Designing Distributed: Leading Doist’s Fully Remote Design Team in Six Countries
Summary
- How to collaborate without borders — workflows and tools to successfully execute high quality designs (Dropbox, Sketch, Figma, etc)
- Management techniques for remote leaders and how to establish trust and goals.
- Best practices for team alignment, particularly when you’re not in the same office or time zone.
- What work-life balance means to Ana, particularly now that WFH is the global norm.
Key Insights
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DeWist differentiates between remote work and emergency work-from-home during the pandemic, despite longstanding remote experience.
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Trust is fundamental; DeWist avoids employee monitoring software and focuses on work quality, not hours logged.
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Employees at DeWist design their own flexible schedules based on natural productivity rhythms and life needs, like Gonzalo's night schedule or Becky's gym breaks.
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Transparency is practiced by making nearly all internal communications public, including leadership discussions and post-mortems.
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The company experienced a 50% expansion in work cycle times during 2020 while keeping scope constant to accommodate human stress.
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Asynchronous communication via a custom tool without 'online' indicators helps reduce pressure for immediate responses and supports global time zones.
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Meetings are minimized, short, and focused on brainstorming or personal check-ins, never used as primary decision-making forums.
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Care for mental health is open and normalized at DeWist; burnout is publicly acknowledged to foster understanding and support.
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Detailed documentation (product, design, implementation specs) is key for knowledge sharing and onboarding across teams and time zones.
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Effective remote leadership means creating safe space for vulnerability, encouraging self-care, reminding about vacation usage, and promoting accountability with clear task ownership.
Notable Quotes
"Remote work is totally different from working from home during a worldwide pandemic."
"Without trust, no relationship can prosper, yet many companies still install tracking software that employees try to circumvent."
"We evaluate the work and not the amount of hours."
"We do not have online indicators in our communication software, so people know they shouldn’t wait for an immediate response."
"We organize our work around our life, instead of our life around our work."
"Asynchronous communication allows us hours of deep and focused work."
"Meetings don’t exist for decision making but for brainstorming, catching up, and one-on-ones."
"We openly talk about burnout and mental health so people feel comfortable reaching out when they need to."
"We document everything from product specs to implementation and design specs to prevent knowledge silos."
"Start with trust by default; most people won’t disappoint you and will deliver responsibly."
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