Be Extra With Remote Teams

Be Extra.

I have enjoyed working successfully and extensively with remote teams for years now. There are many challenges to overcome, and this article does not address the logistical issues; rather it focuses on the team building factors that are the core of success. Much of this is good for all teams everywhere, but it is essential to do this on an extra level with remote teams.

Communication becomes paramount in building remote teams. Remote teams do not get the benefit of information from random water-cooler conversations that give purpose and praise in their work. The feeling of exclusion that can result in remote work can make members nervous. It significantly raises trust to actively trickle-down information.

Safety to express oneself needs to be stated often. Remote teams cannot see expressions and body language, which is an essential aspect of communication. Communicating safety and appreciation of new ideas or dissenting opinions is imperative. Focus on WHY it is important to you and leadership that they feel as if they are in a safe and open environment. This will raise their confidence to share ideas, ultimately increasing the quality of the product. Randomly calling out folks for their thoughts and opinions also helps garnish everyone's mental focus on the subject at hand.

Joke around. It is incredible how much you can get to know people and enjoy the camaraderie with team members you have never met in person. Be you, not a robot. This helps create a cohesive team that sticks up for each other, supports each other, and eventually can become self-organized.

Start meetings on time- always. End meetings on time- always. This shows the team the importance of both the meeting in addition to respecting everyone's schedule and time. Relaxing a start time by one minute eventually moves to 3 minutes, to 5 minutes. Still, worse, it inherently shows that the meeting and respecting people's time and personal schedules are not that important.

Show weakness. Your weaknesses allows team members to feel more confident in explaining their worries, mistakes, and concerns. It is a major risk deterrent to get that information as quickly as possible to allow for any mitigation that needs to occur.

Have an overview of the remote tool(s) you use with the team. Let them just develop, not try to learn a new system with little or no direction. Explain the importance of keeping the tools up to date. Show how it is their tool to communicate with stakeholders who may not be able to interact with them but need to make decisions based upon the project's status.

Be readily available within minutes during expected and agreed-upon "team" work hours! Remote teams can benefit from clearly establishing common public and private working hours. During public working hours, create open doors via instant messaging or similar technologies. Making availability times a priority is necessary to get blockers cleared in time. Emails are sufficient for documenting concerns, but today many people read them sporadically, and you may not get to it in time to help the team before development is affected.

Be real, be honest, be helpful, be you, and let them know that you are their advocate- always.