Khalid Khan • Monday, May 2, 2022
AUTHOR
KK
Khalid Khan, Developer Relations Engineer
Khalid is the Developer Relations Engineer at Codiga. He is passionate about Software Engineering. Startups and Developer Advocacy. He is also an MLH Coach and Organizer & Member to numerous Hackathons & Developer communities
As a lean and mean remote team, we have become masters at work from home and communicating online.
Working from home has many upsides. It eliminates a lot of the traditional aspects of going to work in an office, like commuting and dressing in business attire. It can provide more independence, in many cases increase productivity, and allow us to have more flexibility between our work and personal lives.
Since Codiga was founded in 2020, work from home has been all that we know. This has worked tremendously well for us as it allows us to be a truly borderless team that can hire talent in any corner of the world. Working from home and having a team that resides in many countries also means that we bring many different perspectives and cultures to the table, something we value greatly at Codiga.
Having said that, we recently had the opportunity to bring a good chunk of our team together for our first annual company offsite, known internally as Codicon 2022! We’re lucky to have team members from South America, the USA, Canada and India on our growing team, and even though we couldn’t bring the entire team together this time, we managed to get most of the Codiga crew to gather in Houston, Texas for a week of group brainstorming sessions, retrospection on past accomplishments and areas for improvement, Q2 planning, and a few after work activities for a little teambuilding.
Although us coders conduct our professions solely online, we felt it necessary to meet in person for a few reasons. Firstly, some face to face time with a team you’re used to communicating with online can provide a much-needed morale boost. While of course, Codicon 2022 was largely focused on getting work done and planning for the rest of 2022 and beyond, offsites are not just about accomplishing work-related tasks. While working online, day in, day out is what we do, sometimes this can stump creativity. An offsite can be a great opportunity for new ideas to spark and to give our team employees that extra little push they need to stay productive and enthusiastic. We often get so caught up in the day-to-day and are laser-focused on our immediate to-do list, that it’s difficult to take a step back and refocus on our larger goals.
Meeting and discussing ideas and processes in person can give you a new perspective, increase team motivation, encourage healthy camaraderie and competition, as well as give our team a chance to let loose and get to know each other outside of the world of Slack and Discord.
At Codicon 2022, we made amazing headway on a number of our big initiatives in 2022, mapped a clear marketing plan for Q2, and had a little fun in between all of the work. More to come on the business and product updates in due time, but until then, here's a rundown of some of the highlights of Codicon 2022!
We came, we coded, we ate, we conquered
Between daily exchanges of ideas, and collaborative group working sessions, and discussions about marketing and SEO, we enjoyed all of the local cuisines that Houston had to offer.
Paintball
The Codiga team loves a little healthy competition, so naturally paintball was a great after-work activity. Outside of getting to go head to head with one another, it was a great excuse to get outside, get some fresh air.
NASA Space Center
One of the coolest activities we did in Houston was visit the incredible Johnson NASA Space Center.
Escape the Room
A great team-bonding experience, but not as easy as we were expecting! We made it out with 2 minutes to spare.
Endless evening board games
One of the highlights of our 2022 offsite was the evenings spent playing board games and sharing a drink.
