It takes more than just scattered online hot tubs to cultivate a feeling of community in long-distance teams. Introducing one-on-one meetings or an open project board available to anyone can all contribute to the culture of being a part of a larger group. Slack channels for sharing GIFs or weekend plans can all help.
Being able to check in regularly and consult individual reports makes it easier to gauge workloads, and see if anyone is getting too much on their plate. Transparency can also be boosted through a project management platform.
Set Clear Expectations and Goals
Setting goals and expectations clearly in the first place is foundational when it comes to remote teams. This is because it helps everyone clarify what is expected of them, how they’ll be measured, and how their contributions help make the team successful. As a result, employees are able to plan their time and productivity more effectively. Being accountable to each other is critical to managing remote teams – eg, setting KPIs, measuring progress and rewarding output. Encouraging employees to use collaboration tools, and fostering socialisation between remote colleagues, are other actions managers should consider. It’s critical that you overcommunicate when leading remote teams. This can be done through regular meetings, or old-fashioned virtual ‘round robins’, or even something like distributed team huddles. Mentorship programmes is another way to support remote workers – this can be through one-on-ones, regular virtual check-in meetings, and even team meetings to recognise work. Also, many employees who work remotely feel that there are limited opportunities for career advancements; providing employees with development opportunities is a great way to increase energy levels.
Encourage Feedback
Without regular social interactions with the co-located, remote team members can begin to feel isolated. And, even the most self-motivated remote worker can’t perform at their best without regular interaction from leadership to answer questions and provide feedback. Feedback helps remote workers to play their part – truly become a member of the team. Instead of being able to walk up to someone and ask, ‘Hey, can I pick your brain about X?’ (which I’m a huge proponent of, by the way), asking remotely will be harder. Try giving feedback on virtual stand-ups (similar to Scrum meetings) daily or weekly, or provide it through channels such as group chats, asynchronously. Frequent check-ins with remote staff about their progress, problems and support needs might be needed to ensure that no single employee is being neglected or overtasked. In addition, checking in early and often may mean that you catch little problems before they become big ones; for example, if a member of staff is consistently asking for help in completing certain tasks, you might be able to increase their capacity or offload some of their existing workload.
Encourage Collaboration
The benefits of remote teamwork – less commuting, increased flexibility and a bigger potential talent pool – all depend on operating in a certain way. Managing distributed teams is not easy. It takes a new kind of mindset to ensure that distant teams who might never meet each other can still build trust, work together and feel a sense of connection. For a distributed team, having clearly defined goals and targets and transparency on the project’s goals; having roles defined for team members; defining processes; and empowering employees to make decisions as appropriate will help keep your project on track. Setting weekly or biweekly virtual meetings (especially one-on-one sessions with direct reports) serves as a good time for staff to air any concerns that they otherwise might hesitate to share in emails or chat messages. Don’t forget to celebrate success, big and small, among your team members, whether physical or virtual – virtual celebration or a simple note of congratulation can help promote feelings of connectedness, engagement and productivity – which leads to further productivity.
Encourage Communication
Remote workers don’t benefit from many of the boundaries between self and work that their office-based counterparts take for granted – and so it can be harder for them to distance themselves from a project and its associated feelings. For this reason, remote workers might experience higher levels of stress, burnout or overwhelm than office workers do. It’s up to leaders and managers to help their teams communicate as needed. Maybe it’s one-on-one phone calls with each team member each quarter. Or maybe it’s encouraging spaces for scheduled team-member dialogue outside the full-team meetings: a social Slack channel, a weekly question-and-answer time, a monthly Zoom happy hour, or even an occasional in-person offsite. Moreover, remote managers need to make sure their team knows they are always available to talk and assist, which might take the form of lots of phone calls, daily check-ins, a dedicated chat tool and written procedures. Remote team members also need to understand clearly the company’s goals and how their job fits with these.
