The first principle of my blog is Creating Ecosystems of Success and two focuses are Business/Entrepreneurship and Career Discussions. A great perk for many employees is being able to work remotely. Working remotely gives a lot of flexibility and can add to productivity. There’s a downside to it too, and management must consider how to get the most of teams of employees working remotely. The following contributed post is therefore entitled, Employee Engagement Ideas For Remote Teams.
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Ensuring your employees are engaged is not always an easy task, yet it can become even more difficult when dealing with remote teams. Nonetheless, the following employment engagement ideas from Unum should give you a helping hand…
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Frequent Communication
When dealing with a remote team you should never take the ‘no news is good news’ stance. This is likely to lead to disengagement, as the team members may feel you don’t value them enough to tell them what’s going on. It is definitely a case of the more communication, the better.
Embrace Instant Messaging
A lot of managers believe it is more efficient for them to be the only point of contact. However, you risk alienating the team in question, and this is extremely damaging. Why? Well, information won’t flow effectively and work relationships won’t develop. Instead, promote healthy communication via the use of internal instant messaging.
Consider Various Communication Tools
When engaging with a remote team you need to make sure you use the right tool in relation to the message you are giving. If you merely need to rely on a simple message, an email will suffice. However, when something is more elaborate, or complex, or requires brainstorming, it will be more effective to use an advanced video tool. You can easily find these on the Internet, and some are even free to download. However, managed solutions come highly recommend, as they will be developed to suit your business.
Better Scheduling
Why should those on the other side of the world always have to take a conference call whilst they should be sound asleep? A lot of businesses schedule in relation to what is convenient for their home office. However, if you consider your remote teams and schedule for their benefit in some instances, you show that they are just as important and this keeps them engaged.
Give An Explanation
This is a simple yet effective engagement idea for remote teams. Often, everyone in the home office will know what is going on and consequently their reason for performing a particular task. However, remote teams may be asked to do something and they have no clue why. This may interrupt their current workflow and thus cause irritation. Moreover, it may lead them to feel disengaged because they are working on something without purpose. Therefore, all you need to do is explain why.
Create Personal Connections
It doesn’t hurt to ask someone how he or she is and what is going on in their life. A lot of managers neglect to do this because they feel they are wasting time. However, creating a human connection is time well spent. If you can’t spare five minutes of your time to get to know an employee, no matter where they are located, they won’t feel valued. Instead, they will feel overlooked.
So there you have it, six easy yet highly effective employee engagement ideas for your remote teams. As soon as these practices are implemented you will immediately notice a difference. Start today by making a personal connection when you next communicate with someone in a remote team.
