The COVID-19 outbreak has risen, among others, one very important and interesting question: Can remote work be effective? Thousands, if not millions, of companies had to send all or almost all of their employees home and start adjusting to this new way of working.
But for many, the current situation looks like a perfect opportunity to learn. Managers can carry very important lessons out of this unusual experience.
What can managers and CEOs learn while the teams are working remotely?
1. Some meetings can be emails.
Management loves keeping track of workflows. To make sure that all processes are smooth, we prefer meeting up with our fellow employees to find out how the process goes in person. But the time has come for us to face the truth: Some of those meetings, like updates, memos or simple checkups, can be emails and do not actually require personal communication. Admitting that some meetups are unnecessary and can take up less of your time is a skill that might save you a lot of resources in the future.
2. We have to be more flexible.
As much as we want our teams to be flexible and adaptable, we ourselves sometimes do not follow these guidelines. We might be used to managing everyone on-site and conducting weekly meetings with different teams, but right now is the time to shed some of those habits. We should learn to adapt to the surrounding environment like chameleons. Remote meeting? Fine! Updates are not as frequent? Works for us! No ability to see what everyone is doing every second of every minute? We trust our teams!
This is a perfect opportunity for us to learn what we have been teaching everyone else — the mind should be flexible and open to new experiences in the workplace. Those who cannot wrap their heads around this thesis now may soon become a thing of the past.
3. It is possible to keep on hiring.
Remote work is not the reason for your company to stop growing and developing. Being away from the office doesn't mean that there is no possibility to onboard and welcome new employees. Slack, Skype and TeamViewer are just some of many tools that can be implemented in order to make the welcoming process successful. Welcoming and introducing newcomers to the team using group and private video calls will give them a much-needed feeling of importance and will make sure they are comfortable talking to you in the future.
Plus, this way, you will see who is tech-savvy and ready to adapt to unusual circumstances right from the get-go.
4. Your delegation system might need an update.
Work in the office provides one very important perk: It gives a place to think and concentrate in. It is a much more difficult process when working from home. And no wonder your employees might need more help from their peers when they are surrounded by so many distractions: children, pets, parents and spouses (sometimes even simultaneously). As a result, some tasks might stall, and the entire workflow might become crooked. Updating your delegation system and making sure that your employees feel free to ask for help from others really speeds up and improves the process.
But do not forget to set certain boundaries — asking for help once every couple of weeks is OK. Skipping out on one's direct responsibilities is not. Make sure everyone knows that.
5. Make use of the knowledge you gain.
The situation we see today is not only giving us the possibility to learn now but also giving us food for thought for the future. It doesn't seem that we will go back to business as usual once this is all over. We are going to have to implement what we are learning now into the future workflow. Being more flexible, trusting, relaxed and ready — these are the qualities that we should develop while working remotely.
Working from the office definitely has its advantages. Free coffee, laughs with the colleagues and the possibility to get the answers you need quickly. But even despite that, one study found that about 75% of current remote workers are planning to work from home for the rest of their careers. This means that managers all around the globe have to get used to the fact that our teams will work remotely on a daily basis and not just in crisis situations. All we can do is try to learn from this experience — because it seems like remote work is here to stay.
