The world had to face up to the challenge that has been posted by the Pandemic Covid 19. The constant and imminent threat of virus transmission through the face to face contact had led many people to resort to working at home remotely. Working at home entails difficulty both to the employee and the management, especially that this is the new horizon traversed in these challenging times.
Remotely accessing and monitoring the productivity of the employee may become a challenge for the team leader. However, it is a must to adapt to the so-called “new normal” working scenario by resorting to some of the ways on how to handle remote teams.
Daily Monitoring of the Employee’s Check-In
In the traditional working setup, there is a need for the employee to check in or time in in the company’s monitoring system. Logically this is to determine which among the employees are physically present and actually working. Since physical presence at the office is impossible, there is still a need to monitor the employee’s check-in to determine his or her availability to work for the day.
We have Zoom and Google’s Team Hangouts make everything possible for the team leader to conduct monitoring either through an individual conversation, video chat, email messaging, and the like. It can also be done through team meetings and group video chats. Through this, you can set the agenda for the day, give the resources that the employee needs, and the necessary feedback.
Constant Communication Is The Key
Working in isolation is difficult for being a social animal. There is a “need” for human interaction, and since that is not advisable for it may be exposing yourself to a “high risk” to virus contamination. Loneliness may creep, and this can be addressed and minimize through constant communication via phone, video chat, and exchanging emails.
It is just like having a social interaction without physically doing it. You can still share stories, laughter, insights, and anything under the sun that can help ease the boredom and loneliness felt by you and your team members.
Maximize The Use Of Technology To Your Advantage
As the old adage says, “when life offers you a lemon, then make a lemonade,” and since life is offering us a remote working scenario through the use of technology, then make it a technologically-centered working environment by maximizing the use of technology.
There are many tools for team collaboration that you can use, such as Slack or Microsoft Teams, aside from the usual emails and text messaging. You can check the guide on Notion Vs. Monday as well for better team management.
Setting and Managing Expectations
As a team manager, the burden is on your shoulder to design or map the course on how your team members will attain their expected output. There is a need to lay down the “realistic expectations” for the accomplishment of each employee. The task must be clear, and a definite output must be set and set a realistic deadline for which the task must be accomplished. Without a definite plan on managing both the company’s and employee’s expectations, everything will be going astray.
The Focus Is On The Outcome Based Output and Deliveries
It will be next to impossible for you to monitor your team members’ “activity” or what they are doing in the span of minutes or hours for logically, they are situated in different locations. Do not gauge your members based on their “activity” but rather focus on their outputs.
Resource Your Team
This new working scenario entails that technology is a “must,” such as the use of mobile gadgets, laptops, and internet connections. You must assess your team member’s technological resources and take some positive actions regarding the need of your team member regarding this matter.
As a team leader, you must also be equipped with the necessary technology for you to monitor and remotely access your employees effectively. Since the net had been the fertile ground to search for these project management tools, you can just browse the net and look for the perfect project management tool for your team.
Probably you have already heard about the software Notion, and Monday for these are the leading project management tools in the software market. Let us zoom in on the details and features of each one so that you can better pick which is the right one for you.
Let us start with Notion, which is specifically designed to meet the needs in the workspace for it has useful contents such as wikis and journals. You can definitely create your own wikis such as Personal Wiki, Product Management Wiki, and Engineering Wiki. There is a budget automation feature in which you can track your expense log. You can also rely on Notion to visualize workflows that enhance productivity, visibility, and efficiency during the project management through its Kanban boards. But using it in Notion must entail some “technical know-how.”
You can consider and opt to have Monday, especially if you are looking for the features of Gantt Charts, of which you can make use of it for planning, analyzing resources, and the time duration of which you can track the progress of the project.
Another useful feature of Monday is Budget Management, for it has the capability of calculating “average” and the sum per column, thereby making budget tracking management more efficient. This is also a software for those who are not that “tech-savvy,” especially if you opting to use Kanban Boards. The Kanban Boards can easily be created when using Monday by mere clicking of the menu button.
Those are some of the salient features of the Notion and Monday of which you can choose from that will suit your needs and your technological expertise, but both are specifically designed for you to monitor your team’s progress.
Flexibility
Gone are the days when people are being dictated by the ticking of the clock wherein productivity is being determined by the time you punch in to the company’s time system. Being flexible is now the new trend of which work can be done regardless of the time as long as the output is being delivered on the given time frame.
