Managing Collaboration With Remote Teams

It’s all about streamlining your communication, improving your visual collaboration and building connected teams. Embody your company’s culture and values through all of your communication and regularly remind your remote teams of common goals to keep them motivated towards the overall vision. Make asynchronous communication work, i.e. allowing remote employees to collaborate and communicate on their own schedule. It’s not easy to balance managing yourself while supporting your remote team.

This can be even more challenging for remote workers who are used to real-time, synchronous communication. In a traditional office environment, they may have been able to walk over to a coworker’s desk or call them right away. Meetings may have been face-to-face and everyone worked in an open office. The one thing that can improve remote team collaboration is mutual trust. Being honest with your team leader and team members increases efficiency and collaboration as well. E.g., everyone has a bad day occasionally – the days you can’t concentrate, and your head is in a different place. That said, according to a blog post by Catalent, the majority of CEOs rank collaboration among the top three critical components of innovation.

• Ask for feedback during one-on-ones, team meetings, and through surveys to get insight on how your team members are feeling and identify ways you or the company can improve.
• Efficient, collaborative meet-ups are essential if your team is remote – so make sure you have a plan for every meeting you call.
• The great thing about virtual meetings is that it only takes a click to start a video recording that you can refer to whenever you want.
• It can also be an over-stimulating nightmare of notifications if not managed properly.
• The best way to foster such conversations in remote teams is to create an internal communication channel, or set up a virtual water cooler time.
• One team’s plans won’t necessarily be an excellent fit for another, and this could be an issue if you’re dealing with cross-team collaboration.

In fact, we even have aTeam Playbookof exercises and workshops to help teams work better together. It’s important to take time out to build connections while having fun, too. And, as a company of several thousand people distributed across five continents, we’ve had plenty of chances to act as test subjects for both flavors of virtual team-building activities. We’ve covered the what, why and how when it comes to remote team collaboration. Now let’s explore a few specific examples of common collaborations that happen in remote companies . Team collaboration is vital for companies—especially those who have to deal with remote employees across different time zones. Bria UC softphone solutions, by CounterPath, streamline work communications and let users easily connect, communicate, and collaborate.

Maintain Clear & Efficient Communication

According to Digiday, some companies take this a step further with ‘blended meetings’ in which every session has a video element. This provides added transparency, enabling those in a different time zone, or even just out of the office, to catch up on meetings they may have missed. There are numerous challenges to working effectively with a distributed team compared to co-located employees. Now, virtual team collaboration can’t wait days for a reply. So you’ll want to establish an expected response time for all types of communication tools you use.

• You can have a collaboration using Duckly or other video chat software.
• It offers a range of features and tools for sharing ideas, organizing conversations, and keeping everyone on the same page throughout the project.
• These micro-apps support absence management, automated timesheets, payment cards, network searches, and more.
• This applies to real-world meetings as well, but virtual teams tend to meet more frequently.
• Even a meeting as short as 15 to 20 minutes can make a world of difference in the average employee’s workweek.

And praise from peers helps build strong bonds between teammates. At a minimum, you should create non-work-related Slack channels to mimic the discussions employees used to have around the ol’ office watercooler. This will help guide your meeting so it stays on track and productive.

Virtual Collaboration Best Practice #10: Celebrate Small Wins

Reimagining Work It’s time to redefine how we construct our work days. How can we prioritize our personal lives while excelling in our careers? Here’s where we explore the emerging conversations about Work 2.0. Using pre-recorded video messages with a tool like ZipMessage, can help to pre-screen candidates before committing to time-consuming live interviews. We created ZipMessage to fill that gap and provide a low-friction way for anyone to record their message on camera or screen share, and continue the conversation asynchronously. It’s designed for collaborative back-and-forth conversations, rather than “one and done” recordings that are sent but difficult to reply back to.

While it was popular before COVID, adoption skyrocketed at the start of the pandemic. As a messaging app, it works both in real-time and asynchronously, with public ‘channels’ that can be used for collaboration or announcements. Over time, this builds a culture of “default to transparency” and improves communication across the board. Small details can be invaluable knowledge for new employees. You never know who else needs to be aware of what you’re working on and quite often, the best insights come from those outside of your team or project. If your remote team uses Slack, all channels should be public by default and accessible by anyone. Direct messages should be reserved only for personal or private information.

• Here, team members are encouraged to share accomplishments and significant milestones while the rest of the crew gets to toast them.
• Organizations work on complicated problems, which involve interdependencies between colleagues, teams, and functional areas.
• It’s the way you go about work that actually needs to be different — and it can actually be more effective.
• Virtual retreats, and encourage digital “watercooler” chats to foster team spirit.
• Despite initial hesitation from more traditionally-minded leaders to invest in remote work as a viable option for the workforce, most people now agree that remote work has compelling advantages.

In synchronous communication, the communication is happening in real-time. After a group decision has been made, the people who are working on that group decision can get together and work on it together. You can have a collaboration using Duckly or other video chat software. Synchronous communication is really important for any project that is working in more than one place, or on more than one person. For example, Best Remote Team Collaboration Practices if you are working with a team that is in different time zones, you will need to do a lot of synchronous communication to make sure you are all on the same page. Remote work comes with its own unique sets of challenges and, as we’ve seen, unique opportunities. When a team is already working remotely, be it partially or fully, it typically means set schedules and communication tools already are in place.

Provide Opportunities For Collaborative Teamwork

Trust and transparency are key factors in shifting to remote work. I need to be working with a team that I trust, but also to see what they’re working on and the quality of their work.

Virtual workers need a virtual office — a place where they can meet online and hold conversations. It’s easy for virtual workers to become isolated, so a central hub to communicate with colleagues is a benefit. The best collaboration and community platforms connect employees, give them a place to chat and discuss projects, leave feedback and suggestions, and more. Remember, a remote team is as strong as the tools they have access to and the processes it has in place to support everyone to do their best work. Since every team is so unique, leaders and managers are tasked with finding the best options for creating the custom toolkit. Slack is an instant messaging tool that allows teams to organize their conversations into specific topics or team channels for more effective communication.

More freedom and fewer interruptions have proven that remote workers are more productive than their office working counterparts. Managing remote workers has also gotten easier considering remote team collaboration tools that have flooded the market overnight. Lucidspark is a virtual collaboration tool that makes it easy for teams to communicate and brainstorm in real-time . The infinite whiteboard is your canvas for sharing ideas, sketching projects, and planning work. Use it for work or play to promote team connection and streamline communication and collaboration from afar.

Benefits Of Teamwork: 5 Ways To Empower Your Team Through Collaboration

For organizations around the world, figuring out how to best support hybrid and work from home employees is absolutely essential. Remote collaboration means the ability to engage and work as a team and between teams regardless of where everyone is in the world.

Team members should be able to freely communicate with each other. They should know how to access each other, whether it’s via a platform such as Slack or MS Teams or whether it’s through text messaging and email. All team members should communicate with each other freely, because it’s a great way to build camaraderie and make sure that they can work with each other effectively. Build a directory of how people most commonly want to be contacted. Establish core hours for work and manage your calendar appropriately. You aren’t going to be able to ensure that everyone at home is working at the same time, especially if people are in different time zones.

Retention rates increase with happier employees who find their work fulfilling. Better work collaboration sets the foundations of a work culture that can lead to this conducive work environment. So working remotely clearly had its advantages even before the global pandemic. Let’s have a look at some of the benefits of working and collaborating effectively with a remote team. Your team has to feel like they’re a part of the same office, and your technology will be that office.

All project information should be laid out in a shared dedicated board, so everyone can access it. It also means everyone understands their own roles and responsibilities, but also their colleagues.

What Is Remote Work

Alternatively, file hosting service Dropbox advises building in regular checks for managers to ensure tasks have been distributed fairly. You can block out time at the start of your week on your calendar for this, or use Wrike’s workload view to see it at a glance each day. Moving these stand-ups and check-in collaborations to an asynchronous format can help keep the momentum going. Quick text updates through a platform like Slack can work throughout the day, but embracing a video-based messaging tool can really add substance and clarity to these status update communications. These terms might be new to you, which is why we created our complete guide to asynchronous communication. It’s not complicated really, in fact most of the communication you do happens asynchronously.

Basically, everything that remote employees need to know to do their best work and communicate as effectively as possible with co-workers. Each team is encouraged to set up a workflow that works best for them. Our marketing team, for example, starts and ends each day with a video call. This lets them share their planned tasks achievements & coordinate support from other team members. When working remotely it’s important that everyone is clear on their role, timelines, deliverables, and measures of success. Because it’s harder to pop over a desk and discuss, it’s easier for mistakes to happen. My tip is to create step by step processes that are easy to follow and frequent checks to ensure everyone is on the same page.

Slack Supercharges Customer Success With Expanded Global Consulting Partner Ecosystem

A recorded video can turn a 10-minute long back-and-forth in chat into a quick 30-second tutorial. Set up channels for different key topics and encourage your team to use them.

It’s not possible to clarify quick questions by just walking over to someone’s office when you’re working remotely. Not only are there multiple communication channels and additional distractions, but you also want to be respectful https://remotemode.net/ of any current calls or projects team members are working on. Though there are many team collaboration tools available for remote work purposes, there is no one-size-fits-all solution for every team and their specific needs.

And that’s where our next type of collaboration comes into play. Had they had some time to go back and research and shape their ideas, they could have contributed something that would move the collaboration to a more fruitful outcome. Live phone calls or face-to-face conversations of Zoom or Google Meet are examples of synchronous communication. When momentum declines, everyone on the team can feel it, and it snowballs into a collaboration that ultimately falls flat. Lack of fidelity in communication can cause someone’s ideas to fall flat, simply because other participants didn’t fully understand their full meaning. With a full-fidelity message , a great idea can spark more great ideas from other participants, since the full nuance was received and understood.

How To Collaborate Productively When Your Team Is Remote

Keep communication channels clear of unnecessary chat and think through messages before sending them. Sending an unnecessary question to a coworker might seem innocuous, but it disrupts their flow and potentially several other coworkers. Your problem has now become their problem which can be incredibly annoying and demotivating. Constant notifications mean that remote workers spend more time checking messages and instant messaging. The key to getting this right is to communicate clearly and efficiently.

Within the next seven years, it’s projected that 73 percent of all workplace departments will have at least some remote workers. More and more industries will begin utilizing remote work for their businesses and organizations due to the many benefits remote work can provide. Today, we are going to share ten best practices to maximize collaboration, productivity and teamwork as a remote marketing team. How to transition a small local team to remote work Even though we might be able to go to our offices again soon, many teams might have gotten a taste of remote work, and might want to stay that way. Before you rush into it and close down your office, this is how you can prepare for the switch.

This helps keep things as transparent as possible and sets clear expectations. For example, Doist’s internal communication guidelines expect people to answer within 24 hours. When you break it down, overcommunicating is simply proactively avoiding misunderstandings.

How To Build Your Own Custom Chat Platform: The Full Guide

This is really useful functionality if your workflows require you to collaborate with those outside of your organization like clients, consultants, vendors, etc. With the rise in distributed companies, working with teams across borders is becoming a norm.

Best Video Calls And Screen Sharing Tool

You can keep all your notes organized, sync it automatically across all your devices. Evernote is an application that serves as a notetaker, PDA, to-do list and pocket notebook.