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Managing a Remote Team – Top Challenges and Solutions

Jan 13, 2023 • 7 min read

Three Challenges of Managing Remote Teams

Managing remote teams isn’t easy. There are many challenges virtual teams and remote managers face including communication, collaboration, productivity, culture, and leadership. These challenges make it difficult to keep everyone engaged and productive. As a manager, you need to consider each challenge individually to find solutions that work best for your remote workforce.

Communication

The most important aspect of effective management is communicating clearly and consistently. You must ensure that your messages reach your team members regardless of where they are located. A lack of communication can be a huge setback for employee productivity and employee engagement. This includes sending emails, texts, and phone calls; posting information online, and scheduling meetings via video conferencing. It’s important to try different communication styles until you find what works best for your virtual team. Virtual meetings can be a huge help in achieving effective communication.

Collaboration

You must encourage your team members to collaborate and help one another achieve common goals even when they’re working in a remote environment. Collaborating requires trust, transparency, and open lines of constant communication. If you want your team to feel like a cohesive unit, you must provide opportunities for them to interact regularly. This can include casual conversations and regular team meetings. You can also make use of a collaboration tool to solve some of your collaboration and communication issues.

Productivity

Remote workers often struggle with productivity because they don’t always have access to the same resources as those based locally and this can lead to employee burnout. For example, they might lack the tools needed to complete tasks such as writing code or creating graphics. To combat this issue, you can give your team members access to software and hardware that helps them accomplish specific tasks. It’s important for remote work models to invest in the right software and equipment to ensure high-performing employees.

Ready to build your remote team?

Use the DigiWorks platform to hire, manage, and pay remote talent from all over the world.

Lack of Face-to-Face Supervision

Remote work has become increasingly popular over the past few decades as more people are choosing remote offices over physical offices. However, remote employees are often left feeling isolated and unsupervised. In fact, many studies show that remote workers report lower levels of job satisfaction and productivity compared to those who work face-to-face. This is because managers aren’t able to see how well each employee works, and it becomes difficult to spot problems early on.

The good news is that there are ways to make sure remote teams remain productive and satisfied. For example, you can set up weekly video calls or conference calls with your team members to keep everyone updated on what’s happening. You can also hold biweekly check-ins via phone or Skype, where you’ll discuss progress, ask questions, and give feedback. Finally, you can use tools like Slack or Zoom to facilitate communication. You can try a wide variety of communication strategies until you find what your remote employees respond to.

One way of overcoming the lack of constant face-to-face supervision is to have daily or weekly check-in calls with your teams. We know this can be very time consuming and that’s where making use of hiring platforms like DigiWorks can be extremely useful for not only managing your team but also for growing it. The DigiWorks platform is amazing at connecting business owners and managers with pre-vetted and assessed talent from all over the world. They also handle check-ins and performance reviews as well as the entire onboarding and payroll processes which is a HUGE win.

Lack of Clear Expectations

The biggest challenge for managers working from home is a lack of clarity around expectations. When you’re physically present, it’s easy to see what someone else expects from you. But when you communicate via email, text messages, phone calls, and video chats, there are no visual cues to help clarify how others perceive your behavior. This makes it difficult to know whether you’ve met the goals set out by your manager or colleagues. This is why two-way communication is extremely important for managers and remote employees.

Managers can mitigate this problem by setting clear expectations upfront. They can do this by creating a written document outlining the roles and responsibilities of each team member. They can also use tools like Slack or Asana to establish a common understanding of project timelines. Your management style needs to be clear, open and constantly building trust with your remote workforce to create a healthy company culture and increase productivity.

Low Productivity

Is A Myth When You Work Remotely

When I worked at a traditional office, I’d often hear colleagues complain about “low productivity.” But when I moved into my current role as a full-time freelancer, I realized something: most people don’t realize just how much work they actually do.

I’ve been working remotely since 2011. Before that, I spent six months working from home while traveling around Asia. During those three months, I did everything from writing articles and editing videos to creating infographics and designing logos.

The truth is, even though I’m working from home now, I still end up spending hours every day reading emails, answering messages, researching projects, and making phone calls. And because I’m not physically present, I tend to procrastinate.

But here are some tips to help you avoid falling victim to low productivity:

1. Define Your Roles

Before you start working remotely, make sure you clearly define your roles and responsibilities. You need to make sure there are clear rules of engagement between employees and managers. For example, if you’re a project manager, you’ll want to set expectations early on about what tasks each member of the team should perform. If you’re a writer, you might decide to write one article per week. Or maybe you’ll focus on social media marketing. Whatever your job description is, make sure you communicate it clearly.

2. Communicate Clear Deadlines

I cannot overstate the importance of constant team communication when working remotely. It is incredibly important to be clear and upfront about deadlines and expectations. You can even create a remote work policy to establish ground rules and performance expectations. Project management software and project management tools are amazing for tracking deadlines and popping reminders about tasks and upcoming dates. This can be a huge help for your remote team management strategy.

Lack of Team Cohesiveness

Remote work is becoming increasingly popular among businesses. But it doesn’t come without its challenges. One of those challenges is ensuring that managers are treating all employees equally. In fact, research suggests that managers should try to ensure all of their employees receive equal treatment. This includes providing equal pay, benefits, training opportunities, and recognition.

In addition, managers should consider how to provide benefits to onsite and remote workers alike. For example, you could offer flexible work hours for remote workers. You could also make sure that everyone knows what the expectations are for each role within the organization.

Finally, managers should think about ways to build trust and camaraderie within the workplace. They can do this by having daily check-in meetings, encouraging social interaction, and making sure everyone feels included.

Ready to build your remote team?

Use the DigiWorks platform to hire, manage, and pay remote talent from all over the world.

Conclusion

In conclusion, managing a remote team is no easy task. You must consider how you communicate, manage expectations, and foster collaboration among employees. Communication is the most important thing here and it’s important to establish clear guidelines about what constitutes acceptable behavior, such as emailing during normal working hours.

You’ll want to ensure that your remote team members have access to resources that allow them to do their job effectively and productively. For example, you might set up a shared calendar or document repository where everyone can collaborate. You could also use dedicated software like Slack, Trello, Asana, Basecamp, or JIRA to make sure that your team stays organized.

Lastly, you need to make company culture a priority. When setting up a remote team, it’s important to understand your organization’s culture and values. This way you can better align your team’s goals with those of the rest of the organization.

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About DigiWorks

DigiWorks is an easy-to-use platform that helps small businesses and start ups hire amazing remote talent from around the world. DigiWorks offers a way for you to hire, manage and pay people from all countries. If you find an amazing virtual assistant from Philippines, a content writer from Nigeria, or operations manager from South Africa – manage and pay your entire team from one platform with no hassle.