Hiring remote employees brings many benefits, including cost efficiency, productivity, and quality of work. However, it can take extra measures to build trust and connection with them. But if you succeed in doing so, you will be able to significantly accelerate your business.
Here are 3 effective ways to motivate your remote employees, build an amazing remote team and keep your team members productive no matter where they are.
Communicate Frequently
Don’t be afraid of wasting time by having everyday communication with your remote employees.
To motivate them, try to show that you care about them. For example, simply ask what you can do to make them happy with their work. It is even recommended to lead conversations on not work-related topics. Make efforts to integrate your remote employees into your corporate culture and make them a part of your team.
There are multiple channels to communicate with your remote employees. As a matter of fact, leading communication channels such as email or text messages are not the best option. It is of vital importance to have face-to-face conversations with employees working remotely.
So, use technology to your advantage and make frequent video calls to keep in touch.
Boost Virtual “Water Cooler” Talks
In traditional offices, employees are frequently involved in non-work-related spontaneous conversations. These conversations shape the company culture. No company can succeed without having a strong internal culture and employee engagement.
Interactions between employees are natural for the traditional working environment. Conversely, for virtual stuff that is not necessarily the case. Thus, be intentional to make so-called “virtual water cooler talks” happen frequently.
One of the best tips to promote these conversations is to use chat platforms. You, as an employer, should make the first steps to start fun or casual chats. These kinds of chats help remote employees to socialize and get to know each other better.
Furthermore, encourage your remote workers to have some meet-ups and work together. This can build a strong team spirit and make them all realize that there are real people behind the actual work. This way, your virtual staff will start to cooperate and put real and devoted effort into what they do.
Monitor Your Remote Employees Wisely
Let your employees know that you are not spying on them, but monitoring is a natural part of the working process. Explain to them clearly that tracking is needed not because of lack of trust, but because it serves for accurate billing and company reports.
In this situation, employee monitoring software comes to you for help. Time tracking applications like WebWork Time Tracker allow you to monitor your employees effectively and with no fuss. Furthermore, it facilitates the working process. It gives you the possibility to generate reports and invoices automatically. Therefore, using a time tracking application is so far the most effective way to monitor your employees without interacting with their private life.
Related: 3 Best Employee Monitoring Software
Remember, virtual work is still a job. Furthermore, managing a virtual staff requires even more attention.
It is vital to motivate and keep your remote employees engaged. So, keep using these effective ways of motivating your remote workers and enjoy the result.