7 Tips For Successfully Leading And Managing A Remote Team Leave a comment

For example, traditional managers who struggle with worker autonomy and accountability may find it difficult to adjust to being more transparent and adaptable over long-term planning. Be aware that not everyone on your team or in the virtual meeting will have English as their first language, as well as different cultural backgrounds. Keep these in mind when running meetings and involving the team.

Managing remote employees isn’t without its share of challenges. Aside from employing an in-house team, employers can choose to hire remote workers. In this case, businesses opt for recruiting remote employees to create a remote or distributed team. One of the major advantages of working on-site is spending time with your coworkers, getting to know each other, and learning more about their work habits. For team leaders, this setting allows them to manage their employees with ease. If you want to thrive in the face of these challenges and equip your employees to succeed, here are 12 tips for managing remote teams.

Your monthly happy hours and team lunches might not be happening right now, but challenge yourself to find some other ways you can inject levity and personal connection into your team. Here are a few tips to offer support and encouragement to newly remote workers — while simultaneously maintaining high performance. There are several challenges involved with leading your remote team members, but the good news is that they aren’t insurmountable. If you ever have the opportunity to visit the country or city that your team member lives in, make it a key part of your agenda to meet them. I was even invited to stay at people’s homes and was treated like a king.

How To Manage Remote Teams

Some people might feel more appreciated if they’re applauded in a team meeting, while others respond better to one-on-one positive feedback. As a remote manager with a team of 10 to 20 people, you will inevitably be on the phone or Skyping most of the day. Here are the tools you need to ensure you have a smooth and effective approach to getting things done. When your team delivers a significant milestone or achieves a goal, please do not take credit alone.

Employees love remote working because it is in line with their preferences and needs. It allows them to choose from where they want to work and saves their time by removing the commuting need.

In a survey by cloud services provider CoSo Cloud, it was found that more than half of remote employees feel disconnected from their in-office colleagues. If they have previous experience in a remote role, ask what that was like for them. If they don’t have experience working in remote teams, you can still ask about what appeals to them about remote work, as well as what they think their biggest challenges would be. These answers can reveal a lot about whether or not they would thrive on your team. Many managers turn to remote working tools liketime tracking appsto keep an eye on how much work their team is getting done. Fortunately,79% of respondentsin one survey said they believe it’s perfectly okay for employers to monitor their workplace-related activities.

As a manager of such a team, you need to schedule team meetings and other calls during periods that work for every team member. When teams are not physically in the same location, often the best way to measure employees performance is through outcomes and goal completion. Anyone who is interested in building and managing remote teams would benefit from the concepts taught in this course.

Give Your Team The Right Resources

Empathize with them to show a shared understanding – letting them know that you see them as a person, not just an employee. Having realistic expectations about these goals, time employees should be working and communicating those expectations will help everyone stay happier in their roles. This new type of leader needs to focus more on setting clear expectations and goals, as well as creating a culture of accountability. In managing your remote employees, you may find yourself interacting with people who are from various countries and backgrounds. Beyond delegating tasks to your employees, support their professional development and assist them with goal-setting.

He has spent the last four years researching and writing on leadership in virtual work environments. According to Dr. Gibson, a mistake that managers often make is applying a ‘one size fits all’ approach to remote workers. One of the most practical solutions is an office team timesheet. Your team needs to enter hours worked on particular projects during the week.

The pandemic has forced much of the workforce into remote working, and for many employees, this is the first time they have tried working from home. The applications vary slightly from program to program, but all ask for some personal background information. If you are new to HBS Online, you will be required to set up an account before starting an application for the program of your choice.

Solutions For Managing Remote Teams

It helps them save money on office-related expenses (electricity, rent, heating, etc.), find better talent, avoid office politics, and lower employee turnover rates. Remote work has skyrocketed since the onset of the pandemic, which forced many companies to close their physical offices and carry out operations virtually. You can increase accountability even more with aprojectmanagement platform and regular status updates from team members. Or perhaps you want to do a monthly virtual happy hour or trivia contest.

• Employee empowerment is an essential ingredient of successful, high-trust teams.
• When having a remote team, employers are not obliged to cover health insurance, travel expenses and other costs.
• Holding a great One On One meeting means you will have a highly motivated and energized employee.
• Luckily, there’s a decline in the average length of these meetings – by 20%.
• Thus, as their leader, you’re able to communicate with them in person and manage their assignments and deadlines with ease.
• This piece emphasizes the cultural differences and how they impact international business.
• However, when it comes to remote team members, you need to be very cautious to make sure people are ready to be a part of that work environment and have the right skills.

So, according to Dr. Gibson and Joe Hopkins, managers leading remote teams need to communicate often with the team. Furthermore, managers will understand individual needs and priorities of each team member. When you’re managing remote employees, you can’t peek your head outside of your office door and make sure your team is hard at work.

There’s a lot more room for misunderstandings when you don’t have the benefit of tone, facial expressions, and body language to help you decipher what someone means when there’s any ambiguity. As shown in the above stats, companies were already starting to embrace remote working before the pandemic. As more and more teams become remote, the need for strong virtual leadership skills has grown. A recent report by software company Buffer shows that 19 percent of remote employees report loneliness as their biggest challenge.

As I was in Europe, team meetings were exactly in the middle of my working day, which means the American had to get up at the crack of dawn, and our Asian friends had to stay up late. On the other hand, you probably won’t have these issues when leading an in-house team. No matter if your working hours are fixed or flexible, you and your team will spend at least a couple of hours per day together in the office. Thus, as their leader, you’re able to communicate with them in person and manage their assignments and deadlines with ease.

Creating A Lasting Virtual Culture

We’ve reached out to several experts in the field of management and organizational development, to learn more about their favorite strategies for managing distributed teams. These are their suggestions for anyone leading a remote team. By organizing frequent cross-cultural training programs for the entire team, you’ll get more familiar with varied cultures. Therefore, your remote employees will feel more comfortable, too. But, if you’re a leader of an in-house team whose members come from multiple cultures, be sure to also set up these educational sessions. To promote better communication and collaboration within the team, you should try using the team management software.

You may have a team scattered across the globe or even scattered across the country. All the hours that people spend talking on Skype is no replacement for actually meeting face to face. In my experience, an average or poor manager will neglect to have regular one-on-one meetings because they are “too busy” or they have more important priorities. Holding a great One On One meeting means you will have a highly motivated and energized employee. Repeat the process over and over again with your employees to have a high-performing team. An insecure manager is reluctant to engage their team in a group setting because they are worried they may lose the argument or seem not to be the thought leader in the discussion.

Since there are many peculiar cultural norms throughout the world, you should provide your employees with some interesting publications on this topic. For example, you can start with The Culture Map, a book by Erin Managing a Remote Team Meyer. This piece emphasizes the cultural differences and how they impact international business. The perk of working in an in-house team is that you reach out to your colleagues whenever you need help or advice.

How Do You Introduce New Employees Into A Virtual Team?

But, these risky situations are less likely to happen when business owners employ in-house workers. On the flip side, you should also occasionally recognize people for practices that improve team communication and collaboration. If you’ve established trust, you’ve set everyone up for an open dialogue. A recent study by HBR of 50 financial firms confirmed that leaders of dispersed groups, in particular, must push members to be frank with one another.

In addition to giving feedback and guidance to your employees, you should seek their input on how you’re performing. According to a study by software comparison site GetApp, the number of professionals who work remotely at least once per week has grown by 400 percent since 2010. Learning ExperienceMaster real-world business skills with our immersive platform and engaged community.

Make Time To Connect And Socialize

She explains that for some employees, this may mean maximizing flexibility in terms of work hours. But, for others, it might mean more regular and routine meetings, while some workers might need particular technologies. (before there were worldwide lockdowns due to COVID-19 pandemic). Luckily, there’s a decline in the average length of these meetings – by 20%. This survey gathered 3.1 million workers from North America, Europe, and the Middle East.

The current global situation has accelerated the trend towards remote working, however many businesses and leaders are struggling to adapt to this new way of life. Udacity is not an accredited university and we don’t confer traditional degrees. Udacity Nanodegree programs represent collaborations with our industry partners who help us develop our content and who hire many of our program graduates. No, all of our programs are 100 percent online, and available to participants regardless of their location. Matt Gavin is a member of the marketing team at Harvard Business School Online. Prior to returning to his home state of Massachusetts and joining HBS Online, he lived in North Carolina, where he held roles in news and content marketing.

Leading and managing a remote team is often regarded as one of the most difficult tasks in an organization. While they can be an asset to any company, there are many challenges that come with having employees work remotely including trust, communication, accountability and organizational culture. According to one report, middle managers report being stressed for nearlythree and a half daysof the typical five-day workweek. But, leadership becomes even more challenging when you’re managingremote workers.

Company culture means the values, beliefs and attitudes that are shared by employees. It is the foundation of your company’s environment and defines how people act within it. These tasks are not unique to remote work practices but can become more complicated, especially for virtual teams. Managing remote employees is no easy gig — especially when it feels like the world has been turned on its head. That inherent accountability is a major benefit, especially when a good chunk of leaders say they struggle to emphasize this on their own teams.

Give your team members a chance to maintain those social bonds. Remote communication can quickly transform into strictly business, and you need to make a conscious effort to go beyond that. But your culture is tough to cultivate and maintain when your entire team is spread out.

Use Visuals In Meetings

If you leave it any longer, you will be jeopardizing the well-being of the team. People need to get together; it gives them a feeling of belonging, especially when they are all in different countries. Be prepared to talk https://globalcloudteam.com/ in team meetings.Establish the rule that they will need to provide the team an update in every team meeting. Joe Hopkins holds a Ph.D.in leadership and organizational development with a research focus on remote work.