6 Essential Steps To Keep In Mind When Building A Successful Remote Team.

Whether you’re motivated by flexibility, diversity, the pursuit of top talent or the need to streamline operations.

Building or shifting to a remote team can be challenging, as it requires careful planning and a mindful approach.

Whether you’re building a remote team from scratch or shifting your current team. Without these crucial factors in mind, it can be a disaster.

Let’s discuss some of the most important elements to have a successful, thriving and impactful team.

Why Build a Remote Team?

The remote working model is being adopted by more and more companies. According to a report, up to 16% of companies operate fully remote.

According to another report, by the end of 2025, 32.6 million Americans will be fully working remotely.

The increase in remote work and the flexibility it provides is becoming a more and more attractive option for many.

And if you’re a small business or startup that wants to grow with cost-effective methods, get access to talented employees. Having a diverse and creative team, a remote working model might be an excellent option for you.

Here are some advantages that come with a remote team.

• It’s cost-effective: It saves the cost of commuting, having and maintaining a team, office rent and other expenses.
• Work-life balance: Offering better chances of work-life balance for your employees to have more energy and focus, which helps to reduce the chances of burnout.
• More productive: Research has shown that remote work increases productivity by up to 35% — 40%, Given the stress of commute and the flexibility it provides.

Some Top Industries For Remote Working:

• IT.
• Marketing
• Customer support
• Consulting.
• Finance.
• Education and e-learning.

6 factors to consider when building a successful remote team

1) Organize and structure the team:

Before deciding to build your virtual team, ask yourself these questions.

• Do you have the tools to manage a remote team?
• Do the roles in your team can be played remotely?
• What are your overall goals for building a remote team?
• How can you support and manage your off-site team?

Keep these questions in mind when building your virtual team, because in the end you need clarity and have goals that will help you find and maintain your remote team.

2) Recruit carefully:

When building a remote team, it’s crucial to analyze your organization’s end goals.

Will your whole team be remote, or just a few members? Are they required to work hybrid or fully remote?

Identify these roles and build a simple, clear and brief Job description.

Make sure you have a clear understanding of the responsibilities, qualifications, and experience you are looking for and build your job listing accordingly.

Here are some things to keep in mind:

• SEO Optimization.

Optimize with keywords like “Work from home” “Remote” “Virtual” and “Fully remote”.

• Job location.

With your overall goals and needs, have clear requirements of which region or regions you’re only accepting candidates from.

• Required equipment

It’s better to offer your equipment if needed, but have clear guidelines for the equipment and basic needs like stable internet and good computers.

• Expected hours

Clear working hours that are expected of them, so they don’t have to be there 24/7 neglecting their other life commitments for the Job.

Some organizations use time-tracking tools to make sure their employees dedicate their expected time to the task at hand.

If you’re looking to build your virtual team, FIND services offer worldwide reach to skilled individuals who can help you get started.

Here to find out more.

3) Clear policies and goals:

Set aside clear goals that are expected of new hires, and how their contribution will affect the organization’s overall success.

If needed, give proper training to the new hires to make sure they’re fit for the tasks before the starting date.

Have some sort of guideline to keep your employees on track and have that productivity. It won’t work if your goals are all over the place and have no policy at all.

Clarity leads to better results, and having clear policies builds the discipline and consistency you need to achieve your organization’s goals fast.

This also includes who to contact for what, what are their working hours, the clear deadlines of their projects and behavior that is not tolerated in the team.

4) Clear medium of communication and management:

Having some sort of clear communication is essential for a remote team, given there’s no person-to-person interaction, which makes it challenging to manage a remote team.

Some of the common remote team challenges are lack of supervision, instant feedback or information, isolation and home distractions.

To avoid these challenges and have better management, do constant check-ins, make sure they don’t need anything, provide different communication options, and have clear deadlines.

Relevant read: How to communicate as an off-site team.

5) Access to powerful tools:

Having access to powerful tools that enhance your employee’s productivity and efficiency is a must, especially when you’re serious about building a successful remote team.

Giving them needed equipment and tools that contribute to their performance, because not everyone can afford access to high-tech and quality equipment and tools that are needed for the job.

Here are some must-have tools for having an effective remote team.

i. Time tracking tools.

• Hubstaff
• BQE core
• Intuit
• Time doctor.
• Vericlock.

ii. Communication tools

• Slack
• Microsoft Teams
• Asana
• Trello
• Clariti.

iii. Organizing and project management tools

• Zapier
• Zoho
• Monday.com
• Evernote
• Todolist

etc.

6) Consistent meetups and check-ins:

Have regular check-ins to make sure your employees are in good shape, and have a weekly progress report to keep track of everyone’s progress.

If possible, do frequent remote team activities and meet-ups to get your remote employees to know each other better and discuss things outside of work.

It will also cure your employees’ isolation and have a better online team engagement.

Relevant read: How to beat loneliness as a remote employee.

Other considerations:

• Time zone management

Keep all employees’ time zones in mind, You can use apps for them, and on team events or meetings schedule a time when everyone can be available.

• Security & Privacy

Provide cybersecurity tools and best practices that protect company data and secure them from security breaches.

• Constant feedback and improvement.

Offer courses and other tools to keep them educated in their appropriate field, and give constant feedback to improve.

• Legal laws and regulations.

This is particularly important if your employees are in different countries, to be aware of the country’s laws and regulations when it comes to employment and taxes.

Conclusion

While building a remote team has its challenges, having a clear idea, guidelines, communication and management can set you on the right path to building a successful remote team.

Setting clear expectations and policies to build discipline and focus. Having a clear means of communication, and alternatives to keep your team connected.

Providing them with tools and needed equipment to perform their tasks better, and finally doing constant check-ins to track everyone’s progress, are some of the crucial steps you need to take to build and maintain your remote team.

With these steps, you can easily manage a remote team and maximize the benefits of it.