RebelDot Culture

How we built a Rebel culture after the company acquisition.

by People
The sugar and the spice behind our Employee Spotlight initiative and a little bit of background into our company acquisition process.

Hi Rebel,

For the past few months, we kept receiving positive feedback and questions about our initiatives, how we got to the ideas, what went well, and what did not.

Inspired by your feedback and our firm belief that, as a community, we can achieve more, we want to start a series of articles under the #RebelsBehindTheCurtains hashtag. It’s our way of sharing the sugar and the spice behind our initiatives with you. We are committed to including the bitter as well.

First in line, Employee Spotlight.

How we got to the idea

Two years ago, our CEO acquired the Services Division of our ex-mother company and turned it into RebelDot.

Although all of us worked together before, trying to adjust and create a new culture was a roller-coaster. It was a process of adjusting the new startup setting to a mid-sized company background. Imagine that!

Like every new beginning, it took us some time to learn how to work together in the new formula. Some of the colleagues decided to pursue a new challenge in other companies, while other new talented people joined us.

So here we were in a new context, a mix of old and new employees, trying to build a company together. But how do you do this, while also going through a transition process and a continuously shifting back and forth between the old and new?

We knew a lot about our professional experience but not so much about who we are as people: our passions, our struggles, and what makes us vibe.

We were a bunch of people bonded by history, in front of a clean canvas with new colours and brushes to paint.

Once we have identified the need within the company, we took it with us in the HR and Employer Brand annual planning meeting. For a couple of hours, we sat and brainstormed ideas on how to get people to connect more actively and at a deeper level.

After some interesting discussions, we came up with the Employee Spotlight idea. Such a simple idea that turned out to be so powerful.

We feel you, Chandler! 😀

via GIPHY

The purpose

We were looking for a simple idea to make our colleagues feel (and actually be) seen, heard and understood. Something to help us get to know each other. Suitable for introverts and extroverts, for wild-hearted and introspective people at the same time.

The plan

Once we came up with the idea, we have decided to give it a try and see how it goes. We embraced the same lean mentality we apply to build digital products: build, learn, measure, build learn, measure.

The plan was simple: every Monday, at 12 A.M, we will have one colleague in the Spotlight. That person was responsible for sending a description and a few photos.

We have also created a template for the ones that had difficulties in figuring out what topics they should address.

How it went

Oh boooy! We were so nervous when we announced the initiative, in anticipation of resistance, and we asked our colleague, Ioana, to be the first Rebel in the Spotlight.

Gladly, our colleagues were curious to know more about the people they work with, so the Slack post received lots of reactions.

Spotlight_RebelDot

The post had a snowball effect. Our colleagues were feeling comfortable with sharing more and more about themselves.

What we found out

Our Rebels are super exciting and creative people, so reading their descriptions was and still is so much fun.

We will share with you some interesting facts.

via GIPHY

Rebels are afraid of:

Pigeons on the wire;

Spiders with irregular body shape;

Heights;

Public speaking;

Snakes.

Rebels are passionate about:

Cooking;

Basketball;

Volleyball;

Cycling;

Judo;

Eating jelly beans;

Eating chocolate;

Crafting;

Working around the house.

Oh, are you ready for some juicy ones?🤤

via GIPHY

  • Most of our Rebels are from Bistrita, Baia Mare and Zalau.
  • Alexandra won Miss Universe Romania.
  • Alex had a sabbatical year.
  • Bogdan won a folk festival.
  • Vali has a vertical jump capacity higher than most NBA players.
  • Luciana has a delicious cheesecake recipe published on Adi Hadean’s website.
  • Tudi went alone in Korea at 16 years old.
  • Eli is an MTB champion.
  • Sergiu is a judo champion.
  • Petruta met President Klaus Iohannis in a funny circumstance.
  • Alexandru and his team won the 1st place at a francophone theatre festival in Sardinia.

Simply put, impressive and exciting people. ❤

What we have learned on the way

Sugar, spice and everything nice?

Along the way, we realized that the engagement decreased, so we updated the way we posted the description by introducing, in the beginning, an intriguing question or affirmation about the Rebel in Spotlight. By making people curious to find the answer, they were more eager to read the description and get to know the story behind the answer.

We also put it on hold for a short period of time, when we had other initiatives ongoing, to reduce noise.

Why do we recommend implementing Employee Spotlight into your company?

  • Quick, hustle-free opportunity to help your employees get to know each other.
  • It offers the employees the opportunity to reflect on themselves
  • It helps them identify common passion with the people they work with
  • It allows you, as a company, to understand your people more and create initiatives that are suitable for their wellbeing.

That’s it, folks!

How about you? Would this practice suit your company’s culture? How would you make it more fun?

P.S: Stay tuned for the next article in the series of #RebelsBehindTheCurtains

 

RebelDot Team

🚀You already know we love building digital products, but did you know that we built our own startup? Read the story of how we build a contact tracing and visitors management system, here.

🧐 Curious to know more about how we take care of our employees during COVID-19? We wrote an article to share everything about the RebelDot internal initiatives during these tougher than usual times.

Raluca-Anton

How to deal with the unknown, with Dr. Psychologist Raluca Anton.

by People

Advice on how to manage negative emotions during a global crisis.

Since last week we celebrated Easter and this time around is challenging our wellbeing a little bit more than usual, we thought that this year would be the right time to offer the Rebels a different kind of gift. After a few discussions with our team, we came up with the idea of organizing a webinar with a psychologist, to address some of our most frequent questions in regard to how our mind cooperates with a global crisis, and how to achieve peace of mind during turbulent times.

We already knew Raluca, as she is one of the most renowned psychologists in Romania and a public person, so the decision of inviting her to the webinar came pretty naturally.

When we announced the webinar, we promised we’d get back with some of our learnings and most important takeaways, so here we are. We hope this helps you as much as it helped us.

Processing takes time

We are experiencing an atypical time in history, and our brain is still learning how to process and cooperate with the situation. Give it time and treat yourself with gentleness and patience. Make room for your thoughts and take the time to process.

Whatever you are feeling, it is normal. Embrace it

We often hear that we should not panic and that we should stay positive no matter what. Truth is that being calm in the current context is almost impossible, and we should all acknowledge that. Having more intense feelings and navigating from joy to sadness during this time is normal (*of course, if this persists, maybe you should consider talking to a professional).

We are all different

We all have different coping mechanisms. Some of us eat more or clean all day long, while others binge-watch their favourite series on Netflix. These mechanisms help us adapt to the uncertainty of the current reality. Be open and understanding with other people’s own coping mechanism.

Our brain is just trying to keep us safe

Our brain is trying to keep us safe and reduce the intensity of our emotions through our behaviours. The human brain is built in such a way that it becomes more reactive when it doesn’t have control over the situation and when it is dealing with a lot of uncertainty. This might justify why you’re feeling more nervous than usual and why you start to lack patience.

It’s about joy, fear, sadness, disgust and anger

It’s important to note that emotions are on a continuum, so when thinking about how we feel we should also consider the intensity of that feeling and the way it affects our day to day functioning. In other words, in a certain situation, you might feel sad (as a normal response to an unpleasant situation) or you might feel depressed (which is more intense and could interfere with your daily functioning). To understand more about them, we and Raluca totally recommend watching the Inside Out movie.

Experiencing the five stages of grief

During social crises our brain is going through stages of grief: (1) numbness, (2) intense emotions like anger, denial and fear, (3) awareness regarding the new reality, (4) acceptance and (5), the final stage, finding meaning in the situation. What is very important to know is that there is no linear process. You don’t simply jump from one stage to another, it’s more like a transition (you might go back to the stages that you consider you’ve already passed).

Why is this situation different and why is it affecting us so much?

Apart from the obvious changes in the economy, the health problems and the high level of uncertainty, this pandemic is different because it is affecting all of us at the same time. It is a global issue.

Our brain is used to knowing that if we are not ok, there will always be someone there ready to pick us up. This is not the case anymore these days since we all experience the same thing and we are all trying to figure out how to deal with the new normality.

RebelDot- Raluca Anton

What can I do during these times?

First of all, it is important to acknowledge that you and everyone around you are going through something unexpected. Secondly, don’t try to minimize (oh, I shouldn’t be feeling this, it is not a big deal) or maximize (this is the end of the world!) your thoughts.

Some of the techniques you can use are:

Grounding exercises — getting your mind always to the present moment (e.g: look around the room and say: this is a chair, this is a book, etc or I’m cooking now, I’m adding salt to the dish)

RAIN method — it’s an acronym from mindfulness that helps you acknowledge what’s happening with you.

R = Recognize the emotions or thoughts that are troubling you.

A= Acknowledge, Accept, Allow. The next step is to acknowledge your distress and accept it as your present reality.

I = Investigate. At this stage of the process, you can use your natural curiosity to delve more deeply into your distress.

N= Non-identification. Your painful thoughts, feelings, and sensations are not you.

Yoga exercise — if you haven’t tried it already, we recommend you to follow Yoga with Adriene Youtube channel for lots of yoga challenges and programs.

Meditation — it’s important to give your mind a break during the day so we recommend taking 10–15 min. to practice meditation. You can use Calm, Headspace or if you are not that into this type of meditation you can try journaling or simply listening (but really listening, without distraction) to a song that makes you happy.

Truth be told, this pandemic period is super challenging for all of us and we are all in this together. We are confident that humanity will come back stronger and why not, more empathetic.

The time spent with Raluca brought us so much clarity and peace of mind. We hope the info we shared will help you too.

What are the main lessons you have during this period? Share them with us.

🏡New to working from home? We talked to Alex, our Operations Manager and asked him to share a few tips on WFH and managing teams that work from home. You can read the entire guide, here.

🧐Curious to know more about how we take care of our employees during COVID-19? Petruta, our Employer Brand Specialist wrote an article and shared everything about the RebelDot internal initiatives during these times.

rebeldot-how-we-take-care

How we take care of our employees during COVID-19.

by People

Does anybody else out there want to reset 2020?

Count the Rebels in.

Until we manage to invent a switch button or the time-travel machine, the current situation is testing our adaptability to the fullest.

No matter how hard we’d all want to change what’s happening around us, the truth is that there are some things that we simply can’t control. However, what we can do is control the way we are reacting to what is happening to us.

Having this in mind, we’ve decided to make the best out of the situation and reflect on the learnings.

We invite you to go together through our journey from Rebels to working-at-home-Rebels

How it all started?

Once the President of our country announced that the Government will activate the urgency procedure regarding COVID-19 we immediately knew that we must shift to Work from home.

Since we are super social, and we loooove coming to the office, this wasn’t an easy task to do.

But we did what Rebels do best: adapt and care for the people around them.

We took our laptops, monitors, keyboards and even chairs to make sure we have the full setup needed to continue delivering the same quality and productivity to our clients.

See below a few photos of our WFH set up:

Work_From_Home _RebelDot
Rebels in their new habitat

To make sure everybody is on the same page, our CEO, Tudor Ciuleanu, sent us an official email explaining the RebelDot’s position in COVID-19 times.

We all promised to:

Keep our Rebel Spirit alive

Be available for meetings and calls using Slack

Deliver the same quality

Help each other and share tips and tricks for keeping our mental health

Keep having meetings as video calls

How we take care of our Rebels

Our people are our best asset. Our culture is our main differentiator.

The minute we saw that things are getting pretty serious and dangerous, our main concern was the mental health of our people. So we started working on a plan to make sure we cover all of their needs and that they feel the support of the company even in a 100% online setup.

Survey

The first thing that we did was an online survey to help us identify their needs, worries and the information they need.

The questions we asked were the following:

  1. What are the main concerns that you currently have?

2. What do you most enjoy about WFH?

3. What is difficult for you at WFH?

4. Do you have a daily routine?

5. Do you feel that your productivity increased or decreased?

6. How can RebelDot support you during these times?

Plan

Once we had the data gathered our HR and Employer Brand team started working on a plan where the main words were: care, support, and mental health.

Initiatives

The first initiative that was successful and we wanted to replicate was the Wellbeing Program.

We planned 5 weeks of challenges that are meant to target our physical and mental health.

Rebel_wellbeing_program
Rebel Wellbeing Program

Online Dates

“There is something so unbelievably refreshing about meeting individuals who are on the same life frequency as you. Everything feels effortless and natural. You just vibe, it’s beautiful.”

Although we are all working from home and keep the social distance, we all need connection. We already miss our talks in the kitchen early in the morning or our lunch jokes and roads to the cafeteria (how we miss our Farmec or CBC lunches!).

We didn’t want to lose the bond between us so we decided to twist our Blind Dates and turn them into Online Dates.

Each Rebel drinks a cup of coffee with another Rebel while solving the challenge they receive via email.

This round’s challenge was to answer the following question: What would you want to never change?

Coffee_dates

WFH daily tips and tricks

At RebelDot, we have a flexible work policy. So working from home wasn’t something new for the majority of us. However, very few of us have experience working from home for a long period of time.

Since the current situation is atypical, we started an internal campaign of daily sharing tips and tricks to help us accommodate to the new reality. Apart from the tips and tricks, we have also included a Daily reading material from sources that are verified.

Work_from_home
WFH tips and tricks

Resources tracker

With all the information boom around Social Media regarding COVID-19, it was quite difficult to keep track of all the useful information and activities that we can do while WFH.

We didn’t want to miss useful information and we have decided to create an online tracker with all the nice resources and opportunities we could find.

Short of Rebel aggregator.

We filled it up with the following categories:

  1. COVID-19 trustworthy resources
  2. How can we help? (tab dedicated with causes that need support)
  3. Reading materials
  4. Mental Health
  5. For parents (a section dedicated to activities/articles and webinars for parents and kids)
  6. Movies/Documentaries
  7. Online Board Games
  8. Leisure time
  9. Food
  10. e-Health

We are very proud of it and we would like to share it with all of you. You can access our tracker here.

Resources_tracker
Resources tracker

Keeping our habits

Probably one of the best decisions that one can take in times of uncertainty is continuing with the usual habits.

One of our habits is to have our weekly company meeting, every Friday at 11:30 A.M.

Back to office times, we used to get together, sit on our puffs and listen and joke with our colleagues.

At the moment, things are different but we have decided that now, more than ever, keeping our traditions is one of the most crucial things that we can do.

Every Friday, at 11:30, we open our cameras and we start our company meeting. The laughs, the smiley faces, and the conversations take us, at least for 30 min, back to our cozy office.

Rebels_company_meeting
Rebels during company meetings

We will keep you posted with more and more initiatives that we have planned.

Until next time, please take care of yourself and stay safe!

XOXO,

The Rebels

rebeldot-life-in-our-rebel-homes

Life in our Rebel homes. Stories and insights from our home offices.

by People

Last week was the first entire week in which all rebels worked from home. We decided that in order to keep ourselves and our dear ones safe, the best thing we can do is stop meeting together at the office every day and play our part in flattening the curve. It’s strange how the time we live in is teaching us that care can have a different shape and meaning. This time, caring for each other means keeping a social distance, and we have to embrace that.

Working from home has always been part of the culture here at RebelDot and we would often have some of our colleagues take WFH days on different occasions. This only meant that logistically wise, everyone was ready to move the entire working setup from the office to their homes, with laptops, screens, plants and office desk chairs where needed.

Building digital products for companies around the world and being part of several product teams in Europe and the USA came with the advantage of already having a remote-ready working environment — we just needed to translate every good habit and best practice from a product team to client environment to a rebel to rebel environment and adapt to an isolation environment where everyone is at home, including little toddlers, other family members and pets.

A few days ago, we had a few of our rebels share their own stories of #WFH. We realised that staying social while at a distance, cooperating with a life that is 90% indoors and keeping kids happy while dad and mom are “at work” is the challenging bit of most of our stories. Here’s a sneak peek of the rebel life while working at home and a quick new office tour.

During my breaks, I also read something unrelated to work. Disconnecting for a small period of time helps me focus better once I get back to my working session.

Shortly after switching to working from home, I realised that some of the practices that help me stay efficient are keeping my breaks as regular as possible; (this is one of the tips I received from Iulia, our HR specialist), making sure that I stretch and move as often as possible and interestingly, going to bed earlier than usual. During my breaks, I also read something unrelated to work. Disconnecting for a small period of time helps me focus better once I get back to my working session.

I also have an agenda and I use it to plan my day. Recently, I started splitting the paper into two — this way I keep all the important tasks on one side while on the other side add extra activities that cross my mind during the day. It’s a nice way of making sure that I do not get distracted by my own ideas.

I’ve always been a sports lover, and the brighter side of working from home and being stuck at home in isolation is that I get to try out new workouts. I see daily workouts as being the reward I receive after a productive day at home.

Cristina`s home setup.

One of the things that are helping the most is monitoring my time. Every 30 minutes I stop and do a quick retrospective of the progress that has been made, check if there are any tasks that are taking longer than originally estimated and try to reestimate those.

Cristina, Quality Assurance Tester at RebelDot

I wear business casual in the top and something comfy underneath. I hydrate a lot.

My habits are simple. 6:45 Wakeup, shower, drinking water with sodium bicarbonate, breakfast. Working in Scrum with all German colleagues. I also have “Corona Daily” now besides the regular Daily to discuss with my team every blocker, health updates. I am using Toggl since 2018.

I wear business casual in the top and something comfy underneath. I hydrate a lot. After lunch together with husband we go out to our balcony for a coffee/dessert, yesterday it was so nice we didn’t wear jackets. I try to go out on the balcony every 2 hours, to take deep breaths and try to identify things far away as an eye exercise.

After work, I change my top and start to prepare dinner or work on my personal project/hobby/light exercise. I am in bed around 10:45 with a great book or a movie.

Monika, UI Developer

Monika and her super home office setup.

I found out that a way to plan the day that really works for me is to plan two different scenarios.

I tried for as much as possible to create a daily routine that works for me: I wake up at the same time every day, have 15 minutes stretching session and breakfast while reading a few pages from one of my favourite books. At the moment I am reading Brene Brown’s book, I thought it was just me.

Before starting to work, I sit and plan the day. I found out that a way to plan the day that really works for me is to plan two different scenarios: one that covers all meetings and tasks that should happen during the day, and another one covering tasks that should be taken care of in case one of the meetings get cancelled. This way I make sure there are no blank or “what do I do now” spaces during my day.

I make sure that my breaks are scheduled in advance and that when it comes to lunch, there is a set hour when both I and my boyfriend take a lunch break.

Petruta and Pibu, the cat.

The workday usually ends around 6 PM. After this, I have a few dedicated hours to take care of Parentool, my own business. Recently I started cooking in bigger portions so I don’t have to cook every day. This way I win time that I can spend with my boyfriend, reading or working out.

Petruta, Product Manager at RebelDot

Ending the day, I make sure I close the laptop (and move it in another room) so that I am not being tempted to work until later.

I stuck to the same schedule/routine I had when I was working from the office: waking up at 6 AM, preparing breakfast, enjoying a cup of coffee and getting ready for work afterwards.

I do not excel in taking regular breaks but I managed to end my working day at the same time every day.

Closing the day, I make sure I close the laptop (and move it in another room) so that I am not being tempted to work until later.

When it comes to organizing my tasks I pretty much rely on my to-do list, be it in my agenda, calendar or notepad.

Alexandru, Team Lead and Software Engineer at RebelDot

Alex`s home setup.

Every morning, we wake up at the same time and make sure to have a set of planned activities for each member of the family, including our kids.

Working from home when you have two little kids can be pretty challenging, especially as they do not get the fact that although dad is home he must not be disturbed most of the day. Being pretty solution-oriented, I came up with a fun solution for my kids to understand that I have to work during the day. We wrote, for adults to understand, and drew, for kids to understand, our daily Monday to Friday framework.

Every morning, we wake up at the same time and make sure to have a set of planned activities for each member of the family. We meet at lunch and around 6 PM when I end the working day.

Tudi, CEO at RebelDot

7:30 everyone wakes up; 8:00 papa (we eat); 8:30 dad starts to work and the kids hang out with buni (grandma) and bumbu (grandpa)

Every morning, we wake up no later than 7:30 (usually 6:30). During breakfast, we agree on the activities for the day for the kids. The details are set in the Monday to Friday framework. We meet at lunch and around 6 PM when I end the working day (the official one).

The timeframe you can see us writing and drawing above was for the 19th of March. 7:30 everyone wakes up; 8:00 papa (we eat); 8:30 dad starts to work and the kids hang out with buni (grandma) and bumbu (grandpa), 17:30 the peper experiment (it was all over social media last week… black pepper seems to run from soap and esential oils :)) ), 18:00 Mel Science Chemistry Experiment (nice monthly subscription, you can check it out here). Here are some pictures of the black pepper experiment.

Dragos and Sandra, the little rebels having fun during the pepper experiment.
Tudi's home office.

I asked the mobile team to call me on Slack as many times as they want, just as I was in the office.

Since the gym is closed, I start my day with a one-hour workout at home. Before getting to work, we have a standup meeting with the team, checking on progress and potential blockers. Once the standup is over, everyone goes to work. I asked the mobile team to call me on Slack as many times as they want, just as I was in the office.

Cristi, Team Lead and Mobile Engineer at RebelDot

Say hi to Bella.

I try to make use of video calls as much as possible.

I try to make use of video calls as much as possible. By doing so, I not only maintain a level of connection with the team by better observing emotions, but I also need to make sure that I am “video-ready” all the time: proper clothing, a good working desk, neat surrounding — and these, in turn, have an impact on my overall mood and productivity.

Iulia, HR Specialist at RebelDot

Iulia's dreamy home setup.

Something that helps me enjoy home office days in auto isolation is beautifying the house and the workspace. I make sure to have a warm drink near, together with some flowers and why not, a candle.

Today is my 11th day in auto isolation and work from home. Switching the office with my house, I had a harder than imagined time to unplug after office hours. To this day, I would start working at 8:30, with one lunch break at 12. Since my work can get pretty creative, I try to dose work in bigger working sessions, covering large tasks in the morning and (for as much as possible) meetings in the afternoon.

Because I had a few days in which I found myself in front of my laptop at 10 PM, I decided that at exact 5:30, all working gear (laptop & agenda) go hidden away and I go for a quick walk or do a 30 minutes workout. This way, I have an activity on the that separates the office from home.

One thing I enjoy when comes to working from home is that you have more time to take care of your side hustles and hobbies. I wanted to find cool and productive ways in which to spend my otherwise commuting time, so I took the dust off my piano and decided to spend some time playing during the day.

Something that helps me enjoy home office days in auto isolation is beautifying the house and the workspace. I make sure to have a warm drink near, together with some flowers and why not, a candle — instant hygge.

Andreea, Tech Marketer and Business Development Specialist at RebelDot

For me and my family, this last week was about adapting to the new context and to creative in finding new ways to play, work and to keep things as usual.

Working from home it`s a challenge for sure, but as humans, we have an extraordinary power to adapt to all changes we encounter. For me and my family, this week was about adapting to the new context and to creative in finding new ways to play, work and to keep things as usual.

Miana, Marketing Specialist at RebelDot

Since I started working from home, I did my best to set working hours and plan every day in advance including tasks, meetings, lunch and coffee breaks.

Since I started working from home, I did my best to set working hours and plan every day in advance including tasks, meetings, lunch and coffee breaks.

I make sure to turn off social media notifications during working hours and to only check it after work hours or during coffee breaks. Another tip that really helps is planning personal time for sport and shopping.

Eli, UI Developer at RebelDot

It is in our problem-solving nature to make sure that we face this new challenge of creating new work environments that help us be productive and efficient during the day. Almost seven days have passed, and we are thankful for the many ways in which we manage to stay connected while at a distance, and for the opportunity of working remotely while taking care of the world around us.

Fun resources to make your time at home more enjoyable.

This new worldwide situation is indeed changing the way in which we do life, but we are here to help and stand for each other. If you are new to working from home and need a helping hand from us, feel free to reach out and we’ll make sure to give our best tips. A few days ago we asked Alex, our Operations Manager to share some of his tips for managing teams that work from home, and we put it all together in one article you can read on the RebelDot blog.

Also, we asked a few of our rebels what helps them keep an uplifting mood while not working and hanging around the house, and put together a list of resources that might help you as well.

🎙️PODCASTS:

▪️  — Breaking Brand is a Buffer podcast series that takes you behind-the-scenes with the Pattern Brands founding team as it embarks on a remarkable journey to build a direct-to-consumer business and launch its first brand to market.

▪️ — is a podcast all about the changing landscape of marketing, sales, and customer service. Each season, they explore a specific topic — giving you expert advice, commentary, and strategies that lead to real business growth.

▪ ️, one of our favourite podcasts in Romanian, tackles stories of entrepreneurs and startup founders in tech.

▪️ , a podcast about what Dave and David are learning while building Drift.

▪️  — Brené Brown unpacks and explores the ideas, stories, experiences, books, films, and music that reflect the universal experiences of being human, from the bravest moments to the most brokenhearted.

👪 FOR PARENTS & KIDS:

▪️  — fun DIY projects for kids and parents.

▪️  — in English.

▪️  lessons and resources.

▪️ here you can find fun crash courses into Astronomy, US History, Anatomy & Physiology Sociology, Engineering, Statistics and many other topics.

▪ ️

▪️ 

🏡 OTHER FUN THINGS TO DO AT HOME:

▪ ️

▪ 

▪ 

▪ 

🚀Looking for resources on We wrote some interesting content pieces on .

💛Stay safe until next time, and let’s keep in touch on  , or .

rebeldot-how-to-manage-teams

How to manage teams that work from home. Take-aways from a digital product company.

by People

How to manage teams that work from home. Take-aways from a digital product company.

Until COVID-19 is contained, more companies are advising their employees to work from home. To help you effectively lead your product teams, here are a few tips on managing WFH teams.

Before we start, remember that remote working has been around the tech scene for a long while now. Most of the tech & product companies working from offices already have procedures that can easily translate into a home environment. All it takes is an extra mile walk into making sure that your team has a clear sense of collaboration and productivity.

Respect office hours.“For remote workers, the erosion of the boundaries between when you should be working vs when you should be taking time for yourself becomes even more prevalent because your entire relationship with your job is digital.” According to Buffer, most of the people that work remotely have reported struggling with unplugging after office hours end.

Make sure your teams manage to unplug at the end of every working day. It is crucial for their long time efficiency.

Maintain a clear understanding of their roles and responsibilities. Remote or non-remote; this principle is crucial when it comes to managing digital product teams and not only. If we take a realistic look at how a digital product development team looks like, you would have the stakeholders and the product team proactively working towards accomplishing a goal.

Most probably, your team already has well-assigned roles and changing their office with their home won’t affect that. If you happen to kick-start a project with WFH teams, make sure they have a clear sense of ownership and responsibility.

Now, more than ever, make use of project management software. Most of the digital product development companies out there are already familiarised with working with tools like Jira, Trello, Todoits, Asana and Airtable because they do it on a daily bases, regardless if they are in the office or working remotely.

The cool thing is that most tools allow you to comment on tasks, reassign them, set deadlines, and attach documents or content. We’ve seen how a lot of important details can slip when trying to coordinate a project over email. Make sure your team has a habit of continually updating their ticketing system.

At RebelDot, for example, we use Jira for most of our projects, and Trello for a few of them. Both tools are efficient, collaborative and provide a transparent overview of task progress for both stakeholders and product teams.

Get used to video conferencing platforms, always video conference. Honestly, we could not imagine remote working without video conferencing platforms like Zoom, Cisco and Google. In our day to day activity of building digital products and collaborating with teams, product owners and stakeholders all over the globe, video conferencing plays a massive part as it gives our collaborations the human touch they would probably lack otherwise.

If you want the people working at home to have a sense of community and teamwork, make sure that all online meeting is with the camera turned on.

No agenda, no meeting. Any meeting without an agenda, minutes and followups distributed might be counterproductive for your team, especially when working from home, where asynchronous communication prevails. Make sure you preselect a facilitator, a timekeeper and someone to document the discussion afterwards.

Know when to move away from email and build communication habits. While in an office, most of the communication happens synchronously (here and now), when it comes to remote working most of the conversation is done asynchronously. This means that there is a delay between the question and the response. Many companies out there consider synchronous communication to be the most effective, but when it comes to remote working, this can quickly become counterproductive. If you find an email thread going back and forth more than three times, move away from email, and hold an impromptu call.

Keep having your regular 1:1 meetings. One-on-one meetings are crucial, even when it comes to working from an office space that is shared with the entire team. When it comes to your WFH employees, making sure they have a strong sense of culture, feedback and support requires walking an extra mile. Make sure you set regular one-on-ones with all team members and that you make time for chit-chat on the side.

Final Words

Working and managing teams that work from home can be a challenge, especially for those who are used to working from an office. Let’s remember that companies like Buffer have been remote-first since 2012, which means that done right, working remotely might have some of its own advantages.

Stay at home, and lead from home. It’s good for you, and it’s good for everyone. Plan your agenda, stick to a routine, stay calm and make use of all the fantastic tools that are out there to keep your teams connected and efficiently working.

New to working from home?

If you are new to working from, we found some interesting resources that might help you out.

DESK Magazine on how to work well from home this week -so you can next week, too.

Basecamp has a really good communication guideline we advise you check out.

Charles Patterson, the senior designer at InVision, wrote a useful guide on  working from home.

Stay Safe!

Leading-the-line

Leading the line, like a Rebel woman. Stories & insights from women in tech.

by People

It’s March, which means that besides enjoying the weather getting warmer, this month we celebrate women a little bit more than we do during the rest of the year. We make sure to bring chocolate, flowers and all the kind words with us at the office, all to make them feel special.

At RebelDot, we are over 20 women software engineers, delivery managers, HR, marketing, business development specialists and product managers. We love the tech community we get to work and experience with every day, but we know it hasn’t always been easy for women in tech to pursue a tech career. Some of us still struggle today.

We had a few of our rebel girls share bits of their own experience as women working in the technology industry. Grab your favourite cup of coffee and put on your superhero cape, you’re about to get some empowering messages from our rebel, women in tech.

Allowing yourself to be vulnerable and soft is an act of courage.

I love how my experiences taught me, many many times, that choosing to be kind, perceptive and allowing yourself to be vulnerable and soft is an act of courage. That it’s actually the hardest thing to do, yet it’s still perceived by so many as being a weakness.

I love that not a single day goes by without seeing the importance of empathy, active listening and emotional intelligence. And I love how in the world where we encourage people to speak-up, stand-up, do this, do that, fit templates and checkboxes, the thing that helps us stand out is being true to ourselves and embracing our imperfections.

So don’t “toughen up” if you don’t want to — no matter if you’re a man, a woman or you’re still trying to figure that out. Come back to yourself.

Be confident in who you are and what you can achieve.

Growing up, I have always been fascinated with technology. I think innovation and the fast pace at which technology evolves has been something that has drawn me towards it, since forever.

I give credits to the fact that I was brought up in an environment where I always felt equal to boys, although I know it is not the case for every girl that is in school as we speak. To them, the girls that wish to pursue a career in technology, all I can say is, dare to believe in your abilities, and have the courage to start doing whatever you are passionate about, despite the odds.

The lessons you learn while being a stay at home mom will help you get back on track faster and better than before.

In a such evolving and changing world, and as a new mother, being disconnected from the business’ world for two years can be discouraging. What I’ve learned from my experience is that attitude is a game-changer in this situation.

You took two years to grow a little person, but you also gained so much strength, brainpower and endurance that you`ll bring back to the business field and that will help you get back in the game in no time, better than before, more efficient and more driven.

So, now you have a new set of skills to play with and to bring into the equation. Also, another aspect that helped me was to go back to the basics, learning what`s new on my professional field. For that, I took 1–2 hours per day for study, two months before getting back to work.

Keep fighting for your dreams.

There is a place in technology for everyone, keep fighting for your dreams. Lyndsey Scott, Florina Muntenescu, Sheryl Sandberg are some women who are influencing the landscape of tech and IT.

 

Find mentors in your niche that can help you with their knowledge and experience of navigating the tech industry as a woman.

I was brought up in a world where girls and boys were equally exposed to exact science and technology. As a child, being a girl meant doing great in school. They would also expect you to maintain an eloquent speech at all times, don’t get too covered in mud while playing outside, don’t scream, don’t cry, wear a dress and of course, smile at all times. You’d often find yourself in a constant aim for perfection, being good at everything and excelling at nothing while trying to fit in and please everyone you meet. You grew up comparing yourself to everyone, without even knowing how lethal to your soul this is.

Translating this into the tech business scene, as women, we often become victims to the feeling of not being good enough, lonely, and many times, outnumbered. A lesson I learned in my three years of doing marketing & business development for tech, is the importance of mentorship and community. There are women out there who look forward to helping and sharing their experience with other women. Find female mentors in your niche that can help you with their knowledge and experience of navigating the tech industry as a woman. They can be your peers, your colleagues or female leaders you look up. Look for a community and if you can’t find one, go ahead and create one. Keep an eye for people you can learn from, and be savvy when it comes to learning from the experience of others. It will help you move faster in your career.

 

To succeed, you need to make sure you have people around you that can help you grow.

My passion for tech & informatics goes back to high school. I was in the 10th-grade and 16 years old when they brought in a new informatics teacher, a female. At the time, I was doing great in school, but I had no idea I was ever going to pursue a career in tech. This new teacher happened to be one that changed my perspective. She came in with a unique, empowering vibe, and she had her way of making things seem more attractive than before. I would not give all credits to the fact that she was a woman, although this might have helped me resonate with her. All I know is that the informatics class became, in short, one I was looking forward to attending. Little time passed by, and I started doing research at home and being keen on discovering new things. Years passed by, and I decided to study at the Technical University of Cluj Napoca, pursuing my dream of becoming a software engineer.

University came with its challenges. I vividly remember the front row, filled with young males all with exceptional merits in the field. We were outnumbered, that’s for sure. In my study group, for example, we were 30. Out of this, only 10 were women. Despite the odds, just as in my high school story, I had the right people around. All of our university teachers would continuously encourage us to get involved in research projects and were there to equally support us. I wasn’t surprised when our valedictorian was a woman.

Being fairly new into the work scene and having these two past stories to guide me, the pursuit of a job in tech was highly guided by the people I met during the recruitment process, and whether I felt that I could quickly learn from them.

Today, I believe that to succeed, whether you are a male or a female, and especially if you are at the beginning of your career, you need to make sure you have people around you that can help you grow. It can be your teacher, your colleague or your team lead.

Get involved. Participate. Ask questions & stay curious.

Growing up as a teenager, I had somehow always been passionate about technology and informatics. I can say I am blessed with parents and relatives that had never tried to frame me when it came to choosing a career path. It has always been clear to me that the intriguing problems and the practicability of the challenges you find in this field were for me to choose, from the very beginning.

Today, I am a software developer at RebelDot.
I’ve been asked, multiple times, what makes a great developer, and what are those practical activities you can do to become better in your field. Looking at myself, I believe it is essential to have the passion and to be confident in what you do. I am lucky to be able to say that I get to live my passion every day. This does not mean it is a challenge-free zone. After all, challenges make it all more interesting.

Second, I’ve always been very keen on getting involved and participating. There’s so much you can learn from just showing up and sharing the experience of building something with a team of developers. It helps you overcome fear and uncertainties, accumulate information and build experience. It’s simple, and I like to think of it as the snowball effect. The more you experience, the more you know. So have that curiosity, and keep an eye on those experiences you can benefit from the most.

 

Like what you read? At RebelDot, we are on a constant search for amazing women to join our team, and we are always happy to share more of our experiences with the tech industry. Check our openings, and come by for a chat and a coffee! We look forward to meeting you.

Love,

The Women at RebelDot

Best-Engineering-team-in-Romania

Yet another 2019 in review!
Only this time it’s a Rebel (Dot) one.

by People

2019 was busy, hustling and in a complete manner, uneven. It had its bright highs and lows, and as sudden as it all was, we had our spoonful of learning opportunities we are more than grateful for. Here’s what we are most proud of, and we want to thank you for it!

We turned one!

This years’ July the 2nd marked one year since we acquired the services division of Imprezzio Global and became one Rebel, web and mobile development company. 

If you are not familiar with our story, this is the very short version of it:

We celebrate this moment as it gave us the opportunity to bring more innovation within our digital creative spaces. Questioning everything we have done so far and most importantly, the way we have done it, we were able to adapt to new processes, perfecting our way of building digital products.

Teambuilding Fain.

Before getting into the details of this one we’ll make sure you understand the meaning of the word fain (pronounced exactly like the English “fine”). It is a word often used in Cluj, Transylvania, describing something that is nice or cool.

This summer we had our team building in the mountains. It was the optimal opportunity to reconnect with nature, relax ad rewind. We honestly think that a few photos would best describe the amazing time we spent there, so here are just a few:

Redefining what it means to be a Rebel (Dot).

2019 made us question what we believed to be true about ourselves. It placed us in a zero zone from where we were free to march towards discovering our genuine self. We called on help and boarded on a trip to discovering our Rebel values. We found out that we believe in the power of togetherness, and when we say together, we count you in the mix. Care, growth, fulfillment and fun are the other building blocks of what we do at RebelDot.

Our values chart. Which one of them do you most resonate with?

Oh, wait! Did we double in size?

Growing in experience meant growing in size as well. Since we love a good tech riddle, we couldn’t help it but grasp the opportunity of getting more tech experience, through building digital products from a wide array of industries. In doing so, we needed more exceptional people to join us. We doubled in size, adopting 19 new rebels. We could not have done it without the skilled hands and brilliant minds of the people in our team. This is our #kudos to them!

More work? This just meant more amazing web and mobile apps to build!

Looking back, 2019 was a year in which we diversified our portfolio, strengthened our relationships with our partners and perfected our approach to building digital products. We doubled in size, reaching a number of 60 amazingly creative people and managed to cover software development for startups, medium-sized businesses and Fortune 500 companies all around the world.

Today, we handle more projects, from even more industries and we are challenging our creativity and innovative thinking more than ever before.

We love our craft, love the people we work with and treasure every challenge that gets us closer to a new technology breakthrough

UNL Global is just one of our many favourite projects that happened this year. Having started from a paper sketch, they trusted us with our expertise and our UX-first approach to building web and mobile apps. Thus, the amazing result, proving once again that alignment in values and understanding is essential when starting a collaboration with a client.

Curious to know more about what we have built in the past year? You can always check the reviews of our clients, on Clutch.

Opening a new office, this time in Copenhagen, Denmark

You already know we love traveling, and even more, we love our Rebel people overseas. We wanted to be closer to our clients and the tech community in Copenhagen, so we opened a new office right there, in the heart of the Scandinavian way of living we are fond of. Do we have other expansion plans for 2020? Oh, yes!

We launched Visidot App, our internal digital product.

It all started with wanting to create a digital product that would help us log our dear office visitors faster and in a completely digital manner. Today, Visidot helps office building administrators keep evidence of their visitors.

Curious to know more about our internal product? Find out more, here.Here’s a short sneak peek on how VisidotApp works.

Did you spot the Rebels? London, Singapore, LA & Miami were our hottest travelling locations this year!

Did someone say travel? This year we made sure to meet all of our partners across the borders and check the pulse of the global tech community. If we were to get through all the locations we have visited this year, it would take you a few cups of coffee to read through all of them, so here is our shortlist.

Ending the year with the most epic Jungle (Re) Bell Christmas Party.

We love a good party! And even more, we love a themed party! Thanks to our great employer branding team, this year we managed to break any rule of Christmas party themes that might be out there. It wasn’t a retro party, it wasn’t an ugly sweater Christmas party, not even a Grinch party but a Jungle (Re) bell Christmas party!

We treasure our little Rebels, so we had to make sure Santa passes by our office to give them some really special presents. Here’s a snapshot from our kids Christmas party

Now that’s a wrap! 2019 was a full year, and in 2020 we are up to some great stuff as well! Make sure you know about it before we write our next year in review. Spot the rebels on Facebook, Instagram, Linkedin and Twitter.

🚀Did we convince you that doubling in size did not make us less fun? Reach out and let’s talk about building your awesome digital product. Make sure you getintouch@rebeldot.com, and we will get back to you in no time.

🤔Reading this made you want to be part of the RebelDot team? We’ve got great news! We are in search of creative engineers that can help us ship digital products. Check our openings, here.