Scrabble lesson on Remote Working

So, not too long ago I was able to get hold of my teenager kids for a game of scrabble ! (this itself should get me sort of medal in the attention-deficit world).

I always understood you could win in scrabble by being good at making words and long words. Staring at the scrabble board it easily became apparent it was really about location and not about words. A 3-letter word with a high scoring alphabet on the red corner, would be far more valuable than a complex and long word in a no-bonus location.

On these long flights, I have often stared at the map on the video screen, far too long than a rational person would. Noticing all the economically successful cities in the world - from LA, SF to NYC, London, Singapore, Mumbai and so on - almost all were near the coastal line. Later I read somewhere, most migrants tend to settle in the coastal cities. Increasing diversity and increasing prosperity.

Traditionally, a company has always been recruiting near its offices. For one simple reason that you need to meet, collaborate and come to physical office. Before 2020, there were some eclectic companies who were fully remote, but were mostly disregarded as outliers.

Cut to today in 2022 and beyond, having a diverse workforce in remote locations is the single largest strategic weapon available to all companies. At WS, we are seeing this. We are seeing this with customers. You can see this everywhere.

(check: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/13/10-companies-that-switched-to-permanent-hybrid-or-remote-work-and-hiring-right-now.html)

Remote working is creating diversity , providing access to employees not possible before and enhancing lifestyle of employees. ( the ultimate goal of employment in my opinion).

Remote could be A) fully offsite when its another location or B) hybrid - part office, part home. At WS, we now have adopted a cadence of 3 days in office Tue-Thu. And at the same time there are fully remote colleagues across multiple cities and countries.

It's pretty clear now, that the legendary companies of tomorrow will invariably work in fully remote or hybrid setup. Who knew that going Remote would be the secret sauce to growth!

The big question is: Will Trouser sales go down? :)

Yours Remotely,

Sid

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