Six Pillars of Remote Team Collaboration
Hi everyone!
We’ve already covered the topic of organising your work from home. There are ways to tune up remote teamwork, which is very different from what we are used to in the office.
1. Organise the Workflow and Set Responsibilities
Outline everyone’s role in the team and their responsibilities. SmartSheet’s research shows that people spend up to 1 hour per day looking for the necessary data among all the existing documents, so prepare clear instructions for every new team member
Be ready to provide your colleagues with:
- Q&A for newbies, if they are newcomers.
- A detailed strategy of what you’re doing. People should see the ultimate goal and understand the causes of it.
- Clear descriptions of tasks they have to do. Accurately outline terms of reference or statement of work. The assignment should help colleagues to understand what is the expected result, not confuse them.
- Contacts of people they should address in case of questions. Sometimes, work requires cross-team collaboration in the workplace. Specify whom exactly one should contact if necessary.
- Let others see the team’s progress — you might use task tracking systems to make it clear. It is good not only for control but also for motivation — people always try to keep up with each other. Any lazy guy will do more inspired by workaholics. :)
Also, here find more tips on building a strong and productive team of professionals.
2. Set Common Time for Work
If your teammates are located in various time zones, define a time frame when everyone is online. Use this slot to conduct meetings, discuss important questions and collaborate.
For example, if you are located in London, Europe, while your colleagues live in Vancouver, Canada, the difference in time is 8 hours. A couple of hours between 5 PM and 7 PM London time will match 9 AM — 11 AM Vancouver time. During these hours, you can conduct meetings, approvals, brainstorming sessions and virtual team-building activities.
The time left can be dedicated to anything you can do on your own, as planning, analysing, writing code or articles.
3. Meet Online Regularly
Communication is your key to successful teamwork. Having daily meetings is a great way to keep every team member focused. Share about your progress and your plans for the upcoming day. Discuss any questions with others, seek help, brainstorm. All in all, the collective mind is always more effective.
You already know to consider convenient time for every team member, when you schedule this daily calls, ideally, make sure they don’t last more than half an hour, as you and your colleagues have plenty of other work to do!
We’ve shared tips for productive meetings, so grab them and schedule your first daily call, if you haven’t done that yet!
4. Communicate via Video More Often
We know that not every person on Earth loves video calls, still, seeing your interlocutors provides a sense of unity in the team. When you notice others’ emotions, their reactions, and communicate as if you were meeting in real life, it motivates and inspires!
If there are employees who don’t like to turn on the video, offer them a compromise. Alternate days of video and audio meetings so that everyone is happy.
5. Use Tech Tools for Collaboration in the Workplace
Managing tasks and getting them done in one place is convenient and time-saving. Modern technology allows you to get rid of all those emails with hundreds of document copies. You are empowered to collaborate on texts, spreadsheets, PDFs, graphic materials and many other documents without leaving your home!
If you meet with colleagues in the city outside the office premisses, use safe team collaboration options, such as Collabio Spaces’ local P2P collaboration technology. It allows anyone to co-author documents without passing devices to each other and without uploading files to the cloud!
We’ve outlined the best team collaboration software in this article. Choose the ones that suit you and start working with the team fruitfully!
6. Nurture a Team Culture
Community culture is essential for remote teams. In the office, we feel like parts of a single structure. When working from home, every person feels separated from others and this can cause disengagement and apathy. It is a good idea to conduct some team-building events online — the easiest it to have a cup of coffee in the morning via Zoom. Just chatting and discussing some funny stories will help team members to break the ice and charge with the right mood for work.
Keep in mind people’s birthdays and gather online parties to give best wishes.
Hold virtual team-building meetings to keep everyone motivated — this can be a movie evening, discussing books, playing online video games, whatever! Share your random thoughts and impressions. They don’t need to be work-related, you can discuss your vacation plans, hobbies, plans for the future and so on.
What do you do to make the most of remote collaboration in the workplace? What tools do you use? What team-building events did you hold so far and how regularly do you arrange them? Let’s discuss it in “Responses” and make the most of teamwork! ;)
