Spending a day with Christian from viewflip

July 11, 2024

viewflip came to Unicorn Workspaces in July 2023.

In just two clicks, Viewflip allows you to share any application with others, enabling instant remote collaboration from a common working location or anywhere in the world. It’s software sharing that’s also interactive: all participants can interact with the shared content via their own mice and keyboards.

A message from viewflip:

We’re approaching the end of our free beta phase, so don’t miss your chance to download viewflip while it’s still available for free: https://www.viewflip.app/user/register. Viewflip is exceptionally well-suited for collaborations on low/no code tools such as Make, Zapier, n8n and Workato.

It’s 8 a.m. Are you already wide awake, or still in a deep sleep?

At eight o’clock on weekdays, I’ve already been up for almost 2 hours. I have a child who goes to school, so I’m up early to get breakfast ready. After everything’s done for the start of the day at home, I look forward to heading to the workspace a little after eight.

It’s 10 a.m., time for a team meeting. There’s a lot that has to be discussed. You’re making a lot of progress, even if everyone is not always in agreement. What makes a good team?

A team is good when it can work together harmoniously and each member contributes their own skills and experiences and these complement the others. It’s also important to be on equal terms, to treat each other with respect and give everyone the space that they need. My role is to bring different views and interests together in such a way that action can be taken jointly and decisively. There’s also an appreciation of one another within a good team that’s expressed through positive words, small gestures and mutual regard. I always try to make time for each person and their situation – then I’ll also have a sound basis if there should ever be grounds for criticism.

It’s 11 a.m. You have a meeting with a client. How do you plan on making a good impression?

For me, a successful meeting with a client starts with good preparation – so beforehand I ask myself a number of questions and try my best to answer them: what exactly does this client do? Do we already have some connecting factors, like people we both know or something in common from a point in the past? What is the person I’m going to talk to interested in? What are their expectations in regards to our meeting? How can I bring added value to our discussion? I go into the meeting well-prepared and then I mainly try to create a good level of communication and build up trust. A good meeting should actually be a pleasure for all involved – that will usually allow you to deal with specific topics quickly and constructively.

It’s 1 p.m., time for a lunch break. Do you have a quick bite to eat and get back to work or take a more lengthy break?

I like to get away from my desk at lunchtime and take advantage of the many great places to eat near the workspace at Moritzplatz. It always does me good to get out and walk around a bit. It doesn’t have to be a long break, even a little change of scenery is certainly good for me. Simply going to the space’s inner courtyard or to one of the comfy community areas and picking a nice place to eat the lunch I’ve brought with me. After lunch I get right back to work, which I organize and plan with the help of a kanban board.

It’s 3 p.m. You’re having quite a day! Your meeting with the investors was a total success, but right before the next meeting your computer conks out. What will you do?

Well, that’s not going to break my stride and diminish my elation about the successful meeting. Plus, due to the preparation I do for meetings (see above), I know by and large what will be coming up in the meeting content-wise. When problems arise, I generally keep calm and objectively look for solutions – because I firmly believe that there’s always a solution.

It’s 4 p.m. and you have a meeting with the press. It gets a bit personal as they ask, “Have you been particularly influenced by someone?” and “What are you especially proud of?”.

Even at an early age, I was already impressed by people who took their ideas and knowledge and created something new, so to say the inventors and the entrepreneurs. I don’t have one particular role model, it’s more like I’ve been inspired by numerous people – and now I’m proud of having founded a company and becoming an innovator myself. That’s what drives and motivates me at viewflip: to get another company up and running, one that’s focused on enabling people to collaborate more interactively and efficiently – and creating new value for everyone in the process.

It’s 6 p.m. You’ve finished work for the day. You see a huge billboard in front of the train station with the heading “NEW WORK”. What’s the first thing that comes to your mind?

New Work is certainly not “new” to me – I’ve already been working with these approaches for years. Right from the beginning in my first company, all of our teams were equipped with MacBooks and we were working paperlessly. Six years ago, we set up our own activity-based workspace for the company in a loft. New Work is how I’ve been working for many years now, and I can hardly imagine working any other kind of way.

It’s 10 p.m. Time for your last thoughts before going to bed. What do you wish you had known 10 years ago that would be helpful for you today?

If I had known ten years ago how strong cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin were going to become, I would’ve been able to finance much more on my own nowadays. Otherwise, I guess I’d say that I’m much more relaxed than I was ten years ago. Not only has that improved my quality of life, it also helps me keep my cool during moments when things get heated up.