By Sarah Islam
No doubt, the ongoing outbreak of COVID-19 has had a tremendous impact on our understanding of remote work. While going fully remote has brought many benefits to both employers and employees, it is not surprising that many businesses fear that people working from home will lead to an immense decrease in productivity.
However, there are countless ways to help ensure your employees are on top of their game even from the comfort of their own homes. Read along for some of our tried and trusted tips!
While the best employee monitoring tools are transparent and accountable teammates, empathic team leaders, and a collaborative workspace, there is also a great need for employers to measure the time and effort the team puts in and the projects they worked on. This is why leveraging software tools that can help make communication, collaboration, and transparency easier, is crucial.
- Extend Positive Company Culture to Your Virtual Office
It is very important to maintain a positive culture at the forefront. In fact, a company’s overall culture can either make or break an employee’s experience and willingness to put in the best work, especially when working remotely. In fact, extending your company culture to your virtual office can make employees feel valued and included as a part of something bigger which can push them to work harder and keep the company’s goals in mind.
This can be done through giving virtual shout-outs, giving credit when it’s due or even by just utilizing a company-wide messaging platform where employees can share non-work related matters and build connections.
- Set Clear and Mutually Understood Expectations
It is no secret that the best managers set clear expectations, but when it comes to remote work, this is truer than ever! If your employees are working from home, it’s important to set clear expectations and guidelines so that everyone is aware and could be held accountable of what is and isn’t acceptable during remote working hours.
One of the main expectations that needs to be addressed when working remotely is time tracking. In fact, employees can use a tool like Microsoft Excel, where they can manually input and keep track of their time throughout the work day. But that is too much of a hassle isn’t it?
A good solution could be using a real time-and attendance tracking like Jibble!
Jibble can help your staff keep a detailed record of what they do throughout the day – every single day. By merely selecting a project or activity, the system automatically tracks how many hours out of their day they dedicated to work on it.
With Jibble, your employees are expected to be easily reached and in full-work mode so long as they “Jibble-In”. If employees were to leave their working desk, they would have to “Jibble-Out” indicating that they are not working and may not be reachable at this time.
This easy and accurate method of tracking that Jibble provides can increase your staff’s efficiency, boost their productivity, and help you ensure everyone is putting in the work needed to achieve your company’s goals – all the while refraining from invading your employees’ privacy.
- Ensure a smooth communication line
Communication is a vital part of every work atmosphere, but this is especially true when your staff is working remotely. Effective communication can help lower the chance for misunderstandings and ensure that everyone is clear on exactly what is expected of them. To establish that, it is crucial that both remote employers and employees be available to quickly respond to messages or emails throughout the work day.
Utilizing a messaging application like Slack can be a great way to do this!
Slack is like a chatroom for your entire team. It is a place where you can communicate as a group through channels or even privately through a direct messaging chat. This tool can be an awesome way for you to organize and communicate with your remote team members from different departments.
In fact, Jibble allows you to integrate both your Jibble and Slack accounts together – where your staff can “Jibble in” using their Slack account. This can be a great way for them to easily clock in and access urgent messages all at once – saving time and effort and ensuring a smooth remote work process.
- Set Daily Feasible Goals
Another great way to help employees keep track of their work is to set goals and give them a concrete expected outcome for their work. You can use a goal-setting software like ReviewSnap which can be ideal if you are aiming for a cloud-based performance management solution and tracking tool, where you can set goals for your employees and also measure the attainment of these goals.
Setting daily feasible targets can be a very effective way of holding employees accountable for their working hours as it can help you, as an employer, evaluate their progress and know what projects they are allocating the most time to. It can also motivate your employees, ignite a sense of purpose and help them stay on top of their work game.
Conclusion
Simply put, the best remote teams follow a good strategy and utilize the right tools. With a clear purpose, stellar communication skills and a high sense of accountability, they are able to keep their eyes on their numbers, easily track their time and performance, and continuously meet their goals.
