Jeff Robbins interviews Yann Toutant, CEO of Econocom and President of the French Chamber of Commerce, about transitioning a 300-person company to a distributed model and how innovation is enabling remote work.

Discussion topics…

• Transitioning a co-located 300-person company to a more distributed model

• Educating the company around the benefits of remote work

• Working remotely within the office as a starting point for working remotely outside the office

• Challenges around transitioning managers to working without their own offices

• How middle management adapts to a results-oriented management style

• Why the leaders of today are more similar to coaches

• Going remote to refresh employees’ connection to the organization, not because it’s trendy

• Creating company workspaces around collaboration

• Shortening (or avoiding) commuting time to enhance company productivity

• Why Yann is not a fan of home offices for his employees, rather asking employees to work from customer or supplier offices and in coworking spaces

• Taking a pragmatic approach to remote work

• What does it mean to work together in “clusters”?

• Connecting remote work to a higher purpose

• Finding your remote ambassadors who are willing to test out your distributed team model

• Benefits of having remote workers in different time zones

• Hiring the best remote workers from a global talent pool

• Offering your remote workers a better quality of life

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