Design agency in quarantine: how to survive and gain a benefit

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Do not worry

The ability to adapt quickly to change will never be superfluous. However, it has never been necessary to get used to new conditions so quickly. You should not relax at all, because waving your hand at everything and living in anticipation that everything will return to its place is not the best strategy. At the same time, you shouldn’t get too carried away and worry about the long lists of online courses open for the period of quarantine and opportunities to improve yourself and your staff.

In the case of our design agency, we have always hoped that any of our employees will be able to work effectively even working remotely. And in some situations, it can even increase productivity. In this case, additional reserves and efforts will certainly come in handy.

Quarantine may take a long time, but we should not forget about ambitions, and especially about plans. However, for the future, it is worth making it a rule – plans should be more flexible. However, it is advisable to make a plan and discuss them with colleagues. Take short sprints in work tasks: today, tomorrow, this week.

Use quarantine to your advantage

Due to the coronavirus pandemic and quarantine, people have a lot of time and effort, which they usually spend on the road, at work, chatting in the office, coffee with colleagues, procrastination, solving various minor cases, and so on. Some have been working from home for a long time, for some it has been a challenge, and for others it has given them new insights. And here we are talking about opportunities.

Personally, I see 4 main areas of activity, which I target my employees:

Teaching. Quarantine is a great opportunity to do self-education, complete the online courses that almost everyone has, or, conversely, take a new one from the beginning. Improvement and once again improvement.
New technology. It is time to study and implement new technologies in your business. We are thinking about how to fully automate existing processes, introduce new ones, improve communication between departments, etc.
Useful habits. This is especially true for those who are accustomed to working 24/7, like a fly in boiling water, from morning to evening doing only work. This approach is dangerous for exhaustion and burnout. Now is the time to relax and find balance.
Total audit. View old blog posts, pages, files and images, get rid of everything outdated, if necessary set redirects, optimize what slows down the website.

Everything is not as scary as it seems at first glance

Without a doubt, we live in historical times. And companies are forced to somehow adapt to the new reality in which we all suddenly found ourselves. It is always difficult to change, and even when you go to them you are forced. But don’t focus on the negative.

Personally, as the head and founder of a young design agency, I try to find positive moments. And that’s how it turns out for me.
Virtual meetings are not a problem

A small office of our design agency Wadoo. is located in Kiev. Some employees work in the office every day. Usually, personal presence and teamwork are effective in terms of creative tasks and project work. But is it so important for us to be in the office together all the time? The answer is definitely no.

Virtual meetings are a common thing for us. In the field of web design, it is no less effective for us to share the screen with clients and show them ideas, solutions and sketches than in a personal meeting.
Customers in normal mode

Finding new clients is often the most pressing issue for agency owners. For a young agency, this issue is acute. After all, the whole team and the future of the agency in general depend on the number of clients and successfully completed projects.

And here I am once again convinced of the correctness of my decision to fulfill orders on a remote basis. Carrying out the work of the agency remotely has significant advantages. Not being limited by geography in terms of finding new customers means taking advantage of global opportunities.