Summer last year I had an itch. A very itchy itch. So I scratched it until it felt good. It led to Folks!
Here’s the story :
People build something new out of necessity (well, most things), but more viscerally fueled by frustration - Necessity that creates a problem so annoying they wanted to solve for it.
Strong feelings can be great motivators. Let's say I got deeply motivated few months back.
Chapter 1 : Where is everybody?
After 2 full years, I walked into an office that I had spent better part of last decade to nearly hear my own voice echo off the 25ft ceiling, somewhat in harmony with the air-conditioning (I have no idea why it's that loud - anyways, I digressed).
I was the nearly the only person in what used to be a 300 person office floor. It used to be an actual Trade Floor (and still goes by that name). To draw the stark comparison I'm trying to build up, I had an app downloaded on my phone sometime in 2018 to measure the noise levels of this bustling floor throughout the day to measure number of times it reaches 70db or higher - reference point for what's considered loud.
Picture Credits : Rob Sterry
It was arguably the most happening place in the entire office. It was the fertile environment for serendipitous meeting with colleagues in hallway and spontaneous lunch plans. I had pretty great work friends, some of them aren't at the company anymore, but are still ones I keep in touch with.
Three years into the pandemic, the words "new normal" has been etched too deep into my brain that anything that sits over it has an imprint on it. We all knew Hybrid work was going to be different, we'd be stupid to expect the office of the past. I expected a difference, but I realized not one that I liked.
The truth of the situation was that the office was great — entirely renovated (picture above is from the past). Hybrid work meant people came 2 or 3 days a week - but not everyone came the same 2 or 3 days a week. The flexibility came with the struggle for coordination. And walking into the age post great resignation, there were lot of new faces. I barely recognized people in the office - I admit some people didn't recognize me either having grown a massive beard during the pandemic.
Hybrid work has its' benefits, and for all the flexibility it flourished, left cavities of real-life office experiences.
I strongly believed that this is an area where digital technology can foster real-world connections and make meeting in person easier - in contrast to the narrative of virtual abyss that social apps and the phones suck us into.
There are times where the machines make is easier to connect in person. I thought this was one such time. So I decided to do something about it.
Chapter 2 : Oh wait, I'm a Product Guy
As one would expect to solve any coordination problem, I created yet another Slack Channel that no-one needed.
To my surprise double-digit people joined and participated.
It was a simple poorly constructed poll using emojis to get people to select which days of the week they plan to come. That way everyone knew which days had most traffic and could maybe switch to go the days where others were going - at least what I did.
I used the Slack option mostly to test the hypothesis and need, as I already had something else in mind. I didn't wish to be buried under a gazillion Slack notifications. I wanted the experience and act of choosing to go to Office to meet colleagues and work friends fun, light and cheerful.
I wrote a one-pager and shared with some friends to see if it resonated.
John's reactions are the best - so he gets to be featured.
Here's link to the one-pager if anyone wants to read : https://numberlock.xyz/folks
And then got to sketching.
Again - Same John, best reactions.
Chapter 3 : Show me what you got
Upgraded to Figma and hired a developer to watch it morph into real pixels on my phone. Built a usable app in a month and forced couple good friends to use it. Was expectedly rough around the edges but within another month, was decent enough to show off to anyone that was interested in learning more.
I launched this site a month later, announced on LinkedIn about this side project and collected some interest for Early Access. Again to my surprise, there were to 100 requests for access from 20ish different companies.
The app finally moved to public Testflight and on Google Play Store Beta, and onboarded double digit users on the app within VMware. Some friends were just kind enough to support me, others found it genuinely useful (but wished more people used it). It's a classic case of network effect where in its' infancy can feel futile, but increasingly gets valuable as the network grows. I knew I just had to keep heads down and get the app to feel fun, light and cheerful - just what I set out to do.
My first win with the app was to get a pool game in-between some meetings.
After a short hiatus ( No-one every warned me how much Toddlers get sick), I got back to polishing the app, release to the App Store, send emails to all Early Access and sat down to write this.
It's out Folks!
The app was designed purely out of desire to create something fun. And has its' quirks as you click around (curious to hear what resonates and what doesn't). But mostly it's just packed with inundated meme corporate lingo.
If you work in a Hybrid office setup, give the app a spin.
Check out the Help Section for setting up your domain for the first time (just needed for the first ever user in an organization and the office address)
🥂 To meeting more work friends, more work lunches and happy hours!
Cheers,
Naveen