The world of work is changing. Employers everywhere are quickly learning that top talent exists outside of their backyards, and jobseekers are finding that a wealth of opportunities exist beyond their city limits.
At Oyster, we believe that where you are shouldn’t govern what you do. So we were very excited to bring together remote workers, jobseekers, and employers last week for our event, Oyster Bridges, an educational experience and jobs fair.
Bridges attendees included jobseekers looking for their first remote roles, those seeking new challenges at distributed companies, and team members looking to become more effective in their current positions. We saw attendees from 54 countries around the world!
Whether you’re here to catch up on what you missed or simply relive the fun, we wanted to share some of our favorite highlights from the day, and to say thanks to the speakers, attendees, and partners that made it such a success.
Expert insights from leaders at distributed companies
We kicked off the day with a panel discussion led by our very own Co-Founder, Jack Mardack, who was joined by Rodolphe Dutel, Founder at Remotive.io, Mohamad Chamas, Product Lead at Oyster, and Kim Rohrer, Interim Head of People at Oyster.
Next up was our panel featuring Rhys Black, Head of Remote at Oyster, Kevin Kirkpatrick, CEO at WeWork Remotely, Humaira Khan, Founder at Walzay, and Chase Warrington, Head of Remote at Doist. Rhys opened with a presentation from our new, free Preparing for Distributed Work course, before he and the guests dug into how to unlock the power of asynchronous communication, and why it’s so valuable in the world of distributed work.
Following that was our panel about work-life balance, which is something that many remote workers struggle with daily. To help explore strategies for striking that ideal balance, Tiffany Turner, Learning Designer at Oyster, Mary Grissom, Senior Recruiter at Help Scout, and Renee Fujii, Recruiting Manager at Zapier shared their expert advice.
We wrapped up our panel discussions with exactly what every jobseeker was eager to hear: strategies for landing a remote role. Our Director of Global Recruiting at Oyster, Eryn Marshall, alongside Elliot Kim, VP of Engineering at Lokalise and Meagan Wansong, Candidate Experience Lead at Hired, shared advice for how to stand out as a top candidate when applying to jobs at distributed companies.
Jobseeking in the world of remote work
On top of our panel discussions, attendees at Bridges had access to resources that would equip them with the tools they need to become better remote workers than when they entered the event.
Our virtual job fair ran for 24 hours and gave attendees the chance to meet with 20+ companies who are currently hiring for remote roles. Take a look at them below! We were also lucky to have the support of our community partners Remotive, ReACT Refugee Action Hub, SE Factory, and We Work Remotely.
We had jobseekers join us from the Americas, Europe, Middle East, Africa, and Asia-Pacific regions seeking roles in customer support, engineering, finance, human resources, and legal.
For those looking for some feedback on their resumes, we had a number of job search strategists on hand including members of our People team, hiring partners, and the principal of Art of the Resume to receive an expert resume review. Of course, no job search is complete without a new headshot, so we made sure to have a virtual photo booth ready for those who wanted to give their LinkedIn profiles a refresh.
Who’s hiring right now
If you missed Bridges and are interested in checking out the remote roles our partners are hiring for right now, take a peek at their job boards below.
- Bobbie
- CodeMonk
- Doist
- Geekhunter
- Help Scout
- Highlight
- HiPeople
- Hired
- Hofy
- Lingo Live
- Lokalise
- Lundi
- OpenProject
- PerchPeek
- Quickbase
- RebelMouse
- SafetyWing
- SoftDocs
- Suzy
- Tally Market
- Turing
- Walzay
- Zapier
Preparing for the new world of work
While employees in an office setting and employees on a distributed team might have the same responsibilities, the challenges each face are very different due to the nature of their work environments. That’s why those seeking distributed work opportunities must upskill accordingly.
As we heard from several speakers at Bridges, with more companies hiring globally, remote working skills are becoming an increasingly valuable skill set for jobseekers everywhere to have.
Ready to level up your ability to work in a remote setting? Take our Preparing for Distributed Work course here.
About Oyster
Oyster is a global employment platform designed to enable visionary HR leaders to find, hire, pay, manage, develop and take care of a thriving global workforce. It lets growing companies give valued international team members the experience they deserve, without the usual headaches and expense.
Oyster enables hiring anywhere in the world with reliable, compliant payroll, and great local benefits and perks.
