How to connect your remote workers in your company? Working remotely has a lot of perks, both for a company and its employees. Employers save money by avoiding the expenses that come with a traditional office and can choose the best people for their team regardless of their location. Remote workers get to enjoy more flexibility, get rid of the annoying daily commute, and spend more time at home with their families. Many organizations already saw these benefits and were trending toward remote workforces, the coronavirus pandemic forced others to shift to a work-from-home model.
The emergency reasons for going remote during COVID-19 were non-negotiable, the reasons to connect your remote workers in your company is beyond the pandemic. From more successful hiring and improved customer service to increased company diversity and significant money savings, leading remote
How to Connect Your Remote Workers in Your Company
1. Use remote working communication tools
The easiest way to connect your remote workers in your company is to make the workers easily communicate with each other. Sending off an email and waiting to receive the response just won’t cut it in today’s work environment. To make your remote workers really feel connected, you need to use remote working tools for communication.
2. Team collaboration software
There are several great team collaboration software options on the market to help your team stay connected and up to date. For example, Zoom Meeting allows organizations to build relationship between workers and an enterprise social network for team members to collaborate on projects.
3. Warm welcome
While it is easy to gather everyone into a conference room on a worker’s first day in an office, it is more challenging to build relationships when working remotely miles away. Therefore, it’s important for leaders ensure that their new starter receives a warm welcome from the company.
Prepare an existing team by communicating what the new person’s role is to get the team excited, as well as setting up an introduction meeting with their new colleague. A quick video call is enough to put a face to a name and begin building an easy rapport.
4. Keep an open dialogue of constant communication
Another way to connect your remote workers in your company is to keep an open line of communication.
One of the most effective ways to make your team feel connected is to make them feel heard. Keeping an open dialogue of constant communication and feedback is important for every company, especially those with remote workforces. Hold regular check-in meetings to ensure each team member has the necessary tools and support to perform their best. Foster a company culture that allows employees to frequently voice any questions or concerns without fear of ramifications. When employees feel like they can be honest – and their feedback is being heard – they are more likely to feel connected to the organization.
5. Do a quick catch-up
Regular communication is vital during the onboarding period. Remote workers can sometimes feel isolated, so a quick catch-up in the morning can make the new worker feel very welcomed and connected.
6. Focus on worker wellbeing
Employee wellbeing is an important aspect of onboarding and beyond. Mental health challenges at work have increased over the last year so leaders have focused on building and providing mental health support for their workers.
7. Cultivate a workplace culture
Understanding the company culture and philosophy is very important for new workers. In fact, one of the reasons why a new worker does not work out is due to not understanding how the company works. During the onboarding process, it is important that leaders brief the remote workers on the company’s history, policies, mission, and goals.
Additionally, cultivating a workplace culture that engages, rewards their workers is also key to helping keep a worker engaged and productive. While the new starter may work remotely, there is still plenty of opportunities for them to communicate and feel part of a team.
8. Let your workers know the expectations
During onboarding it’s vital that workers receive training and guidance on their new role. Leaders must let their workers know their expectations of them in terms of meetings, conversations, and work.
In addition, it’s important to maintain the workers productivity by letting the worker know they know that you can grow with the company. Having early conversations about career opportunities, professional development helps a worker stay engaged and integrate well into a team.