My research on remote work and writing about my own remote work experiences made me realize a very important thing- success of remote and distributed teams is highly dependent on what we as leaders and managers do…on a day to day basis. There is no silver bullet!
So what’s not working?
Teams are struggling to stay connected and real
Managers are facing accountability challenges
Individuals are not feeling heard because no one is listening
Individuals are drifting and are finding it difficult to stay motivated
Issues with physical and mental space are real
How to make it work?
One easy way I keep it top of mind is – C A L M S (Connection, Accountability, Listening, Motivation, Space)
- Get social@work with coffee together, BYOD, birthday parties etc
- Help your team plan downtime, so that there is time and space for non work interactions
ACCOUNTABILITY (https://www.watsimp.com/5-things-that-are-broken-in-the-current-remote-work-scenario-and-what-we-can-do-to-fix-it-part-4/)
- Build mutual trust with your team
- Address skill gaps and provide support
- Understand and provide resources and information that are needed
- Improve focus in team meetings
- Minimize distractions
- Enable team participation
- Make 1:1s count
- Be regular with your individual and team check-ins
- Run AMAs (Ask Me Anything) sessions to proactively address concerns
- Publicly recognize performance and milestones
- Celebrate company and team successes together
- Create home-office set up through financial support
- Provide IT infrastructure upgrade where needed
- Consider Lunch Programs
- Structure work-hours
- Make team social time possible
- Make team wellness a priority
Remote work and distributed teams are testing us as leaders. It’s a great opportunity for us to “up our game” and create truly differentiated workplaces. Our ability to do this, will become our competitive advantage in the near future.
And when we do this well, we will create the futureofwork!
