The breakfast table is the office, the garden or verandah is the
break area, the boss is on a screen at the other end of the town and while
there are risks like getting video bombed by kids, when you are on a zoom call,
or a call to dinner by the wifey, as Anushka Sharma did, interrupting Indian
captain Virat Kohli’s call with ex England captain Kevin Peterson, WFH is the
new cool- Work From Home
Software companies in Goa have been primarily taking work from
clients abroad. Even if the projects are signed in person, the collaboration happens
over the internet and several communication tools help collaborate these online
meetings.
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As one of Goa’s oldest and largest, local IT companies, they
always wondered if they could or would be able to really work from home (WFH),
contemplates Ricky Noronha, Founder Director of Online Productivity Solutions
Pvt Ltd. Verna, Goa which has over 90 members.
“Sure we are a cloud systems solutions provider and cloud
systems designing developing and implementing company for clients across the
globe. After the announcement of the lockdown we had in virtually two working
days, we had everything up on the cloud, every team member fully connected from
their homes and working in their respective teams and projects, smoothly. It
was wonderful to see and I am proud of every single of our 90+ team members.
All Goans, living across Goa state,” said Ricky Noronha. “Personally I see this
as a huge achievement for Goan IT and a way to the future,” he adds confidently
Similarly, Open Destination has over 500 employees in Goa and
the company is catering majorly to the travel segment. Since its
inception in 1999, Open Destinations has successfully implemented their
software in over 30 countries, with a system that supports in excess of 85
million searches per day. The company has a combined staff of 510 people in Goa
and about 35 in London (of which, 95 percent of its employees are Goans)
between the headquarters in London and the development, support and outsourcing
center in Goa.
Vice President of Open Destination, Mr. Milind Anvekar, “All our
employees are working from home and very efficiently too. They are all
connected to our office server. Yes, the network is a challenge and so is
manpower to handle minimum office work like maintenance of machines, Genset and
equipment which is essential for servers to keep running. We have also arranged
laptops and desktops to be transported to our employee homes so that they can
operate.”
CEO of Genora Infotech Pvt Ltd, Mr. Milind Prabhu which has over
30 employees of which 90 percent are Goans, said that “We need to adapt to
clients comfort on the preferred platform. Zoom has been the most favored
platform. Given the fact that it is easy to use and it provides cloud recording
of the meetings and now has end to end encryption for better security of your
communication online, it is being used”
Recently there is a rave to build online collaboration
platforms. Prabhu goes on to add that, “several competitions have been
announced with prize money as high as Rs one crore to build collaboration
platforms. We would love to use any of our Indian products if they can come out
with one.”
Tangentia, which has an employee strength of 150 across North
America and Goa has also adapted to the tune very quickly. In Goa alone, they
have about 60 employees. Its CEO, a Goan Vijay Thomas believes that their
Toronto employees are saving an average of two hours on their daily commutes.
“We are also encouraging our team to spend more time with their families, take
up new hobbies, or join online courses. Overall, we are coming to a full week
of ‘working from home’ (WFH – is our internal term for this), and there had been
nothing but good reviews from our employees. We are beginning to wonder, why
did we all not think of this earlier?” asks Vijay Thomas.
In a completely different field and that is education, Aakash
Educational Services Limited which has over 2000 students in Goa are also
attending their classes regularly on e-platform which includes Zoom etc. “Yes,
many of our students are attending our live classes in batches of 40-50 at
different timings during the day. We have given our students e-books and tasks
to do which is discussed and clarified during live classes,” said the Regional
Director, Aakash Educational Services Limited, Mr. Amit Singh Rathore.
Recently the Goa Technology Association (GTA) launched a series
of online webinars on March 30 this year titled ‘Lockdown Series’. It aims to
share experiences, educate entrepreneurs and navigate through the issues
currently faced. Hosting its first episode as a panel discussion, the event was
attended by over 60 participants.
So home was always where the heart was. But it is now where the
work is. And everyone’s liking it
