nology doesn’t come cheap — at the time of writing it rang in at about $15,000 a month — but for them these investments are worth the excitement of constant innovation and the satis- faction of work-life integration. By its very nature, a virtual setup entails a loss of face time.
While this is a cause of concern for many employers, Zweig and Davis have covered their bases well. Recognizing the potential downsides of a fully remote team, they have made retreats a central pillar of their work culture, gathering their team members twice a year in different spots around Canada for teambuilding and fun. As for clients, Zweig says most are actu- ally enthusiastic to learn about their new accountant’s atypical lifestyle. “When I started, I would have my degrees in the back- ground for every call,” he says. “I even bought a white back- ground because I thought my clients would want to see me in the office.” But Zweig soon realized his props were a kind of mask. When he started showing up for calls in a T-shirt and telling people where he was, he found “the responses were amazing.” Before long, he was getting emails saying, “Hey, I’m moving to this country — what do you think? How do I set myself up?” But while nomadic life definitely provides for good conversa-
tion topics, it also takes a toll on one’s sense of connection to a broader social network. Zweig doesn’t mince his words when describing what blogger Mark Manson calls “the dark side of being a digital nomad”: “When you’re not sedentary, people come into your life and then go. You constantly have to start again, and that can be exhausting. So there are going to be times when you feel alone.” Four years into nomadic living, Zweig has learned to get through these moments by bracing himself and seeing the chal- lenge as a learning experience. Paraphrasing comedian Louis C.K., he says, “This is what being a person is about. Being there with no support but yourself, and learning how to cope with it.” It’s a life skill Zweig and other nomads are willing to learn as
a more peripatetic future peeks out on the horizon for many industries. As Lai says, “I think my roots are with me now. It’s not as hard as people think, and it’s only getting easier and easier. It’s the way of the future.” According to Zweig, this future could include the accounting profession as well. “Mentalities have changed,” he says, citing recent innovations in accounting soſtware that have made remote work increasingly seamless. “I imagine in the next five years we’ll see a lot more nomadic accountants.” While he doesn’t know if he’ll still be a nomad by then, Zweig
says that for now, the lifestyle is just what he needs to integrate his drive to work with his yen to see the world. “When I worked in an office, there was a clear separation between work and life. Office equals work, everything else equals life,” he says. “Now, there is no longer this clear separation. Yes, I may have to step away and take a client phone call in the middle of a parade,” he says. “But that’s a pretty good price to pay for being part of Carnaval during tax season!”
LARA BOURDIN is a freelance writer and digital nomad currently based in Montreal
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