How To Make Remote Working Better For Your Team

Modern work is quite a different beast to anything that’s gone before - just think back a decade or so ago, and who would have imagined that today so much of the workforce is remote? It would have seemed impossible, and perhaps even unnecessary, but it has happened, and many business owners are enjoying the progress as it’s saving them money and potentially making their team stronger.

However, that strong team is only going to be as good as the tools and processes in place to help it, so if you want to make remote working better for your team, there are a few things you need to do. With that in mind, keep reading to find out more.

Put Communication Channels In Place

If you want to make things as good as possible for your remote workers, communication is the right place to start because that’s the thing they might be missing out on the most if they’re working at home by themselves. Remember, when people are in an office, they’re going to talk to one another, share gossip, ask questions about work and so on. So if that’s the case in an office (and it’s not going to hurt productivity), why shouldn’t it be the case at home as well?

The answer is that it should be, so it’s a good idea to put tools and programs in place to make sure it can happen. There are all kinds of great communication tools that your remote workers can have running in the background and where they can join in with general chat and ask and answer questions about work. In this way, they’ll still be (and feel) connected even if they’re also able to do their own thing at home and work however they choose to. It’s going to make them feel much more comfortable.

Create A Culture Of Trust And Accountability

The one thing that is more important than anything else when it comes to remote workers is trust - as a business owner or manager, you need to trust that your team will do their work and not waste their time or your money just because they’re at home. However, at the same time, you don’t want to create a business that micromanages its employees, as that’s only going to make people frustrated and uncomfortable, even if they’re doing everything right.

The best thing to do is to empower your employees to do their work in their own time, trusting that they’ll get you the results you want without constantly having to be supervised. You can build trust by providing your employees visibility into their progress toward goals and those of which they've already achieved. For instance, give your remote sales teams sales compensation dashboards to foster transparency and accountability. It’s often a great idea to give people deadlines rather than telling them specifically what they need to do at every moment of the day, as they’ll be able to work to their own schedule and pace but still get the work done on time. It’s this kind of trust and accountability that can mean people work harder and are more willing to put extra effort in because they know you trust them to do what needs to be done. Plus, if you make sure you recognize and reward great achievements, they’ll be even more motivated and although you might lose a few bad apples along the way, the majority of your team will be excellent additions to the business.

Set Up A Reliable VPN

One of the most critical aspects of remote work is ensuring that everyone’s able to access the documents and files they need, but that when they do so, it’s all secure and safe. After all, although you can protect things in an office with your own firewalls and antivirus software, it’s not so easy to do the same when people are working from home, and you do run the risk of a security issue occurring.

That’s why you need to set up a reliable VPN for your company that your remote workers can log onto and access everything through. Look for the best Mac VPN or Windows VPN (depending on your system) you can find so that there’s no lag or downtime, and everyone can do what they need to do quickly and securely.

Another benefit of a VPN is that it allows people to access sites they wouldn’t normally be able to in their country, and that could be valuable if you have a global team who needs to do research and so on. Of course, you’ll need to make sure the sites being accessed are for work purposes only - that’s a given - but it could certainly be a useful addition to ensuring everyone gets things done.