at my joke and people are like, \u201cWhat did I miss? What I missed?\u201d And the joke is not funny again. So that\u2019s just one example of innovation that she\u2019ll be in person, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Do you see this changing in the future along with technologies like AR, VR and so on?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0I mean, first for like the listeners to explain like the main premise I have here is if you work remote, you can really, really focus on your own productivity. You can own your own performance and everything, right? So you iterate really well and really quick.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0On the other hand, in a Hangout, a lot of the nuances in human communication get lost, a lot of the things you can do in person, like realizing what people actually mean and like all this little nuanced stuff kind of gets lost in Hangouts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>So I personally recommend remote teams also to meet in person for cultural reasons, like just to get to know each other, but also meet in person for, like, complicated kickoff, project kickoff, quarterly kickoff. So like all this kind of stuff usually pays off.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>When I say innovation, I actually don\u2019t mean doing like crazy, innovative stuff. I believe that every startup, every company needs to be innovative in a digital marketplace to actually succeed. You can\u2019t just do what everybody else does the same way and expect to succeed tremendously. It won\u2019t happen. So you need to be innovative.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But this is not like the kind of innovation I mean. I mean more like radical step function innovation like you need like a huge pivot, you need to launch a new product, you need to like, figure out how you actually hit your growth numbers in a large step. You know, like all this kind of stuff. These kinds of discussions, like this crazy brainstorming, is usually easier in person to the point that I would even recommend having teams meet for lesser important reasons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To your second question related to AR, VR, I don\u2019t know. I honestly don\u2019t know. I\u2019m personally not too bullish on VR. I\u2019m kind of bullish on AR. And I personally believe they will emerge as a concept anyway. I believe AR is one of those things where it\u2019s kind of like hard to mention right now, and that as soon as we actually use it, it will be hard to imagine how we ever watched these small screens all the time, you know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>VR is always mentioned as one of the things that people would use for meetings, and I\u2019m always so confused because if I could redefine how meetings work, would I really try to recreate an office meeting room because like one of the hellish\u2026like one of the worst environments to be in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0All right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Like being several hours in a meeting room is actually not a joyful thing, you know?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Like, this is like a setup I would use to make the most productive in a meeting? I am not sure. So I wonder actually what is, like, VR first kind of approaches to brainstorming and all this kind of stuff, you know? And I honestly don\u2019t have a good answer. So if anybody out there is working on something, please let me know. I\u2019m more than happy to invest. Like this is the kind of stuff I\u2019m looking for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, this sounds like a parody of like an office space in the future. Like you create the VR meeting and then in the meeting, you decide when to have another meeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes. And then you have like these people in VR pulling out their phone and like \u201cOh, [inaudible 00:36:28] my phone yeah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Right, right. That\u2019s horrible. I don\u2019t want to live in that kind of future honestly. So let\u2019s move on to the more, like, personal level of remote your [inaudible 00:36:39] more on the workers and talent itself. So I want to touch on the subject of a digital nomad, right? I think for companies that are hiring, a lot of companies are still afraid of \u201cdigital nomads,\u201d because they have this perception of not being reliable, like \u201cOh, now you\u2019re in Bali today and you\u2019re in Bangkok tomorrow. We literally can reach out to you because you have no internet,\u201d and so on. How do you think this affect the brand of remote work?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. So there\u2019s a few terms that right now are put together with remote work only for the reason that all of these people happen to work online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0One of them is outsourcing, very common, like outsourcing, offshoring. You know, like, \u201cHey, I don\u2019t know if remote work is something for me because I couldn\u2019t trust in some random agency in the middle of nowhere to do my work.\u201d And I\u2019m like, \u201cThis is not the kind of remote work I have in mind,\u201d right? Another one is working from home. It\u2019s true. A lot of remote workers work from home but like, not by default remote work means that you work from home. I cannot work from home. I work from like small offices all the time, right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>Another one is for example, as you mentioned, digital nomads like I have people telling me \u201cYeah, remote work sounds amazing. I would also love to work from a beach and like work from a pool. That sounds great.\u201d And I like \u201cNo, that\u2019s not the kind of remote workers I know,\u201d like the kind of remote workers I know actually have an office desk that\u2019s absolutely optimized for their own performance. They spend a lot of money on like actually fixing the room.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Exactly, yeah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0They might have a small office with like\u2026 I know people who have small offices with noise cancellation, walls and all this kind of stuff. They don\u2019t go on a beach because that\u2019s just not productive. They wanna be as productive as possible and optimize their own life for their own happiness, you know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I wonder if these terms not even as you said, like damage the brand of remote work to some extent and I think they do. So for example, at Product Hunt or like in most remote teams I know, are very critical of hiring digital nomads in a mission-critical role. So for example, if it\u2019s a person writing content, sure, maybe works. If it\u2019s a program that has to work with multiple other people, I\u2019m not sure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I personally if I do\u2026 Like I\u2019m okay with people doing random, like, one-off, like, a few times when they want to, like going nomad. That\u2019s fine. But it shouldn\u2019t be the default setup. For example, I can only speak for me as my experience. When I do digital nomad and I travel, I need at least one week to actually be back productive. So if I switch locations every week or every two weeks I\u2019m barely productive, you know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It might be useful for other reasons. It might be useful to meet clients. It might be useful to get new experience. It might be useful just to, like, honestly, like just like, wind down a bit. Like, \u201cI can\u2019t do vacation right now, you know, but I need like a little bit of a break. So we have this compromise. That\u2019s fine.\u201d If somebody is a digital nomad and wants to be productive, I personally, at least I need to do this, I recommend staying somewhere at least a month, actually embedding yourself in the local scene, in the local environment, finding out how your productive over there and all this kind of stuff? It\u2019s more like a digital slowmad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I would\u2026this pattern I would recommend. The exception is obviously if it\u2019s your own company. You are one-man person, you know, like or one-girl, company, sure, do whatever you want. If you have to work with other people, stay in one place. There\u2019s a few of these concepts like working from home, off-shoring outsourcing, digital nomad, you know, like a bunch of these terms that just thrown in. Another one is like part-time freelancing for whatever reason. Like, a lot of people, when you talk about remote work, assume that you mean like part-time freelancers who will just do like a few things for you or for your project.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I don\u2019t know why these terms are thrown in. I think it\u2019s because to us as human species, working online is still a new thing. And we\u2019re still like a little bit blurry around the lines and it needs a\u2026like just cultural inertia, like it needs a little bit so that people understand the differences, you know? Maybe that\u2019s the reason. I don\u2019t know. But I believe it borderline damages the brand remote work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, and I think on the flip side, the digital nomad has got a bit too much of a bad rap because as you mentioned, actually, a lot of these digital nomads, I think Peter Levy has tweeted about this while ago. They\u2019re basically so-called digital slowmads. They stay in a country that they\u2019re not\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m completely cool with that model\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, exactly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0\u2026that\u2019s how I travel usually when I actually need to work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, so I think it\u2019s like too quick of a judgment when someone says, \u201cOh, you\u2019re on Instagram. You\u2019re on the beach all the time. You\u2019re not working. You\u2019re a digital nomad. You\u2019re unreliable,\u201d when actually, these persons probably just move like every two months or so.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, I usually\u2026nowadays I differ between digital backpackers and digital slowmads.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm-hmm. You gotta write about, like, an article about the whole terminology\u2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Maybe I\u2019ll do that. Yeah, it\u2019s actually a good idea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. So still on the personal level of remote work, so a lot of companies when they\u2019re hiring, I\u2019ve seen a lot of people that they prefer to hire someone that had experience working remotely, like for an extended amount of time, right? \u201cOh, this person has worked remotely for a project for a couple of months, three or six months.\u201d And some companies accept that, oh, some remote companies,\u201d Okay, you don\u2019t have remote work experience, but it\u2019s okay. We can train you.\u201d So my question will be, do you think the so-called remote readiness, is it a thing?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t know. I see it a little bit like Nick Francis of Help Scout. Like, what kind of questions would you ask somebody to join an office? You just expect that they\u2019re able to join an office. You don\u2019t really ask them like, \u201cHey, do you scream randomly while working? Do you like to be told exactly what to do? Do you\u2026I don\u2019t know, fart while programming?\u201d I have no idea what you would ask somebody like that. But we kind of think we should ask questions to remote workers in a way, like are you actually capable of working remote?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>In my experience, a lot of this stuff actually is just a proxy for bad management because if your processes are set up well, if you actually care for having a good culture, if you care for good onboarding, you can get people who are just skilled in what they do to be happy working remote. You can do that.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>If you don\u2019t have those things, obviously, you would prefer somebody who\u2019s like just fixing whatever problem you have on their own, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I personally don\u2019t care much if people already have like a strong background in remote work if I hire them. I really don\u2019t mind. I also believe it\u2019s really, really hard to judge from an outside if they\u2026for example if you look at a co-located company. Like if they have worked at, I would say, mid-size to large company, it\u2019s a good chance that this company was already a remote company in denial. That like this person worked with four or five people out of which nobody was actually in the same room, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s a realistic chance. It might also be that this person, beforehand, was kind of self-managing anyway. Like, I know a lot of co-located teams where all the engineers only communicate in Slack although they\u2019re in the same room. And it\u2019s completely normal. So where do you draw the line? I would just not draw the line. I would rather check if the people are like a cultural fit, skill fit, hire, period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, that\u2019s a great way to look at it. So we kind of touched about this a little bit. It\u2019s basically about hybrid companies, right? Actually, Arc is also a hybrid company. Some people are distributed, some people are co-located. And I know the sentiments out there is that hybrid companies are usually not ideal because there are chances that the remote team members will feel somewhat left out or something like that. In your opinion is there any way to make or to optimize hybrid\u2026? Yeah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0So as I said before, like<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>I think remote work is more like a spectrum nowadays. So a lot of companies will be hybrid. Even a lot of the companies that you associate with remote work are technically hybrid. They\u2019re just like remote first. They have this attitude of making sure that remote and non-remote people or like remote workers or co-located workers are actually on the same level of information, same layer of communication, you know, and nobody has advantages about the other, and so on and so on.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>There are a few techniques you can do. You can have meetings where everybody who actually will talk will call in. There\u2019s nothing more isolating than to be this one person who watches a table talking about stuff and you barely understand them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Exactly, yeah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s extremely isolating. So what you do is you have everybody who\u2019s going to talk call in. And it\u2019s fine if the other people go into the meeting room, but these people call in, so, like, all of a sudden, everybody is on the same communication layer. The same is true with, like, you have a standard how you actually expect processes to start, you have like specs and handovers, you know, and it\u2019s not like, \u201cHey, we\u2019re starting a project. Yeah, we discussed everything in room blue. Yeah. Just know I will tell you later. No, no, there\u2019s a spec, somebody wrote it, like, read that and it\u2019s the same layer of communication again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So that\u2019s like how you make\u2026and there\u2019s a few hacks like that to make, in a team, the hybrid setup a little bit better. I think a healthy setup or a healthy approach for companies that consider going remote and are by nature will be hybrid is actually just think of it a little bit different. To think about the whole company might not be remote, but individual teams will be remote or at least remote first.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So you have, for example, your customer care team, where there\u2019s like three people in the office, but 10 people remote. This team needs to, by nature because there\u2019s a non-critical mass in the office, they need to work remote first, they need to communicate primarily remote and all this kind of stuff. Nobody in this team will feel isolated. They might not have the same career options. If the company is not well set up, that\u2019s a fair argument to be made. But at least, it\u2019s not that isolating and that limiting, you know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A different one, a very common, people have their infrastructure team remote. They have like a DevOps teams remote. Sometimes people have\u2026and so on and so on. And, like, this is actually a natural pattern that you can use. You can\u2019t just say, for example, this team that handles customer onboarding should now be acting as if they\u2019re remote first. So there is like a non-critical amount of people in the office and a critical amount of people remote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>If, for whatever reason, more people actually happen to be in the office, you know, is there a way that you can change it a bit? Is there, for example, can you like not have them sit next to each other, although this sounds non-productive, you know? But, like, let\u2019s say you have four people in the office and four people remote, maybe these four people in the office shouldn\u2019t sit next to each other. Maybe these four people should, some of them just encourage them to work from home from time to time, you know?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So how can you make the critical amount not to be in the office and then have, like, basically, these sub-teams, be remote-first, learn from these sub-teams what actually works for you, what does not work for you, what do you need to change in the company to be more remote-friendly? You know, and then bring these learnings into the whole company and then, like, start more and more of the company actually remote. If this is the path you wanna go, it\u2019s also fine to stay at that level, obviously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, yeah, that\u2019s fantastic. So I think my last question for today is I think a lot of our audience are, you know, startup founders or even startup workers that are either transitioning from a co-located team and want to be a remote team or start hiring remotely or they just want to start a company and start hiring remote people from around the world, right? Any particular general advice or like this one top advice that you would give to them?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes. How I would approach hiring?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0You start with your network because these are people that you trust and like people that people you know trust, right? Start there. I think this is always the most healthiest thing especially early on as long as you can. Invest in your own brand so that people actually recognize you, want to work with you, and so on and so on. This can be in multiple ways. It\u2019s also useful if you actually want to, at some point, raise money. It\u2019s also useful in front of your customers, you know. So it\u2019s, in general, worth doing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>Be a good place that people actually want to work at, as weird as this sounds. Like, be a company that\u2019s aware about how they are as a company, you know? Like most likely, if you\u2019re a first-time founder, you\u2019re a shitty manager, you know. Be aware of that and try to compensate.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>And I notice because I was a first-time founder and I was a shitty manager, you know. So try to compensate that, obviously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When it comes to hiring, at some point, you will, like, reach the limits of those resources. At that point, I would highly recommend just inbound. That can be on your own site. It can be through platforms like AngelList like we have several hundred thousand people looking for remote work. So it might make sense to, like, have job listings there. It might be on a million other websites where you can do that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So at some point, you wanna invest in inbound. You might also wanna invest in outbound, like, sourcing. For example, at AngelList, we have a good tool for that called Source or there\u2019s tools on competitors like LinkedIn where you can basically start\u2026like at Source, you can look at our tool, you can basically say, for example, something like \u201cI wanna have somebody who used to work with Google, now lives in Europe, and is currently looking for remote work.\u201d [Inaudible 00:50:57] with 60 people that start talking to these people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Another good hack that I strongly believe in for senior hires, is actually reaching out to people for advice, and by that, seeing if there\u2019s a path that they actually take over this role. So if you\u2019re actually looking for somebody who\u2019s\u2026as a CEO\u2026 I mean, you shouldn\u2019t maybe go to like, the top CEO in the world, but like some CEO in your network, or like extended network, get advice from them, like what you should look out for in a good CEO, like what you should find in a good person, what they should actually do, how you as a CEO should step back, and so on and so on, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Maybe there\u2019s even a way that you can convince those people, and in my experience, this actually works quite well. This works for senior hires and engineering as well, finding out like what this role should actually be, who these people should be, and so on and so on. So, actually, leveraging the top end of your network is worth doing here as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Cool.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0The other thing when it comes to hiring, assume that your actual assessment funnel is broken, so double down on your assessment thing as much as you can. A lot of companies have really, really bad assessment pipelines. The classic one in Silicon Valley is like the whiteboard tests and the coding challenges and all this kind of stuff. My personal recommendation here is pair programming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0I see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s a very simple example that relates to your actual problems, like your actual work. Like, maybe if you have like a big site, make a very, very small variation of that site, or one big feature in that site, you know, and ask people together with you to change that. If for whatever reason, you know that you have a very complicated stack, maybe have this in one or two different stacks, you know, so that people who don\u2019t happen to work in Lisp or whatever you\u2019ve decided to use, you know, have a chance to actually use it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But like pair programming is one of the most underutilized things for hiring, and in my opinion, especially remote, really useful. Because you will realize that people who are native speakers tend to be by far better in presenting themselves than people who are non-native speakers. And that\u2019s a bias I have. When I speak to somebody who is a native speaker, I instantly have a very good impression. Like, they seem very eloquent, very smart, right? And like as a non-native speaker always have like this self-doubt about when I speak, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, non-native speakers tend to shine a little bit less in talking, especially this\u2026 If you hire like also in Silicon Valley, you have this extreme. Like here, people are really, really good in presenting themselves, really, really good in talking and you instantly wanna hire this person. And then when they actually do pair-programming, you realize, \u201cHey, turns out they\u2019re not that great.\u201d So I highly recommend pair-programming here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There\u2019s a few other things. And hiring by itself and assessments and recruiting is almost its own science. And it\u2019s always worth iterating on it. But if I would be forced, I would say network, brand, inbound, sourcing and outbound and pair-programming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, that was fantastic. So Andreas, thanks so much for your time today. This is a fantastic chat. I really learned a lot on this. So where can listeners find you online?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0If you wanna reach out to me, the easiest, honestly, is Twitter @andreasklinger, first name last name. Feel free to DM me. If you have any questions, send me. I also actively invest in startups related to remote work or tools for remote work or even remote teams if they\u2019re good. So if you think this might be interesting, like please ping me on Twitter. Also, if you have any questions or just like advice in general or like if you can help with the network, let me know, always happy to help.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes, awesome. So guys, don\u2019t forget to follow Andreas on Twitter. Six of his 10 tweets per day is related to remote work. So if you\u2019re really interested in this topic, don\u2019t forget the follow him. So, Andreas\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Do I really tweet that much? I probably should. Okay, fair enough.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Yeah, you really tweet that much actually. My research for this podcast is just I was scrolling down your Twitter feed. And that\u2019s it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Damn it. I think I have a problem.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0So yeah, Andreas, thanks so much for your time today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Likewise, thanks for having me. This was awesome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0Thank you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Andreas:<\/strong>\u00a0Bye-bye.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jovian:<\/strong>\u00a0And that\u2019s it for another episode of \u201cOutside the Valley,\u201d brought to you by Arc. We created this podcast with the hope that in each episode, you can learn something new from other remote startup people. So if you have any feedback or suggestions, please don\u2019t hesitate to reach out to me at Jovian@arc.dev. It\u2019s J-O-V-I-A-N-@-A-R-C.D-E-V. Or you can find us on Twitter @arcdotdev. See you next week with another episode of \u201cOutside the Valley,\u201d and ciao.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>You can also try <\/em><a href=\"https:\/\/arc.dev\/\">Arc<\/a><em>, your<\/em><em> shortcut to the world\u2019s best remote talent:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>\u26a1\ufe0f Access 450,000 top developers, designers, and marketers <br>\u26a1\ufe0f <em>Vetted and ready to interview<\/em><br>\u26a1\ufe0f Freelance or full-time<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/arc.dev\"><\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/arc.dev\"><strong>Try Arc and hire top talent now \u2192<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Should you hire engineers in Silicon Valley? AngelList&#8217;s Andreas Klinger explains why hiring outside the Valley is the new normal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":156,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-74","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-thought-leadership"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Normalizing Hiring Outside Silicon Valley (Andreas Klinger of AngelList)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Should you hire engineers in Silicon Valley? 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