What are the best ways to manage remote employees?

Creatives especially love remote work! They encourage you to concentrate on the delivery and deadlines rather than where they are. In the new age of work, effectively managing remote employees involves establishing clear, realistic expectations and maintaining regular, transparent communication. I have also found it helpful to utilise SMART goals to provide a structured approach to tasks and objectives, Regular feedback, recognition of achievements, and fostering a trusting environment are essential for their morale and productivity. Flexibility in work arrangements, considering different time zones if you’re hiring from further away, and even their personal circumstances help align individual efforts with company goals.

- Define how communication will take place within the team. Specify which communication channels to use for different types of messages (e.g., email for formal communication, instant messaging for quick questions). - Clearly communicate the expected work hours and availability. This includes when team members are expected to be online and responsive. Be flexible if necessary but ensure there is a common understanding of when everyone should be available for collaboration. - Be transparent about company goals, strategies, and any changes that may impact remote employees. This helps in building trust and keeping everyone informed.

From experience, setting of clearly defined and measurable results is very key. Also the lines of communication should be very open and smooth to ensure that any issues/mistakes are brought up and solutions sought.

Remote employment tends to conflate with flexible employment. People may be working remotely because it gives them flexibility on their time schedule too. Setting clear expectations is crucial to allow them to know what is required and avoid you trying to micro management remotely. If you’re watching if someone is “green in the chat” then you already lost. Set goals, with success criteria, and milestones. For junior employees these might be daily or weekly goals. For senior employees this might be quarterly goals with milestones. Crucially you need a clear working model. Eg is the employee receiving low level direction where the manager is responsible for identifying work/tasks/etc. Or is it on the employ to reach out when blocked

Understanding the challenges of remote workplaces Limited face-to-face opportunity Social isolation: Employees may feel disconnected from your business without Information accessibility Home distractions. 11 tips to effectively manage remote employees 1. Set clear expectations 2. Have a communication strategy 3. Encourage socialization 4. Balance team meetings 5. Foster trust, rapport and transparency 6. Focus on onboarding 7. Use tools to manage remote employees 8. Show flexibility 9. Be inclusive 10. Focus on outcome, not input 11. Create an open-door policy Remote employees may not want to disturb you by contacting you outside of meeting times. This is especially true if you work in different time zones.

Creating and nurturing open door policy is key to trust. If you don’t know the opportunities or concerns, you can’t solve them. To stand by your convictions & commitments, and be open to contrary views and even invite arguments helps build rapport. Doing all this with “Respect” is the critical ingredient in this process. It keeps ego out, and hence brings the best from all parties. Being appreciative of others pointing out gaps or mistakes in your views or approach goes a long way - both, for learning and relationships. Easier said than done !

Part of trust is setting SMART goals for your staff. Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, Targeted. Set people up for success and help them get there. Works whether remote or in the office.

Building trust is really not a rocket science. We are all enjoy great communication, openness, consistency, kindness and support. That's one of the ways to enable trust.

Make sure workers have what they need. Managers can help keep remote teams engaged and build trust by staying on top of the needs and providing what's required for people to get their jobs done well.

Whether physical or remote, trust is very important. By giving sufficient trust, the employee will have strong sense of belonging and willing to go extra mile. Other than that, the rewards need to provide to match the effort given.

Managing an engaged remote team takes creativity in itself. Managers are constantly looking for news ways to bring their team together in a virtual world. You don’t have to do this alone, simply ask your team what they want to see or learn. Be careful- I’ve seen too many times where managers will host non-productive meetings for the sake of having a meeting. Be respectful of your employees workload and make sure you plan team building activities and learning in advance.

-flexibility should be given that benefits both employers and employees, for example if employees are given remote work, they should be performing top notch -team bonding sessions once a month where different activities could be done to get to know each other's strengths together

Remote work has become a popular trend in recent years, and it is important to ensure that remote employees are supported and motivated to maintain a healthy work-life balance. To support flexibility and balance for remote employees, an employer can do: • Build awareness and understanding with your team • Devise ways to connect on a daily basis • Use digital collaboration tools • Build trust • Create channels to highlight accomplishments • Allow flexibility for self-management • Prioritize your staff’s well-being • Offer incentives

Managing remote employees also requires providing them with the necessary training and development opportunities to enhance their skills and performance. Remote work can pose different challenges and demands than office work, such as technical issues, communication barriers, or time management difficulties. To help your team overcome these challenges and adapt to the remote work environment, you should provide them with relevant and accessible training resources, such as online courses, webinars, or podcasts. You should also support their career growth and aspirations, and offer them feedback, coaching, and mentoring.

Additional training is imperative and not just using the training you provided on site. You have to train how to remote work sometimes

Remember the 70-20-10 rule. Training is around 10% of the people's development process. Invest time in finding opportunities also to learn from each other (20%), face new challenges, and build new skills during work (70%).

Recognition is a very strong need for people. Make sure, as a manager, and as a team member, you appreciate others' work, not only results but also effort. You see not only tasks, KPIs and products but also a human standing behind this.

Congratulate and recognise the contribution of all the TMs who have helped you achieve a goal. Recognition drives hard work and sense of achievement amongst individuals. Take it away and you are left with a bunch of non-motivated co-workers who are assets turning slowly but steadily into liabilities Recognition may not always be monetary. A cup of tea is also worth a million dollars for one who is dedicated. This will in long term promote growth of a rewarding and appreciating culture

Managing a team 100% remotely requires more intention. Structuring your week so you have enough individual & team touch points is key. The way I set my week up: - One longer team meeting on Monday. This is where we do a KPI performance update, each member of the team discusses their focus for the week, highlighting any roadblocks getting in their way. - 1:1 with key direct reports and cross-functional teammates. - monthly step-ups with members of team (non direct reports). - weekly stand up, mid week, to resolve issues preventing us to achieve weekly goals. - each team member submits wins, losses, learnings, & roadblocks on Friday to me. - I send a reflections email to the team on Friday, celebrating wins, reflecting on the week

Remote working is very effective, if the above mentioned topics are considered. From my experience -> Trust is the key to success and if the team meets at least 3 times per year in person to talk, work and celebrate together this is a very good basis to develop a high performing team.

One of the biggest challenges managing a remote team is making sure they feel connected not only with their team members but the larger organization. Something I've done is to incorporate ice breakers into the opening 10-15 minutes of our weekly calls. I would provide the question 24 hours in advance so no one is put on the spot and allowed for fun, thoughtful and creative answers.

One point which I feel is important but missed in above points is Technology enablement. At time, Applications usually operate on VPN in WFH environment and they operate with latency which is extremely frustrating while working from home. Organisations should enable smooth WFH operations by diffusing technological barriers.

Regular check ins. Not just your productivity one-on-ones. Actually see how they are doing. They need to know they are supported. It's alot easier to hide behind a screen. Creating open dialog, allowing them to speak freely and contribute, will show them they matter.