Sophie Wade’s Post

Loved sitting down with Daniel Huerta and Stephen Huerta for an episode of The Modern People Leader to dig deeper into why Dropbox is such a firm believer in our #VirtualFirst model. Here are a few highlights from the episode: ⚖ Finding the right balance in your approach to modern work comes down to HOW you work, not just where you work. A great company culture isn’t tied to a specific building or location. It’s about giving employees agency, trusting them, and providing the right support — essentially, enabling them to be their best selves and do their best work. 🤝 We’re building our Virtual First approach with our employees. We count on our teams across various functions and levels of the organization to share feedback so we can iterate on this model and make it even better. (Spoiler: That also means acknowledging when something in your approach missed the mark — we’re only human! In fact, one of our core values at Dropbox is to Make Work Human.) 🛩 Virtual First doesn't mean virtual only. We discussed Dropbox’s approach to the art of gathering and the different ways we’re intentionally bringing employees together for in-person collaboration. This in-person connection plays a crucial part in our overall effectiveness, impact, well-being and belonging. 🌶 Hot take: Great leaders invest in the growth of other great leaders. Our role as is to enable careers and develop the next generation of leaders, even when their career journey takes them elsewhere. The significance of the part we play here is often overlooked or misunderstood. A special thanks to Daniel and Stephen for having me on the show. Tune into the full episode below! https://t.ly/Nd7WG #Dropbox #FutureofWork #VirtualFirst #HRleaders

Company strategy and organizational strategy are inextricably linked! It was a delight talking with Josh Levine ⚡️ about how this plays out at SimpliSafe and how our culture and approach to hybrid work helps to drive our overall success. #greatmondaysradio #companyculture #hybridworkplace #workplacecollaboration

Every time my team run an offsite, our first day is walks. Not work, not whiteboards, we've not got marker pens, I wouldn't even call it team building. We're going for a walk because we care about each other - Dominic Price It's ingrained in my head. If I have a complex task, don't start with a task. Start with the safety. Make sure the room feels comfortable first - Dom Price We now trust each other to have an argument - Dom Price ----------------------------------- Create trust to unlock points of view and real exploration of alternatives, pros, and cons, without fear of retribution or feelings being hurt. Great strategy for better decisions, more contributions, deeper engagement. Win, win, win. From across the Pacific, an enlightened hour of pragmatic behaviors everyone can try. Thanks again Dom. Full-Length Interview  Dominic Price | Experiment, Feel, Safety, Learning | Work 20XX podcast with Jeff Frick YouTube - https://lnkd.in/gr2hpxK2 - Spotify - https://lnkd.in/gNaqBNgX - Transcript and Show notes - https://lnkd.in/grqagxXC - or wherever you podcast #leadership #trust #culture #bond #connect #human #team #walk #atlassian Atlassian #walkabout #takeawalk #freshair #exercise #empathy #safety #security #host #TeamBuilding #PsychologicalSafety #Connection #rto #office #fow #futureofwork #work #decisions #interview #LIVideo #LevelUpYourLI #TopVoice #Connections #workplace #digital #distributed #hybrid #remote #podcast #work20xx 

I think this is one of the under-the-radar benefits of this explosion of distributed work being adopted is that there's an explosion of tools that have been developed to service that market. - Chase Warrington As someone who wants to see this become more adopted on a wide scale. I love seeing that - Chase Warrington How do we consolidate communication? How do we find documentation and content a lot easier? How do we get to the fewest number of stakeholders and people who have to participate in any given asynchronous conversation? There are some really interesting tools emerging to help support virtual connection and strengthen tighter, deeper bonds with your async or remote-first team, which is also pretty fascinating. - Chase Warrington ---------------- Explosive growth of a market, is followed by explosive investment into technology to service that market. We're seeing that big time in technology to better support remote, distributed, and hybrid work, from communications, to office coordination, procedural handbooks, to improving connection and well-being. As a long time fully remote organization, Chase and team Doist are out front and benefiting directly from this investment. Learn more here. Full Length Conversation  Chase Warrington: Priorities, Abroad, Async, Retreats | Work 20XX with Jeff Jeff Frick  - YouTube - https://lnkd.in/gFDQwHSN - Spotify -https://lnkd.in/gWu3FQg3 - Transcript and Show Notes - https://lnkd.in/deUT7bR7 - or wherever you podcast Chase's 'About Abroad' Podcast, an amazing resources for those that are looking to work and live somewhere else. https://aboutabroad.com/ #RemoteWork #DigitalTools #AsynchronousWork #HybridTeams #Doist #WorkplaceInnovation #TechAdoption #TeamHandbooks #GitLab #Work #ProcessImprovement #DistributedTeams #Collaboration #Workplace #FoW #VirtualConnection #TeamCollaboration #Digital #Distributed #Remote #Hybrid #Interview #Podcast #Work20XX 

💻 🏠 Navigating hybrid work isn’t just about where people sit—it’s about aligning how and why they work. When I spoke with Ai-Li Lim, Chief People Officer at SimpliSafe, their approach stood out: decisions about their hybrid model weren’t just practical—they were rooted in purpose. For a safety and security company like Simplisafe, integration between teams is critical. So, when they set a hybrid schedule, they made sure everyone was in the office on the same days. Why? Because collaboration thrives when the right people are in the room at the right time—not just in the same building. Their decisions leaned heavily on two core values: One Team and Lean and Nimble. By tying the “how” of hybrid work to their culture and business strategy, they made the purpose clear to everyone—from customer support teams who’ve always been on-site to HQ staff adjusting to hybrid. And yes, there were challenges—change is rarely easy—but grounding these shifts in their values helped build understanding and trust. Simplisafe’s approach is a reminder: workplace strategies work best when they reflect your culture and purpose. Tune in to Great Mondays Radio next week to learn more about improving your workplace practices! FIND IT WHEREVER YOU GET YOUR PODCASTS! #GreatMondaysRadio #companyculture #hybridworkplace #workplacecollaboration

Even if you're digital first, that doesn't mean never in person. It really is important that you get teams together - Brian Elliott People who have flexibility in where and when they work are actually more connected to their teams than those that are five days a week in the office - Brian Elliott My giving you the freedom and flexibility is saying that I'm going to base my assessment of you on the outcomes you drive, not whether or not you show up. It says, I trust you. And nothing builds connection like trust in the first place - Brian Elliott ----- Brian is sharing his wisdom in Libson this week at Running Remote. If your not 100% remote, why should you care? Because distributed and digital best practices are VERY applicable to ALL teams when it comes to building connected teams that perform. And Future Forum (with others) have a research library to back that up. Have a Great Show I'll be watching the live stream and on demand session from the other side of the pond. Full-Length interview  Brian Elliott: Connected, Effective, Workplace Future | Work 20XX with Jeff Frick - YouTube - https://lnkd.in/gmB_eH2M - Spotify - https://lnkd.in/gbNNKG2U - transcripts and show notes - https://lnkd.in/gGJruQxf - or wherever you podcast #Leadership #AsynchronousWork #Async #BetterProductivity #Collaboration #CollaborationHours #Connection #Culture #CxO #Defining #Digital #DigitalFirst #Distributed #Effectiveness #EmployeeReward #Flexibility #Hybrid #Interview #RunningRemote #LevelUpYourLI #LIVideo #FutureForum #ManagerialInnovation #Meetings #Office #Manage #PhysicalPresence #ProductiveMeetings #Productivity #Remote #RethinkingMeetings #RTO #Socialization #Team #TeamBuilding #TeamConnection #TopVoice #TrustInTeams #Workplace #WorkplaceCulture #WorkplaceEfficiency #WorkplaceCulture #Podcast #Work20XX

“Today, we’re off to Miami, where people are surprisingly not at the beach. More than most other big American cities, they’re back at the office, if they ever left at all.” So began host Sean Rameswaram on Friday’s “Today, Explained” podcast. Sean’s topic, a hot subject of speculation since Covid made home-based workers out of many of us in 2020, was the current state of remote vs. in-office culture. While I spent a year back then toggling in and out of my office on Wall Street, governed by the severity of the coronavirus strain, Citadel, under Ken Griffin, famously decamped its trading floor to a hotel in Palm Beach. From there, its teams kept on ticking, pretty much business-as-usual. On a podcast earlier this year, I asked Ken if, post-Covid, workers could continue to thrive at their jobs via Zoom. “I find it very hard to believe that will be a successful way to develop human capital,” Ken told me. Now at Citadel, I’ve watched human capital develop, in person, with my own eyes. Walking the floors of our New York offices, I see teams huddled around white boards, working through a range of complex problems. Even the best remote technology has a tough time replicating that human dynamic. So when Sean asked my colleague Jaquelyn Scharnick if we could share some of our learnings, she introduced him to Hasan A., a Miami-based software engineer at Citadel Securities, and Alexander DiLeonardo, the company’s chief people officer. Hasan, 22, earned a degree in computer science and business from The University of British Columbia. In his young career, he’s had internships at Enverus, Databricks, and Meta before joining our firm. Beyond the tech, gym, and food at his fingertips, he says his most powerful perk is his daily face-to-face interactions with others. “I think it definitely lends itself towards more creativity, collaboration, Hasan told Sean on Friday’s episode. “I think that I'm learning a lot more right now being in the office than being at home. And I'm getting a lot more done, to be honest with you.” While Hasan’s setup isn’t for everyone – and, certainly, those chiseling away at the Great American Novel don’t do that around a white board - Alex DiLeonardo puts a fine point on it. “If you survey knowledge workers – and there's many there's much public data on this – they say the most important thing in the value proposition that they expect from their employer is the ability to learn,” Alex told Sean. “And we believe that learning happens best in person.” It doesn’t hurt that the learning is happening in Miami, a cultural and lifestyle melting pot fast becoming a global capital of finance and tech. “The juices are flowing here,” Hasan observed on the podcast. Vox’s “Today, Explained” episode is worth a listen.

Remote and effective for the last 18+ years, I read “management’s” current drive towards “back at the office” as “this is how we always did it.” Research shows it’s not about productivity - we’re more productive when we have more flexibility. Sure - innovation, learning, development - those require the presence of senior leaders with time and motivation to question, teach, motivate. But my experience is that even when I schedule that one week “in the office,” the leaders don’t really take the time to meet, educate, drive. When do they? Corporate retreats and conferences when everyone is there for the same reason. If you really want innovation, learning, development: schedule quarterly events when that’s all you do. Make us all show up to focus on the same thing. Everyone in the office is about the illusion of control - it’s not really about productivity, innovation or learning. It’s about seeing faces at the desks.

Why Slack users can’t get any work done Levels Co-Founder and CEO Sam Corcos was a guest on David Perell’s How I Write podcast to talk about workplace productivity and why Slack prevents people from doing deep work. Slack creates a culture of always being available, even when you need to concentrate on a task or project. Slack behaves like text messaging, generating a sense of urgency in reading and responding to messages. With “pseudo synchronous” tools like Slack, research shows the average tech worker can’t go six minutes without checking a communications tool. Do you want a better way to communicate across teams that doesn’t disrupt your coworkers? Watch the episode - https://lnkd.in/gv2XfGUJ Check out Comms - https://comms.day/#cta #worksmarter #timemanagement #inboxzero #slack #productivity #productivitytips #deepwork #inboxzerotips #batchprocessing #worklifebalance #productivityhacks #productivityhack #saas #productivitytools #workplaceproductivity #inboxmanagement

Dropbox CEO Drew Houston on solving the biggest problem with modern work: “It's a thousand paper cuts. It's like, 'Oh, I can't find the thing I'm looking for, and now I've got 10 different places where my content lives.' The complexity has exploded, which means the idea of having one organized place for your stuff is further and further out of reach for people every day." Listen to the latest podcast episode of Working Smarter.