While the Covid-19 pandemic certainly led to more people working remotely, remote work was already growing beforehand. It allows people to work from wherever they’d like, and can give them more freedom, while also cutting out long commute times and having to deal with traffic.
Not only is remote work great for employees, but it can also provide benefits to business such as better employee retention and reduce many office-related costs. But in order for remote work to be a success at your business, you need to adapt and provide remote workers adequate solutions. This can ensure they work efficiently, and have as much success as those working in the office.
This blog post covers how to adapt your business and provide the best solutions for your remote workers.
Find the Right Technologies, Apps, and Platforms to Use
One of the first ways to ensure your business can adapt and provide the best solutions for remote workers is to find the right technologies, apps, and platforms to use. These can include apps for collaborating, apps for tracking time, PTO software, and plenty of others.
All of these should be aimed at helping remote workers do their job effectively and efficiently, no matter where they are. You want to do all you can to help remote workers feel like part of the team, and providing them the best tools to do so is a good idea. There are hundreds of options, so be sure to try a few out and have your team decide which provides them the most value. It can take some time to find the right stack, but it is well worth it.
Take Security Seriously
Security is very important for a small business. If you don’t take it seriously, you could be at risk. While many businesses may think they will never be victimized and that hackers only go after big businesses, that isn’t always the case. They may attempt to steal customer data from any company or even take your website down, or threaten to leak important company information.
Security is especially crucial when dealing with remote workers. While the technology remote workers use every day is convenient, it can also be a security risk. You need to make sure every remote worker knows some security-related best practices to ensure your company information and data don’t accidentally fall into the wrong hands or get seen by the wrong people.
They should all use strong passwords, be careful to watch out for phishing, and even secure their home internet connection.
Ensure Optimal Communication
No matter what industry your business is in, good communication is crucial to your success. Thankfully, there are many ways for small businesses to improve how well they communicate. However, as remote work has become more popular, there is a greater need to focus on remote-specific ways to improve communication.
You need to look at your current communication tools and judge if they are sufficient for a remote workplace. For example, while the email might have worked well in the past, it is simply not an efficient way for remote workers to collaborate and share ideas. Instant messaging of some kind is often preferred, as is having Skype or Zoom meetings for those times where face-to-face conversations are better.
Provide Them the Same Access to Information as Everyone Else
One problem that many remote workers struggle with is not feeling like they are part of the team. A good way to ensure they feel like a part of the team is to provide them with the same access to information as everyone else. If you give an update, no matter how small, to your team in the office, you need to give the same information to remote workers.
If you don’t, miscommunications are bound to occur. These can lead to major delays in projects getting done, or things being done incorrectly. Also, don’t expect your team to share all updates with their remote-working counterparts, it’s your job to let your workers know when things change or information is available.
Also, make sure to help remote workers get to know their coworkers on a personal level. Having frequent meetings on Zoom or Skype, and allowing for some “non-work talk”, can go a long way in fostering important relationships among coworkers. Also, workshops and conferences can also be a good idea.
There Will Be Growing Pains, Take Your Time
Making a large organizational change such as taking on more remote workers is a big deviation from how many companies operate. Because of this, there may be some growing pains. It might be difficult to implement certain things and issues may arise.
To reduce the likelihood of things going south, take your time. You won’t have the perfect system and solutions for remote workers overnight, so take time to fine-tune things like the platforms you use, how you communicate and how you track worker progress, and more.
Implementing any solution comes with issues, so don’t be disheartened when things don’t go perfectly. Simply learn from your organizational mistakes and use this information to improve your implementation going forward.
Be Clear With Instructions and Expectations
Clear expectations and instructions are crucial in business. It keeps everyone working on the right things, and ensures your entire operation can run successfully without a lot of wasted time, energy, and money.
When working in a physical office setting, it is very easy to check in and make sure everyone is doing what they’re supposed to. However, with remote workers, that isn’t an option. Because of this, always be incredibly clear when giving instructions and expectations. It’s always better to over-explain things to make sure everyone is on the same page than it is to rush through an explanation that leads to confusion.
Always keep an open line of communication with remote workers, as well. They need to feel comfortable asking you for clarification on things if they need it.
In conclusion, remote work isn’t going anywhere, so it is important for businesses to adopt the best solutions to keep remote workers happy and productive.
About the Author
Kyla is a former content writer, who started her own blogging site, becoming a digital nomad. She managed to create a platform where all her previous clients are gathered - so they can merge and learn from each other! Her main motto is “sharing is caring” and her goal is to see the world from different perspectives.
