Remote workers are more important today than ever and an increasing number of small businesses are looking to leverage at-home workers. For employees, there are obvious perks of either working from home or working when traveling. Small business owners can have a more fluid staffing ecosystem and save on the costs of a physical workspace.
Like many other areas, the online world has transformed small enterprise, allowing it to tap into a moving workforce. Individuals use the internet for entertainment like watching movies and playing the best casino games at NetBet UK, but they also increasingly use the internet for work. Small businesses can leverage workers who would previously have not been accessible, either through location or availability.
In this article, you can read about the best practices for forming a strong remote worker network for your small business.
Communication is King
In any working environment, communication is vital to ensure your business functions at an optimal level. When working with remote workers, the lines of communication become more essential and can make or break your relationship with an employee. In fact, poor communication can lead to misunderstandings, a loss of time, a loss of effort, and ultimately a loss of money.
Many communication avenues are open between small business owners and remoter workers, and you should use all of them. You can then segment your audience into groups based on the type of content they respond to. It would also suggest using a tool like Klean Leads to find email addresses by name and access lead information to help you get results.
Email: Probably still the most efficient way of passing large pieces of information to employees. If you have a project or files to send, email is probably the best way to do it because workers will have that information more readily on hand when they need it.
Chat: Numerous chat-based communication platforms are now available. While services like Facebook Messenger and WhatsApp are good for quick questions and messages, you may want to consider an enterprise solution for your small business. For example, Microsoft Teams and Slack combine aspects of instant chat, email, file management, and task management.
Phone: Because chat communication tools allow you to video and audio call workers, the phone has become less important in a remote worker world. Skype is an excellent tool for both phone and video chat, while multi-group meetings are available from Microsoft Teams and Zoom. Sometimes it’s good to see and hear the person you are communicating with.
You Must Be Present
An extension of communication is availability. One of the biggest problems remote workers face is being detached from the organization they work for. Often, a small business owner will delegate a piece of work and then disappear. While regular communication can help ease this problem, making it clear you are available to a remote worker is important.
You can check-in with workers and help them feel included in the wider operations of your business. This may be as simple as the occasional email to touch base or more complex like cluing a remote worker in on your vision for the company and how they are helping to achieve it.
Develop Working Relationships
Because remote workers often feel isolated from your physical workforce, you should strive to make it clear they are valued members of your team. Just as you would with the staff in your office, it’s important to foster working relationships with remote employees. Professional and personable relationships can often lead to better results.
Find the Right People
And finally, the success you have with remote working will depend on the type of person you find. Just as in any other job role in your business, recruitment comes with its fair share of risk. This means some candidates are good, bad, and everything between. To find the best ones for the job, it’s a good idea to give the candidates specialized ability tests for recruitment. That way you’ll get a better picture of the candidate abilities and thus save a lot of time. Some of the key things you should look for in a remote worker are:
- Consistent and clear communication
- Can fulfill the criteria of the job
- Are organized and meet deadlines
- Self-motivated
- Patient
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