Avoid A Communication Breakdown With Remote Workers

An increasing number of businesses of all sizes and niches are employing remote workers, and it isn’t hard to see why. It gives companies a wider pool of talent to recruit from, eliminates the need for commuting, and can often lower expenses. However, remote workers can also bring in challenges with communication. If you’re bringing on remote workers, and seeing trouble on the horizon, here are some tips to avoid communication issues.
Establish Expectations First
The very first thing you need to do when you’re planning to integrate remote workers is being upfront with what you expect of them. This is going to vary depending on your company culture, existing workers, and your most pressing targets, but the more direct you are with expectations, the better. Do you need workers to be available at certain hours of the day? Do you have concerns about security, and want remote workers to use an online ID verification system? Do you need them to submit work using a certain cloud sharing platform? The one thing you don’t want to do is make assumptions about what seems obvious. Spell everything out, ideally in an easy-to-understand document that all your remote workers can access.
Be Proactive
When it comes to communication among remote workers, you need to set a clear standard of proactivity for yourself, and your entire remote team. If there’s a big project coming up in the calendar, make sure that every relevant employee knows about it well in advance. On the other end, you need to make sure they’re giving you notice well in advance if they won’t be available, with clearly defined rules. The more proactive you can be about informing everyone on developments – even seemingly little ones, the better your remote teams will operate.
Plan for Emergencies
Unexpected, and often costly emergencies can and will come up, and affect the way you and your remote employees work together. When this happens, you don’t want to be caught with your pants down; scrambling desperately to get a hold of the right staff member through whatever communication channels you’re using. As part of setting expectations, you need to set out a clear standard for how to reach out to others in the business, and how your remote workers can stay ready for any emergency communication. This can be as simple as using phones instead of IMing and emails, as long as everyone’s clear about the procedure.
Open Up to Queries and Concerns
Finally, make sure you’re keeping an open line of communication between you and your employees, and encouraging them to bring up any queries and concerns that they might have about their work. When you’re available to address these things, it will encourage them to bring them up quickly and proactively. This, in turn, will allow you and the other higher-ups to solve problems with greater efficiency. More importantly though, it will help all of your remote workers feel satisfied and in-the-loop, and appreciated by the organization they may feel slightly detached from.