Remote makes it possible to employ anyone, anywhere in the world. Their mission is to simplify how companies employ the best talent globally and to help remote organizations do their best work. They offer services such as international payroll, benefits, taxes, and compliance for businesses big and small - so that they can hire anyone in the world - while outsourcing all the admin & legal work to Remote. Remote's vision is to become the "stripe for (remote) work".

Remote is also among the fastest growing startups globally and is backed by some of the best venture capital investors in the world, such as Index Ventures, Sequoia, General Catalyst, Two Sigma, and many more very accomplished angel investors. Remote recently raised their Series A financing round of $35M.

Before founding Remote, Job worked as neuroscientist, and he was one of the first engineers that joined GitLab. In his role as VP of product, Job was responsible for GitLab's product development and he helped grow the company from 5 to 450+ employees. Today GitLab is one of the largest distributed companies in the world.

We discuss:

• How Job entered the world of tech at GitLab
• The advantages of remote work
• Second order effects of remote work on the world
• Best practices for working from home
• The origin story of Remote.com
• Tips for aspiring entrepreneurs and much more

Show notes:

• 00:50 -- Intro
• 03:49 -- Personal intro from Job van der Voort
• 06:59 -- How Job started as one of the first engineers at Gitlab
• 07:37 -- Background to Gitlab - What is Gitlab?
• 08:05 -- Job’s first touchpoints with working for a fully distributed / remote company
• 10:07 -- Insights into Job’s role at Gitlab as VP of product
• 11:37 -- Gitlab’s growth and scaling up
• 12:40 -- Collaboration tools
• 14:06 -- Advantages of remote work
• 16:33 - The shift to remote-first from employers perspective
• 17:56 -- Second order effects of shifting to remote work
• 20:30 -- Best practices for remote work
• 24:59 -- The origin story of Remote.com - How remote.com was started
• 27:45 -- Introduction to what remote.com does
• 30:35 -- Remote.com’s venture capital fundraise
• 32:00 -- Customers of Remote.com
• 33:23 -- Remote.com as stripe for remote work
• 36:09 -- Job’s vision for remote.com in 5 years
• 37:19 -- Job van der Voort’s advice for aspiring entrepreneurs and leaptakers
• 40:39 -- Labor market and demand for remote roles
• 42:36 -- Book that had biggest personal impact
• 43:08 -- Job’s favorite remote collaboration tool
• 44:42 -- Advice to younger self
• 45:03 -- What courage means to Job
  

Please follow me on Instagram, Twitter, and my Website, where I post new episodes and share resources & tips for anyone interested in entrepreneurship in Europe.
Sign-up for the mailing list to stay in the loop!

If you're enjoying the podcast, the best way to support the show is by leaving a review on Apple Podcast or in your favorite podcast app.

Special Guest: Job van der Voort.

Support Leap Takers

Links:

• GitLab - DevOps Platform Delivered as a Single Application
• Remote - Global HR Solutions for Distributed Teams
• Hacker News
• Google Docs: Free Online Documents for Personal Use
• Aeron - Office Chairs - Herman Miller
• Key Light Air | elgato
• Remote Jobs - Find awesome remote engineering, designer, product and marketing jobs |
• The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales - Oliver Sacks
• Figma: the collaborative interface design tool.
• Notion – The all-in-one workspace for your notes, tasks, wikis, and databases.
• Bitcoin - Open source P2P money

In addition to Seedtable, Gonzalo is Head of Growth at Jobbatical, an Estonian Relocation Service for Tech companies, and he is mentoring startups. His previous experience includes having founded two startups, being a Content Specialist at Piktochart, growing EVELO from $1.2m to $4m as Director of Marketing, and helping to bring The Martec from 2,000 to 50,000 monthly visitors.
Gonz likes to read and to fly. He speaks 4 languages and lifts heavy things, plus he seems to be into the occasional burger or ramen.

In today’s episode we talk about practical tips for remote work and working from home, how Gonzalo started Seedtable, what makes a successful newsletter & advice on how to grow your own content, the impact of Covid-19 on various startup sectors, and more.

Please follow me on Instagram, Twitter, and my Website, where I post new episodes, share interesting articles I found, and blog occasionally about cool startups!
Sign-up for the mailing list to stay in the loop!

Show notes:

• 01:53: Who is Gonzalo & introduction
• 04:52: Is a certain personality type required to be able to work remotely?
• 06:25: Tips & tricks for remote work
• 10:08: Gonzalo's favorite city to work from remotely
• 12:22: How did Gonzalo become interested in technology and entrepreneurship?
• 15:40: How does website flipping work
• 16:53: Learnings from his experience as a founder & failed startups
• 19:11: How to pick and find your co-founder
• 22:21: The beginnings of Seedtable
• 24:09: How Seedtable got traction
• 27:18: Tips to produce good content and to grow your audience
• 30:19: How to separate a job and a side project
• 33:30: Key facts about Seedtable
• 36:32: Gonzalo's predictions for 2020 and the impact of COVID-19
• 39:18: Discussion of startup sectors that are positively or negatively affected by COVID-19
• 44:20: Gonzalo's understanding of courage
• 45:14: Wrap-up

Remo's Favorite Quote of the Month:

“Discipline equals freedom”

• Jocko Willink

If you're enjoying the podcast, the best way to support the show is by leaving a review on Apple Podcast or in your favorite podcast app.

Special Guest: Gonzalo Sanchez.

Support Leap Takers

Links:

• Seedtable: Weekly newsletter on European tech
• Seedtable edition: Interview with Matt Clifford of Entrepreneur First
• Seedtable edition: Spotify goes wild
• Gonz (@gonsanchezs) on Twitter
• Entrepreneur First - Find a co-founder at the world's leading talent investor
• Roam Research – A note taking tool for networked thought.
• Flippa - #1 platform to buy and sell online businesses
• WIRED
• Sifted | Telling the untold stories of European startups
• Jobbatical - Relocate your new hires efficiently and reliably