Katy Peichert

Remote way of living is not easy, and there is tons of recent evidence of the common challenges described over the past couple of years given the adoption en masse.

Why do I talk about remote life and not ‘remote work’? First of all, the division of so-called work-life balance is to me essentially artificial. Work is a huge part of life, and now, more than ever, people are trying to embed it in the way of living they projected, especially after very challenging years of the global pandemic, among other ongoing crises and ever-present change.

Secondly, there is no such thing like one recipe for remote living – some choose digital nomadism, some decide to move away from the overpopulated areas, some want to work in the surroundings which are aligned with their neuro-cognitive preferences (hello fellow ambi-, and introverts :). People who can no longer imagine long commute, working in open spaces, shifting freedom for ‘presentialism’ anymore when things can be done pretty much from anywhere, at any time, in any way one works and lives best*.
*Given they could because there are still a lot of jobs which do require in-person presence.

Still, even for the biggest remote / freedom advocates like me, remote life brings lots of challenges. I miss socializing more than ever – and this motivates me for building social life outside of the 9-5 context, often with people who are very different than I am, or work on something completely else. I find this enriching, and at the same time, healthy and inspiring, as I am curious by nature.

I still miss my friends and my colleagues, or business partners, who are living thousands of miles away. And more than ever, I try to make an effort to travel and work from the locations which allow for face-time and reconnection. This is not always possible nor sustainable though.
And when I mention it, I mean authentic, humane exchange and not superficial, rapid scrolling through the social media feed which adds to the digital fatigue, another challenge of nowadays.

This is why living remotely one needs to learn that the human communication, its nature, frequency is somewhat Async.

Adjusting the way we communicate with fellow humans – be it colleagues, team mates, friends or clients / business partners / our network. Making sure there is no perfect timing nor way of broadcasting and receiving information, in the times of the digital fatigue. However, there is a way to navigate this complexity and preferences.

In my previous role at BRYTER, and as a leader in the companies like The Workshop, I encouraged the new joiners during their onboarding process to create their personal communication style preference sheet. When is their deep work focus, when to best schedule a ‘watercooler convo’ / v-coffee and what is their preference for receiving / digesting information.

I am personally an avid reader and writer so I love to send / receive text and often got a feedback that I write a lot. I know that for certain groups I need to adjust for brevity or using another channels. Starting from my mom, and most of my friends, the preference is to hear my voice more than reading through an essay to get my regular updates. My former team mates preferred that I recorded instructional or coaching content using tools like Loom or Slack videos. Then, there are even those who would receive an audio or a video but would rather reply using bullet points or comments. 

Anything goes, as long as we reach our objective, to communicate clearly, intentionally and in a way that fits our own personal preferences. The recipients should understand that and bear in mind the cultural, personal, or neuropsychological preferences. 

Living in complex, distributed, and global reality may be challenging but at the same time, the organizations using the async approach to get in sync will surely outgrow the traditional ones, which need everyone in one room, at the same time, and using the only possible way to communicate: The Death by a Meeting (chapeau, Patrick Lencioni for writing this masterpiece way ahead of the Async times).