Working in public in a remote-first world

As I reflect back on 2022, it can be described as “the year of uncertainty.”  We all entered 2022 thinking it was the start of the “new normal,” but instead, it was a rollercoaster ride of so many highs and lows. From navigating COVID restrictions and shutdowns, opening then closing our office, and moving to a fully remote-first culture to preparing for compensation transparency, beating burnout, anticipating a recession, reorganizing our teams, and upleveling our talent.  We analyzed data from our annual and pulse surveys, and one theme remains clear for 2023: keeping our fully distributed employees engaged, informed, and activated.  

In the spirit of creating New Year's Resolutions, one of our People Operations Team resolutions will be to “work in public.”  What does that even mean? Here’s a look back at how our employees at Rhino used Slack in 2022:  

• 53% Direct Messages were sent in Slack

• 25% messages were sent in Public Channels and 22% in Private Channels

• #techsupport had 9,833 posts

• #poem-of-the-day had one single post… and we hope it was a good one

• 2,037 posts in our main team-wide Slack channel

• 77 new Slack channels created

• 335 Donut meetings completed

• Introduced bi-weekly 15 minutes of “fun” via virtual categories and trivia

• Sent 2,205,775 Slacks

With Slack as the primary mode of communication, the challenge for 2023 is to continue activating our employees through engaging content and informative and consistent communication. Additionally, we plan to foster an organized approach to cascading important company updates on goals, performance, and major announcements (accomplishments and failures) via Slack and email.  

Similar to how our Vice President of Product and Engineering, Eric Harper, aligned four clear goals to advance our overall business objectives, our People Team has also set clear goals for 2023:  

1) We plan to lay the talent foundation for growth. We were one of the first, if not leading companies to commit to a structured compensation philosophy with transparent pay bands. We are incredibly proud of being ahead of the curve with our commitment to give transparency into our compensation philosophy. 

2) Clarity on Goals and Performance. We plan to remain a lean organization for the next 18-24 months, which means our talent density and bar for performance will remain very high.  With that in mind, we plan on being very clear, direct, and focused on key achievements and goals in pursuit of maintaining an outcome-driven culture. 

3) Workplace Culture Matters.  In early 2022, we moved into our second office, and near the end of 2022, we decided to go fully remote.  No one is getting hybrid or remote culture right. In fact, there’s no right way to create remote culture. We want to empower teams to work autonomously and collaboratively. We are encouraging teams and investors to share, post, react, and communicate “in public,” which is a much more inclusive approach to communicating.  

Finally, each of our four People Operations team members have very clear goals and work streams, each with one singular accountability leader. As a leaner team, this allows everyone to have direct impact on the broader company goals, and it fulfills a sense of purpose and responsibility.  

On a personal note… I always look forward to a fresh start in the new year to refocus and recenter myself for what’s to come. If 2020, 2021, or 2022 has taught me anything, it’s that we truly need to come to expect the unexpected. Our team stands at the ready!

Juls Fleury

Juls Fleury is the VP of People Operations at Rhino. She's passionate about creating inclusive environments and bringing the best out of employees every single day. She knows that creating solutions for renters starts with the well-being of the team doing the work, and she wishes she could scare security deposits away with garlic like a vampire.