In this edition of Workflow, we have Greg Sherwin, Senior Principal Engineer at Farfetch, talking about working out of his Lisbon apartment and being a Mac fanboy.
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Describe what you do: Enable a global team of product owners, engineers, data scientists, and analysts to ask questions and test hypotheses of their products and processes
How do you like your coffee: Mornings it is a café pingado, the Portuguese analog of the Italian caffè macchiato. Afternoons it’s either a double espresso or a stovetop Moka pot. But when I am sharing coffee at home, it’s a lot of V60 drip.
Device(s) you use: MacBook Pro, iPhone 8, and an iPad Pro for leisure. And yet I would not consider myself a Mac fanboy, go figure. (I do run Parallels, after all.)
Describe your working style in one sentence: Curious, human, collaborative, multidisciplinary, and a bias to action.
What does your workspace look like: At the office, it’s a modern open space. At home it’s a bit of hot desking in my Lisbon apartment.
How does your workspace affect your creative process: In the office, it’s conducive to convenient interactions that are more serendipitous and opportunistic than I have if I were working only from home. I know there are recent studies that show these have had less overall value in workplaces in recent years, but I really do feed off of them for inspiration and motivation.
Particularly since I consider myself more of a neo-generalist with lateral rather than purely vertical, siloed interests. How do you get to know what you don’t know and should need to know? So that’s facilitated well.
At home, it’s a bit more focused given that everything has to come over a wire. Perspective-changing is still key for me, so I tend to move around a little with the physical space mapping to my own mental space.
Do you have a favourite playlist for work: A favorite playlist presumes repetition. That’s helpful when you’re doing something more meditative, like routine busywork or training for a 10k run. But if I am going to listen to music while working, it’s often very targeted and deliberate to match my mood, the attention level I need to the music, and possibly what other distractions I might be trying to keep out. So the short answer is “no”.
Who would you like to nominate for the next workflow interview: My last podcast interviewer, Tobias Barnes Hofmeister
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