Summary
In this engaging panel talk, Shameless, Michelle, Charzade, Darian, Solomon, and others explore nuanced aspects of remote work and collaboration. Shameless opens by reflecting on the difficulty of synchronous and asynchronous teamwork across time zones, suggesting dance metaphors like cues and energy to improve remote coordination. Anthony and Michelle elaborate on how embedded agency designers must balance championing both their agency and client cultures through empathy, code-switching, and maintaining rituals like dedicated in-house days. Darian contrasts handling toxic relationships as an outside consultant versus within an organization, highlighting complexities around trust and long-term entanglements. Solomon stresses the importance of clarifying expectation gaps early to avoid misalignment, emphasizing pre-sales discourse as ongoing onboarding. Charzade shares personal pandemic experiences demonstrating that owning one’s role and seeking impact can lead to unexpected growth and promotions, while others note deeper team closeness and enhanced trust despite physical distance. The group reflects on how pandemic conditions humanized professional interactions, breaking down formal facades and enabling more personal connection, though it remains uncertain how these changes will persist post-pandemic. The conversation combines practical tactics with empathetic leadership, focusing on sustaining culture, clarity, and human connection amid evolving work realities.
Key Insights
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Remote teamwork benefits from adopting dance-like cues and rituals to communicate energy and intention asynchronously and synchronously.
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Embedded agency designers must code-switch between their native agency culture and the client’s environment to build trust and effectiveness.
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Maintaining distinct but respectful dual cultures between agencies and clients fosters better collaboration and happier teams.
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Toxic relationships are easier to address internally due to familiarity but complicated by organizational politics and fear of repercussions.
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Outside consultants can leverage the clear endpoint of engagements to manage difficult relationships, unlike in-house staff with uncertain futures.
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Clarifying expectation gaps early with clients through pre-sales and onboarding discussions prevents misalignment and frustration later.
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Pandemic remote work unexpectedly strengthened team bonds by making physical distance catalyze emotional closeness.
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Trust in remote teams can be maintained and even enhanced when there is a prior foundation of face-to-face relationship building.
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The pandemic blurred the boundary between personal and professional lives, leading to more authentic, humanized client and agency relationships.
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Cultural differences impact work personas; for example, some cultures like Argentina naturally blend business and personal personas more than others, influencing client relationships.
Notable Quotes
"I gave birth to two things at once: my talk and my son Mateo, adding a new member to our panel."
"How do we dance at a distance? That’s the challenge: replicating energy and connection through screens and time zones."
"Code switching is like speaking multiple languages: you must shift to connect and be heard between agency and client cultures."
"The happier the vendor’s team, the better work they deliver back to the enterprise."
"An outside consultant relationship has a clear end; inside, navigating toxicity is messier because options are complex and stakes higher."
"Sometimes you need somebody else to tell you the obvious, that clients expect you to already know what they know."
"Not knowing everything is okay — having conversations about expectations needs to be normalized."
"Being physically away made our team feel closer emotionally, which I did not see coming."
"Pandemic forced us to strip the masks we wear at work and show our humanity more honestly to each other."
"In Argentina, we don’t separate the business persona and the human persona as much — we are human beings at work."
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