We’re catching up with William McLeod, our Future Technology Group Director, on how life has been over the last few months and how NVT is continuing to drive innovation from home.
Can you give a description of what your role entails?
I lead the innovation projects at NVT, these include the development of products like Viia (our cloud offering) and Concepta (our monitoring and security platform).
What does your working day look like now you’re working from home?
My commute has shortened to a few minutes. I take the hall way to the kitchen, stop in for a coffee and make my way from there to the study.
Apart from that, I am working on the same things. In-person meetings at the office have been replaced with video conference. We’ve been meeting more often online for shorter periods which has been good to let us keep in touch but not distract from productivity.
What has been the biggest changes or challenges in your role?
My internet connection at home wasn’t the fastest when lockdown started, this has given me the motivation to investigate alternatives.
I ended up replacing my cabled broadband for a 4G solution from Vodafone, I often upload large files to the datacentre which would run overnight and sometimes fail half way through, the new connection has reduced that to around 1 hour.
How have you adapted to the changes?
NVT use Microsoft Teams as our collaboration platform and that has been instrumental in allowing us to continue effective communication.
I’ve taken the opportunity from this change to record a number of collaborative technical sessions for future reference and training. That was much easier whilst working from home than it would have been in a busy office.
It’s also been much easier to arrange online meetings with customers so I’ve been taking advantage of that to get some projects moving quicker.
Working remotely, how do you stay productive and connected with your team?
Just as I worked in the office, I write my top three priorities for the day in my notepad and try to progress them as far as possible. I take a coffee break whenever my concentration starts to dwindle, so I drink a LOT of coffee.
Video conference and instant messaging has been good to stay in touch with my colleagues.
Do you have any tips for home working?
Get comfortable! I worked from the small screen on my laptop for about a week before setting up my second monitor which was more than worth the 10 minutes of effort. I also adjusted my seat back to give me more support. Those small changes have paid dividends.
Do you have any interesting or funny lockdown stories to share?
Just a couple of self-inflicted bad haircuts. The front has generally been OK but the back is not very straight.
What are you most looking forward to in the future?
Sport, both on TV and in person. I am looking forward to the return of NVT’s weekly five-a-side game and Formula 1 starting again in July.
We had tickets for a family visit to the Silverstone Grand Prix this year. That trip is postponed until 2021.
We’re working from home to support you working from home.
Read more from our team on how they have been adapting to home working here.