By Tricia Sciortino
With the rise of remote and distributed workforces, building and maintaining a healthy and productive work culture in these new models is getting a lot of attention.
There are plenty of voices and opinions on both sides of the issue, but I'm here to tell you that it's just as possible (if not more possible!) to build and keep an amazing company culture even when your employees are rarely in the same place.
Remote employees don't need micro-management, but they do need to be held accountable. They must know what is expected, have the right tools and be given regular coaching. Map your strategy for effectively managing remote employees.
Our company is entirely virtual, and we've been able to create a company culture that empowers and fires up our entire team every day. Here's how we did it:
• Make your mission, vision and values part of everything you do. And I do mean everything—your meetings, your communications, your employee reviews, every interaction you have. Don't ever stop talking about, acting on and sharing your culture. That means you, as a leader in the company, have to live them out, as do your fellow leaders. It has to be ingrained into everything you do, every hire you make, every project you finish.
You can't just write down your mission, vision and values on a piece of paper and never think about them again. They have to be lived out every day. We even call our employees on a regular basis to quiz them on our core values—that's how seriously we take them.
• Use video to stay connected. We use video meeting technology for nearly every interaction. We hardly ever pick up the phone, but do all our meetings via webcam. Even the quick, "Got a second?" kind of questions are done over video.
Actually seeing the people we work with creates and strengthens connections and helps us overcome the isolation that can come with remote working.
Remote working is on the rise. This has created new challenges and questions for managers and supervisors: - How do you know employees are working… and not tweeting? And should you care?
- How can you track their progress?
- What's the best way to give them feedback?
Get these answers and more in How to Effectively Manage Remote Employees.
• Celebrate what you want to see. We make sure we call out and celebrate the components of our culture that we want to have replicated. We celebrate big and small wins publicly via our company's private Facebook page, and make sure we include both personal and professional wins—because our employees are whole people and we want to celebrate their whole lives!
We budget for what we call "frugal wows"—just small tokens of appreciation we send to each other to help build relationships and reinforce our core value of "gratitude."
You probably know by now that people don't quit jobs—they quit cultures. But by incorporating these simple practices, you can make your company's culture one that brings in the talent you want and keeps the people you have.
Tricia Sciortino is president of eaHELP, a leading virtual assistant provider in the United States, matching experienced virtual assistants with customers across dozens of industries. Visit eaHELP.com.
Do any of your employees work remotely—even for one day a week? If so, this webinar is for you… and your management team. Join us Tuesday, December 6 for How to Effectively Manage Remote Employees.You'll discover how to: - Create metric-based performance expectations that hold employees—both local and remote—accountable for their performance (using a "Performance
Expectations" worksheet). - Correctly give ongoing feedback and coaching to remote employees.
- Give effective and realistic performance reviews to your remote workers.
- Identify candidates who are a good fit to successfully work remotely.
- Measure remote employees' performance daily, weekly and monthly.
- Help remote employees feel "connected" to the company and other co-workers.
The dispersed workforce is a trend that will only grow. As companies look to cut costs and employees look for more flexibility, remote working is on the rise. A new Stanford study says employees who work at home are 13% more productive than employees who work in the office.
Still, some managers are uncomfortable or unsure how to manage employees they don't see every day. This webinar, presented by Jay Forte, the president of The Greatness Zone LLC, will help your management team become masters at coaching and dealing with their far-flung employees.
The result: Better managers and a more productive (and happier) workforce! Register today!
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