13 Tips For Leading And Managing Remote Teams

When the topic of remote work comes up, it’s quite common for people to be doubtful of how to work on the projects. The whole process involves connecting solopreneurs and project teams living in different countries or continents. Every individual is looking forward to endearing the culture of remote working. It becomes a tough gig to empower the teams to thrive when, for instance, an Indian sitting in Banglore is working for an American company and so on. Remote work allows employers to access a wider talent pool, giving organizations more choice in finding the right person for the job.

Continue reading to learn some tips and tactics for supervising remote employees. You’ll learn how to use project management software and other remote team management tools how To manage a remote team to improve work performance. While managing remote teams, you need the typical skills of a manager. However, the remote mode of work brings along several unique challenges.

Many teams have been practicing this effectively while successfully alleviating the many challenges inherent in teams that work from home. The remote work environment demands a strong foundation of trust and respect to thrive and grow. It’s never been more important to promote these core values in your workplace.

How DeskTrack is the Best Software for Managing Remote Employees

Eliminating the journey to and from work allows for more recovery at home and possibly more time to sleep, improving employees’ quality of lifestyle. Immunity and mental well-being may both benefit from this as well. It is much simpler to turn on a laptop from the convenience of home than to commute to an office and spend the entire day there if someone is not feeling physically well. Stress, another significant reason for absences, can also be reduced by remote work. Eliminating some job constraints typically connected to office-based working arrangements is a frequently overlooked advantage of remote work. Abolishing these obstacles allows businesses to broaden their exploration of talent and hire the best candidates for each position, regardless of where they live.

Whether you’re managing a remote team of 10 or an entire company moving to remote or hybrid work, there’s a way to make your home office less lonely—while making sure it’s just as productive. It becomes much simpler to know a person who is sitting whole day beside you. You work together, spend hours together and you start knowing them in and out, their strengths and weakness and what personality they possess. But when working remotely you will have to try a little to know about your team.

Now, it has become the norm and looks to continue, with a recent study by Mercer finding that 83% of employers intend to continue providing remote working at a greater scale post-pandemic. We’re firm believers in the Golden Rule, which is why editorial opinions are ours alone and have not been previously reviewed, approved, or endorsed by included advertisers. Editorial content from The Ascent is separate from The Motley Fool editorial content and is created by a different analyst team.

And you’ll be more equipped with the battle gear necessary for navigating the murky waters of change. It can help to deal with personal issues if you can talk and listen to your peers. Set up online meeting groups that are only there to talk or let off steam.

No. 9: Encourage innovation

That can save companies $10,000 to $30,000 per employee, according to Global Workplace Analytics. You won’t be able to watch over your employees when they work remotely as you could if they were in the office, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t getting the job done. If you can’t trust them, ask yourself why you hired them in the first place or what happened that caused you to lose trust in them. Successful managers can identify the strengths, weaknesses and needs of the individuals who work for them.

Encourage your employees to take breaks now and then so they can relax and feel refreshed. Taking breaks is one of the simplest ways to keep mental health in check. Team members who need more time to adjust to the remote environment might deal with mental health concerns if they continue to work under pressure. With several businesses online, equipping your employees with these resources will set them up for success and increase productivity.

Remote not only offers unlimited time off but enforces a minimum number of days per year to ensure our team members get the rest they need. ActivTrak helps you uncover risky remote worker behaviors that put security and sensitive data at risk so you can swiftly take preventative and corrective action. Automatic screenshot redaction, for example, protects sensitive information from being shared inadvertently.

Hale noted that good managers make themselves available to team members. Surveys are an often-underutilized tool, according to Pellman. A monthly or quarterly employee net promoter score, for example, can be useful, along with pulse surveys for a deeper dive into employee sentiments. The net promoter score, according to HR Technologist, is an indicator of how likely an employee would be to promote his or her organization to other job seekers. They also should model behavior around the hours employees work, such as establishing expectations around responding to any after-hours work e-mail and texts.

What Are the Benefits of a Remote Workforce?

Again, defining the WHY is always critical for emotionally connecting employees to the mission. This is always an imperative but has become increasingly more important in this current environment. Set clear expectations and request feedback to ensure alignment. Don’t simply assume the team understands where they need to focus their energy. Humans are social animals, and 100% remote/virtual work compromises real engagement. One possible solution would be to have a combination of remote and in-house work days.

Although handling remote teams isn’t all that distinct from managing on-site teams, virtual work does add complexity to the leadership position. No matter where they are, managers face the same fundamental difficulties when leading employees, whether in the office or remotely. As an employer, it’s important to provide emotional support to your remote workers. One way to do this is to create opportunities for social interaction, such as scheduling regular video calls or holding monthly virtual happy hours. Managing remote employees comes with its own set of obstacles.

Tips for instilling independence in remote workers:

They don’t have a shared hometown or many common experiences to connect them. Being a good manager in a remote setting is almost identical to being one in an office. The only difference is, you cannot take certain things for granted, like connections and culture. Managers should plan remote interactions like virtual happy hours or open a fun chat channel to help maintain a sense of normality and to bring a sense of community back. While you’re together, be sure to listen, and offer encouragement and emotional support. Buffer showed that loneliness is tied with collaboration and communication as the biggest struggle remote workers say they face.

• By monitoring the day-to-day activities and tasks of employees properly, managers can easily measure the output of the individuals.
• Because of this, picking the right communication channels is crucial for managing remote teams.
• And a big part of transparency is setting clear rules and regulations for your team members.
• Hence issues will be removed quickly and the team sounds more productive and efficient.

For remote teams, it may take a little extra effort to recreate common workplace water cooler communication. And when there is a mix of off-site and on-site employees, remote managers should seek team building opportunities to include everyone whenever possible. Collaboration, one of the key challenges of working remotely, can be addressed by ensuring that remote employees have access to the right tools and software technology at all times. Establishing an async, dynamic repository or knowledge management system where all enterprise knowledge is centrally accessible can go a long way in improving their productivity.

Make sure the right tools are available and accessible

Use every opportunity to make clear to employees that you support and care for them. This may seem like overkill, but for managers and teams new to remote working, this is key. To start, managers need to understand factors that can make remote work especially demanding. Otherwise high-performing employees may experience declines in job performance and engagement when they begin working remotely, especially in the absence of preparation and training.

If you can’t trust a team member to work without supervision, then remote work may not be the best setup for them. For employees, working remotely can offer a number of advantages as well. Join over thousands of organizations that use Creately to brainstorm, plan, analyze, and execute their projects successfully. The best practices we’ve discussed are inexpensive and can be implemented right away to ensure effective results.

Unseen distractions and interruptions

Your team members want to work remotely — but are you ready to manage workers across multiple locations? Remote work isn’t going away, so if you are not yet an experienced manager of remote teams, take this opportunity to sharpen your skills and become the remote manager your team deserves. For your workers to work remotely, they need to have the means to do their job. Confirm each employee has access to workplace tools, like computers and scanners, and communication platforms like Google Calendar, Zoom or Dropbox.

Promoting a connected and friendly work environment is the biggest challenge for organizations implementing work from home arrangements. We spend a great deal of our time at work; our colleague’s validation and presence play a significant role in our motivation to do a good job. These platforms play on the universal tendency for people to seek social respect. For instance, some employees might be with their small children at home. And others might even be living in large groups, with part of their close or extended family. Check how much your constructive feedback skills are helping you in remote work.

Tips for effective remote team meetings:

When cameras are turned on, it’s easier to make a connection with your team. By showing that you care about your employees‘ well-being, you can create a positive and supportive virtual work environment. Break down individual tasks on the https://globalcloudteam.com/ project management platform and estimate them by hours. Cultivating your company culture might also suffer over time. Company culture is fostered naturally in an office, but it might not be the same for a team that works from home.

Although many employees value the autonomy that often comes with remote work, others prefer extra guidance and the company of others. Indeed, sometimes working from home is too isolating for remote employees, particularly for those who live alone. Health is top of mind right now; it’s the reason remote work became so common. Remote workers don’t have to get on crowded buses or trains, or interact with others in lobbies, elevators and offices. When employees are at home, they avoid the risk of being exposed to the coronavirus and other contagious illnesses.

Our engineering team is a fan of their extensive keyboard shortcuts that let one create, find, access, and resolve issues at lightning speed. Multiple teams can collaborate together and tie their goals to the overarching roadmap in Linear. Establishing clear OKRs is a best practice for all teams, whether remote or co-located. It ensures everyone is on the same page regarding what needs to be done, when, and how. Documenting productivity standards also allows companies to identify and eliminate possible bottlenecks to performance.

During periods of uncertainty, employee misconduct increases by as much as 33%. Remind employees of the channels for reporting unacceptable behavior and highlight punitive measures for noncompliance. This will promote work well-being — which has a huge impact on feelings of psychological safety. If you can have physical workshops, use them to troubleshoot issues with your model. If not, use something like Dialpad’s video conferencing feature to hold a virtual workshop.