Improve Remote Working Experience using My Journey
I hope to improve the experiences of anyone finding working from home challenging by sharing my own experiences and insights of remote working.
My Journey as a Remote Worker and Leader
I started full-time in 2014 on secondment in Kuala Lumpur (KL), Malaysia. Although based from the KL office, I interacted with solely Brisbane, Australia based colleagues. All my value was delivered through online platforms such as Git, Skype and email (video calls weren’t typically used back then).
Whist based in KL, I took my laptop jetting around Asia and Europe. I worked in random environments ranging from hotels, train stations, park benches, beaches, gyms and cafes. Basically anywhere that had a secure and decent wifi connection.
In 2015, I moved to HK permanently. I worked in Hong Kong from my 300 sqft. studio apartment and interacted with only Brisbane colleagues for nearly 4 years. With the time saved in commuting, I acquired my MBA and focused on growing my knowledge on how to manage people effectively through self-reflection and study. From 2016, I started to grow my remote leadership experience, through training new hires and implementing productive agile development teams in Australia, Indonesia and Kuala Lumpur from Hong Hong.
Throughout this time, I continued to achieve positive growth in my career as a Senior Developer. This offered me a promotional position back in Brisbane as a Technical Architect. In less than six months after that, I was promoted to the Development Manager after returning to the office full-time.
At present, due to covid-19, I’m back at home working full-time remotely. I must say, it’s like “riding a bike”. But this time, as a remote leader I’ve experienced a new set of challenges that I’ll continue to share in future posts.
I aim to share my thoughts in an honest way that reflects what I experienced whilst working from home. I can only hope I end up helping someone reading to cope better with the situation we’re all in based on my own experiences.
