Hi everyone,
I hope you all are keeping well in these cold times as last week was brutally cold here in Delhi. I have been hearing rumours about NCR becoming a new hill-station as the temperature here is even lower than a lot of hill stations in India, lol!
It’s been a while since I have written a newsletter but here I am writing it back to all of you. Finally, after lots of discussions, we have shifted to a bigger office because our team size grew 2x in the last 6 months and we are definitely growing Perfora at a very rapid pace. :)
It is definitely thrilling but scary at times because a bigger scale comes with a lot bigger problems but trust me, we are all ready for it.
Shifting our HQ was a very crucial yet emotional decision for all of us because we were operating from Jatan & Tushar’s house before. Full on startup vibes, no? We used to operate from a 3BHK flat in gurgaon & trust me, it was an experience in itself. A few things that I loved about our old office are:
We all used to crash in Jatan & Tushar’s living room daily and work from there. Back then we used to have only 2 office chairs & everyone of us used to fight to get them.
I personally used to take 15-20 mins naps whenever I used to feel tired & get back with double the energy (Work is definitely the priority).
Sometimes our meetings used to go on till 12AM & few of us stayed there for the night & technically woke up in our office the other morning. It was definitely fun to be honest. Probably this is also the main reason why we as a team are so closely knitted.
Sometime on Saturdays we all used to cook as well & have lunch there.
But with time & the growing team size, the place got a little cramped. I would say that’s the sign when you know you are going in the right direction as a brand. Finding a perfect place for all of us was indeed a rollercoaster ride. The search started in the month of August & we were definitely confused in-between getting a co-working space or to get a small separate office for ourselves. As per the general opinion, a lot of people will definitely choose a separate office because of various reasons like work privacy, no third party interferences etc. We also thought the same. After the hunt of about 2 months we did finalise a place near to our old office. It was a newly constructed apartment (apartment because we as a team are really frugal.) which we wanted to get furnished as per our requirements. It was all set to be handed over to us but life had other plans. The possession got delayed by 2 months due to some unfortunate reasons & we were back at ground 0.
On the other hand, the hiring was going on at full pace due to business & growth requirements. We had no time to search for another place & that is how we thought to shift to a co-working space. We started exploring the options available in the market & we finally shifted to a privately operated co-working space known as Nimble Co-Work in Gurgaon (our current office).
YES, Perfora now has its own corporatism office. It feels so great when you look back & see from where we all started. One has rightly said that “You should focus on the journey & enjoy every bit of it. The results will definitely follow”. We all have seen & experienced the same in our lives now.
One thing which is absolutely beautiful about working in a co-working space is you get to meet a lot of new people & get to learn a lot of things from their respective life experiences. Nimble is a 5 story building & we are seated on the 3rd floor here. There are 5 more companies (about 70 people) sitting alongside us on our floor itself. Isn't it amazing? As per my life experience, I have learned that networking is a key to abundance of knowledge & solution to the problems which you might face while building anything because a lot of people/entrepreneurs have gone through the same thing while building something of their own.
Earlier while working from our old office, we all used to run into each other’s calls/meetings unintentionally due to space constraints but now we all have our separate meeting & conference rooms. In our old office, our inventory used to be all over the place (It is still there though) but now we have a separate cabin for inventory too. Things are definitely much more well managed now & personally, my productivity has increased to the double (hoping this is the same for other people as well). The other day I asked Jatan & Tushar, "What do you like about our new office? " Both of them replied the same thing that, “Home feels like home now & we have a place to rest & to take a break from all the hustle that we do the entire day”. It is definitely very important to have a work life balance & to have an office away from home. Do any of you have such similar experiences? I would love to hear back!
Best regards,
Dheeraj Beri