MacJunky
MacJunky
  • 2 months ago
In this conversation, we talk about, remote work and dogs. it's a great, fun conversation with lots of information great as well. So enjoy The Conversation.

Post: https://macjunky.com/post/conversation-with-guilherme-ferreira
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#apple #mac #consulting #coaching #training #business #tech #technology #minimalism #simplicity
Transcript
00:00So I've just finished the conversation with glaring I've met him on Twitter.
00:04We've known each other for a year or so and we're always having a conversation online
00:10on Twitter basically about simplicity and minimalism and things like that.
00:15Now, I don't know if he is actually a minimalist after this conversation,
00:20but he really knows what it means by simplifying in this conversation.
00:27We talk about remote work and dogs.
00:30We actually spoke about our dogs.
00:32It's a it's a great fun conversation and lots of information there for you as well.
00:38Anyway, enjoy the conversation.
00:42So yeah, you're in Portugal, right?
00:45Yeah, I live in Portugal.
00:47No, nearby Porto.
00:49Nearby Porto.
00:50Okay, man, you know, I've been wanting to come to Portugal for such a long time.
00:55I go to Spain a lot, but I'd never go to Portugal.
00:59Probably currently isn't the best time to go.
01:03No, because of everything that you know, but you should come.
01:08It's even Porto, Lisbon are the two main cities,
01:13but there's a lot of small places in Portugal that are really cool.
01:18But it's an interesting country because you have a good weather
01:23and a lot of history and if you like nature also.
01:27And the food is amazing.
01:29Yeah, the food.
01:30I mean, for me, it's more to do with weather and not being anywhere near a city
01:36and being with my dog and a car.
01:39That's it.
01:40One of the things that usually people like Porto is that it's a city without being that
01:46kind of metropolis where it's always traffic and those kind of things.
01:52So yeah, it's like a small city with a lot of history.
01:56But especially in north of Portugal, you will find a lot of places to visit
02:02with a lot of history, a lot of nature, all those kind of things.
02:07Yeah, it's just so yeah, I'm definitely going to knock on your door.
02:10Don't worry.
02:11I'll definitely it's funny.
02:14Yeah, it's funny because I've been talking to a lot of people online.
02:20I'm just finding them and all of a sudden a lot of them are coming from Portugal.
02:24I'm like, this is pretty cool for me because there's a there's a guy in Lisbon.
02:29He has a YouTube channel and it's called one cyclist in Portugal or something like that.
02:36And he literally just cycles around Lisbon where he lives.
02:41But he goes everywhere else with his bike and wonder and great content.
02:47I just love watching it because he's really cool guy.
02:50And he messaged on his YouTube channel.
02:57I'm going to Amsterdam.
02:58Who's around?
02:59Like, dude.
03:00Yeah.
03:01So I went round with him round Amsterdam.
03:04He put it into a video and he's like, you got to come to Portugal with you and your
03:09dog and your bike have to come to Portugal.
03:12And before then I was interested, but after them like, okay, I've really got to go.
03:16I've really got to go.
03:18And now I'm meeting so many people from Portugal.
03:22And I wonder why that is.
03:23I think the universe is basically just saying to me, go.
03:28Probably is that probably is that we never know.
03:31Well, we met on Twitter.
03:34Yeah.
03:35Because we do something very similar simplicity.
03:39I would say, I would say that we love the same thing.
03:42Right.
03:42Okay.
03:43So basically, I, you know, I'm not into minimalism.
03:48It was before I understood the word.
03:53It was more like a religion to me.
03:56So it was kind of, and I'm not into, I'm not religious.
03:59I'm not into religion.
04:00I don't hate people for it, but I think religion is silly, but that's just my take on it.
04:07So minimalism being a religion to me was silly.
04:11It's like, it's a cult and it's like, but after I understood it,
04:16I think minimalism means different things to different people.
04:21The problem with minimalism is that you have the minimalism from YouTube.
04:26Okay.
04:27And that is a religion.
04:28Okay.
04:29Where you believe that you should be a missionary or something like that.
04:35And if you study the concept, you see that it's not really about that.
04:40It's about knowing yourself and knowing what you need, what you enjoy.
04:46And you can be minimalist and have a lot of things.
04:49Okay.
04:49If you look around, beyond me, there's a lot of books.
04:53You don't want to see what's around you right now.
04:55Yeah.
04:56So you need to have with you the things that you love and that bring you happiness.
05:04But I see minimalism as a kind of a framework where once you understand it,
05:12you can apply to almost all decisions that you took in your life.
05:17And that's why I like the concept.
05:19Not the concept from YouTube, as I said, the religion, I get what you mean.
05:24Because it's common to have that reaction from most of the people
05:31when you talk about the minimalism.
05:34The word is quite strong.
05:38Yeah, absolutely.
05:39I mean, you know, I say this so many times about myself.
05:44The reason I fell into it was more a case of simplicity rather than minimalism.
05:50I hate complications.
05:52They are quite similar.
05:55They're quite similar.
05:57But I never put myself into that minimalism guy.
06:01I put myself into I like everything to be simple.
06:08Why are things so complicated?
06:10Why is software so complicated?
06:12Why are APIs so complicated?
06:15This is getting into your realm of work.
06:17Why are things so complicated?
06:20They just don't need to be.
06:22And I've been like that for as long as I can remember.
06:26And so now when I see this movement, as we say, into minimalism,
06:32it kind of got me to think about, well, am I a minimalist or am I?
06:39It's not the right word, but simpleton.
06:43And simpleton has negative connotations.
06:45Probably you are a minimalist.
06:48You basically don't use the shirt saying I'm a minimalist or something like that.
06:55I would say that if you are really concerned with those things
06:59of bringing complexity to your life,
07:01and if you are aware of the choices that you take to bring new things to your life,
07:08to take decisions,
07:09probably you are following the same kind of practice.
07:14Basically, I would say that minimalism is a way of noticing decisions that you take.
07:19Okay.
07:22You want to buy something and you have that thing that will make you notice
07:27that you are taking a decision probably by impulse and you don't need to take it.
07:33And those things is what to me are based on minimalism.
07:37Obviously, when you start and you try to join the cult,
07:44you will look around, you will see a lot of things,
07:47you will try to do those declutter things.
07:51They are also important because they are a framework to start, okay?
07:56It's a way to at least to gain the conscience of what you have
08:01and what you don't need and how bad you are, okay?
08:06But after you start doing that, I don't believe that I need to be
08:11the guy that dresses always the same shirt or something like that.
08:15I'm not that person.
08:16Yeah, that's the extreme.
08:18I'm not that person.
08:19And for example, I couldn't be an extreme minimalist
08:23because I'm married to a person that isn't a minimalist.
08:26So we need to find the balance.
08:29And if I didn't find the balance, I was in the cult
08:34and probably I shouldn't marry her.
08:37But I'm happy and she's happy with the way I am
08:42and we understand the decisions.
08:46Obviously, that you try to use those things
08:49to influence people around you in a natural way.
08:52For example, I try to be really mindful with my daughter
08:56when we have new toys in the Christmas and on birthdays,
09:02trying to take the decision, do you play with this toy
09:06or do you want to give it away?
09:08Those kinds of things.
09:09But I believe that in your case, you don't dress the shirt,
09:16but you follow most of the concepts of minimalism.
09:24Probably I'm using the shirt is the only difference.
09:27Yeah, I mean, it's interesting because this whole minimalism thing
09:31came about purely because of tech minimalism.
09:34I wanted a word.
09:36I didn't want to use the word simplicity or simple
09:38because it had a different connotation to it.
09:42And tech minimalism just worked
09:46rather than trying to come up with some sort of an idea.
09:50Tech because I'm in tech minimalism
09:53because that's kind of the hot new word right now in a way.
09:57And almost what I am kind of doing
10:00and it's working and it's been pretty good.
10:05But you do something with code, right?
10:08You're a coder.
10:09Yeah, I'm a software developer.
10:13Yeah, and the reality is that I discovered this thing
10:18of minimalism by kind of accidents.
10:22Basically, I have a chronic disease.
10:25It's something that usually is a lot of problem
10:30when I'm tense with a lot of anxiety
10:33and all those feelings when you are overwhelmed.
10:37I start feeling a lot of pain.
10:39And I try to change a lot of things in my life
10:41to deal with that pain, to avoid it.
10:44Things like food and the kind of exercise, whatever.
10:49And one of the things that I start noticing on myself
10:52was on those moments when in my work
10:54I was feeling a lot of stress related to complexity,
10:59usually the things start to creep up.
11:02And that drives me to minimalism and to simplicity.
11:06And I try to take those lessons to simplify my work
11:12and to simplify the things that I work with.
11:16So my relationship with simplicity,
11:19it's quite strong like you.
11:20Probably not in the same way
11:23because I deliver software not only as a consumer.
11:29But for example, I have a good example to you
11:32related to applying minimalism to using technology.
11:37I'm a kind of a productivity geek, okay?
11:40I really like to define my setup,
11:44to take conscious decisions of what I'm using.
11:48If there's a new tool, I really like to play around.
11:52But the reality is that I was looking to myself,
11:56searching for things that didn't bring value, okay?
12:02And it took me a while to realize
12:04that sometimes we are investing our time
12:08just because we want to have the fun of exploring.
12:13And a lot of times you don't bring any value to your life.
12:19And you see the shiny object
12:22and you basically start going around.
12:24Yes, welcome to my world basically.
12:30Yeah.
12:31It's interesting you come out with the technology
12:33because this is the thing I find,
12:35this is the whole point of tech minimalism
12:37is that with McJunkie, I've seen so many clients.
12:42I've had about 6,000 clients
12:44and pretty much every single one of them
12:45have so many tabs open,
12:47so many different apps that do the same thing
12:51slightly differently.
12:52And no one can understand
12:54why they're not getting any work done, right?
12:57So I'm like, well, get rid of stuff.
12:59Then the thing comes about in the FOMO,
13:03like I don't want to miss out.
13:05So they keep getting these apps and this is the thing.
13:08And I've always been into simplicity, as I said before.
13:14So it was more a case of
13:16how can I do the most difficult job simply?
13:20Because I don't want to waste time.
13:22And if you already have tools,
13:24it's always a good bet to try to see
13:26if they can solve your problem in an efficient way
13:30instead of going shopping around just because.
13:33Absolutely.
13:34I mean, my job is to find the right tools for my clients.
13:37So unfortunately, I have to go and check,
13:40but do as I say and not as I do.
13:42So effectively, when I work with my clients,
13:45I tell them to get rid of all of this stuff.
13:48In my dock, for instance, I have three apps open.
13:52That's it.
13:52I don't need anymore.
13:53People don't need more than one calendar.
13:56They don't need more than one notes app.
13:59They don't need more than one task manager.
14:03I've had issues with having tasks in Basecamp and my Things 3.
14:10So I'm like, well, why am I using two to-do lists?
14:14But they're not to-do lists.
14:16They work slightly differently.
14:18If you, you know, my job is to try to pry the difference
14:23between a to-do list and a project management tool
14:26because they are different.
14:28But if you're working for yourself,
14:30do you need a project management tool?
14:31So it's really weird how people don't really think ahead.
14:37They just, as you say, get that shiny tool thinking
14:40it's going to fix everything.
14:43But in fact, it's making it worse.
14:44Yeah, and if you like technology,
14:47you are probably the first person to do that
14:50because it's fun.
14:51And as you said, you probably are feared to missing out
14:56the new thing, the new cool thing.
14:59And you see a lot of people using that.
15:01And yeah, give it a try.
15:04But one of the things that I was seeing myself doing
15:08a lot of times is I was trying just because I see a new thing
15:13I see a new thing, not because I'm not happy
15:16with the one that I'm already using
15:19or trying to move everything into that new tool.
15:23Okay, it's quite common.
15:24For example, when you use a notes tool
15:26or something like that, you try to move everything to there.
15:30You work with it for two weeks
15:32and then you need to go back because you don't like it.
15:35It's missing just one small feature that you can't live without it.
15:40And you've wasted all that time with the transfer.
15:42This is the thing.
15:44So what I tend to do now is try to use a tool
15:48for like a month or so without moving anything over
15:53to see if I like it, see if it does what I want it to do.
15:57This is for me personally.
15:58And then start moving stuff I need to.
16:02But I've kind of stuck with Apple notes.
16:05So that's my brain.
16:06That's my thing.
16:07I don't use anything else.
16:10But I've now found a new tool,
16:12which in fact, that's what I was doing earlier on before the call.
16:18And it's great.
16:19It's such a...
16:20It works the way my brain works in a way.
16:23But the main part of it is that you can share it externally and stuff.
16:26But what I want to talk about is how you...
16:33Because you do a lot of tweets about simplifying code
16:36and development and stuff.
16:39Talk about that a little.
16:41Yeah.
16:41Basically, I'm passionate by writing code.
16:46And one of the things that I try to apply
16:48is to even in code being taking the simplest decision
16:53and the simplest solution.
16:56Basically, because when you write code,
16:58it's more often will be read than rewritten.
17:02Okay.
17:02It's like writing a book with the option of editing it.
17:08And there's a lot of things published
17:14with more than 20 years of history
17:17about good practices to write code that is maintainable
17:21and it's easy to use.
17:24And it's something that I advocate for.
17:28Other things that are not that common
17:32and usually are a problem for software developers
17:35is not related to code itself,
17:37but the way that we approach problems.
17:39Okay.
17:40Because when you write code,
17:44you can be a really geek guy
17:45and you are so focused on playing around with code
17:49because programming is like a game.
17:54It's like a game.
17:54And if the next level is more challenging,
17:57you will take more pleasure from it.
18:01And that usually can be really a problem for your end users
18:06because they don't care if you are really clever
18:09with a piece of code.
18:12What they want is a good solution for that problem.
18:16And those are the things that I try to bring value
18:21to people around me is how you can simplify
18:26the way that you approach problems,
18:27the way that you understand that you are a human
18:32and there's things in your brain
18:36that you should be aware that many of those things
18:41that you have to deal when you are choosing a tool,
18:44we need to be aware when we are delivering it.
18:46Okay.
18:47Doesn't matter if you start coding
18:50a really elegant piece of code,
18:53if your API or your front end, it's a mess.
19:00Those are the things that I try to advocate for.
19:04And especially with the fact that
19:07if you simplify those things,
19:08you are basically removing yourself
19:11the pain of dealing with complexity in a year.
19:15If you have a really complex solution for a problem,
19:17you can be really happy today,
19:19but down the road, things will get back at you.
19:23And that's really hard to deal.
19:26And you don't want that.
19:28You want to take the simplest solution as you can
19:32as far as it's the best one.
19:34Now, one of the misconceptions
19:38that I see a lot of times related to simplicity
19:41is the idea of relating simplicity with simpler
19:46or lack of effort, something like that.
19:51But simple, it's more complex than doing a complex thing
19:57because you need to put your brain on that
19:59and you need to put the effort.
20:01I think that Steve Jobs had a sentence related to that,
20:05that you need to really fight for simplicity.
20:08You can't just wait for it.
20:10And that's what I try to do.
20:12Yeah, I mean, simplicity,
20:14if people think simplicity is the lazy way out,
20:17but what they fail to realize
20:19is trying to construct something simple
20:24takes so much pre-thought into doing it.
20:29It takes so much architecture in your brain
20:31to try to figure it out.
20:33To build it might be simple,
20:35but the actual road of getting to that end point
20:39is so much harder than just getting, you know.
20:44So for instance, you can build, when we were young,
20:47when I was young anyway,
20:48we used to go out and build a cart out of wood, right?
20:52Yeah.
20:52Just now wheels on, but it broke.
20:57It broke because we never thought
20:58about how to create that thing.
21:01And I think simplicity is basically the same,
21:03all that, the product or the thing
21:06that you're trying to build
21:07and trying to make it so simple is so freaking difficult.
21:11Yeah, you can see the example of a search engine, okay?
21:17To a random person that doesn't think about those things,
21:21it looks like a really simple thing.
21:22It's usually just a text box with a button, simple.
21:28The amount of things that are abstracted on that thing,
21:32it's stunning.
21:33It's really difficult to understand what is being done.
21:37And when you start thinking on the things
21:39that you live around that way,
21:42you need to think about abstractions
21:44and decomposing the problem in small pieces.
21:48Because if you are abstracting something from someone
21:51and you still need to deal with too much information,
21:55complex problem, too hard, too complex,
21:58you will deliver a bad job.
22:01So you need to apply tools to understand
22:04how can you split this big thing in small things
22:08like Lego or something like that.
22:11And that's the challenge in anything.
22:15Yeah, as I said, it's more the strategic thinking
22:18behind the product rather than the product itself,
22:21rather than the thing, rather than the button,
22:24rather than the field.
22:26I struggled with that on my website
22:31where all my videos were.
22:32I've obviously moved them to the new place.
22:34But where my videos were, I was like,
22:36how can I put a search field there
22:39that didn't take away from the look
22:42and didn't take away from me wanting people
22:44to kind of scroll through?
22:46So I left it out.
22:47Because a lot of people saying,
22:49I can't find this, I can't find that.
22:51I'm like, well, I know I don't really want you to find it.
22:54I want you to find the information
22:57that's being presented to you.
23:00Plus also, it will look silly if I put it there.
23:03So the idea of trying to just put a search field
23:07is so simple to do, but I don't want it there.
23:11So I think about that stuff a lot.
23:14So even when I'm working with my clients
23:16and they say, is it ready?
23:18Or what can we do?
23:20It's not as simple as that.
23:22It will be simple once it's done,
23:25but getting there is so complicated.
23:28And that's kind of difficult to explain to some,
23:32not everyone, but to some.
23:34Yeah.
23:35And especially if you deal with those detailed things
23:38on you are focused on the tool,
23:40you are focused on the process,
23:42and you are not able to step back.
23:45This can be really a problem.
23:47This is really common in code.
23:50Because you are looking to a few lines of code,
23:53you are using your focus, your flow.
23:56And if you don't step back,
23:59your brain will not see what is around.
24:01It's that idea of looking for the forest instead of the trees.
24:08When you look around,
24:10you see things in a different perspective,
24:12and probably you will notice that you can go to another route.
24:17And there's value on that.
24:19There's value on being able of that abstract thinking,
24:23of looking to the everything
24:26and constructing something really good.
24:30That's what I believe.
24:31Yeah.
24:32I mean, you definitely have to step back and look.
24:34I mean, if you have a top-down view,
24:36if you step away from it, step away from the project,
24:39step away from the code, as you're saying,
24:41step away from the tool.
24:44I do this a lot as well.
24:47I find a tool, I really get into it,
24:50use it for a day and think this is the best thing ever.
24:54You take a day to process what you've actually done
24:56and go back and go, actually, no, that's not the way to do it.
25:00That's not the right process,
25:02not the right flow for the client I'm working with or whatever.
25:06So stepping away from your project,
25:10from whatever it is that you're working with,
25:11is definitely a time saver in the long run.
25:17Because even though people might think,
25:19oh, I don't want to waste another day thinking about it.
25:22If you don't take that time to think and slow down,
25:27you're going to pay for it at the end.
25:29Yeah, you see many problems being solved
25:32after one night of sleep, after going grab a coffee,
25:38after anything that you go away from your screen.
25:44It's, our brain is really powerful.
25:47And when we don't understand how we can take advantage of it,
25:51usually we try to create complex things.
25:54And complexity brings anxiety, brings stress,
25:57brings all those things to your life that you don't want.
26:02And for example, in fields like mine,
26:06you have concepts like burnout being really common.
26:10You see a lot of people talking about burnout
26:12and mental health, those kinds of things,
26:13because it's an industry of heads down
26:16and let's deliver this thing.
26:21And if you don't take care of those things
26:23and you are basically shooting yourself in the foot,
26:28that's why it's important to be aware of these things.
26:33I don't see a lot of people talking about this.
26:38It's interesting that I found you on Twitter
26:41because of the concept of tech minimalism.
26:44The tagline was sketchy, at least to me,
26:48but we don't see a lot of people realizing
26:51that they need those kinds of things.
26:54They are not aware of that.
26:57We start seeing a few things like digital minimalism,
27:01but usually it's because of the detox of social networks.
27:07Absolutely.
27:09Instead of being a well-thought approach
27:13to your relationship with technology.
27:17And that's what is missing, I think so.
27:21You've hit the nail on the head, basically,
27:23because I see so many posts,
27:27especially in the past year or so,
27:29about digital detox, digital minimalism,
27:32and digital this and digital that.
27:35And I'm thinking that is more of a fad,
27:38more of a short-term relief.
27:40It's like an aspirin for your headache, right?
27:43It doesn't go away, but it doesn't work
27:45because the headache will come back
27:47if you don't organize your structure in your body
27:51and you sleep funny, because you sleep funny,
27:54the headaches are going to keep going there.
27:55And digital detox is basically the same thing as that,
27:59when I say it.
27:59It isn't sustainable.
28:02It's not.
28:03You see those people working, for example,
28:06for two to three months, really long hours
28:10and extra hours, all those things.
28:13And by the end, they took two weeks of vacations
28:18and that will not work
28:20because you will get back
28:22and if you don't address the real problem,
28:26that is, you put yourself in a really bad situation,
28:30you will get back there as soon as you can imagine.
28:35And with technology is the same thing.
28:38For example, I have been using Inbox Zero for a long time
28:44before it was something that everyone tends to talk about.
28:49But nowadays, you see people sharing things about,
28:52okay, I reached my zero
28:55and if the same person published the email counter
29:03after two months,
29:05I bet that it will be back to the same problem.
29:09Absolutely.
29:10And again, I'll say it again and again and again,
29:13it's the process that matters,
29:15not what you're doing,
29:16not the program, not the app,
29:18not the placebo.
29:22I would say that is the habit that you create.
29:26You have that goal of achieving the Inbox Zero.
29:32You have a process to achieve that,
29:34but during that process,
29:36you don't create an habit that sticks to you,
29:38doesn't matter.
29:40Because the goal is easy to reach,
29:42you can archive all your emails
29:44and you have the Inbox Zero.
29:45But if you don't create the habit,
29:51it will not work.
29:52And you can see that with a lot of things,
29:54like when we choose a new tool
29:57and you go play around
29:59and you can have good feelings with it
30:03and it fits your workflow
30:05or your brain works,
30:06like you were saying,
30:07or probably something that should just play around
30:10and go to the garbage.
30:12Because the habit of working with that thing doesn't stick.
30:18And if it doesn't stick, it doesn't matter.
30:20It's true.
30:21I mean, habits definitely.
30:23The thing is, it takes so long.
30:24Is it 21 days for a habit to stick?
30:30They say, but I don't believe in those hard measures.
30:35And to be honest, it's really easy.
30:38If, for example, I try to practice meditation,
30:42I'm not really an excellent example
30:46because sometimes I have to skip it
30:49or I think that I have because I create excuses.
30:54But for example, the first month is really easy
30:57because you are so focused on achieving that thing
30:59that you think that you created a habit.
31:03The science of creating a habit
31:05is to really embed that thing in your workflow.
31:09And if you don't do that, it doesn't matter.
31:12Because one day, everything changes.
31:16I mean, the interesting thing about what I do,
31:21my clients is that they're already stuck
31:23in a way of working with their habits.
31:27And you're trying to explain to them,
31:29look, this is better for you.
31:31And they say, okay, I'll try it.
31:33But because they're so stuck in the way
31:36that they have been working, the habit that they have,
31:39it's not easy for them to pick up that habit.
31:42Habits could be done within three days, four days.
31:45I have done it in certain things.
31:47But you need a longer period to get into that habit
31:52if we're talking about tech minimalism.
31:54For other things, I guess it's different.
31:56I don't meditate.
31:57I actually still don't understand
31:59the concept of meditation.
32:00I don't want to try to understand it.
32:04The only thing I can put meditation down to,
32:08similar to is me walking my dog
32:11and not thinking about anything.
32:12That to me, I guess, is meditation.
32:15Because I don't understand the concept of meditation.
32:17Yeah.
32:17If you go for a walk
32:18and you are not actively listening for something
32:23and you are basically enjoying,
32:25I would say that is a kind of meditation.
32:28I walk my dog every morning
32:30and come up with ideas for videos I make.
32:34That's the only thing I do.
32:36I don't think about anything else.
32:38Obviously, other than him falling into the water
32:41because we live on an island.
32:42That's about it.
32:44Yeah, yeah.
32:45I have a dog too.
32:47And in the morning, I go every day with him.
32:50And in the lunch break,
32:53it's the kind of thing that demands you
32:56from obstructing yourself from what you are doing.
32:59And that's really important for mental health also.
33:03I got a dog for various reasons.
33:04But one of the main reasons
33:06is because I was sitting behind the computer for too long.
33:09I was putting on weight and stuff like that.
33:11Because the older you get, the faster your weight comes on.
33:14And so I thought, you know, everyone's telling me get a dog.
33:17And I'm like, do I?
33:18I don't want another dog.
33:20So the best thing I ever did was get that dog.
33:24Best thing I ever did.
33:25Because as you say, it helps you step away
33:30from whatever it is you're doing.
33:31It helps you.
33:32At least they demand from you.
33:34Right, yeah.
33:36It helps me talk to something else
33:39because I live on my own as well.
33:40So it's just such a great thing to have a dog,
33:45especially if you're in tech.
33:48If you can, obviously, because a lot of people can't,
33:51to kind of walk away from whatever it is that you're doing.
33:55Come up with new ideas.
33:56Don't even think about work.
33:58Whatever it is, it's having a dog
34:01is like the best thing that's happened to me in the past.
34:03How old is he now?
34:0410 years.
34:05So yeah, if you can find something,
34:09you can't do it with a fish.
34:11Let's put it that way, or a rabbit or a cat.
34:15You need a dog.
34:17And especially if it's a dog that really demands from yourself,
34:22usually if it's a large breed or something like that,
34:25they need really a lot of attention
34:27and going for long walks and those kind of things.
34:31I don't agree.
34:32No.
34:33My dog is huge.
34:35I mean, we walk.
34:36Hey, Wolf, he's downstairs.
34:37We walk four times, five times a day.
34:42And he doesn't run around the house.
34:44He's quite relaxed, actually.
34:48So it depends on the breed, maybe.
34:50And it depends on how you bring it up.
34:53I have this conversation all the time with people around the island.
34:56How's your dog so well behaved?
34:58Like, I don't know.
34:59Just, I don't know.
35:01Like, I have no idea.
35:03Yeah, they are like kids.
35:04They come with natural skills.
35:07Right.
35:07Yeah, yeah.
35:08And so everyone's asking me, can you look after my dog?
35:13So I looked after my uncle's two dogs, and they are small little rats.
35:18They're just so annoying.
35:19Yeah, they have more energy, yeah.
35:22And energy.
35:23And they had to go to Paris for a weekend, long weekend.
35:29So I was looking after the dog.
35:30When they came back, they said, what did you do to the dogs?
35:34What do you mean?
35:35I said, well, they're listening.
35:36I'm like, yeah, this is what you should be doing, training them.
35:39Because a lot of people don't train their dogs, you see.
35:43But after two days later, they went back to the same routine as they had,
35:48because that's what they were used to.
35:51And they didn't, they weren't doing the same thing as I was, basically.
35:56They weren't actually, you know, adhering to the rules I gave them.
36:00Yeah, even them create habits and understand that a different person can have different inputs
36:09and expecting different things.
36:13So they are clever, yeah.
36:15Yeah, I mean, it circles back to being at work.
36:18Depends on who you work with.
36:19You work at home, obviously.
36:20You work remotely.
36:22At least during the pandemic, yes.
36:24At least during the pandemic, right.
36:25Yeah.
36:26I was working in the office once this starts in a different company.
36:31In the meanwhile, I changed jobs.
36:35And one of the things of being in the office is you create a different schedule.
36:44And it's quite easy.
36:45For example, in the lunch break, if it's raining outside, you don't go out.
36:51You don't go stretch.
36:54And when you are at home and you are with your dog, you need to do that.
36:58You need to go.
36:59Yeah.
37:00And that is one of the important aspects.
37:04And he has a funny thing that is when it's the lunch hour, he already knows.
37:12And he comes by to my desk with a paw.
37:17Yeah, they just know.
37:18And I know, okay, it's time to feed him and go outside, usually.
37:23It's funny.
37:24We have a routine, but it's never fixed, like my life and like my work.
37:29And so he, you know, I can wake up at 11, 12 o'clock and he's still there chilling,
37:36not expecting anything.
37:37So he knows that we will go out.
37:39He just doesn't know the time.
37:41So he never asks.
37:43On the rare occasion he really needs to go out, he will literally sit in front of me,
37:47staring at me.
37:49It's the only thing I get from him.
37:53But I want to go back to you working remotely.
37:57Yeah.
37:58How does that work with your colleagues?
38:02I mean, a lot of people say, I hate working remotely because...
38:07And a lot of people say, I love it because I get left alone.
38:10But do you get distracted with Slack or anything like that?
38:15No.
38:17I had the experience of two jobs.
38:21And in the previous one, I was leading a team.
38:27So it was interesting because we were, everyone was in the office.
38:32We know each other.
38:33And we moved to the remote environment, as far as we can call this remote,
38:40because it's not the same thing.
38:44And to be honest, we didn't feel that we were missing a lot of things.
38:51Everyone was still collaborating, helping each other.
38:55It's quite easy nowadays, jumping the call if you need to figure it out.
39:02One of the things that I noticed from changing jobs recently
39:08is that when you come to a team, you don't know the dynamics
39:12and you don't know everyone.
39:15And it's a bit hard to get in the spirit.
39:20And Slack seems like a really informal tool to those kind of things.
39:28So I would say that if you have a good connection with everyone, it's easy.
39:37If you are in an environment like you are a new fish in the pond,
39:42probably you will struggle a bit in the beginning
39:45because you need to create those connections.
39:48But to be honest, in the kind of work that I do,
39:52I don't feel a lot of things missing out,
39:55besides that thing of creating relationships.
40:00One of the things that I was missing in the beginning,
40:02probably because I didn't use the right tool, was whiteboarding.
40:09I really like to explain things with diagrams.
40:13I'm quite used to grab a pen and paper and try to sketch something.
40:20And that thing I was missing because the tools that I was used to do,
40:26isn't natural when you are used to do that with a pen.
40:32And on that thing, when we had discussions of what we should do,
40:36how should we do, and I tried to explain something, I was missing that thing.
40:42But to be honest, the cost benefit of going on to work remotely,
40:50I don't see a lot of things that we are wasting.
40:56But the connection between the team and the relationships
41:03is something that if you have a way to combine both worlds,
41:07I think that it's something that you are winning.
41:11And maybe it's the future will be something like that.
41:14Yeah, I think it's the human connection that people are generally missing.
41:20Because I hear about it, I hear it all the time on Twitter and LinkedIn and stuff,
41:25because they're the two places I visit most,
41:29that people on the one hand saying they love it,
41:32and then the people on the other hand saying I hate it.
41:35And the difference really is exactly what you said.
41:38It's the human connection that they miss.
41:40Not because they want loads of people around them,
41:44but I think the connection between teammates matter,
41:48the human element matters.
41:50And that's missing.
41:52And I don't think you're going to ever get that
41:54without that actual human interaction.
41:58You either have a company where everyone is remote since the first day,
42:02and the culture is that.
42:05And if you have a kind of hybrid environment
42:09where everyone was in the office,
42:11and then everyone jumps through remote, you will feel that.
42:16I really believe that most companies will create a kind of hybrid environment
42:20where you go to the office once a week or something like that.
42:25You can have a few meetings together, those kind of things.
42:28And then you have your focus time at home.
42:32I believe that.
42:33I think Basecamp started, they were fully remote,
42:36but they had an office where people could go in.
42:40And there were some people that just went to the office
42:42because that's the way they worked.
42:43And I think that even though they say they were remote only,
42:47it's not quite true because they did actually still have an office.
42:50However, they were pushing the remote part of it more.
42:56But because of the pandemic,
42:58and the fact that they want to make everything smaller,
43:02they're actually going fully remote, actually going fully remote.
43:05So I don't know how that's going to affect the people who were going into the office.
43:11But I think, as you said, I think a hybrid makes a lot of sense
43:15to have an office where people can go for events,
43:22for meetings, for anything,
43:24rather than going to the shared workspaces and stuff.
43:30Or a nine-to-five.
43:32I mean, the thing is, people don't work nine-to-five anymore.
43:35I don't.
43:36I don't think anyone does, really.
43:38They have kind of borders.
43:40But if you're working on something,
43:44you're not going to just stop because if you're in the zone,
43:47it just doesn't happen.
43:48And if you're not in the zone,
43:49you're not going to sit behind your table to do it.
43:52That happens to me as well.
43:54So having a place to go where you think,
43:56you know, today I want to work.
43:58Well, there are co-working spaces,
43:59but why not have an office where your actual co-workers can be there as well,
44:05which would be much better.
44:06You would need a different kind of office that we have nowadays.
44:11Probably nowadays, most of the offices are set up to have a lot of meeting rooms
44:17with a huge open plan with a lot of desks.
44:23And probably you need something different.
44:24You don't need an office that big.
44:27But you need to create those spaces
44:29where a team with four or five elements can join together
44:34to have a discussion or to spend a day together, whatever.
44:39Yeah, yeah.
44:41Do you miss going to the office, do you think?
44:45I don't feel that a lot.
44:46I know a lot of people that miss it.
44:50I don't feel it a lot, to be honest.
44:54There's one thing that bothers me most,
44:59is even outside of work, not being able to go wherever I want.
45:06But probably it's because I'm thinking in the current situation.
45:10In the current situation, I don't want to go to an office.
45:15I would not feel comfortable even to go.
45:19But I believe that in the moment that we can go,
45:23if it's something that you go once in a while,
45:26you will take pleasure from it
45:28instead of that thing of going every day to commute to the office.
45:34If it's a kind of an event that you know that you have once in a while,
45:39you will take pleasure from it instead of being a problem to you.
45:44It's interesting because I've always worked for myself.
45:47I've always worked at home.
45:49I have had jobs, obviously.
45:51And I've had jobs where I've had to go to clients and go out.
45:57But I've generally worked for myself.
45:59So I hated working in an office.
46:03It actually really annoyed me because,
46:07weird thing to say, but people annoy me.
46:09You know, when you're working on something
46:10and then you hear something in the background in that sense.
46:14So I'm thinking for you being a developer and you're coding,
46:18you want to concentrate more.
46:20One of the things that you will see if you go to a software company is that,
46:26and if everyone is in the same, yeah, noise cancelling.
46:31And that usually is a bad sign.
46:36If you need that to concentrate,
46:39and if you need to use that as a kind of a signal,
46:42trying to concentrate is a really bad sign.
46:44That's worse. Yeah, that's worse.
46:46Yeah. And besides that, you can live in an environment
46:51where people feel comfortable of approaching you at any time.
46:57And if you live on that environment, you can create those focus blocks
47:03where you try to act on something and get into that state of flow.
47:10And at least to me, it's something that I need.
47:13If I know that I have a meeting in one hour,
47:17probably I will try to pick a different task
47:20that doesn't need a lot of concentration.
47:24One of the things that I am seeing happening
47:27with this thing of the remote working
47:31is that we are creating meetings for a lot of things
47:36that probably don't need to be a meeting.
47:38Hallelujah. Yeah.
47:40Yeah. We, as working people,
47:51we learn to use Zoom and to use all those things to have video calls.
47:54And probably we love it because we are using it too much.
47:58But we didn't jump through that step
48:02where you are thoughtful about taking a decision
48:05or bringing everyone into a meeting.
48:08And writing more and putting your mind in the things that you want to do
48:14and trying to explain in a written form,
48:16at least to prepare a meeting,
48:20is something that I feel that is missing in this industry.
48:24Yeah.
48:26Probably you see the same thing also.
48:28If you can do that asynchronous conversation,
48:32you will waste time for a lot of people.
48:35Yeah. I mean, it's different.
48:38There are use cases for both, sync and async.
48:41And I prefer async because you have time to think.
48:47But I really love sync because of things like this.
48:51You know, you can talk and whatever.
48:54The secret is understanding.
48:56The secret is understanding when to choose one or another.
48:59I know that you have said in a different episode
49:04that you don't receive or you don't react to SMS and those kinds of things.
49:10It's a deliberate choice that you have.
49:13And the problem is when you don't take those decisions
49:20with all the information.
49:22And going into a meeting with 10 people in the meeting,
49:28and nowadays it's quite easy because you don't see a room packed
49:32and because of that, you can bring everyone into a meeting.
49:36It's quite easy.
49:38And that has a cost also.
49:40If you start summing the money invested in simple decisions sometime,
49:47you will see that there's a lot of waste.
49:49There is so much waste in company culture in general.
49:54And I've always fought for it.
49:57I used to work in a bank and I used to hate every minute of it.
50:00There was meetings all the time for nothing, for like effect.
50:04I mean, there was an email back then, but this could have been in an email,
50:07you know, that type of thing.
50:08And there is so much waste in companies because the processes aren't there.
50:15My best friend who will be listening to this,
50:18because she really wanted to listen to this,
50:20because she works at a coding academy.
50:23So she wanted to get some insight from what you were saying.
50:26So she's listening to this and she's a process manager.
50:30That's what she does do.
50:33She's a COO at the moment.
50:37And we're always discussing processes and we're always agreeing with each other
50:40because process matters way more than anything else in a business effectively
50:47for the working of the business.
50:49And if you don't have your process down,
50:52you're running around like headless chickens.
50:54If you don't have the right SOPs, no one knows what they're doing.
50:59If you don't have the right method, you know, the right methods of working,
51:04the right processes and stuff, you're just asking for trouble.
51:10That's one of the things, being able to empty your brain
51:15with information that you have in your brain,
51:18because otherwise things doesn't scale.
51:20And in the moment that someone new joins to help you,
51:24they will not help because everything is stuck in your brain.
51:28Having that second brain with something is a tool that we should be aware that is important.
51:36And I see that missing a lot in software.
51:40We tend to prefer to write code to documentation.
51:48But the reality is that when we try to use the framework or something like that
51:53and the documentation is garbage, we start complaining.
51:57Yeah.
51:58Yeah.
51:58But if you don't do that, things don't scale.
52:04And there's a lot of complexity into that.
52:07There's nothing worse from you seeing something
52:10that you know that you have been in the same situation in the past
52:14and you are almost sure that you fixed in the past and you don't remember.
52:19And you don't have any place to go search for it.
52:22And creating that habit of taking notes and writing down processes,
52:27SOPs, those kind of things, I think is really important for every company.
52:33Every company, yeah.
52:33I mean, documentation is huge.
52:36And for many, many years, I didn't document anything.
52:41Nothing.
52:42Because I was just working.
52:44But I've realized afterwards, like you said, how did I do that thing?
52:49Because I used the program FileMaker for myself.
52:52I didn't do it professionally.
52:54So I made my own thing and everything worked.
52:57When something didn't work, I didn't have any documentation to go back
53:01to figure out how I built it in the first place because I was just building.
53:06That was in the very early days of FileMaker.
53:09So I learned very quickly to kind of document my processes, what you do.
53:16And the thing is, a lot of people think,
53:18well, I work on my own.
53:18Do I need to document?
53:20And again, it's something I thought about as well.
53:24Maybe not.
53:25However, it will make your life a lot easier.
53:29The thing is, again, about scale, you're talking about scale.
53:33I never want to scale.
53:35I never want to hire.
53:36I never want to get anyone from Fiverr or anything like that because I like doing
53:41everything myself because I have all the time in the world in the way I work.
53:45So do I need to document?
53:48Actually, not really, but it helps me understand my own process.
53:54And that's the reason I document, not because I may use it again,
53:58but more a case of, is this the right thing?
54:01Am I doing it correctly?
54:04And when you have it written down, you kind of understand, okay, well, this,
54:08I don't need to do this or I need to do more of this and so on and so forth.
54:12You shift your brain from the creator side of things to the editor or the reviewer.
54:19And by doing that, it's enough to understand that you are doing the wrong things.
54:25Our brain doesn't work in the same way when you are trying to create or
54:28review or maintain something.
54:30And that's important.
54:32But even if you nowadays don't want to scale, let's imagine that one day you
54:39just want to work one hour a week and you have someone, you want someone doing the
54:46things that are low-hanging fruits.
54:50On that moment, if you have everything written down, you have the conditions to do that.
54:56Otherwise, it will be overwhelming for each other.
55:02No, absolutely.
55:03Absolutely.
55:05Anyway, I won't keep you longer.
55:08It's been a great chat.
55:09I love talking to you.
55:11Great that we meet at last night, actually.
55:13Yeah.
55:13Because we've been tweeting each other all the time.
55:17So great.
55:18Thanks for the conversation.
55:19And nice to meet you.
55:20Yeah.
55:20Nice to meet you.
55:21And I'll see you next time.
55:23Yeah.
55:23Bye.
55:24Ciao.