No matter how many employees you had to send to remote offices, with the right approach, you can make them as productive as they would be in cubicles and offices.
The pandemic continues. Businesses around the world have had to seriously reshape how they function within the new world order or face a very uncertain future. Only companies that have made the necessary adjustments are working with some semblance of efficiency and profitability.
Relatively speaking.
While many companies were forced to rethink the way they operate, one thing they learned very quickly was that once adjustments were made, operations did not fall apart and it was possible to continue unabated.
But even if a company managed to continue in this new scenario, new questions began to emerge. One of those problems was maintaining team productivity while working remotely.
When employees work within the confines of a company building, they are under the jurisdiction of obvious mandates: they work from 9 am to 5 pm (or whatever hours are defined by policy), take breaks of specific lengths at specific times, and must report to those above them when necessary. Of course, there are always other rules to take into consideration, but you get the idea.
Working from home is a completely different story – there's a certain level of freedom that comes with the territory. The big question is: does this freedom translate into ongoing productivity or does it harm the employee's ability to perform at expected standards?
Give them freedom
If there's one thing that harms productivity, it's an unhappy team. You must remember that life has become exponentially more challenging for everyone. Parents are having to deal with their children juggling distance learning and family 24/7. That's a lot of stress.
So when you tell management to stifle staff in ways that might eliminate the small benefits that can come from working from home, you end up with a dissatisfied staff on your hands.
One thing you can do that will help a lot is give these employees the freedom to work at their own pace. Whether they are doing work from 9am to 5pm or from 10am to 3am and 5am to 9am, as long as they are producing the results you expect (and doing so in a timely manner), you should allow it. By doing this, your team will show their appreciation by being even more productive than when working on campus.
Check-in, no check-in
The last thing you want your team to think is that you are looking out for them. After all, they are adults. You hired them (or used outsourced software development services), so you should be able to trust them completely, right?
In fact, you should.
But there are deadlines to meet, and you need to be informed if your team members can meet those deadlines. How do you do this without acting like you're hovering over their shoulders, making sure to crack a metaphorical whip?
You could employ a tool like Slack to maintain ongoing communication with your teams. As they communicate, you'll be able to watch project discussions without having to behave like a babysitter.
Or, you can deploy a project management tool that allows employees to update their progress on a project. With this tool, you will always be able to know how productive your team is. And once they know that you know, they'll take working from home seriously.
Give them the right tools
When you sent your employees to work from home, did you leave them alone, assuming they had everything they needed to get the job done from home? Or did you provide them with everything they needed to be productive? Laptops, printers, cell phones – whatever is needed to make the transition easier and not require them to spend their hard-earned salaries on technology they wouldn't otherwise acquire.
If you make the effort to provide your team with the right tools to get work done in their homes, they will be much more likely to actually get that work done. You don't want your team to rely on underpowered and insecure hardware to work with large amounts of proprietary data.
Plus, you wouldn't expect your team to use their own equipment when working in the office, right? So why would you expect (especially during a pandemic) these same people to use their own technology to do the same work from home? You should not.
What should you do? You send the machines they use in the office home (which can cause a network nightmare) or buy new laptops (and anything else needed) for them to use. This will go a long way in not only helping your team work productively, but also ensuring they know you have your back when they count on you most.
Hold company-wide Zoom meetings
One problem you don't want to face is the feeling of disconnection that can arise when an entire team works separately. Eventually, they may begin to feel like they don't belong. This feeling can lead to a serious drop in productivity.
How do you avoid this? One important thing you can do is hold (mandatory) company-wide Zoom meetings to help maintain that sense of community. The problem is that you don't want these meetings to be just about business. Inject some fun into them. Hold contests and allow the team to talk about what's going on in their lives. Get involved, don't lecture. Invite guest speakers – maybe even entertainment.
I once worked with a company whose CEO loved playing guitar. He started every meeting by playing something new he wrote. It was wonderful and left everyone excited about the meetings. He was warm, welcoming, and never attended those meetings about financial results or profit margins. Instead, he held employee meetings. He cared. And all of this translated into seriously dedicated and productive employees.
There's no reason you can't do the same with Zoom.
Conclusion
Whether you're an outsourced software developer, a marketing company, a corporate headquarters for a large retail chain, or an industrial hardware machining factory, you can do it. No matter how many employees you had to send to remote offices, with the right approach, you can make them as productive as they would be in cubicles and offices.
