It’s the end of lockdown as we know it (and we feel fine)
With Italy in Phase 2 of the COVID-19 crisis and eyeing Phase 3, businesses have been reopening and many are getting back to the office.
Not us.
At Moskito Design, we’re continuing to work remotely until 31 July or later.
We were early adopters when it came to lockdown: on 25 February we heeded the government’s call to shift to 100% remote working. While we never shut down for one minute, our office has been shuttered for three months.
And now we’re in no hurry to go back. Why?
The first and most important reason is the same reason we decided to close the office in the first place: the health of our teams.
As much as we love seeing each other in person, and as much as we love our office (seriously!), if we all piled into the office again we would be creating risks where none currently exist.
So when many places are beginning to reopen, we’re staying right where we are. At home.
The second reason we’ve decided to stay home is that we’ve discovered remote work works.
Ok, remote working isn’t actually a new idea, but here in Varese, Italy, and in general throughout a country where relations are built on handshakes and baci (kisses), and where a physical gesture says a thousand words, up to now we have definitely not been a “remote company”.
But we jumped in. Early. Italy was the first European country hit hard by COVID, and was the first European country to impose the strict lockdown measures that would gradually come to much of the world. And we’re happy to say that in terms of work, our clients didn’t notice a thing.
Our teams took home their computers and connectivity gear, and we all started creating and delivering from our home offices and bedrooms and kitchen tables.
Briefs and projects, team meetings and calls, feedback and delivery all carried on without a noticeable hitch.
In the meantime, we’ve improved and secured our connectivity. We’ve beefed up our servers, put a cloud-based phone system and other tools in place, are increasing security across the board and have taken to internally sharing a lot more news online.
Like everybody else in the world, we’re learning.
But one lesson nobody needed to teach us is to prioritize the health of the people here.
So we’re staying home until 31 July, or as long as we need. In the interest of our teams, for their health. In the interest of our clients, because remote work works.
