Home office tools: How Raidboxes works despite Corona

We at Raidboxes have been using our home office for some time now, either partially or completely. We are coping with difficult phases like COVID-19 much better this way. Do you work in an agency or as a freelancer and are still looking for the right infrastructure? We have a lot of experience with home office tools. And are happy to pass it on to you.

In this article, you will find the most important tools for distributed working. We'll also tell you how to use them as efficiently as possible. Does your team still have little experience of working from different locations? Then also read our articles Advantages & disadvantages of remote working and Remote leadership: location-independent agencies.

Before we get started, a little tip: Raidboxes can help you through the current crisis: Are you planning a platform for your region on which local retailers, restaurateurs and service providers can present themselves digitally? Then take a look at our #SupportYourLocals initiative. Are you using our FREE DEV program to host your projects with us for free during the development phase? Then we will extend this phase if required - uncomplicated and unbureaucratic.

Slack: Organize distributed teams

Slack is a type of chat service for companies, agencies and teams. Many companies in the technical environment and in the WordPress scene organize themselves entirely via Slack. Especially when some of the employees work from home, as is the case with Raidboxes. More and more companies are even working completely remotely - without a central office. Tools like Slack are then indispensable.

Here's a little insight into how we use Slack:

• Direct communication: Want to ask a quick question without leaving your desk? You can chat directly with someone or put together any number of people in the company/team for a group chat. Files can also be uploaded and exchanged.
• Channels: Discussions or results that are only of interest to individual teams are communicated and organized in special channels.
• Notifications: Specify which type of notification you want to receive for which messages and channels in order to be informed immediately. Or mute individual channels to only read them from time to time.
• Ping: A message is particularly important? Do you want the other person or the team to be informed immediately? You can use so-called pings for this.
• Status: In a status channel, we communicate whether we are currently working and can be reached. Or whether we are taking a break or do not want to be disturbed ("tunnel"). Slack also offers its own function and labeling for this.

We use special channels set up specifically for certain tasks. For example, channels that are not used for discussion, but where only work results and minutes are shared.

Channels of a more private nature channel everything that is fun but not directly related to work. The advantages of Slack and similar services:

• Work productively: If you stand in front of your colleagues' desks every time you have a question or comment, you will inevitably interrupt their work. Slack allows you to control who wants to read what and when. This increases efficiency - if used correctly.
• Avoid distraction: Slack can also make for chaotic communication. It is therefore important to systematically use functions such as joining/following, muting, status messages, pinging, threads, etc.
• Inform yourself: You decide where you want to read along. Or you can leave a channel if it is no longer relevant to you.
• Archive: You can search for past entries. In this way, all communication within the company - as well as its results - is documented. This is important to avoid duplicate discussions.
• Remote connection: With consistent use of Slack, employees working from home are just as informed as the teams on site.

You can also use Slack to make calls or hold online meetings - with or without a camera. We no longer use this function ourselves as the quality and performance were too poor for us. More on this later. Do you have any questions about using Slack or the other applications listed here? The comments are open.

Microsoft Teams serves as an alternative to Slack. It can also be used to combine chats, meetings, notes and attachments. Thanks to the connection to Office 365, the service is likely to be particularly worthwhile for companies that already have a strong infrastructure for Microsoft.

Google Meet: Video conferencing for companies

Google provides a variety of tools for companies. These are mostly easy to use and geared towards virtual collaboration. This also applies to Google Meet. The tool is still known to most as Google Hangouts. There are apps for Android and iOS to take part in online meetings. However, you can also dial in purely via the browser, with Chrome being the best connected.

Firefox, Edge and Apple Safari are also supported. External guests can be integrated via an invitation link or a meeting ID. Meet is integrated into the Google Suite. This is particularly useful if you use other Google tools, such as the calendar. A suitable link for the meeting is then generated for each meeting entry if required.

We at Raidboxes have also created several fixed virtual meeting rooms. The link always remains the same. We then meet in "Münster", "Freiburg", "Hamburg" or "Magdeburg" - the last three are the locations of our remote employees. This means we can arrange to meet quickly and easily, even for spontaneous meetings.

Otherwise, we use the online meetings for a wide variety of purposes. Sometimes for meetings on site with a "switch" to the remoters (top right, the picture was taken before Corona), or for a virtual after-work beer or water in home office times:

Video conferences are difficult to handle above a certain size. We also notice this when almost all employees connect from home, as is the case now - in times of corona. If an online meeting has more than ten participants, you need to organize it clearly. For example, with the following rules and options:

• Moderation: Someone should lead the meeting, solicit contributions, move discussions that get out of hand and control the time frame.
• Agenda: Do you have problems keeping to the structure? A document shared in advance and edited by everyone will help you. In it, you define together which points are to be discussed.
• Mute: Do you want to improve the audio quality? Then everyone should mute themselves as long as they are only listening.
• Accompanying chat: Most systems support a chat function alongside the audio or video track. You can use it, for example, to get in touch if you want to be considered by the moderator.
• Split screen: Does your team want to work centrally on a document? Or someone wants to present something to the others? This is also possible using the "Share screen" function.

We used to use Slack Calls for video calls at Raidboxes. But as the team grew in size, the problems became more frequent: Breakdowns in the conferences and poor sound and video quality. Google Meet has been more stable so far, even with low bandwidth. For example, when working from home or on the move. Test which service is best for you. Other alternatives are Skype from Microsoft or Zoom.

Aircall: Flexible telephone

Not all of your customers or partners can be reached via chat, Slack, Skype & Co. And not all employees have or want a business smartphone. That's where the good old telephone comes in, in its modern version. With service providers such as Aircall, you can make calls from your company computer. Regardless of whether you use the world of Microsoft or Apple.

In the age of IP telephony, call quality is no longer a problem. Thanks to your own "landline" number, nobody notices where you are calling from - you can set the area code yourself if required. And you can be reached at any time. Assistants such as the virtual answering machine provide additional support. Most providers also allow you to create shared numbers for individual teams.

Or you can connect the virtual phone to your CRM or helpdesk. Aircall offers integration for, among others:

• Salesforce
• Zoho (more on this in a moment)
• Slack
• Hubspot
• Zendesk
• Intercom
• Microsoft Dynamics & Microsoft Teams

An interface to WordPress (partly via Gravity Forms) and WooCommerce is even possible via third-party providers. This raises the question of whether this makes sense - your CRM will normally be the first port of call here.

Google Calendar: Keeping an overview

Who works when, where and on what? What meetings and external appointments are taking place? Who is on vacation or sick? Which employees are currently in the office and which are working from home? Corona and similar challenges mean you can quickly lose track here. That's when a virtual calendar makes sense.

But even this can quickly become confusing. For example, if there are several teams with different meeting structures. This can be remedied by different levels in the calendar, which can be shown or hidden as required. For example, the Raidboxes calendar differentiates between the categories:

• Internal meetings
• External business appointments
• Information such as home office status
• Vacation
• Support
• Occupancy of the "real" meeting rooms in Münster

Depending on our role in the company, we can only display the information that is relevant to our work. Looking for an alternative to Google's calendar? Dr. Web has created a test of the most important calendar apps. It also presents solutions such as Wunderlist (soon to be replaced by Microsoft To Do) or Todoist, which link the calendar with to-do lists.

Zoho Sprints: Project management and task management

Of course, it is not only important for remote organizations with a high proportion of home office work to plan their projects well. However, it becomes even more important in distributed teams because there is no regular coordination on site. Otherwise, individual tasks are left undone or even duplicated. Every agency needs a method and a suitable tool for this. Even as a freelancer, it will help you to manage yourself in sprints.

We have tried out several tools for planning our projects for technology, marketing, support and sales. These include Trello, Hygger and GitScrum. Other options include Asana and Hive. In the end, we chose Zoho with its Sprints module.

The way the tools work is always similar:

• Management of tasks: Employees and teams enter their tasks or projects as "tasks", sometimes weighted according to urgency. Example: "Write contribution tools for the home office". You can also use this to assign tasks to others in the team.
• Correct assignment: The tasks are assigned to different "boards". These usually reflect the departmental structure in the company. This means you only ever see the tasks that are relevant for you and your colleagues.
• Map structure: Individual tasks can be grouped into projects to maintain an overview. Sub-tasks of the example just mentioned would be "Create post image", for example, if you want to proceed in such a granular way. The blog post could be part of a higher-level project "e-book for agencies".
• Automatic schedule: Each task is regularly categorized. Is it a task or idea for the future ("backlog")? Should it be completed in the current sprint? Is it already in progress or already completed? Where have tasks been left behind?
• Joint coordination: Your team regularly discusses the current status in meetings. This quickly makes it clear who needs support or where capacity is available for additional tasks.

With consistent implementation, you can see immediately if the schedule of a sub-project is at risk. You can then reallocate your resources accordingly. Project management (PM) also disciplines a team and its members not to accumulate too many tasks for a sprint. Used correctly, your agency will finally end up with realistic time management.

Have you never worked with a PM tool before? Then the way you work will seem unfamiliar at first. You or your team will also need a while before the tool is used consistently and filled with tasks. However, you will usually see the first successes soon. Then you won't want to do without your project management anymore.

Google Cloud: Shared access to documents

Of course, applications such as Google Cloud do much more than simply manage documents. The spectrum ranges from joint project development and machine learning to comprehensive web analytics. In times of coronavirus, however, it is the simple things that make everyday work more convenient:

• Shared information: everyone in the company has access to the same documents at all times.
• Stringent data storage: This means that there is no longer an archive spread across various company computers and no different file and data statuses. Access is retained if a person is absent.
• Fewer resources: The team also saves storage space, an important contribution to sustainability. Backups are also easier to perform and can be managed centrally.
• More security: Do you work in your home office with a notebook or a private computer? Then you may or should not save most files locally for data protection and security reasons.

At the same time, you can get your work done faster. Have you been moving files back and forth in Slack & Co. up to now? In future, you'll just send the link to the document. That's faster and more efficient.

Such a cloud archive needs to be well organized so that it really helps you. Pay particular attention to the following points:

• Structured approach: Even in the cloud, you can quickly lose track of things if there are too many or too few folder levels. Check your structure regularly. If necessary, only one person should be able to create or delete new folders.
• Old and redundant data: Define rules on who should save which files when and where. This includes a role per team that cleans up from time to time.
• Project managers: For individual projects in particular, you need people responsible for filing logs, quotations, invoices, etc. Otherwise, all data will end up being stored locally. Otherwise, all data will end up being stored locally. This approach also pays off if another person takes over the project.
• Central storage location: Documents that are regularly processed by several employees in particular require a central version - stored in a concise location. Otherwise, several versions and different work instructions will quickly exist.

Your company is not allowed or does not want to work with Google software? Then take a look at services such as Dropbox or Microsoft OneDrive. Pay close attention to the data protection conditions in each case.

Google Docs, spreadsheets and more

It's not hard to see: The dependency on Google is quite high in many start-ups and agencies. This is not least due to the fact that the Mountain View-based company cleverly combines the factors of compatibility, easy access, brand awareness and low entry-level prices. We opted for Google Docs & Co. for the same reasons. We use them throughout the company, for example to document projects and processes together.

Virtual documents make collaboration easier for us, especially in marketing. Internally, but also in collaboration with our external authors or content partners. This is paying off now that we are working completely remotely - and our guest authors sometimes have more time to create new articles:

• Editors: If the text comes as a Google Doc, we can make comments directly in it, edit the content and have the changes approved by the authors. That saves a lot of time.
• Brainstorming: New ideas for articles are constantly emerging - more than can be implemented. We collect these in a Google Sheet. We can then weight them and gradually implement them based on our keyword strategy.
• Editorial plan: Our editorial plan is also a Google spreadsheet with several tabs. Among other things, we can see the status of currently planned posts, the forward planning for the coming weeks, which categories are served and how often, which guest posts are pending, who has applied and how high the costs for external content are.
• Content strategy: Our content strategy is set out in a detailed multi-stage document. Google Docs allows us to constantly expand and adapt the strategy together and add new projects. At the same time, we discuss new points in proposal mode. Changes are documented.

The beauty of such tools is that they work across hardware boundaries. All you need is a license for the document in question and then you can edit it from a browser. Most employees at Raidboxes work with Apple, but some also work with Microsoft. Our authors and partners are similarly diverse.

With virtual tools, this no longer matters. If necessary, you can still export your Google Docs and spreadsheets. In the following formats, among others:

• Microsoft Word or Excel
• OpenDocument
• RTF, PDF, .txt
• CSV
• HTML
• EPUB (for e-books)

Or you can create a copy in your cloud with one click to create different versions. Do you work with external content suppliers or agencies? Then pay attention to which documents you share. You can differentiate here between read-only and write permissions.

TeamViewer: Remote access and remote maintenance

Are your employees increasingly working from home? Even then, the computers still need to be maintained. Urgent updates, security vulnerabilities or the elimination of technical problems cannot be postponed until adversities like Corona are over again. The solution is programs like TeamViewer or AnyDesk. With them you can:

• Connect you to an external workstation
• Troubleshoot together with the respective employee or instruct the other person
• Roll out updates on the other computer
• Monitor its security, etc.

At Raidboxes, we have only used such solutions sporadically so far, as most employees regularly work in the office. However, the number of our remote colleagues is growing. We are also currently pleased that the infrastructure for distributed working is already fully in place.

Time recording: HeavenHR

Until now, the tool-supported documentation of working times at Raidboxes was voluntary. Those who wanted to could track their times via Clockify. Because some people love systematic time recording, others reject it. Legal requirements forced us to introduce a standardized solution. We now use HeavenHR for this. It is a comprehensive HR management suite, and the documentation is just one component of it.

And this is how working time management works in our case:

• Tracking: Each of us logs in and out in the browser or via an app when a working day begins or ends. Breaks are recorded in the same way.
• Transparency: Employees have a real-time overview of how long their working day and working week already lasts. Or what overtime has been worked in the past.
• Time account: We can convert this overtime into compensatory time off (days off) directly in the tool. We also take and manage our vacation via HeavenHR.
• Rights management: Raidboxes gives us the freedom of self-management when applying for leave etc. See our article on the Holacracy model, which we use successfully.

I myself was never a fan of systematic time recording. Too often I felt pressured by the tools. But in a fair company, such doubts fade into the background. What's more, the programs are so easy to use that they quickly become second nature.

Working from home: much easier with the right tools

I now start HeavenHR every morning, followed immediately by Slack. I also post my status in the relevant channel. I have to leave my computer at home for a moment because the letter carrier rings? That's quite simple:

1. A short "afk" (for "away from keyboard") in the status channel
2. Followed by a "re" ("back")
3. Done.

In between, I manage my tasks in Zoho, in Google Docs or in the virtual editorial plan. I've been working completely from home for nine years. But even in an on-site company, I would no longer want to do without the applications listed here.

I see my colleagues regularly - unfortunately only virtually via video conference at the moment. With the right tools, you'll get used to working from home more quickly. And it gradually becomes more efficient. Nevertheless, I'm looking forward to visiting Münster again as soon as possible. For me personally, no tool in the world can replace contact with my colleagues.