You're a Project Coordinator with a remote team. How do you keep everyone on track?

1 Define clear goals and expectations

One of the first steps to coordinate a remote team is to set clear and realistic goals and expectations for the project. You should communicate the project scope, deliverables, milestones, deadlines, roles, and responsibilities to everyone involved. You should also establish the standards and criteria for quality, performance, and feedback. Make sure everyone understands what they need to do, why they need to do it, and how they will be measured and evaluated.

2 Use the right tools and platforms

To ensure your remote team stays on track, you should use the right tools and platforms to facilitate communication, collaboration, and coordination. Consider your project needs, team preferences, and budget constraints when selecting the tools. Project management software such as Asana, Trello, or Basecamp can help you plan, organize, track, and report on project activities. Communication software like Slack, Zoom, or Microsoft Teams is helpful for chatting, calling, or meeting online. Collaboration software like Google Workspace, Dropbox, or Miro enables you to edit, review, and comment on work in real time or asynchronously.

4 Empower and support your team

Empowering and supporting your remote team is an essential part of keeping them on track. Allow them to manage their own time, work, and results, and avoid micromanaging or controlling them. Provide your team with the resources, guidance, and feedback they need to succeed. Delegate tasks and responsibilities according to their skills, strengths, and preferences. Give them autonomy and authority to make decisions and solve problems within their scope. Encourage them to share their ideas, opinions, and suggestions; listen to their input and feedback; and acknowledge their contributions and achievements. Coach and mentor your team to develop their skills, knowledge, and confidence. Offer learning opportunities, training, and feedback; help them overcome any challenges or difficulties they may face.

5 Monitor and measure your progress and results

The final step to maintain your remote team's effectiveness is to monitor and measure your progress and results. You should track and report the project activities, tasks, and deliverables, and compare them with your goals and expectations. Additionally, you should collect and analyze data and metrics to evaluate your project performance, quality, and impact. To achieve this, you can use dashboards and reports to visualize and communicate your project data and metrics with tools like Smartsheet, Power BI, or Tableau; surveys and feedback forms to gauge team and stakeholder satisfaction with SurveyMonkey, Typeform, or Google Forms; reviews and retrospectives to reflect on successes and failures with Retrium, Parabol, or FunRetro. By doing this, you can gain valuable insights into your project status, progress, outcomes, experience, expectations, suggestions - all of which can help improve upon your remote team's performance.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?