Remote Work Shouldn't Mean You Never Meet Your Colleagues In Person

Remote Work Shouldn't Mean You Never Meet Your Colleagues In Person image

It's no secret that X-Team is a proud remote-first company. Because our software engineers are located in over eighty countries, it's not uncommon for X-Teamers not to meet their colleagues in person for many years.

For this reason, we have built a vibrant online community with events like the X-Summit, GameCon, X-Mas, and many more. We have also deeply incorporated remote work best practices, such as asynchronous communication, meetings-as-last-resort, and flexible working hours.

We fully believe that you can build great things, be financially successful, and create a sense of community as a fully remote company. But we also understand that there's something irreplaceable about meeting your colleagues in person.

That's why we created the X-Outpost, a funded travel experience where X-Teamers live together in a new country to both work and explore for a few weeks. Over the years, X-Teamers have traveled to dozens of countries, and they often come back saying that the X-Outpost was a place for converting colleagues into friends.

But that's not all. X-Team's software engineers work with top tech companies like Coinbase, Kaplan, and Riot Games. It's not uncommon for our partners to ask if our software engineers can physically meet their teams. If given proper notice, this is something we can happily agree to, not least because our engineers love it.

This is from Alex Demets, who lives in Vancouver, Canada:

My first week working with [the partner] coincided with a company get-together in Salt Lake City. Getting the chance to fly out and meet the team in person sounded like too great an opportunity to pass on. I was happy things worked out in time for me to join the event—in no small part because X-Team handled all the logistics in record time.

Antonio Paes, who lives in Presidente Prudente, Brazil:

I work with a construction management company as part of their data science team. Their Engineering Manager Rodrigo lives in Arizona and organized an offsite meetup with the team in Brazil. We met in a co-working space in São Paulo. It was really cool to meet the team and spend some time in the city with them.

Gustavo Azevedo, who lives in São Paulo, Brazil:

I flew to an offsite in San Francisco for [the partner] and it was one of the best experiences of my life. It was my first time traveling alone, my first time in SF, and the first opportunity to get to know the team. So a lot of firsts, but it was amazing. I flew back to Brazil with my luggage full of great experiences.

There's a win-win situation here. For our partners, meeting our software engineers in person gives them the ability to really get to know them. It makes X-Teamers a true part of their team: Developers who participate in teambuilding events and are there for them through thick and thin.

For our software engineers, it's a unique experience that makes them feel appreciated. They are not just part of the X-Team community, but they are part of the company they're working with too. It's a great change of environment from the remote lifestyle, to the point where we believe that the combo of remote work with the occasional physical meetup may just be the golden ticket to the modern way of working.

Are you looking for a team of software engineers who can help your company scale? A group of engineers to optimize your codebase? To modernize your architecture? Look no further: Contact X-Team today.  

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Thomas De Moor / travel