In spring 2023, tech heavyweight Cisco partnered with Greece’s South Aegean Region for an initiative to establish the Greek island of Rhodes as a top haven for digital nomads, sending a group of Cisco employees from across Europe to live and work from the island and explore the impact of digital nomads on the local economy.
Leading global technology company Cisco, in collaboration with the South Aegean Region, launched an initiative to establish Rhodes as a prime global hybrid work destination. The initiative involved a hosting program that saw 17 Cisco employees from all corners of Europe travel to Rhodes and spend three months—March 2 to May 31, 2023—working remotely from the breathtaking Greek island. This pilot program successfully showcased Rhodes as a smart digital island and an enticing destination for global remote workers.
The project’s key objective was to establish relationships of mutual cooperation and nurture a fulfilling experience for all parties involved by integrating Cisco’s highly qualified, tech-savvy employees with local organizations and the local community. Cooperation and co-innovation are integral components of Cisco’s Country Digital Acceleration Program (CDA), a program designed to encourage digital research and education and stimulate digital entrepreneurship.
Last year, Cisco embarked on an innovative venture in Venice to reimagine the future of hybrid work and transform work, workplaces, and communities by accommodating work-from-anywhere employees. Sixteen Cisco employees were given the opportunity to live and work remotely in Venice for three months as part of the Venywhere project. This year, focusing on regional development, Cisco partnered with the South Aegean Region to commit resources and expertise and set Rhodes on the path to becoming one of the most sustainable destinations globally, using CISCO’s digital technologies.
This venture provides exciting opportunities for regions and destinations offering a high quality of life—such as Rhodes, with its beautiful locales, natural environment, and rich cultural heritage—and the Rhodes Digital Nomads project builds on this to bring forth meaningful transformation.
The advent of work-from-anywhere capabilities is significantly altering the landscape of destination growth. In addition to focusing on attracting businesses, destinations can now also thrive by engaging individual talented workers. These locations can serve as distributed workspaces, providing individuals with greater flexibility and establishing a better work-life balance.
Cisco’s hybrid work research included evaluating the concept of hybrid work and understanding how to harmonize work and personal life by integrating home and workplace environments throughout the city, identifying ways to contribute to the area’s economic, social, and environmental development to establish Rhodes as a leading sustainable destination, and exploring ways to create connected communities and strengthen the relationship with the destination.
The 17 digital nomads worked out of four traditional co-working spaces across the city of Rhodes, namely the K2 Development Agency, the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Dodecanese, the South Aegean Region headquarters, and the city’s Museum of Modern Greek Art.
In the spirit of fostering strong ties with the local community, and in the context of its collaboration with the South Aegean Region, the project, dubbed “Cisco Island” by participants, included a series of special actions and CSR activities aiming to contribute to the digitization and transformation of Rhodes. These included helping to strengthen the marketing capabilities of the Rhodes International Cultural and Heritage Society and developing attractive voluntourism packages that highlight local heritage, promoting e-learning and VR/AR integration with the University of the Aegean, and expanding the boundaries of hybrid work and digital nomadism research, as well as hosting an internet safety workshop in collaboration with the Center for Child Protection and holding constructive dialogues with Metropolitan College students on the digital nomad lifestyle. Finally, true to Cisco’s sustainability goals, the digital nomads contributed to green initiatives in partnership with the Plant Nursery of the South Aegean Region and supported the Social Grocery’s food security efforts.
The project, and associated initiatives, aligns with Cisco’s broader mission to center digital innovation as a catalyst for community development and highlights the transformative power of technology.
The sustainability of the new working model lies to a large extent in the wellbeing of employees and the ability to create and produce in an environment that fosters the growth of soft and digital skills. During these three months, Rhodes became the ideal destination for remote work, with the local society and economy at the forefront of interest for the effective implementation of digital transformation.
— Antonis Tsiboukis, CEO of Cisco Greece, Portugal, Cyprus, and Malta
Rhodes has a vision to attract not just tourists but digital nomads who can help shape a new type of citizen. Greece makes concrete investments to attract remote workers, with their Digital Nomads Visa. Rhodes’ ambition to create a sustainable future for its citizens resonates perfectly with our company’s purpose to power an inclusive future for all.
— Agostino Santoni, Vice President of Cisco South Europe
The Digital Nomads Project is an initiative by Cisco in cooperation with the Regional Governor of South Aegean, Greece, whose aim is to making Rhodes a digitally sustainable destination. Hybrid work and digital nomads can be a key pillar of that strategy. For three months (March through May), 17 Cisco employees, from nine different countries, lived and worked in Rhodes. They experienced hybrid work at its best, using four co-working locations distributed in the city of Rhodes and their apartments, fully equipped with Cisco technologies.
— Guy Diedrich, VP and Global Innovation Officer, Cisco
Cisco Island in a nutshell
Cisco, in the context of its Digital Nomads program, partnered with the South Aegean Region and committed resources and expertise to foster co-innovation and promote regional development in Rhodes. Specifically, the project involved:
- 17 Cisco employees
- from nine different countries in Europe,
- with five different roles
- and a 50:50 gender balance,
- working from anywhere on the island
- using Cisco’s cutting-edge technologies.
