Nora celebrated her two-year anniversary at QualityMinds in March this year. Her working model allows her to work remotely as she does not live near the QualityMinds office in Berlin.

She is an agile learning coach and the central point of contact for all learning-related topics. Her degree in educational science and her many years of professional experience in this field, including in self-employment, stand her in good stead in her current role as a learning expert. She appreciates the flexibility of her part-time model and the open working culture at QualityMinds.

What do you particularly like about your working model?

Nora: My working model has evolved over my time at QualityMinds. In the beginning, I only worked remotely and occasionally met up with my colleagues in a coworking space. When we had several minds in Berlin, the idea came up to set up our own office and this has now been in place for about 1.5 years.

I like my working model because I can plan and organise a lot myself. I’m lucky enough to live near an idyllic lake. In summer, I love to go stand-up paddling or swimming straight away during my lunch break or after work. It’s a relaxing balance to my desk job. When I have a lot of meetings and coaching sessions coming up, I like to go out for ten minutes in between to look at the lake, relax my eyes and clear my head. It often feels like a little mental reboot and helps me to re-adjust to new people.

I also appreciate the flexibility of my working model. Sometimes I combine work with visits to family or friends in the work & travel style by adding a day or two to the weekend.

What do you find special about your working model?

Nora: The flexibility of working from home is fantastic, especially because I can organise my work according to my own ideas. My husband also often works from home and on some days we often meet in the kitchen to make tea or lunch, for example.

How do you use the opportunity to work and travel thanks to your remote model?

Nora: I like to visit family and friends who live further away and take some work with me. Sometimes I also add a day or two to the weekend so that I can spend more time with my loved ones.

So far, I’ve only travelled work & travel-style in Germany. I once worked from the Baltic Sea for half a day as part of a holiday because it was necessary for a customer project. Otherwise, however, I prefer to separate work and holiday so that I can return to work fully rested.

Do you ever work from the road?

Nora: I sometimes work on the train when I’m on my way to the Berlin office. However, this often depends on various factors: Is the wifi working, how quickly can I get through the dead zone and have I managed to get a seat at the table? Smaller tasks that need to be done offline can be completed easily. In general, however, I can work best in the home office, in peace and quiet.

What does your workstation in the home office look like with your technical setup?

Nora: As I work at a secretary desk, I have my devices arranged one behind the other: My laptop, whose keyboard I use, is at the front and behind it is the external monitor. Fortunately, QualityMinds makes it easy to get the equipment I need to work efficiently. If I don’t need an external monitor for individual calls, I can sometimes work standing up, which is a good change, also for my back.

What do you think of the technical setup at the workstations in the office?

Nora: I always enjoy using the modern hardware and technology in our offices. In general, our offices are all very nicely and brightly furnished and offer different workstation settings, so I also enjoy working at the other office locations.

Do you manage to close your laptop in your home office after work?

Nora: Yes, I now find it easy to leave my work laptop closed when I’m not working. Ideally, I then also close my secretary.

I used to be self-employed full-time for a long time, which unfortunately favoured the mixing of private and professional life. My private affairs were often just a click away from my work. That’s why I honed the ability to separate the two early on and it’s now paying off.

What do you think of our team events, such as the summer event, the cultural days and the Christmas parties?

Nora: The many events we organise for the Minds are always a highlight for me. The inspiring atmosphere at these events encourages dialogue and I always come back with lots of new ideas. They give me the opportunity to talk to my colleagues outside of their usual learning or work situation. Normally, most of our conversations revolve around learning, the design of the learning sprints and the reviews and retros. Since I work with almost all German-speaking employees company-wide, it is very valuable for me to meet them outside of these work-related contexts and just chat. We also recently had a team strategy day in Nuremberg, which was very enriching.

How do you organise communication in the home office compared to the office setting?

Nora: We mainly communicate via Slack, especially in topic-related channels. I prefer to write directly when I need something and avoid unannounced phone calls. I prefer to ask in advance if someone is available for a call. I have regular and irregular meetings with some of my colleagues, especially when topics overlap. I am responsible for internal agile learning coaching on the one hand and for our agile learning coach training on the other. We have fixed communication channels for both topics.

Where possible, I plan focus phases and block out longer periods in my calendar. On certain days, I devote more time to learning coaching, on others to project support or follow-up work. The digital “QualityMinds Daily” is intended to replace spontaneous, company-wide meetings that would otherwise take place in the office, but I rarely take part in them, although I value such chance meetings. Minds from the other teams often have very good ideas and solutions, so that great synergy effects can arise in the morning.

I can work in a more focussed way from home, but I miss the spontaneous conversations that happen in the office. That’s why I like to go into the office on less busy days to facilitate such encounters and make specific appointments with colleagues. I then use the office for tasks where a relaxed atmosphere is helpful. Otherwise, I plan my appointments so that there is time for socialising and lunch breaks together. In our Berlin office, we also occasionally organise cross-team meetings, which always add value.

What do you like about the working culture at QualityMinds?

Nora: As many of us work remotely, I appreciate the excellent internal structures that we have established. Thanks to our internal communication tool Slack, we are always able to stay in touch. Even when colleagues are in meetings, you can leave them messages to which they reply as soon as they find the time. This asynchronous way of communicating works very effectively. Of course, there is also the risk that such tools can be distracting if you don’t use them purposefully.

Do you have any special rituals in your day-to-day work?

Nora: I don’t really have a set routine that I do every day. But in summer, I have a ritual that I really like: before I start my working day, I briefly go through all the messages that have come in and then I like to enjoy my first tea in the sun on the stairs that lead from my balcony to the garden. This is my favourite ritual in good weather and I really miss it in autumn and winter, unfortunately I haven’t found a comparable ‘winter edition’ yet. After this personal ‘tea ceremony’, I often have a few things sorted in my head and can then sit down at my desk and start my working day on a positive note.

As my desk is in our living room, I usually tidy it up in the evening and close it to visually remove the work: out of sight, out of mind. This helps me to separate my professional and private life and get in the mood for the end of the day.

You are our expert for further training. What training programmes do you use yourself?

Nora: On the one hand, I naturally also enjoy using our agile learning coaching programme with all its possibilities and am supported internally by my colleague Manuel. As I provide agile learning coaching myself, I also have an internal perspective and therefore look at many things differently. It also helps me to reflect on myself and my work and to take away inspiration.

On the other hand, I like to take advantage of the educational leave that all employees who live outside of Bavaria or Saxony are entitled to. This year, I was drawn to the water: I wanted to learn more about the compatibility of tourism and industry with nature conservation and the UNESCO World Heritage Site.

How does agile learning coaching work at QualityMinds?

Nora: The focus at QualityMinds is on agile learning, which can take place both on site and in the home office. Agile learning coaching is individualised and tailored to the learner. The structure provides a framework and a timetable, while the implementation of the learning units is flexible and on a self-directed basis.

In the planning phase, we define together what and how my counterpart would like to learn and which resources should be utilised. The length of the learning sprint can be customised – some people want to have a regular exchange during the sprint, others need it less. There is a reflection at the end: What learning goals have been achieved? How did the personal learning rhythm work? What was learnt about the individual way of learning and should be considered and integrated into future learning sprints? This not only develops technical skills, but each mind also learns something about its own individual learning – creating valuable metacognition.

With us, every mind can decide for themselves what they want to learn. ‘Learn what you want’ is our motto. The range of topics is correspondingly broad: You can acquire skills that will advance you professionally or qualify you for job-relevant certificates, but there is also room for private interests. I always encourage colleagues with families in particular to set themselves private learning goals. After all, personal needs are often neglected alongside work and children, and then it is all the more important to do something for yourself and to learn. This great freedom in the choice of learning topics and our many support programmes is what makes QualityMinds so special for me.

One popular topic for a while, for example, was ‘meal prepping’, which helps many people to organise their everyday family life in a more relaxed way. Others choose sporting goals, for example, to improve their fitness. For example, you could find out how many sports sessions per week are best for you to feel really good in your skin. Learning musical instruments and languages are also in demand, as are insights into AI. The learning topics vary greatly and are as individual as our students themselves.

Last year, I combined two of my own learning topics in an experiment: As my ‘fun learning topic’, I practised balance exercises while stand-up paddling; as a ‘sensible learning topic’, I took care of the important but less motivating topic of living wills. This was an ideal mix for me, as my agile learning coach always pushed me a little when I was learning about ‘living wills’, and I could then proudly tell him about my successes with stand-up paddling.

What ‘learning type’ are you? Can you work better in quieter environments or do you need a bit of hustle and bustle around you?

Nora: In agile learning coaching, we don’t use the term ‘learning type’ as the concept is not scientifically proven and also encourages categorisation. Everyone has their own factors that can promote or hinder good learning. I prefer a quiet environment. If I choose background noises, I only choose them myself, such as music or nature sounds. Over time, I have found out better and better what works well for me: The sound of the sea gives me too much of a holiday feeling. When I’m mentally enjoying the sun and dipping my feet in the water, it’s not very conducive to a productive working atmosphere. On the other hand, I find the sound of rain very pleasant, it has a calming effect. Sometimes I also listen to songs on a loop, sometimes with lyrics, sometimes without.

Everyone can find their own individual, favourable factors and make use of them. I used to work a lot with students and they had a colourful mix of preferences when it came to the learning environment. Some preferred the absolute silence of a library, preferably with headphones. Others studied best in a lively street café, where they could get a good coffee and concentrate perfectly thanks to the ambient noise. It’s fascinating how different people are and I encounter this individuality every day in my learning coaching. I learn something new every day, which is great!

What is your learning tip for all learners?

Nora: That depends on the specific challenge. For example, I really appreciate Vera Birkenbihl’s methods. The ABC list technique for example, was developed by her and is a simple exercise for the creative collection of ideas or to check your own level of knowledge. It is suitable for many learners, especially when starting a new learning topic.

Many find more abstract topics that cannot be directly applied in everyday life, such as advanced maths, more difficult. I have observed that the more interesting and applicable the topic is for the learner, the easier it is to learn. For example, many of my coachees described how learning at driving school was perceived as much more effective, focussed and concentrated because what they had learnt was immediately put into practice. Even the theory was easier to master by imagining that you were actually sitting in the car. Motivation therefore often increases with greater practical relevance.

In general, learning always depends on the situation and is very diverse. A basic principle at QualityMinds is that learning should be fun. We tailor the learning methods in agile learning coaching to the learner and consistently give him or her responsibility for their own learning process. This gives us great and, above all, sustainable learning effects.

Listen also to our podcast about agile learning.

You want to learn more about the flexible working models at QualityMinds? Read the interviews of our Minds Max, Bettina, Klaus, Mario, Katja, Tobias, Richard and Lukas.