Remote Management: Navigating Talent Management in a Virtual Workspace

Within the last year, 62% of employees state that they have worked remotely at some point in time. With an influx of people working from home, leaders have had to find ways to efficiently and effectively handle remote management. Challenges arise when organizations lack the flexibility and accountability to accurately measure and track their remote employees’ performance. Managers need to take a hard look at their current talent management processes and determine what is working for them and what needs to be changed. 

How is Remote Management Different?

Remote management poses unique challenges for managers. Whereas in a traditional office setting, managers can easily track progress on any given project, they are not granted this luxury in a virtual environment. With this, communication barriers can prove difficult to surmount. When organizations fail to consistently communicate about goals, projects, and processes, silos can occur. 

The lack of connection that comes from working in silos can be detrimental to your organizations’ culture. 26% of surveyed employees cite feelings of loneliness while working remotely. When employees begin to feel lonely at work, their engagement levels and loyalty to the company plummet. Remote management needs to identify and address these issues so that employees stay engaged with their work. 

Tip: Keep an eye out for indications that silos are forming in your workplace so that you can solve the problem before it begins. Some key signs to watch for include:

• Misalignment of goals between teams and individual members
• Lack of collaboration on projects
• Decline in communication levels

Additionally, remote management can be tricky for leaders looking to track performance. When working in an office, it is easy to keep tabs on tasks’ progress and measure employee performance. As managers steer more toward remote management, this ease of information quickly changes. 

Daily successes that were once visible to the company leadership are no longer consistently accessible. Areas in which employees are struggling are no longer clear unless they take the time to communicate these challenges to others. Managers need to find ways to weave transparency into their team’s culture to help mitigate these obstacles. 

Tip: One surefire way to increase your team’s transparency? Make everything public! By working in public documents, chats, and folders, you can keep one another accountable and up-to-date on tasks. A quick motto to live by — if your whole team can’t see a document, it doesn’t exist! 

Tips to Adapt Your Strategies

Set clear expectations and set them often. It is more critical in a remote setting than ever to set clear expectations for communication and productivity. One way to combat disengagement is by providing frequent check-ins. Whether this is a daily check-in with your team to give quick updates on the progress of tasks, or a more thorough weekly meeting, use these opportunities to get insight into your team’s productivity and provide oversight on deadlines. 

Overcommunicate with your team. Communicating with your team not only helps to hold one another accountable, but it also helps to build trust in your department. It is important to make sure that you provide your team with the tools they need to communicate. Apart from assisting with tracking performance, communication helps to align the goals of your organization. Share the quick wins of your day, or reach out to others for advice on the challenges you face. Put simply, when it comes to working remotely, you cannot communicate too much. 

Provide outlets for collaboration and team-building. Studies have shown that the social connections in a workplace directly tie to feelings of purpose and well-being. Employees who feel actively engaged with their team are 87% less likely to leave their current position. Apart from collaboration on work-related tasks, it is also essential to find creative ways to connect with your coworkers outside the realm of work. Some fun ideas include playing icebreaker games on Zoom calls, scheduling virtual coffee breaks, or even a Zoom lunch. Brainstorm with your team to see what ideas they have for decompressing after a stressful work week. 

Stay away from micromanagement. 85% of businesses cite remote policies as having improved overall productivity. Remote workers feel they can accomplish more in a day, so make sure you don’t hinder this productivity by micromanaging their work. 55% of employees cite micromanagement as the reason for a decline in productivity. Trust that your employees are accomplishing what needs to be done, and take the time to listen to their feedback.  

Remote management presents unique challenges to leaders, but these barriers are easy to overcome with the right preparation and mindset. The first step to effectively managing your remote team comes from ensuring that you equip yourself and your employees with the tools and support you need to successfully perform your job. Through collaboration, transparency, and a relationship founded on trust, you and your employees can navigate the changes that come with remote work. 

Caliper assists in your talent management process by screening top talent and supporting your teams’ development. To see how Caliper can supercharge your talent management strategies, schedule a demo today, or reach out to one of our experts to learn more.