Remote team management: 7 mistakes you must avoid
Managing a team every day is not easy, and from a distance it is even more challenging! If you want to adhere to the remote work model efficiently, it is ideal to invest in managing remote teams .
To begin with, it is essential to avoid the 7 mistakes that we will talk about below in order not to have losses. Good reading!
Challenges in managing remote teams
Among so many changes experienced, the home office is perhaps the biggest one for the corporate world.
Having the flexibility to work remotely is a huge advantage for companies that want to keep innovating and reduce costs, but this working model comes with challenges: time management, collaboration and communication can suffer from distance.
Communication can become more disorganized, as well as the monitoring of processes by managers, interactions between employees and engagement.
Employees feel more motivated to work in this format, being able to better manage their time with their family, not spending hours traveling and having more autonomy.
Advantages for the company:
Building a more honest relationship between bosses and remote teams;
Flexibility;
Cost reduction;
More confident and independent teams;
Retaining talent;
Reduction of the turnover rate;
Strengthening Employer Branding.
And more.
If you want to adhere to this model efficiently, avoiding the challenges of the adaptation phase, it is essential to invest in the management of remote teams. Start by knowing the 7 mistakes you shouldn't make.
Remote team management: 7 mistakes not to make
To maintain good management of remote teams, the ideal is to focus on economic advantages and create strategies to deal with the new work format.
After all, it is not good to take the vices of face-to-face work to remote work, it is necessary to think differently and adapt the organizational culture. Check out the following tips:
1. Lack of regular communication with the team
Shifting the team to remote work can reduce the frequency of communication, but this is a mistake that can cause a lot of damage to productivity.
You need to define how the communication processes will be in advance to avoid problems.
2. Lack of technical support
Companies need infrastructure that allows for remote work, including technical support and updates for the software used.
Support makes managing remote teams easier and remote work is safer and more stable, without pauses that can harm productivity and without insecurities that can damage data protection and the company's reputation.
3. Deficiency in building relationships
It is essential to strengthen the bond between the manager and the team so that the work goes smoothly. Good relationships generate engagement, motivation and avoid mistakes by ensuring good communication.
Despite the difficulties of distance, it is possible to use the advantages of digital to your advantage to generate an even better connection than the face-to-face connection: more assertive and empathetic.
4. Not setting expected expectations
A goal-oriented team is more productive. It is essential that employees meet the established deadlines and goals so that they can better manage the home office routine.
Therefore, the company must have an effective remote work policy so that the team clearly understands the organization's expectations.
Management must empower staff to ensure employees use software solutions correctly, understand deadlines, remote work arrangements, best practices, and goals that must always be communicated.
It is important not to forget security practices, such as granting permissions, who are the authorized users to access certain documents and how to communicate with management to keep them up to date.
5. Not giving feedback
If you don't have a feedback routine implemented, it could be harming the company's productivity.
In good management of remote teams, feedback should not be sporadic, you need to include periodic meetings for conversations with employees.
Feedback doesn't have to be just criticism: invest in constructive, constant conversations, valuing qualities and congratulating them on good acquisitions.
Keep active listening, which should be valued regardless of your team's physical distance. Have empathy and be welcoming, generating intimacy between teams and incentives for employees to stay well.
6. Lack of investment in online events
It's not because work works remotely that company events can't happen!
Good management of remote teams needs to have special meetings for the work to work to its full potential.
So, set dates to celebrate, talk and strengthen the bond between the manager and the team. Events like this generate engagement, motivate the team and promote interaction that creates harmony for the day-to-day work.
Do team dynamics and offer prizes, such as an extra day of vacation or dinner.
Enjoy your events on Connect , the software to create a good work culture, involvement, good communication and automation for the team!
7. Lack of confidence
If, on the one hand, companies gain many benefits by adopting the remote model as a rule, on the other hand, there are those who find it difficult to gain and maintain trust on a day-to-day basis.
After all, in remote work, employees are distant from each other, and the lack of communication, feedback and meetings can reduce trust between employees.
When working remotely, leaders feel that they are losing the ability to monitor and may think that the solution is to control more, but this is a mistake: with greater control, the team feels overwhelmed, distant, and productivity suffers .
It takes engagement from both parties (leaders and followers) to establish a good relationship on a daily basis. The manager must monitor while giving autonomy and reinforcing trust, without trying to control the team in an exaggerated way.
Preferably, let technology control the workday for you. Within Connect , you have the electronic attendance control tool to make monitoring easier, assertive and impartial.
