We are now moving out of our Headquarters in Cluj-Napoca, the heart of Transylvania.
As I am writing this, we are on our way to begin a new chapter of our journey.
You can imagine we are both nostalgic and excited.
Nostalgic because, as we walk out of this office for the last time, we can only think of all the memories we made here. Excited because we are bound to reinvent ourselves once again, embracing the future of work, as well as the future of RebelDot.
In the past few days, we were all busy with packing boxes and going through all the hassle that comes with moving out (all of which has been done while keeping our social distance).
Shortly, the place that we used to call home for the past 6 years, became loudly empty.
It is said that art is how we decorate space, but this was no museum, and we didn’t have any interior design skills whatsoever. Still, we decorated it with our presence, attaching meaning to every lifeless spot in the office.
From that warm corner in the kitchen, where we would gaze through the window on a rainy day, to the water dispenser that we’d travel to when feeling stuck, or the meeting rooms that had known and witnessed our biggest ideas.
Origin story.
As RebelDot, we have spent 2 years in the office on Buftea Street. It’s the place where some of us met for the first time. The walls of our office witnessed intense interviews and created room for some of our most memorable brainstormings and client meetings.
But the history of this office dates way back.
Some of us have been working here for almost 6 years, long before our current CEO acquired the services division of Imprezzio Global, transforming it into RebelDot.
To them, this has been already a space of transformation.
Back to the present.
We knew that remote working was the future of work, but we didn’t expect to be plunged into this whole new thing overnight.
Luckily, as an agile organization, we have adapted to the new conditions pretty fast. In just a matter of days, everyone mobilized and each rebel was delivered a home-office set-up which included laptops, screens, smartphones for our mobile developers, the peripherals needed and even office chairs.
In no time, we all started working from the comfort of our own homes, wearing comfy slippers & bottoms and sipping our usual coffee (or champagne) in front of the video camera now.
Embracing the future of work.
Embracing this new kind of working environment, at first, we feared that productivity was going to lower and that it will be a drag for us to adjust to the new working environment – our own homes.
We were wrong.
In fact, looking at the reports following the first two months of working remotely, we noticed that our productivity levels went through the roof, which had its own downside.
With the line between our homes and work getting so much thinner, we had to develop strategies that would ensure the well-being of the team and support our people’s work-life integration.
That’s why, in the weeks that followed, our People and Culture department focused on ensuring that everyone was engaged and safe, carrying out various initiatives, from online cooking nights to emotion-management sessions with renowned psychologist doctors.
Once everyone seemed to have got used to the new way of working, we have officially released a statement, to publicly announce that we have adopted a home-first policy for at least two more years.
We decided to switch from working in an office building to periodically see each-other in a house that looks more like a residence than an office.
Before the pandemic, the office was designated to stimulate productivity. Noticing that this wasn’t the case anymore and that we can still perform when being at home, we decided that the new space should be more like a playground, a social area where bonds are tightened, where we meet to take the edge off a challenging project and chat about anything, but not work.
That’s why, when we started to do our research for this new home, we had a few specific requirements in mind, some details that were going to change the aspect of your casual office into a warm and welcoming home. Besides the decorations that we were going to add, we specifically wanted the house to have a chimney, a spacious garden and lots of natural light.
And guess what?
We found the perfect house.
It was obvious that this change was going to take place, eventually, but, to most of us, it was, indeed, a sudden transition, more like a roller coaster ride. Still, it was a transition that we went through together, a ride that we were able to enjoy, taking care of ourselves as well as each other.
Just like we made all those memories at our previous office, we are now looking forward to doing the same, remotely.
