These companies chose to work remotely, definitely

(CNN) - As we enter one more year of pandemic, companies continue to deal with uncertainty about the return to workplaces.

Many have tried to reopen their offices, just to have to change plans due to new variants or outbreaks that have made another closure or a delay in reopening necessary.

So some companies are eliminating the conjectures completely when deciding to work completely at a distance ... permanently.

This is what happened when these companies decided to go to work remotely.

Allow employees to make great changes in their life

When David Cancel began the Sales and Marketing Software Company Drift in 2015, he and his co -founder firmly believed in a culture of work in person.

"We were very strict about it. No one worked at a distance. Everyone was in the office five days a week. All our rituals were in person, like our meetings, our starts, our events ... a culture very focused on theFace to face, "said Cancel, which is also CEO.

But when the pandemic arrived in March 2020, the offices of the whole country closed, including the headquarters of Drift in Boston and three satellite offices, and the work was done totally at a distance.

"It was great panic," says Cancel."It is not that we did not support the work from home, but we were against. We had no ritual, or configuration, or practice to do something remote."

At first, adjusting the company's culture to a remote model was a challenge.

"The most difficult thing for me in this transition was that I had the limiting belief that I could not hire people for senior positions ... without knowing them in person. But I was forced to do it [when the pandemic began] and once I sawThat it worked and that these people were integrated and productive, then ... I said: 'Oh, we should do this forever,' "Cancel said.

At the beginning of 2021, the company announced that employees will work at full -time distance, and that the offices spaces will be used as "conversation spaces" for meetings, collaboration and events."These spaces will not be used for primary work or configured for it."

The radical change against distance work had benefits for both cancel and for its workers.For example, he allowed him to return to New York City, and his employees have also been able to make great life changes.

"We have seen many advantages for the team: people have moved to places of lower cost, closer to the family ... and thanks to those removals, they have been able to marry before or make different vital decisions that had been postponing for a long time"

The company decided that employees who move to lower cost cities will not have a salary adjustment.

"We are agnostics regarding the location in regards to the pay," Cancel said.

In addition, hybrid work, in which workers spend some days in the office and others at home, was not an option.

"Intrinsically, we have a bias towards people who are close, whether we can detect it, as well as if not," said Cancel, who claimed to have seen this first hand in a previous company.

"The people who were in the office with the managers ... They were disproportionate for promotions and opportunities. I wanted to make sure we were equitable and that, regardless of where you were, you had the same opportunities for everything in the company."

Get a more diverse template

Davis Smith, CEO of the clothing and equipment company for outdoor activities Cotopaxi, was also firmly against distance work before the pandemic.

But less than two months after employees started working from home in March 2020, changed their minds.

"We begin to realize that [distance work] is working. Our teams work more effectively than ever," he said.

The decision to become totally remote means that Smith does not have to worry about the constant decision making that the reopening or closing of the offices entails.

"It seems to us a distraction ... We only focus on building the business and a great culture. We are not worried about having to make all those decisions. That has benefited us greatly, the fact of making that decision in advance," he said.

The company maintained its Salt Lake City office, and Smith said some employees decide to go every day."It's a small percentage ... those people wanted a place to go."

Smith said that he rarely goes to the office these days, but finds that he is more intentional with his relations working at a distance.

"Every day I intend to approach someone from our team; before I did not. I was not so intentional, I only thought: 'Oh, I will find them in the office'".

The company has tripled its size during the pandemic and the fact of being totally remote has allowed it to create a more diverse team. "It is much easier to hire a diverse team when you are not limited to a specific geography."

Although he has succeeded until now, Smith said that he is still worried about the possible long -term implications of a remote work model.

"I have asked myself many times: at what time will this reach us? Because many people are new and maybe they don't understand culture so deeply. But our culture has changed and all those rituals and traditions, we had to erase them and start over and havecreated new ones that work for this new environment. "

The company sends employees a weekly survey through Slack in which aspects such as commitment, culture and other issues, such as compensation and exhaustion, to help maintain the loyalty and encouragement of employees.

"There has been a lot of power in us saying from the beginning that we adopt this new way of working. This is the path of the future: we can fight against him or hug him and solve it faster than others," says Smith.

Keep employees happy

Before the pandemic, the majority of the employees of the Robinhood online brokerage agency were expected to be in the office every day.

But in December, the company informed its employees that it would become a mainly remote company, which means that there will be no regular location or requirements in the office for most workers.But it will keep its offices open, including its headquarters in Menlo Park, California.

The change to remote work during the course of the pandemic has had a remarkable effect, said Cindy Owyoung, vice president of inclusion, equity and belonging in Robinhood.

"Over time, it became increasingly evident that our employees were happier and did their best job when they had the flexibility of determining where and when they work better," Owyoung said in an email to CNN Business.