BEEPLE’S VIEW ON AGILE WORKING

PAGE 2 - 4COPYRIGHT © BEEPLE 2018. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

TWO OPPOSITE PERSONALITIESNathan Samson and Karel Rabaut, respectively the CTO and CEO of Beeple, started writing this international success story by working together quite freely. They are both keen on freedom and not having to be somewhere at a certain point in time. In other areas, they differ greatly from each other according to Karel.

“Nathan always needs to be in a fixed spot at a fixed time, while I love working from different locations. Think of for example a couch in a coffee bar, a train station, an office, a library etc. Nathan is a true night person. He arrives at the office around 10 am, because otherwise, it is too early for him. I regularly work in the morning, so our flexible hours are geared to one another. That is why we strongly believe at Beeple that not everyone is equally productive at the same time of the day. Our vision is that not only every person is different, but every job as well. We believe that not every job can have an equally long productivity. The coding activity of a developer is much more complicated than for example sales conversations. For sales team members, their activities are intrinsic to network nights, dinner parties etc. For developers, it’s often a difficult thinking exercise, during which concentration cannot last that long. That is why our focus is not on efforts, but on performance. The

achieved results are important, the made efforts are less important. We aim at the most productive people. As a scale-up, you can make a difference by dealing with your Human Capital in a visionary way.”

MORE FREEDOMAt Beeple, team members are given the freedom to carry out their job according to their own rhythm and working methods. Karel emphasizes the importance of trust because they all walk a path together they have never walked before.

“We hardly do micro-management and we exclusively hire people that are better at performing specific tasks than the management itself. Knowledge and experience are the most important if you want to scale fast. We love being challenged by our own people. The hearing of, listening to and appreciating of collaborators’ input is really important at Beeple. Two of our values are a ‘critical eye’ and an ‘open mind’. We ask people to be open, to explore and to adopt an entrepreneurial attitude. That is why the management rather adopts a supporting role instead of a directing role. The management will on the other hand plot the vision and the priorities according to which everyone needs to work. They determine the playing field.”

BEEPLE’S VIEW ON AGILE WORKINGAt Beeple the employees can freely choose where, when and how they work. In this whitepaper, you discover in detail why our founders chose this working method and what agile working entails exactly.

PAGE 3 - 4COPYRIGHT © BEEPLE 2018. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

INTERNATIONAL LEVELWorking internationally is taken for granted at Beeple and English is consequently the language of communication.

“We always need to bear in mind the ultimate goal, namely becoming world leader in innovative flexible staff management. That means that we already need to ensure a scaling organization on global level, by writing English documentation, always sending multilingual communication to customers, stimulating remote working etc. At Beeple, it is self-evident that people do not need to live in the same city, the same country or even the same continent to be able to work together in a team. That is why we have many remote stand-ups and meetings at Beeple. We are convinced that the way in which mobility is organized, in Belgium and beyond, does not make people happy. As a company, we do not believe that a single train ride of an hour or half an hour in a traffic-jam makes employees happy. That is why we believe remote working should be a possibility.”

“It is important to realize that work isn’t just work anymore (people don’t live to work anymore), but that your work needs to occupy a special place in your life. - Karel Rabaut

WORK-LIFE BALANCEBeeple has a lot of employees that find themselves in different stages of life: young potentials, mothers, persons that are almost going into retirement, men that have just become fathers, people that attach great importance to career and people who don’t. For Karel, these are all people who have included Beeple in their lives and do their work passionately, but who also pay attention to work-life balance.

“It is important to realize that work isn’t just work anymore (people don’t live to work anymore), but that

your work needs to occupy a special place in your life. That special place can only be created when people feel comfortable and happy and like what they do. I am strongly convinced of the fact that people need to choose a job that they can do with passion and in which they can give their all for 200%. At the same time, people have a life outside of their work and the two should go together harmoniously. Employers or managers have absolutely no right to take away moments of happiness in private life. On the other hand, the work cannot suffer under it and the manager should be able to rely on the fact that the self-chosen deadlines are reached. That is also part of freedom: when you might not reach the set deadline, you should look for a solution yourself. It is your responsibility to have clear arrangements with customers, extern stakeholders and intern stakeholders within Beeple for one thing and to have a harmonious work-life balance for another.”

PAGE 4 - 4COPYRIGHT © BEEPLE 2018. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

OUR 10 HINTS FOR AN OPTIMAL REMOTE WORKING EXPERIENCE

1. Make sure there’s a stable WiFi connection.

2. Buy a decent headset for remote meetings.

3. Make sure you have a clean desk, with as little as possible distractions on it.

4. At home: decorate a separate room/corner as your office where you will not be disturbed (constantly).

5. At a public place: bring your headphones for some background music.

6. Make sure there’s a coffee machine to pick you up when you’re tired.

7. Go for a walk every now and then. Fresh air boosts the concentration.

8. One of the advantages of homework is that you can combine it with household chores. Make sure to balance these two.

9. Since you don’t have the supervision of your manager, set daily deadlines yourself.

10. Determine an end hour of your workday, after which you close your laptop for the rest of the day.

Babs Gabriel Content Creator at Beeple