My location-agnostic PR agency life | Lavinia Haane

Hello! I am Lavinia Haane, an Associate Director at Tyto, and this is my location-agnostic life. In this series, we want to highlight the freedom our model enables and how we navigate any challenges it presents.

What’s your morning routine?  

I don’t really have a specific routine apart from thinking about coffee first thing. I’m not a morning person, so after hitting the snooze button up to 5 times, I tend to wander to the kitchen to make a cup of coffee that I drink while getting ready for the day.  

Once I sit down at my desk, I tend to start the day by reading the top headlines from the UK and Germany or watch the news recap on BBC or Tagesschau. It’s not just important to me personally but also crucial to our job to know what is driving the news agenda on a daily basis. Plus, it’s a nice and relaxed (depending on the news) start to the day, helping my brain kick into gear before I dive into work.  

How do you organise your day?  

Before I log off every day, I tend to look through my to do list and tick off completed items and ensure the list is prepped for the next day. My to do list is organised by weeks with daily breakdowns to give me more flexibility and keep a good overview of everything going on not just on a specific day but the entire week. It’s basically an excel spreadsheet which looks a bit like one of those school schedules every kid had. That way, I can easily move things around, add deadlines to it and colour code by level of importance and urgency – I love a good colour coding system! 

When are you the most productive?  

Given I’m not a morning person, it probably shouldn’t come as a surprise that my productivity peaks around later afternoon or early evening. I always have and always will be a night owl.  

What is your favourite workplace?  

I love my living room because it has beautiful old bay windows which allow for the room to be flooded with light. In the summer I often open all of them which is a bit like sitting outside with a nice summer breeze. 

Other days where I don’t have many meetings (and we’re not in the middle of a global pandemic), I like to work from a nice East London coffee shop in the morning to get a coffee and breakfast while writing content. Eventually, I return to my desk though as I can’t live without my huge second screen.  

What’s your favourite thing about working remotely? 

The fact that I can build my workday around my private life is a huge benefit. I also enjoy the flexibility to work from anywhere. I’m currently living in London but my family lives in Germany. Weekend visits don’t always allow to spend enough quality time with family and friends back home. So, working from Germany for a week occasionally is a great benefit that I personally feel has a positive impact on my life and mental health 

What do you miss about working in an office?  

Socialising with colleagues in an office or for a drink after work is important to me but just because we all work remotely, doesn’t mean that we can’t do that. The culture at Tyto is great and I’m excited to see my London based colleagues some more once it’s safe to meet again.  

What’s your secret weapon?  

My positive energy and my empathy – the great part about it is that it doesn’t just work on others and I can always cheer people up, but it also works on myself.