The ITO Story

Jon Kent and Adam Scorey discuss why Jon built intheOffice during the first lockdown. With hybrid working here to stay, people need a way to coordinate without relying on rigid desk booking systems or messy spreadsheets. Jon explains that his design philosophy for SaaS products is genuine simplicity, no long contracts, and value from day one.

(Originally posted at https://www.intheoffice.io/vlog-episode-1)

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Show Notes

What is intheOffice?

• A hybrid work coordination app that lets team members signal where they're planning to work each day
• Solves the classic problem: you commute in, nobody's there, you never bother again
• Features include space/desk booking, visitor management, offsite status indicators, and analytics

Who's it for?

• Built for the individual user first, not the office
• Particularly useful for office managers, facilities teams, HR, and team leaders
• Anyone trying to coordinate flexible teams without resorting to rigid mandated days

The origin story

• Jon was a product manager who needed one work-from-home day a week for deep work
• That day kept getting hijacked by meetings and client visits
• During lockdown, he realised hybrid working was here to stay and the only tools available were inflexible desk booking systems or messy spreadsheets
• Core design principles from day one: genuinely easy to use, no training required, no long contracts, value from the first day

Key challenges

• Convincing buyers that simplicity is a feature, not a limitation ("But it can't be that easy")
• Overcoming ingrained expectations of long onboarding processes and rigid contracts
• Resisting pressure to replicate features from competitors without questioning whether they actually solve the user's problem

The workplace as an economy

• Workplaces behave like economies, where changes in one area create ripple effects elsewhere
• Flexibility requires trust, and trust requires transparency
• The UK's flexible working law (right to request from day one) is a good idea, but legislation alone doesn't fix culture
• Every company, team, and person is different. Treating them identically doesn't work

What's next for intheOffice?

• Global expansion after clients rolled out from single offices across their organisations
• Exploring features around team dynamics, working preferences, and wellbeing
• Staying focused on helping people make better decisions with better data, not tracking what they do