The Ultimate Guide to Managing Remote Workers in Small Businesses

It’s no secret that today’s workforce is changing more quickly and more dramatically than any other in modern history. At least four generations are working now, ranging from the new graduates of Generation Z to the retiring – or more often semi-retiring – Baby Boomers. In the span of their careers, this era of employees has seen how technology can impact almost every aspect of their job—not only how they do it, but often where they do it.

The Rise of Working Remote

Business Advantages of Remote Workers

The Challenges of Remote Working

How to Motivate Remote Workers

Best Practices for Engaging Remote Workers

The Secret to Remote Worker Collaboration

How to Support Remote Workers

Best Practices for Managing Remote Workers

How to Pick the Right Tools for Remote Workers

Keep Remote Workers Connected and Engaged

The Rise of Working Remote

Two decades ago, remote workers were usually independent contractors or a relatively rare and privileged corporate employee. The concept of “mobile workforce management” had not yet been invented. Today, however, both the size and definition of “the remote workforce” have expanded to impressive proportions. Given that many businesses are returning to the office after 2020’s work from home mandate, several companies are pivoting to allow for hybrid model arrangements – being referred to as “the workforce of the future”. Others are deciding to stay remote altogether. As economies continue to grow, so does the need to ensure employees do not become disengaged during this critical transition period of a return to “normalcy”.

Consider the following trends from the latest reports:

Because mobile devices and communications solutions are tailored for remote work, employees are able to connect with managers, dispatchers and team members from wherever they happen to be, making work more flexible. Perhaps more importantly, their managers and colleagues can call them whenever the need arises.
The number of employees working remote full-time prior to the pandemic totaled 30%, which rose to 48% by the beginning of 2021.
Post Covid employees would now choose to spend 40% of their week continuing to work remote.
Remote workers report an increase in job satisfaction and productivity. Those working from home reported more positive measurements in performance based on an enjoyment of a more comfortable workspace, focused environment and less interruptions and involvement in office politics. Working parents also reported less concerns involving commute and childcare, increasing honed productivity.

Business Advantages of Remote Workers

The result of these new developments is a workforce that’s more mobile and less centered on physical location. Small businesses, in particular, now have the tools they need to efficiently communicate with and manage workers, no matter their respective roles, where they are located or how much they happen to travel.

This is especially important today, when workers are more inclined to switch jobs when they spy a better opportunity and often base their job satisfaction at least partly on the tools that employers provide. Employees, after all, are also consumers. They don’t see any reason why they should only enjoy simple-to-use mobile apps in their personal lives, while using clunky, outdated products for work.

Today, even businesses with a handful of employees can afford to make use of the latest communications tools. Consequently, they now have opportunities they never had before in terms of hiring, sales, distribution, product design and production. If the most talented product manager happens to live 500 miles away from headquarters, moving them may not be necessary. When a customer has an emergency, they can reach their sales executive right away through a smartphone. When the factory discovers a flaw in a product, production managers can huddle with the design team, no matter how far-flung the team members may be.

Do you manage a remote workforce? These remote working solutions can help you get the most out of your team ->

The Challenges of Remote Working

That same approach is even more important for so-called “deskless workers,” the employees in warehouses and delivery trucks, on production lines and retail floors or roving from site to site to maintain and repair customers’ equipment.

In many instances, these people may not even have a company smartphone or business email address. Yet, those who visit customer locations may be the most visible employees you have. Like their colleagues at the office, they have the same desire to feel connected, be part of the team and know the company’s behind them if they need information or technical support to get their job done. Without the right tools or mindset, managing this mobile workforce poses a challenge.

Seamless communications – such as mobile apps, integration with enterprise applications and click-to-call functionality, to name a few – provide business owners with a powerful advantage. By providing these tools, they reinforce connection, so employees are always in touch. A variety of mobile apps allow users not only to communicate with each other, but also to handle a variety of nuts-and-bolts issues that once required a chat with your HR person and the filing of multiple forms.

For example, a number of small business HR apps allow remote employees to submit time-off requests, check their latest pay stubs and see how much vacation time they’ve banked. They can ask simple questions through a text message or participate in a video conference with their manager and HR if a more complex issue arises.

These tools are also key in reinforcing a feeling of connection and feeling included with coworkers. A Gallup poll noted close professional relationships boost engagement among employees and more of a personal investment in their employers. With fewer interactions while working remote, an employee may be more focused, but can also feel more isolated. Establishing a network of support through remote worker tools is critical when those casual interactions that help build the company culture are so limited.

How to Motivate Remote Workers

The key to facilitating a remote workforce isn’t technology; it’s how people use the technology. In essence, technology is only an enabler that provides more streamlined communication between personnel, regardless of where they happen to sit. But for communications systems to reach their full potential, small business owners must build their use into every process—and design every process around the people who follow it.

HR professionals like to talk about the importance of “the employee experience.” Today, that experience is no longer limited to what happens within office walls. The programmer working from home, the driver making deliveries, the forklift operator stocking loading docks and the electrician making house calls all want to have the best possible experiences, too. By using the right communications tools in the right way, businesses can now include workers who – because of their location – were once “out of the loop” in almost every aspect of a company’s operation and culture.

Collaboration within and amongst teams delivers a huge payoff for companies that embed remote working best practices into their routines. Managers regularly challenging distributed teams and establishing open communication channels work well for keeping remote workers motivated. Businesses can also think about implementing or moving towards a remote-friendly company culture across the entire organization. The opportunities are endless for using communications for successful mobile workforce management.

Best Practices for Engaging Remote Workers

Office engagement describes how emotionally committed workers are to their employer and its goals. There are so many options for companies to engage employees. Through contests, games, various tech solutions to allow for team bonding, or even just “remote coffee.” One of the most important is the chance to actually speak to their colleagues and managers on a regular basis. What engages them even more is the knowledge that they can initiate the conversation without “looking bad” to their boss and co-workers.

Imagine, five employees of a company work in the same location with no fear of knocking on the owner’s door to ask a question or talk through a problem. But when three of those employees work from their homes in separate states, the dynamic changes. Picking up the phone to call the boss feels like a higher bar, so employees turn to email, which is rarely as clear as direct conversation and can involve a long wait for answers if the boss is out of the office.

Messaging can speed things along, but it, too, requires care to craft each line if the conversation is going to be efficient and productive. A click-to-start video call is the best solution, since it allows the owner and employee to speak more naturally than they would on the telephone and to read each other’s body language and improve overall engagement. Layering on collaboration features such as document sharing and video makes it possible for colleagues to work through issues like they would if they were in the same room.

Need to keep your remote workforce motivated? Apply these 5 things for ultimate remote motivation ->

The Secret to Remote Worker Collaboration

Nothing is more concrete than the results of effective collaboration. Just like with engagement, today’s communications technology allows small business teams to collaborate closely, unhindered by each team’s location.

But like engagement, collaboration depends on the business owner’s leadership skills. How to manage remote employees is all about making them perform as a single team even when they’re scattered geographically. You can’t put three people in a conference room with a vague goal and hope they’ll emerge with even the beginnings of a concrete plan for reaching that goal, especially if it's a virtual meeting. Owners and managers have to set parameters to drive results, educate the team on the reasons behind the goal and make sure boundaries between roles and departments are clear.

How to Support Remote Workers

For growing businesses, the owner’s biggest responsibility is to convince their employees they are truly just a click away, while supplying them with all they need. They should make it clear they don’t regard video calls as any more intrusive than they do a knock on their door. To accomplish this, small business owners must lead by example. They need to be exceptionally proactive when they rely on remote worker tools and other communications needed to foster collaboration.

First off, to demonstrate the value of these channels, managers should actively use the tools in their own work, essentially “evangelizing by doing.” The best way for employers to foster adoption of communications tools is to reach out. It’s not enough to tell everyone to “just video me.” They must start video calls themselves when the need arises as well as schedule regular check-ins. As a result, remote workers will feel connected and recognize that management is accessible and responsible.

Second, they must ensure remote worker success by supplying the same access to training and technical support as their office employees. In fact, going out of your way to support remote workers is even more important than providing help to your headquarters staff. In the office, employees know they can ask a quick question in the hallway or stop by your desk. Because their remote colleagues cannot see you and have no way to judge how your day’s going, they’re more likely to hesitate before reaching out for help. The same holds true when they’re wondering whether to contact their manager or a colleague.

Best Practices for Managing Remote Workers

Another challenge for the owners of growing businesses is the ability to effectively manage remote worker performance. The good news is a wave of new products allows managers to provide performance feedback in (close to) real time. The old idea of managers and employees sitting down once a year to talk about goals, successes and needed improvements is quickly going by the wayside.

This can have a dramatic impact on the relationship between small business owners and their employees. By nature, owning a business requires juggling abilities, and the employee review is hardly ever prioritized. It’s not that owners don’t care about their staff’s desire for feedback. Instead, they have trouble carving out the time necessary to prepare for, conduct and follow up on an effective review.

Today’s integrated tech solutions allow owners and managers to provide instant feedback as soon as a remote worker completes a task, to praise an employee’s efforts to their team members and even enable team members to give shout-outs to their colleagues in a way that’s visible throughout the company.

When used regularly, these tools allow for constant conversation among the workforce, regardless of where they’re located. When the Omaha sales rep delivers a new account, the news is quickly shared with staffers around the country, not just those working in the main office in Indianapolis. When the field technician in Fort Lauderdale completes an emergency repair at 3 a.m., and so allowing your customer’s store to open on-schedule the next morning, word of her good work spreads even before the rest of the company even begins their day.

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How to Pick the Right Tools for Remote Workers

We’ve explored how the right technology contributes to the best practices of managing remote workers. However, there’s one last thing to emphasize. These special tools are no help to employers if employees don’t just use them, but also use them well. One of the most important things small business owners can do when selecting technology is to focus on the old saying, “Keep it simple.”

Tech companies love to tout their bells and whistles. Nowadays, they’re sure to emphasize their “cloud” features and “redundancy,” their approach to “cybersecurity” and their 24/7 customer support. To be sure, these are all important components of any successful product. However, they shouldn’t overwhelm the importance of usability.

“Usability” is a catch-all term to describe how simple a product is to operate. It’s an important concept because, time and again, users have shown themselves more likely to embrace tools that are simple and neglect those that are more complex. For example, workers are much more likely to start a video call with a single click than they would be if three or four steps were necessary.

“Providing a seamless, flawless digital experience for customers, be it on mobile, via web or in-store, is what strong companies are focused on,” observed the software testing expert Matt Johnston. “And that integrated customer experience cannot be tested, measured or optimized from a lab.”

Johnston believes technology tools succeed when users can make them work as advertised from the beginning. According to research by the mobile app firm Localytics, 56 percent of users will give up on an app if they can’t get it to work after three to five tries. If workers regard your tools as difficult, your job of managing them becomes difficult as well.

Focused, easy-to-use technology makes managing remote employees less of a headache. With easy-to-use products, your employees spend less time learning how to make them work and soon consider their use routine within their home office or on-the-go. That means you’ll worry less about training and support and spend less time chasing after people to perform everything from simple chores, like clocking in, to more advanced tasks, such as setting up collaboration calls and sharing documents. In addition, operations will run more smoothly because workers are less inclined to put off requesting vacation time or filing reports when the processes are straightforward.

Keep Remote Workers Connected and Engaged

The key to remote worker management is leveraging technology in a way that extends the experience of being in the office. Start with robust tools that allow team members and business owners to communicate as easily as they would if they ran into each other in the hall. Then, follow best practices for managing remote employees and set a high bar for the kind of visibility and collaboration that allows close working relationships to develop.

Finally, lead the way. Be the first to take up the tools and build them into the way you work. Your team will follow.

The Ultimate Guide to Managing Remote Workers in Small Businesses

Table of Contents

Do you manage a remote workforce? These remote working solutions can help you get the most out of your team ->

Need to keep your remote workforce motivated? Apply these 5 things for ultimate remote motivation ->

Going digital is key for business continuity for your distributed workforce. Read our e-book today ->

Be Sure To Read These Other Installments In The Remote Worker Series:

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