Discovering the Digital Nomad Lifestyle: For Freelancers, Entrepreneurs, and HR (Ep. 17)

Transcript

Nishchal Dua (00:00):
Hello, this is initial UA of Remote Work Summit, and you're listening to Travel Fuels Live.

Drew (00:19):
Hello everybody, and welcome to Travel Fuels Life, the show we share stories, tips, and inspiration to help you live a travel lifestyle. I'm your host, drew Hanish, and one of the first questions I get when I tell people that I hang out with travel bloggers is how do they do it? I mean, how do they step out and do all of this cool traveling? And I know that the question behind these questions really is how do they survive? How do they make money doing this? So in my own case, I can say, well, I was lucky enough to have a nine to five job that I created myself many years ago as a web designer, and that's been very easy for me to transition into a remote work job. But not everybody has that advantage. So I wanted to have somebody on the show who has not only transitioned into a digital nomad lifestyle, but someone who's developed a business themselves and who's helping others survive in this world of traveling entrepreneurs, freelancers, and remote corporate workers.

(01:26):
And I met Sul through a conference that he founded called The Remote Work Summit that is the world's largest online conference for remote workers. So he should know a thing or two about remote workers. So I asked him if he could come on the show, I could pick his brain and we could get some information on this location, independent lifestyle and how you get there, and then how he supports people with that. So from my home here in Greenville, South Carolina, it's time to jump on the worldwide web spend halfway around the globe to India and talk with UL Dua of the Remote Work Summit. How you doing today, insul?

Nishchal Dua (02:08):
I'm, I'm really good, drew, and thanks a lot for having me on the show. It's actually a delight, and I have to say I just love your energy and I've been subscribing to a lot of podcasts lately, but what I see is that most of the hosts, they don't really understand their audience and they don't have a sync in what shows they record. But I see that with you here, so thank you again for having me.

Drew (02:29):
Well, thank you very much. I appreciate that. And you're coming to us from India today, right?

Nishchal Dua (02:34):
Absolutely. New Delhi to be specific.

Drew (02:36):
Ah, very nice. All right, so well, we bumped into each other on Twitter, and I saw your remote work summit, and so that got my mind working in terms of here's somebody who's really going to have a handle because you've seen it firsthand. Give me a little bit of your background, first of all, in terms of how you got started with remote work and what your business is.

Nishchal Dua (03:00):
Right. So long story short, I'm an entrepreneur. I've been building companies for almost the last seven or eight years. My first company, again, all tech companies, all tech products, and I exited my first company. I made a decent amount of money and I thought, what's to do next? And the only thing I could think of was traveling. So I took off, I went backpacking across Southeast Asia and Australia for almost six, seven months at that time. But before I knew it, within the first couple of months, I got bored. I got bored because I really didn't have much to do on a daily basis. Traveling seems very fancy on Instagram because you only see the highlights. What you don't see is that every day you're just stuck in airport queues and you're going from one place to the other. And it's, it's not just fun anymore if you're just constantly come commuting and not traveling.

(03:52):
So that's when I started my latest company, which was the Remote Life, and that's essentially a travel program for digital nomads by digital nomads. The idea was that there's a huge population of digital nomads out there. They might need help with their travel arrangements, they might need help with their logistics. And most importantly, what I observed was the community, because if you're traveling alone, it gets really boring after a period of time, and you would really want to connect with like-minded people wherever you are. So that's how my first company came into being. And before I knew it, I was working remotely because as an entrepreneur, most of my business model, most of my work was anyways online. So I was working out of my laptop and wherever I am, all I need is a laptop and internet connection. So I was typically by the definition a digital nomad before I even knew it. So I think that's how it got started. But if you would like me to explore more about how remote work comes through the picture, I can probably go on about

Drew (04:51):
That. Sure, sure. But one thing that got me curious was when you had these businesses that you were running and then you just took off and went on the road, were you still running those businesses or did you just drop those and go just l live your life for a while doing the Instagram lifestyle? I guess we could call that.

Nishchal Dua (05:11):
Right. So the second thing, I exited my company. I sold it off to another company in India. And because of the exit, I was free with nothing much to do. So that's when I took off for a sabbatical of sorts. And when I was traveling, I was completely free. I didn't have any business to manage, I didn't have any work to do for a couple of months. I was just enjoying my life. And that's when I thought of the latest venture and I thought of a couple of other companies and I started building them while I was traveling. So to answer your question, when I did start traveling for this six, seven month period, I had already sold off my previous company. Yeah.

Drew (05:47):
Okay. All right. And then once you got this started up again, did you feel like it was better maybe to have a home base always and then go out and do some exploring and then come back to your home base? Or did you actually move to these different places and basically set them up as this is where I'm at now? Yeah,

Nishchal Dua (06:10):
So you're absolutely right on that first thing that you said. I myself, it's a personal choice. Again, different for everyone, but for me, I personally prefer to have a home base and the ability for me to go out for a longer period of time and do slow traveling. So I don't like the typical concept of a five day, seven day vacation where you just go somewhere, you're running around the whole day doing sightseeing, kicking pictures, and coming back. So whenever I travel, I prefer to stay at a single place for at least a month, maybe more if I really like it. So for me, the answer was always obvious. I need to have a home base from where I can go out, travel, enjoy, get new experiences, meet new people, even at the same time doing my work, so not leaving my work behind. And then I can always come back to my home base, like you said. So yeah, that was always my format.

Drew (07:03):
And so different personalities can handle this, I guess, and others can't. Wh who is this lifestyle really for?

Nishchal Dua (07:11):
So there are all sorts of digital nomads and remote workers out there that I've met. I specifically focus on the people who are working while traveling. So if someone's traveling for a vacation or someone's traveling for fun and they're not working at the same time, then that's not someone I'm considering at this point. So I'm talking about specifically people who are traveling and working at the same time. So these people are all sorts of different categories. One is the sort of person who has a very flexible job style. They don't have remote work, but they have flexible job. So the company allows them to take off for a couple of weeks for a month or so and then still come back to their office. So these people are also sort of digital nomas because they can go out and live in a new place. For example, they could always go to South America, Europe, or Asia, and they could be there for a month, two months, three months, and they can still come back so they don't travel.

(08:09):
And then there are those people who are traveling, which means that they've sold off their belongings, they've taken off from their home base, and they're not probably looking to come back anytime soon. These people have been on the road for a couple of years, they may travel frequently or they make go to a place and then settle down there for a longer period of time. I've met a lot of friends that I've made who have been living as expats, so to speak, for almost three, four years. So the line gets blurred over there, who's a digital nomad and who's an expat, because if you've permanently moved to a new place, then you're no longer traveling, so you're not a nomad anymore. So it goes both ways.

Drew (08:47):
Do you find it's mostly entrepreneurs probably that are living these very flexible lifestyles? Or are you seeing more companies now allowing their workers to do this sort of thing?

Nishchal Dua (08:58):
So there, there's a third category there as well, and that's freelancers, right? So I would say the biggest chunk of people who are digital nomads who are traveling and working are freelancers. And by freelancer I mean they're people who don't have their own businesses and they're not directly employed by a single company. So these are people who are teaching online. They are content writers, marketers, designers, engineers, all sorts of different job profiles out there that they're doing. You've got all sorts of photographers out there as well. And I've met a couple of interesting people who are Instagram models and celebrities and evangelists and influencers. So there are all sorts of new types of jobs coming out there. So I would say the biggest chunk of digital nomads are people who work for themselves. So these are freelancers, consultants, influencers, those kind of people. The second biggest category is of course, entrepreneurs.

(09:52):
Because if you are working for yourself and then gradually you start hiring a team, then you've become an entrepreneur. So from having a one person team to having a three to five people team, it just makes you a business owner now. So if a person is really good content or a marketer, gradually they'll start hiring more people. And once they do hire those people, they have their own business and they're entrepreneurs now. So that's the second biggest population. And you'll see all sorts of, again, in the same categories, people who are running their own agencies or their own firms, a lot of tech startups are also working in a distributed fashion these days because just cost effective for startups, because cost for tech startups the first couple of years, they really need to keep their burn rate low. So what they do is they hire a team of four or five people and they all move to a more economical location like Thailand or Indonesia or something like that. So that's a big chunk. And at the same time, there are a lot of huge companies, enterprises and tech companies who are open to hiring remote employees. So that's also there, but that's the third category. So there are people who are working with these companies and they're working remotely and they're traveling at the same time. So they're both a remote worker and digital nomad.

Drew (11:07):
Okay. And is there an age range that you're seeing of people who are really more accepting of living this lifestyle? Is it mostly millennials or do you see other age categories also sliding into this nomadic lifestyle?

Nishchal Dua (11:23):
So this is an interesting point. You do see a big chunk of millennials here because as people who are between the 25 to 35 age group, you'll see a big chunk of these people out there. And then there's a certain drop off because post 30, 35, most people have their own families. So they don't travel a lot with families. You do see a couple of nomad families as well, but they're not that common. But then the second biggest category of people is people who are above 45 or 50 at this point. And it's exciting to meet these people because they're all having different stories and they have different reasons to become a digital normal. For some, they just wanted to change their entire lifestyle for someone else, they wanted to move to a different place altogether. So I did meet a couple of people who specifically researched, which is the best place in the world for you to live at depending on what your lifestyle and expectations are.

(12:18):
So there's this person, Andrew, who runs a company called Nomad Capitalist. He advises his clients on the best place for them to relocate to. So for example, if you're looking to make a couple of investments, instead of doing that in the states, why don't you move to Brazil? Maybe the real estate property there is giving good returns, and if you're looking to make your business more optimized, then move to a different country. If you're looking for love or family, then move to a different country. Those kind of things is, so you see a lot of 25 to 35 year olds, and then you see people who are above 45 50.

Drew (12:54):
Okay. And is this picking up and moving your entire company over to these places or just trying to find remote workers in those areas?

Nishchal Dua (13:02):
Both because if you relocate your company or reincorporate your company in a different country, then you can legally save a lot on your taxes, on your compliance issues and whatnot. So the big companies do it Al always. So everyone from your Apple to Facebook and Google and Microsoft, all these companies have headquarters somewhere else where there's literally zero taxation. So the same knowledge can be now made accessible to smaller entrepreneurs who are probably paying, let's say 30%, 50% income tax on their earnings in their companies if they relocate to a country like let's say Estonia. So interesting part, I'm, I'm going to digress slightly here,

Drew (13:41):
But Sure, sure, go ahead.

Nishchal Dua (13:43):
Estonia is a really interesting country because they've launched something called an e residency program, effectively saying that you can become a resident of the country, you can open a company there, you can get registered, you can have a bank account, and everything can be done online with just a form. So you don't need to go to the country ever. And it can still be a citizen of Estonia, you can have a bank account there and you can register your own company there with absolutely negligible taxes. So let's say I'm an entrepreneur with a company in a high tax country. What's stopping me from just reincorporating my company in Estonia and getting a bank account there? There's just absolutely no difference. And if I'm traveling at the same time, I could just start using my Estonian bank accounts, debit and credit cards. So effectively I'm paying a lot less tax now and everything's still the same.

Drew (14:37):
Is this a dual citizenship? Is that what you're describing?

Nishchal Dua (14:40):
Yeah, and the citizenship is optional. You don't really need to become a citizen, it's just something you can do if you want to. But it's just way too easy for you to open a new company or incorporate a new company in Estonia. These days it's completely online, so you fill up a couple of forms, you put in your name and everything, and they'll register your company in Estonia on that registration. You can have a bank account, you can have payment gateway and everything. So if you are a digital entrepreneur, if your company relies on accepting payments or billing clients online, then there's absolutely no reason why you can't move to a country like Estonia and pay a lot less of taxes.

Drew (15:21):
Okay. And does he kind of help you figure out how to, let's say I'm a US resident, the US is always going to want to get their piece of the pie in terms of whatever taxes they can get out of you as does he work with you through all of that sort of stuff?

Nishchal Dua (15:38):
Yeah, I mean, there are all sorts of consultants out there who can help you structure your company properly. But bottom line, yes, you could incorporate your company Estonia, you could receive payments from your clients in the Estonian bank account. You could pay your employees and your vendors through that bank account, and you can start doing your expenses from the same account. So effectively, you're not moving any money back to the states for yourself, and you're not paying tax on that money. So it's just a way of how you structure your company. Every company's going to be different, but it's technically possible. Yes.

Drew (16:08):
So do you think this is a future model that a lot of developing countries might utilize this as a way to sort of draw in more revenue, more interest in their countries?

Nishchal Dua (16:20):
Absolutely. It's already happening. So countries like Thailand and India have already started discussing the concept of a digital nomad visa, essentially saying that if you are a digital entrepreneur and if you would like to travel to our countries and work here, then why not get this visa and pay us a chunk of your whatever taxation. So it could help both of you, us, the countries get a decent amount of revenue from here, and you could save a lot on taxes because you're not paying taxes in your original country now. So for example, on a tourist visa, you're technically not allowed to work while you're in the country. So if you travel to Thailand today on a tourist visa, and if you, I mean for you especially Drew, this is your work, right? Recording a pod podcast. So if you're in Thailand and you open up your laptop and you start recording a show, is that work or not?

(17:12):
Because if it is work, then you're legally not allowed to do that in Thailand right now, whereas there are millions of people who are doing it. So yes, these countries are coming up with a concept of a digital nomad visa. And that kind of a visa would allow you, me, everyone else to travel freely around the world, work wherever we want in corporate, our companies in different lower tax regions, and then increase our own profitability. So Estonia has already done that there, other countries were discussing it, but in the near future it's going to happen because we are all living in a digital global world. We are free to move around.

Drew (17:44):
So you bring up an interesting point because I've, I've always wondered this. For instance, I'm about to take a trip to Scotland, and when I go to Scotland, they're, I'm going to be taking my podcast equipment with me. It doesn't mean I necessarily am going to be working, but I might. So I bring it along with me just in case. And of course you're going through all of the security checkpoints and then you go through immigration and customs and they start asking you questions about are you working, are you working? How many digital nomads are living under the law right now? Trying to saying, okay, no, I'm not really working because I've heard somebody said, well, just don't tell 'em working. You're going to open up a can of worms if you do that.

Nishchal Dua (18:29):
Exactly, exactly. That's the bottom line here. Don't tell them you're working. You're just carrying your laptop for fun and you'll check a couple of emails, that's about it, but you're not here on work because if you are, then you need to get a business visa. And it's a whole lot of different problems. So yeah, that's a complication. The systems and the processes in these countries, in fact, all countries are still decades old. They have not adapted to the concept of a working traveler businessman. They only think that a traveler is either a tourist or here for conducting business, and then in that case, you need to get two different visas. So I think it's a problem that's going to get solved in the next couple of years for sure. It's, it's going to happen. We just need to sit and watch who does it first, because Estonia has already done that, and they're retracting a lot of attention PR and business directly because of this concept. Because most digital nomads currently, they're like you said, just under the radar. They're not officially seeing that they're here and working, but they're here as a tourist and they might open their laptop and do some work. Yeah, right.

Drew (19:33):
Okay. Well, one of the other things that you mentioned is creating a work life balance. And I think sometimes I struggle with this myself. Sometimes when you get on the road and you're in a place where you just want to explore and see everything, and then you go, how am I going to fit work into this? Right? Because I mean, that's the whole thing, how I have to stay dedicated to doing my job. That's how I'm making my revenue, but I'm in such an interesting place. I want to go explore. How do you see digital nomads dealing with this issue?

Nishchal Dua (20:09):
I think the very first thing you need to tell yourself is that you're not traveling. You're not a tourist. You're not in a new, interesting, exciting place. You're just living someplace new. And the moment you think of it as living, you will be able to go about your regular business as usual. So if I'm in, let's say Rio in Brazil, I might say that I'm a tourist. I'm here on vacation, but no, I'm just living in Brazil for a month, and that means Monday to Friday, nine to five, I'm supposed to do my job. And then after nine to five in the evenings, I can go out to a local pub, I can go out for a movie, I can go out to the beach, I can do whatever feels nice, and on the weekends I can go out for excursions. I can probably make a short trip to the nearby city.

(20:54):
I can go for a river rafting excursion, I can go mountain climbing tracking, whatever I feel like. But you have to get this right in your head that you're living in a new place, you're not on a vacation. So Monday to Friday, you're not going to be on the beach all the time. You're going to be working. You have to put your head down because if you're not, see, like you said, work-life balance, it, it goes both ways. If you're not making your work a priority, then this lifestyle is not sustainable for you because you'll just burn through your savings and pretty soon you'll be broke and you'll have to come back to wherever you went from. So it's very important to prioritize your work at the same time and to understand that you've changed your lifestyle. So for example, there are all sorts of people who think that they need to start meditating a lot more.

(21:40):
They need to start doing yoga, so they move to a place which enables them to do this, but at the same time, they have to do their job as well. So they might wake up early, they might go for their yoga session in the evening after their work is done. They might come back for a meditation session over the weekends, they go out, they experience new cuisines, new cultures, new activities. But this doesn't mean that your work stops. Your work is just going to be there for you forever. If anyone thinks that there is, there's possible for anyone to travel the whole world carefree and not be responsible for any job, then I think that's just a utopian dream that's never going to happen.

Drew (22:23):
Well, and on the other side of that coin, I think that you're also trying to show people that they need to open up their world by immersing themselves in new places and not just getting locked into their regular nine to five day job and their daily habits.

Nishchal Dua (22:38):
Absolutely. Yeah. So for example, let's talk about, take my case, I live in New Delhi. For me, the challenge is will I ever get out of the city? Will I ever know more about the world that's out there? And the traditional options in front of me is either say no, that you're going to be in this city forever, you're going to be stuck in traffic forever. The only site you're going to see is those glass cement buildings and nothing else. The other traditional alternative is that you work 50 weeks a year and you take two weeks off. And in those two weeks you stuff in all possible things that you could ever do. So you go and you travel for two weeks, and in those two weeks you spend all your time sights seeing and clicking pictures and hashtagging and just checking into different places.

(23:27):
And when you come back, you just feel tired and it doesn't feel like it's a vacation. So those two typical traditional options, they don't work for me. And that's where I'm coming from. I'm saying, let's change our lifestyle. Because if two things happen, if I'm able to work online, then I'm limited to a particular place. That's what you call location independence. I can technically be anywhere in the world as long as I'm being productive and I have the discipline to do my job properly so I can be anywhere in the world. And the next step is where do you want to be? So if you feel like you want to live on the beach, then pick a beach, go there, live there for a couple of months, but live it as your natural life, right? Imagine you would've been born in that place. What would you be doing right now, nine to five job? And then at the same time, you're doing all sorts of fun activities. So don't overburden yourself with the responsibility that because I'm traveling, I need to do these a hundred things, which every tourist does. No, you can skip a few things. You can take it easy. Just make sure that whatever you do is sustainable both for your work and for your lifestyle.

Drew (24:31):
Well, and I imagine when somebody first starts this lifestyle, they probably act like they're in vacation mode just because that's the natural tendency. But then after time, it starts to become a little bit easier to focus yourself in on your job and create that nine to five space.

Nishchal Dua (24:50):
Absolutely. The excitement is just too much in the beginning. And you make all these checklists and to do items and you're like, I want to go here. I want to do that. I want to cover all these things. You download all sorts of travel guides on Google, and you decide what all things you want to see and do. What you're not thinking of is how do you want to structure every day? Because remember, you're not going on a five day vacation. You're not going to come back from here. If you're traveling as a digital nomad to a new place, you're effectively setting up a new lifestyle for yourself. So think in your daily routine terms. What do you want to do every day? I want to spend six hours working four hours focusing on myself and two hours exploring the new place. That's how you could structure your every day.

(25:32):
So yeah, packing and your planning and your days, they change and they evolve over time. And that's why for a lot of first time digital nomads, it just, it's too much of a shock. They expect life to be amazing and happy and you know what you see on Instagram, but it doesn't turn out that way because you have to work at the same time. Say like, Hey, this is so shitty. I'm a nice tourist spot and I'm have to reply to these emails. So it's not fun anymore. I thought it was going to be a vacation where I would get paid to have fun. That's not how it works. So

Drew (26:05):
When we're talking about the types of jobs that work best for this, I think one of the biggest challenges I have are time zones and trying to figure out how to build my work schedule around the place that depends on me in terms of my work. Are you finding that companies are becoming much more welcome to the idea of passing off the work to somebody, here's what you need to get accomplished, and then letting them figure out what time they want to do it in mean, or how do you battle this time zone issue of scheduling your day, especially with somebody like you, you're in India, and if you were having to work on an American time schedule, I can imagine that becomes a little bit difficult.

Nishchal Dua (26:52):
So I answer this from two perspectives. First is the perspective of an individual, and the second is that of an organization. So both have different criteria and preferences here. So for an individual, it all starts with what are you good at? So what kind of a job are you looking for? Because all jobs demand different type of availability online. So for example, if you're in a customer support role, you would have to be online during your support hours. Whereas if you are a content writer, you would typically have a weekly task or a monthly or daily task, and you could complete it from whichever time zone you prefer to. And maybe you are a product or a project manager, which means that you will have to be online for your meetings, for your coordination, and to make sure that your team and you are online and available at the same time.

(27:40):
So different jobs, different challenges. So as an individual, the first thing to figure out is what kind of a job are you looking for, number one. Number two, what kind of time zones would you be working in? Because from an organization perspective, there are all such different levels to remote work. Most companies offer a flexible work from home policy. What that means is there's an office and you have to be available in the city. So if we call it to the office, you have to be here, but it's flexible for you to work from home. So in that case, most people don't travel frequently because even though they're working from home and working remotely, they still need to be available in the city if there's an urgent meeting coming up. That's the first level of remote work. Second level is a distributed team, but still in the same time zone.

(28:26):
So companies which have smaller teams of 10, 15, 20 odd people who require a lot of coordination. So if you're on a product team or if you are in an agency where coordination is very important, these companies allow remote work, but in similar time zones. So between West Coast and east Coast, you could be there, you could be in South America, but that doesn't mean you can be 12 hours away to Aus in Australia. So that's the second level of remote work. And the third most extreme level of remote work is where you have a globally distributed team of digital nomads. So people who are or could potentially be in any time zone. And this approach is mostly followed by startups who are very flexible, who don't have urgency issues, and they rely on individuals through the entire job where there's minimum communication or collaboration between the teams.

(29:16):
So for example, if I have survey example for my case, my company has eight employees and they all do their own specific jobs, they have their own roles. There's very minimum coordination required between these two, between any two people. So my team could technically be in any time zone because I would never need them urgently if I send them an email or a message, or if I request a document from them, they could back in the next 12 hours, and that's fine for me. So different companies, different structures, but definitely as a digital nomad, if you're traveling frequently, then time zone becomes a massive, massive issue. And I think that's one of the core disciplinary things you should take care of. So for example, I'll give you the website name. It's called every time zone.com. That's the one that I rely on the most. It has, it says every time zone in the world. So it's very important for you to coordinate when am I going to be awake? When is my company or my team going to be awake? And how do we make sure that we work this communication through? Because if I'm sending emails and they're not going to read those emails the next 12 hours, so a major problem.

Drew (30:25):
Yeah. Okay. And talk about it from an entrepreneur standpoint, because I'm sure you've dealt with this before in terms of monitoring your employee performance mean you're not sitting there watching them to make sure that they're sitting in front of their desks from nine to five, but instead is it much more just in deliverables that you measure your employee performance?

Nishchal Dua (30:48):
Alright, interesting point because so I've discussed this and I've covered this in depth on our summit as well, and primarily from an organization perspective, because as an entrepreneur, as a manager, as an HR manager or a team manager, all of these people are very much concerned about trust, they're concerned about productivity, they're concerned about what if my employees are sitting in their homes in their pajamas, they're lying on their bed, they're not working, they're being lazy. How do I make sure that it doesn't happen? So I'll say there are three, again, there are three levels to how you can address this from the easiest to the most extreme, which I don't recommend. But I'll walk you through all the three levels. Yeah, I mean, I'll give you examples of these. So the first is of course measured in terms of develop rules. And the way you do that is to use the right set of tools.

(31:35):
So for example, we use Trello for project management, we use Google Drive for all documentation, and we use Slack for all communication. So what we do is on a daily basis, we have a standup channel and Slack where everyone on the team just writes down what is their to-do list for today and what they do yesterday. So we know what they're working on right now. And all of that gets updated on Trello board so that things are moving on. There's a calendar hygiene being maintained by everyone. So if you put all these tools and processes in place as an entrepreneur or as a manager, you put these processes in place, you can ensure that your team works on time and they deliver the right kind of work. Because in the end, that's all that matters. I don't care about a person who's spending 10 hours or eight hours in the office if they're not working, and as long as they're working from home and being productive, I don't mind how they do it.

(32:27):
So the first and the most basic thing to do is to have the right set of tools and processes in place for your company, both as an entrepreneur or as a manager. So that's the most basic thing to do. The second level of answer is to have an intelligence layer on top of these tools that I just talked about, and that's what a company called Proto Score does really well, and there are other companies as well, but proto Score, what they do is they integrate all your tools. So I said, Trello, Google Drive, email, slack, everything. They integrate that and then they create a report and a score of how much productive your employees are quantitatively, not qualitatively, of course. So let's just say I've, I've got a team of hundred people, 500 people, and I can't look at everyone's deliverables and their Trello and to-do list on a daily basis.

(33:18):
So this intelligent layer just tracks their performance and their actions on different tools. So if someone is sending out a bunch of emails every day, and if someone is taking off to-do items on their Trello board and they're completing their tasks on time and their calendar is properly maintained, then this proto score tool will give me a hygiene score. So all your employees are being 95% productive, for example. So that's the second layer of monitoring because you're not getting sort of breaching anyone's privacy, but you're just observing from a meta level what actions are they doing on the different tools? So are they even using the tool or not? What if I set up a project management tool and two weeks later no one is using it? So those kind of things are tried by this tool. That's the second level. And the third most extreme level, and I have to say this beforehand and I do not recommend it, but it is being done by a lot of companies out there.

(34:14):
So that's where you're using sort of like a tracking software that gets installed on an employee's laptops. And you could track what time they were online, what time they were offline, that software could randomly switch on the webcam and look at whether they're in front of their laptop or not. And it can tap track keystrokes, it can track the websites that you visit, and it actually recalls the amount of time you spent on the project itself. So a company called Crossover does that a lot. So what they do is they install this dedicated software and they say, if you're supposed to work eight hours a day, then this software will make sure that you're working eight hours a day. So it can randomly click your picture and see whether you were in front of your laptop or not. It tracks what kind of websites you open. So it's pretty invasive, but it's a fool proof. You are making sure that your company's working well.

Drew (35:05):
You brought up trust before, and I would say that introducing something like that pretty much says that you don't really trust your employees too much.

Nishchal Dua (35:12):
Precisely, precisely. It just says we don't trust you, but we just want to get the work done. So that's why Crossover doesn't have a lot of fans, but people still, it's a job.

Drew (35:24):
So from an employee perspective, let's say they want to approach their company about potentially letting them move out into more of a remote role. And maybe this is just working from to start with, before they actually start going overseas to start working, how does somebody approach their employer about that?

Nishchal Dua (35:47):
So I'll first break down the different things that an employer and organization and HR would potentially look for before giving you a work from home opportunity. So the basic things that an HR looks for, number one is of course communication skills because it's never more important than in a remote environment. If you're working from home, essentially, you don't have face-to-face time, so you have to communicate everything in written. Your emails need to be more effective, your communication on internal chat softwares need to be more effective. If you're giving someone a task, it needs to be crisp and clear. If you're taking someone's tasks, they need to be able to communicate that properly. Everything happens through communication. If you think of something and don't say it, it's never going to get done. So people don't realize this unless they move out of the office in the office.

(36:36):
It's just too much, too, it's just very easy for me to turn around and say something to the other guy and just expect that it'll be done right, because I said it to their face. But that doesn't happen so quickly and swiftly, remote environment. So communication skills is definitely one thing. Second is integrity, which we just discussed about trust. So NHR or your employer would definitely look for integrity in you, which means if you say, or if you commit to a timeline, how frequently are you on that timeline? And if you're getting delayed, are you able to communicate that openly that yes, I'm going to get delayed, but here's the reason for it and I'll try my best not to repeat this. So integrity and honesty is definitely important over there. Third skill that people look for is sort of like an ownership attitude where you know, have this self starter sort of a personality where you are taking initiative yourself.

(37:29):
And that that's important because in a work from home situation, you will observe a lot of times that people get up at 8:00 AM in the morning and because they don't have to commute to the office, so they're technically free to start working right away. So instead of starting their job at nine or 10, they can start at eight or seven whenever they're up. And that kind of initiative is required from people who want to start working from home and then gradually start working remotely. Time management is a big, big focus area because when you're at home or when you don't have a defined nine to five office hour, it becomes sort of difficult for first timers to be disciplined and to actually focus on their work because there's just too many distractions and there's no one to check you. So if you're at home, you can be like, I just take a two hour break, watch this movie, and then I complete my work at night. Or maybe after dinner, or maybe I'll pull off an all-nighter. But that kind of a discipline is very important. So like I said earlier as well, if you are a digital nomad who's traveling for a long period of time, having your defined time every day for work is very important. You need to be able to separate your work time with your personal time. And that kind of a discipline is just what kills most of the people when they start working remotely for the first time.

Drew (38:46):
When I first started my own business and I was working from home, I had the opposite problem, which is I never stopped working. It would get to five o'clock and I'd go, I'd just keep on working and working and working until my life became nothing but work. So it seems like there's also the other side of the equation that you got to watch out for as well.

Nishchal Dua (39:07):
Absolutely. Trust me, it happens more than you would expect this kind of situation to happen, but people do end up working a lot more. And that's kind of the pitch that I have for organizations that are listening to this, that if you allow people to work remotely, you will see a definite increase in overall productivity for everyone. Because like I said, if people are not spending a couple of hours commuting every day, and if they're sitting at home free, they might just open the laptop at any time. And because, so what happens is, if you're not coming to the office, this mental notion that I have to sup, I'm supposed to work nine to five, it breaks down. So even at 10 in the night, if you feel like working, if there's an email, you might just open your laptop and start to applying to that because you're just too free and you're free to make your own decisions.

(39:50):
So on the individual side, it does happen that you tend to overwork because you know, just have that freedom with you. And also a lot of times people are trying to prove too hard to their companies that, yes, I'm being productive while working remotely. So there are organizations out there who try to convey this idea it's remote work over burn. So I think Buffer had some sort of a P policy in place last year, I think I read about it, where they specifically told their employees to input on their Slack channel, which are there off hours. So during this hour they would not be working at all. They can't open their email, they can't check their messages, they would not be doing any work. And that is just to prevent that sort of like a burn situation where you're just working too much. And that does happen, but it's a balancing act on both sides.

Drew (40:40):
So let's talk about some of the locations that you've worked in and where do you find the easiest places to work and where, where's been the toughest place for you to work remotely?

Nishchal Dua (40:53):
So a bunch of different answers here. What do I personally, yeah, the things that I look for before I even plan to go someplace new, because one lesson that I learned early on is that if you think you can work anywhere, then that's a myth. Because if you want to feel, yeah, because internet speeds differ a lot everywhere. And if you're someone who needs to Skype or video conference or watch videos on online, whatever it is, you would need a really stable internet connection. And there are a bunch of other things that you would need. For example, if I have to get on a call with a client or my team, I need a proper meeting space. I need maybe at times a Skype room, which is soundproof. And for me to be able to do my job properly every day, I need sort of like a proper workspace, which has chair and table and everything else.

(41:42):
So it can't be done from a hotel room. So the planning is really extensive. And the things that I look for before I move to any new place is, of course, number one, is a really good co-working space, a co-working space that has accommodation nearby for long-term and then has high speed internet. It has 24 7 access, it has really stable electricity because you wouldn't know it, but literally does go out in a lot of places and you don't want to be stuck in a meeting where there's no electricity and your clients are like, we paying you a lot for this, and you're traveling and you're having fun because people don't expect you to have fun while you're on the job. So that becomes a challenge. So in terms of the locations, some of the really beautiful places I've been to that are an absolute delight, both for traveling and working, I would start off with Bali.

(42:33):
It's one of the hottest locations for digital nomads. Number one is Bali, beautiful place, beaches, scenic mountains, rice fields, amazing food, very nice people. And you've got high speed, a hundred Mbps connection everywhere you go. Wow. So you could work and you could travel and you can enjoy your life. So yeah, I think that that's the number one location. Number two is, and I'm also thinking from an economical perspective here, because a lot of digital nomads, they're traveling on sort of like a budget because they're traveling and spending a lot of money. So the second hottest location for most people is Thailand. In Thailand there are two hotspots. One is Chiang Mai, which is in the northern areas of Thailand. It's sort of like an a hill area. And then towards the south there are a bunch of places, but the one that I really love is Lanta.

(43:28):
That's K O H L A N T A Lanta. And so Lanta is basically an isolated island. It has no road connectivity with the main country, and you have to get take a ferry to reach the island. And it's a beautiful island. You are always walking along the beach or you're running along the beach. And the co-working space that I used to work out of it was made almost entirely of bamboo. So it's just a beautiful open place that you're working at. It feels so great. You're productive, you're creative, and you feel great about working. I've seen people working there for 12 hours straight, and they don't feel like it. I mean, they don't feel stressed at all. So yeah, so two interesting places in Asia would be Bali and Thailand. In Europe, I've worked in Porto, Barcelona, Budapest, and Prague, all amazing places. Of course, on a digital nomad budget, sometimes it gets too expensive for you to stay there for a long period of time, but if you have a remote business or a job that pays well, it shouldn't be a problem at all.

(44:35):
Porto is beautiful. They've got amazing vine, port Vine, of course. So that's the one I place I would recommend. It's overall best. And in terms of the places I did not enjoy that much, I hope no one hates me for this, but it's going to be Rio Brazil primarily because of the safety concerns for tourists. It's just not safe for you to travel to Brazil. I don't know I'm saying that, but muggings happen all the time. You leave your stuff on the beach and you will never get it back. And if you are booking your hotel or your Airbnb or your long-term, stay online without knowing exactly where you're going. You're in for a surprise trust. Trust me. The pictures that you see online and the place that you end up at is going to be very different.

(45:27):
I mean, it's it, it's a beautiful place, no doubt. But stay safe. Don't expect to be very chill about what you do just, and that goes without saying. For every country that you visit, where before you go to any place, have what you do list, have, go and read about an online, check the blog, make sure that you have all those traveling recommendations taken care of. So for certain countries, it's about getting the right vaccinations done. For other countries, it's about cultural nuances. You should be careful of how to not offend the local people, how to stay safe, those kind of things. Oh, for example, I just quickly point this out, there are a lot of people who are online poker players. So they are digital nomads and they make their money entirely through poker online. And for them, the challenge is to find the right countries so they don't get prosecuted. So there's this one guy who was playing poker in Indonesia in Bali, and someone told him that it's against the law, and they do. They don't just like charge you with an offense, they'll take you and they'll probably behead you because Islam, oh my

(46:32):
Goodness, laws are very strict. He got scared and he ran to

Drew (46:36):
The next flight, Thailand. Holy cow. Past in those the country's laws that you're going to for sure. Yep. All right. So tell me a little bit about the Remote Work Summit. That's in April, so it's just right around the corner. Give us a sense of what that is and who we're going to hear from and how to take part in it.

Nishchal Dua (46:59):
Absolutely. So the Remote Work Summit is my own personal project. It's something I've been working on for the last two and a half years. It's now the world's largest online conference focused entirely on remote work. I say the largest because as of yet, we have 7,000 people who have registered for it, and we are expecting this number to go up to almost 11,000. We get 500 registrations every week. So the Summit is an online conference. That means you could attend the conference from wherever you are in any time zone, watch it from any device, your laptop, your mobile, whatever it is. The summit is a collection of free recorded and live video interviews with industry experts, people who have been working remotely from companies who are completely remote. And we talk about a bunch of different topics. I'll just cover the top five topics that we talk about.

(47:55):
First is the best practices for HR managers of distributed teams. Second is how to get a remote job, how to clear your interviews for remote jobs and how to transition to a remote work environment. Third is how to scale your remote teams, and most importantly, how to build your culture and engagement if your team or if your company is remote, right? Because people not meeting each other. So how do you build engagement? How do you bring people together and build your company's culture? So those are the topics that we'll be discussing. The summit is a three day conference, April 16th, 17th and 18th. And it's completely free for everyone and anyone to attend. You just need to go to the website, click and get your free pass. And then on those three days you can tune in, you can watch the interviews, you can watch the live q and a sessions. You can also start networking with all the people who are attending live. So that's also a functionality. So basically if you tune in and you find the HR or the entrepreneur or the CX oof another company out there, you could start talking to them directly and you could network with other people who attend as well.

Drew (49:04):
Okay. So also after the conference is over, do you have a way for people to connect with each other?

Nishchal Dua (49:12):
Yes and no. So we have a premium access for the summit, and people who do purchase the premium access, they can connect with each other. They also get access to two exclusive kits that we have. We call them the remote work kit. Essentially it has resume templates, email samples list of all companies that hire remotely successful case studies and how you can start reaching out to different organizations and how you to prepare yourself to get a remote job. So that's a kit. So for people to connect with each other and to get this kind of a kit, they have to upgrade to the premium version. And the free pass allows them unlimited access during the three-day summit, but nothing after the summit. So during the three-day summit, they can connect with everyone else on the platform, they can attend the live sessions, they can watch all the video interviews, they can comment, they can participate in the networking sessions, but post the three-day summit, only the premium users would be able to do that.

Drew (50:14):
You know what I love about this is that you practice what you preach because by doing this online, I, I've been to many conferences where I've had to book my plane flight and go, and it's nice to be able to meet people face to face. But I mean this is really kind of creating within this world that you're discussing a conference that's built the way that you want people to be able to work and interact.

Nishchal Dua (50:41):
Absolutely. I mean, if we can't work remotely and if we can't organize a conference remotely, how can we preach the same thing?

Drew (50:47):
Right. Absolutely. Well, nul, you've provided some valuable information here today and I really appreciate that. And I know people are going to have questions about the summit and the remote life and all that you're doing. What's the best way for people to get in touch with you?

Nishchal Dua (51:04):
So the best way would of course be Twitter. My handle is ad rate, N I S H C H A L D U A. You can always Google that and you'll get my website, my LinkedIn, my Twitter, everything. So I'm like all over the place. The only complication is my spelling. Of course, it's very difficult to spell my name, but if you do it right, it's going to be easy for you to find me for anyone to find

Drew (51:25):
Me. Okay, good. And we'll post in the show notes I'll have, of course, we'll have your name right there in the title of the show notes page, and if they're looking at their podcast, they should be able to see the spelling of your name there too. So hopefully that will help everybody out. And I will post links to all of the content that you have, and feel free to share with me any links that you want me to post out there. And we'll fill up the show notes page so everybody can have reference to all of the stuff that we talked about today on the show. That

Nishchal Dua (51:55):
Would be great. All right, perfect. Perfect.

Drew (51:57):
Fantastic. Well, thank you for taking time out in your evening, me and my morning, and you and your evening over there in India, and it's been great talking to you. I wish you a lot of luck with the Remote Summit and good luck down the road.

Nishchal Dua (52:11):
Thanks it, Andrew, it was a real pleasure taking talking to you, and I really look forward to the entire show that once it's online. Thanks again.

Drew (52:20):
Well, thanks again for listening to Travel Fuels Life and head to our show notesPage@travelfuelslife.com slash podcasts for episode number 17, where we've got some links to those sites that we discussed during the show, some of the tools and resources, and also Nauls social media and the Remote Life website and the Remote Work Summit official website. All that stuff is out there. So check it out on our show notes page. And if you want to start hitting the road a bit more and you need to find ways to optimize your travel packing, we'll head out to travel fuels life.com/shop, and that's where you can find some of my favorite travel tools, including a sturdy carry-on bag that I use. I've taken it all over the world. And it helps me avoid baggage fees, which can sometimes rack up a lot of costs and it's very light.

(53:15):
And also have a nice laptop that I use and all the other little gadgets that I use. All of that stuff is out there at the Amazon shop, which you'll find@travelfuelslife.com slash podcasts. And just so you know, I do get a small commission for the sales, but it's a big thank you to me for the guests that I bring on the shows. And it's the same low price you're going to get through Amazon normally. So you're just throwing a couple extra pennies my way and I really appreciate that and I appreciate you guys being loyal listeners as well. And until next time, have a great week. Safe travels and thanks for listening to Travel Fuels Life.