The results of a recent survey by NUI Galway on the subject of distributed working included some interesting findings:
- 44 per cent of leaders believe that distributed working has made the challenge of managing their team more difficult (with, interestingly, an equal proportion saying the opposite)
- The overwhelming majority of respondents (95 per cent) expressed a preference to work remotely “some or all of the time” (a finding that corresponds with colleague surveys from my own experience)
- 75 per cent of respondents indicated that their organisations had not yet firmly decided on their long-term (i.e. post-pandemic) working arrangements
It’s obvious that several factors here are in conflict: almost all workers want the ability to work from home at least some of the time, but a large proportion of managers and leaders believe this arrangement is too difficult. Meanwhile, a big majority of organisations are struggling to develop a clear and coherent strategy on distributed working.
The intransigence and uncertainty can be attributed to a number of factors. On the one hand, many mindsets are still wired to the old command and control model of management. Leaders who prefer this style will struggle with the idea of not having their team back in the office, right there under their noses. In addition, many companies are suffering from perceived tech inadequacy – the view that they’re not digitally sophisticated enough and could never embrace remote working to the extent that Twitter or Facebook have.
I’ve specialised in managing large, geographically-distributed businesses for almost 20 years, and I’ve rarely had the benefit of a starting point that didn’t involve challenges with processes, performance, motivation, communication or technology. Improving the performance, work environment and engagement of your Distributed Team isn’t at all complicated, once you get the foundations right.
It’s essential that your distributed business properly embraces somewhat-intangible but critical elements like Culture, Values and Trust, before moving on to more practical considerations like Workforce Planning, optimising Data and Technology, and remodelling of Business Processes.
However, it’s impossible for these factors to contribute effectively to your strategy if you don’t have excellent Communication. So here are six practical tips for managing communication with your Distributed Team, which are just as relevant for home-based office workers as they are for, say, a team of service engineers, or a multi-location retail business.
- With your team’s input, draw up and publish a simple one-page guideline covering areas such as: the appropriate form of communication in different scenarios (“could this meeting have been an email?”); what regular communications can be expected at every level (e.g. weekly team meetings or fortnightly individual 121s); how you will handle out-of-hours communications for critical business emergencies.
- Borrow from agile software developers by implementing daily stand-ups for all teams. This helps with planning of day-by-day priorities as well as preventing the sense of isolation that can come with working remotely. Keep these meetings short (15 minutes) and the agenda reasonably informal, but ensure that all participants ringfence that daily timeslot, and that those meetings happen every day as planned, without fail.
- Don’t be afraid to embrace Instant Messaging using a secure and reliable platform, but make sure to outline what you expect from team members. Encourage a level of fun but remind all colleagues of the professional standards expected. Canvas opinions regularly to make sure IM is delivering the effective team communication that you wanted, rather than becoming a platform for inappropriate informal messaging.
- Make it a point to ensure that nobody is left behind – for example colleagues who regularly work unsocial hours, or a specialised sub-team that uses different technology. It’s critical that the design and execution of your plan ensure that all workers can expect the same consistent communication. Check in regularly to make sure that people leaders throughout the organisation are meeting their commitments as part of the strategy.
- Encourage collaboration by setting up cross-functional project teams that meet on a fortnightly or monthly basis. As well as being highly effective at solving important business challenges or process issues, project teams help prevent the creation of team silos, and minimise the sense of isolation that can often be felt by distributed workers. These meetings could be virtual, in-person, or a combination of both, and you can rotate the format each month, depending on what works best for your business.
- Finally and importantly, check the effectiveness of your communication on a regular basis to make sure the strategy is working for your distributed team. Do you need to increase or decrease the frequency of certain meetings? Have you done what you committed to do in your plan? Did you leave anybody or anything out? Do your distributed workers perceive that the plan is working? Do they believe that Communication is consistent with the Culture and Values that you originally sought to foster in your business?
Whether you lead a large distributed organisation or are part of one, the measures above are a highly effective way to revitalise Communication within your business or your team. If you’re still uncertain about how you’re going to handle distributed working for your organisation in the long-term, these simple changes along with other critical components will help you develop a simple but effective strategy.
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If you’d like to understand how we can support your organisation’s Remote or Hybrid Working strategy, contact us at hello@ireganadvisors.ie.