Month removed. We summarize and share life hacks from the leaders of the working groups of the Jet Infosystems

We began to switch to remote work in mid-March, which was not difficult for our company technically: in particular, we are organizing virtual workplaces (VDI) and helped equip remote access to many large Russian companies. At that time, another important question remained open: can we work just as efficiently from homes and summer cottages, surrounded by beloved children, other relatives and pet-hungry animals.

Breakfast with top managers, seals and ironing boards

To prevent our employees from feeling too isolated, we launched a telephone hotline where you can get advice or seek help, including with a personal problem.

Once a week we have online breakfasts with top management, where any employee can ask a question and get an answer from one of the company’s leaders. Now many admit that in the office they have never communicated so often with top management.

Of the positive aspects, we can note the booming prosperity of our telegram channels and social services. networks – we notice that we have begun to learn more about the work of other units than in the office, communicating mainly with our team. At the beginning of the era there were funny attacks of spontaneous flash mobs, for example, we shared photos of our new jobs, someone had to sit in the middle of repairs in the country, and one of our leaders hid from the children in the dressing room, surrounded by his wife’s outfits, hoisted on the ironing board computer. By the way, many admitted that the ironing board turned out to be an ideal work surface – it is mobile, it can be adjusted in height, and the width allows you to expand everything you need for work.

Then someone posted a photo of their cat, and away we go: the cart was filled with seals. Owners of dogs and other animals did not keep silence for long: when the cats had exhausted themselves, the people began to show their dogs, parrots and rats to their colleagues.

In peacetime, most Jetovtsy travel regularly: and now in a nostalgic outburst we started the baton of memories of the most unusual trips on our Instagram.

Surprisingly, in this way we better recognized our colleagues from the other, “non-business” side, seeing each other at home, with children and animals, in nature and traveling.

About mentoring

For those who first encountered problems of self-organization on a remote site, and do not know where to start, we have good advice from Galina Levitskaya, Head of the Jet Infosystems Business Systems Implementation Center: “Nearly 90% of people do not plan work time. Their planning horizon is a working day, nothing more. If you have not yet been involved in time management, choose a person in your company, in your environment whom you consider effective and successful, contact him for advice and try to follow his advice and instructions. We at the company practice the tradition of mentoring, it helps a lot to develop new employees. ”

About the dark side of udalenka

The negative aspects of a remote lifestyle were also discovered. Roman Gribkov, the deputy head of the department and the head of the working group says: “First of all, communications have become very long. Previously, when you are sitting with someone nearby, you can drop a task through the room, but now you need to call and chat. In addition, people miss live communication, start talking to you a little longer, and it eats up more time that you could spend on tasks.

For employees, it has changed that tasks are now being delivered in a larger volume, for the future. We give more tasks because there is no direct access and you cannot shout through the room at any time: “Look at this!” “I often call my team in the morning and outline tasks for the day. It is very important for everyone now to receive feedback from managers, first of all, the timing of tasks and their priority.”

Galina Levitskaya, the head of the Center for the Implementation of Business Systems, said that it was complicated for her team: “Skype For Business (we use it for internal communications) is a thing that allows everyone to be pulled at any time, and if you previously thought whether to call a person after 18.30, now, as soon as you need to inform something, you do it despite the time. The boundaries of personal space have been erased, but as far as I can see, everyone likes it, despite being tired. It was hard for the visuals to be removed, but the messengers and Zoom minimized the discomfort. “

Another side effect of the many conferences and video meetings that many encounter: when you recorded something during the meeting, you seemed to listen carefully, and after 2 days forgot half of the context. To solve this problem, employees learned to use the “30 second rule”: sit down and spend 30 seconds immediately after the meeting to view what you recorded. This completely changes your perception of what you saw and heard. As a result, you can even remember the context you need after a long time.

About Jedi techniques and individual nature

In our company and in ordinary times, books on self-organization are popular, and now many admit that they even more felt the need for them. For a long time studying various techniques Maxim Belitsky, head of department, shares his experience:

“When you constantly try to optimize your tasks and time, you try different approaches, there comes a time when you start to consciously do things and be more organized and efficient, and you can evaluate by yourself how much you are doing. The main thing is to learn how to clearly assess your scope of tasks and be able to distinguish them by degree of importance. At this point, a reference point appears.

“The main thing that I understood is telling Roman Gribkov: Do not try to fully apply some kind of time management system that this or that author offers, because this is not universal knowledge, and is not suitable for everyone. It’s better to pick up a few tricks from different sources that are right for you, and in the complex it will work. I used to try to find a single secret in all these books that will help me solve everything at once. I did not find it, because it does not exist. Do not try to look for a universal rule for life, you will not find it.

One of the tricks that I use is the “Rule of two minutes”: Max Dorofeev says that this rule can be dangerous, because you can get stuck in a heap of small tasks and not do something large-scale and important. But it suited me. When I take my mail apart, if the letter takes no more than 2 minutes, I immediately process it so that it will not be returned to it.

Also at Max Dorofeev I spied a good methodology for compiling a list of tasks: I always write myself the first action that I have to do to complete some big task. It helps me get involved in it quickly. Of these little tricks, I made up my own self-organization system, but I got the idea from David Allen, the author of “Getting Things Done”. I tried to make my system absolutely perfect and fully correspond to it. But I realized that this is impossible: a system is a living organism that will constantly need to be reviewed and redone.

The same thing with different programs: not a single program and not a single diary will be 100% convenient for you. At first I did not believe this, but when I went through hundreds of programs and scribbled hundreds of diaries, I realized that in some ways they were all uncomfortable. In the end, I came to the conclusion that when my system crashes and I start to get lost in it, I just move from one diary to another, or from one program to another, thereby reviewing my entire system of self-organization, revealing everything that there’s superfluous, and I’m adding something new. Such a life hack on the subject of perestroika. ”

“In general, a system of self-organization and personal effectiveness is an individual thing. I recommend it to all those who greatly expand the list of responsibilities and tasks in order to reduce stress. Do not try to do everything perfectly: you will spend a lot of energy, and still you will not succeed. Do well, it will be most effective, ”concludes Maxim.

About anxiety disorders and perfectionism of IT specialists

Some of our employees shared that on a remote site they began to feel anxious, feeling that they had not done enough. Galina Levitskaya says: “We, IT specialists, need to remember that perfectionism is our professional deformation, we are taught this in universities. For example, we had the subject “Programming Technology”, and they said that only 10% of the developer’s working time is occupied by direct algorithms, and the remaining 90% of the time is bypass traps and “protection against the fool”. 90% of our activity is the search for ways to secure.

I can advise one very effective technique: you write out two columns directly on paper: in the first you list your job responsibilities, in the second what you yourself demand from yourself in your professional activity. And you will see that there is no more terrible judge for a man than himself. This will help to understand what your work (1) and your internal stress (2) are composed of.

Allocate a time slot for yourself in order to write a list of tasks and divide them by importance and urgency – say, half an hour a day. Plan all stress-generating factors and task control measures on the calendar. The fact is that the greatest tension is brought not by the fact that you are nervous, but by the fact that you keep these chains in your RAM. If you use a systematic approach, you will have a picture of what you are responsible for and how to properly manage it.

I would like to draw attention to the fact that people and their attitude to time management are divided into right- and left-hemisphere: lists help the left-hemisphere, right-hemispherical – color differentiation, markings, associative approaches. Everyone probably knows what type of people they are. If your right hemisphere prevails, do not torture yourself with lists, make colorful schemes.

And, remember that our main task is to preserve our mental integrity. ”

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