How to transition your team to remote work

[mostakimvip06]

It doesn't matter why you're interested in remote work: because of a forced transition to remote mode or because you want to follow global trends. The transition to remote work requires preparation, and in practice it turns out to be not so simple. We have prepared a complete guide to organizing remote work in a company.

Content

What is remote work?
How to transition your company to remote work
Tools for remote work
What is remote work?
The transition from office to remote work is a global trend that is growing stronger every year. In the article on the effectiveness of a remote sales force, we mentioned that over the past 10 years, the number of people working remotely has increased 4 times.

On the one hand, the trend towards remote work has arisen due to the growing capabilities of online services. On the other hand, a remote office has many advantages:

You don't need to pay for rent or maintenance.
You can recruit employees from anywhere in the world. This is relevant both for companies that seek to form a team of the best specialists, and for businesses in small cities where qualified employees are difficult to find.
Higher employee loyalty. You don't have to spend money and time traveling to the office. People can organize the most comfortable conditions for themselves, including the schedule and workplace environment. The remote office team has a greater degree of trust from management and freedom of action, independence.
Remote work forces you to approach business in a more organized way. This requires well-established business processes, a clear control system, and motivation.
To understand what remote work means, it belgium phone numbers list is important not to confuse it with freelancing. Freelancers are hired for specific projects or tasks, and are more likely self-employed professionals who provide individual services to a number of companies. In this case, there is no need to organize or control anything. It is enough to give the freelancer a clear task and agree on the terms of work.

Unlike freelancing, remote work means having a permanent staff. The team works in the same way as in a physical office - the only difference is that people are at home.

How to transition your company to remote work
The process of a company's transition to remote work includes several mandatory steps.

Think through the mechanism of work.
If the company does not have described and worked out business processes, it is time to do this. In a remote office, it will no longer be possible to ask, reassign, clarify, or request at any time. You need to clearly know who is doing what and which employees are responsible for this or that part of the task. Otherwise, confusion will quickly begin in the company. In addition, business processes will be needed to automate the business and transfer it to online programs.
Choose tools for remote work.
To work remotely, you will need a number of online services and programs: file sharing, communication tools, accounting, programs for working with clients and controlling tasks. The services that you will use for remote work should be selected and tested in advance to make sure that they are convenient and functional enough. In addition, it is important to take care of the security of data on employees' home computers in advance. We will talk in detail about the most necessary tools for remote work in the next section.
Prepare the staff.
This step includes several subtasks. First of all, you need to think about how to monitor work, communicate with the team, and motivate employees. If you already have instructions, they will probably have to be rewritten, since the principles of remote office personnel management are somewhat different:
Staff gain more freedom, as it is no longer possible to control every step of an employee. Remote work is built on trust, independence, and personal responsibility.
In remote work, the main criterion for efficiency is the result. The need to show the result is what will help the team cope with the temptation to arrange an extraordinary vacation for the period of remote work. In addition to procrastination, the focus on results contributes to greater efficiency in conditions of force majeure. If one of the employees has the light turned off during the day, he will be motivated to finish the work in the evening or on the weekend.
It will be necessary to think through clear frameworks and rules that will help the team stay in shape. For example, a number of companies require employees to be ready to accept a video call at any time during the working day. Such a condition in itself excludes the possibility of working while lying on the couch.
For remote work, it is important not to forget about communication. Experts recommend using video calls more often, both for work-related matters and for informal communication during breaks.