Managing Virtual Work and Workers
Nowadays many workers, from salespeople to executives, are working virtually, meaning that they are seldom if ever at a single office location. Instead they are at home, on the road, on a train, or on a plane. They stay connected to their boss and co-workers and the home office using a variety of electronic means. They may have little or no face-to-face interaction with their immediate boss or fellow team members.
1. What have you found most challenging about this?
2. Most rewarding?
3. If you are a Manager of virtual work and the workers that do it:
- What works for you?
- What pitfalls have you stumbled into?
- What lessons would you offer?
Good Answers (6)
Paul E
Managing Director (Asia) at Global Colleague
Best Answers in: Internationalization and Localization (1), Organizational Development (1), Project Management (1), Distribution (1)
I manage large projects where the client is usually in another country and time zone from my team and, in some cases, where I am overseeing teams in multiple countries. While such arrangements pose challenges, the right mixture of technology and old-fashioned management skills can allow you to leverage the benefits of remote collaboration, while minimizing the communication pitfalls.
1. What have you found most challenging about this?
The most important management skill is communication and information is most effectively communicated face-to-face. As your communication becomes further removed from direct interaction, you run a greater risk for misunderstanding, delayed or missed communications, and a decreased sense of responsibility to your supervisors and customers.
2. Most rewarding?
When remote-collaboration systems are properly implemented and managed, it is much easier to generate good documentation and enforce the habits required for the effective capturing of information. When people work in close proximity with regular opportunities for in-person interaction, they tend to take that access to each other for granted and are often less assiduous in their preparation for discussions and in their attempts to capture information and action items than they would if they knew that a given communication might be one of their few chances to interact.
When working remotely, opportunities for live discussion become quite valuable and it is easier to coach your team in the skills needed to capture client or management input correctly the first time.
3. If you are a Manager of virtual work and the workers that do it:
- What works for you?
The best-case scenario is when you are working with clients or senior management who understand the importance of developing a relationship with the teams working for them, even if those teams are half a world away. Managing virtual teams becomes a whole lot easier when you’ve invested the time and money into communication technologies that are easy and even enjoyable to use. Not only should the technology be easy, you should also simplify your lines of communication. One of the most powerful things you can do to help ensure the success of a virtual team is to establish single points of contact for each team and make is easy to reach team.
- What pitfalls have you stumbled into?
If you don’t bring your virtual team, or your client and your team, together at the beginning of the relationship and establish the lines of communication and habitual use of the available remote-collaboration tools, it will be increasingly difficult to establish effective communication as time goes by.
- What lessons would you offer?
Create a sense of community and responsibility by including humanizing touches to your remote collaboration systems. This can include:
• Posting the photographs of all team members and having the photos included with posts to bulletin boards and instant messages.
• Making use of video on teleconferences and telephone calls.
• Using announcements to share team victories.
• Beyond team victories, share the accomplishments and important life events of individual team members.
Rediscover the telephone. You can often get more accomplished quicker by telephone than sending e-mail messages back and forth, while at the same time enjoying the interpersonal benefits of putting a voice to that communication.
Where possible, try to get the team together at least once at the start of project. Encourage the client to make a site visit.
Dave E
Award winning virtual worlds, web3D, social networking, and mobile augmented reality entrepreneur.
Best Answers in: Web Development (2), Using LinkedIn (2), Education and Schools (1), Freelancing and Contracting (1), Events Marketing (1), Internet Marketing (1), Organizational Development (1), Software Development (1)
Having advised companies as an attorney and HR consultant and having managed remote workers, I can tell you that the challenges I believe are more extreme than perhaps we realize. When people do not work together, they fail to bond appropriately, communicate effective and "spontaneously", share ideas, develop consistent approaches to company issues. Managers often complain that they do not "know" that their remote employees are working as much or as effectively as they say they are. There's also a problem around social time. I believe that socializing in the workplace is critical to employee engagement and satisfaction. If you don't have someone at work who you look forward to seeing and chatting with, it becomes so much more of a chore. All of this is not to mention the complaints of employees who are for some reason not permitted to work remotely, abuses of the privilege etc. Some companies simply throw out the baby with the bathwater by saying no one can remote work (even if it makes sense to remote work) because they don't want to deal with the issue.
As a manager of virtual workers, and workers around the world, I would say that unless you have a very substantial travel budget and don't mind the disruptions caused by travel, you should get out to see your employees and encourage them to come in to see you. You should force some in-person interaction. The problem is that at best this is only periodic and therefore, in my opinion, insufficient.
I started a new company VRWorkplace to advise companies on how to use virtual reality in the workplace to deal with the problems I mention above. Consider a virtual reality workplace the next building in your corporate campus, one that anyone in the world can get to, for work, play, etc anytime and for any reason, without travel. People crave this interaction and my concept is to introduce companies to this as a means of promoting better communication, interaction, socialization, collaboration etc. Companies are getting to this solution -- some more quickly than others, but it is here to stay and I predict in the near future, companies will be using virtual environments to replicate the close working environment despite great distances between and among members of their workforce.
Links:
- http://www.vrworkplace.com
- http://www.businessgyan.com/content/view/3513/460/
- http://www.twitter.com/VRWorkplace
Clarification added November 16, 2007:
In para 2 I meant to say "if you have a substantial ..." (not unless).
Cindy A
IT exec, mgmt consultant, PMP, CGEIT, ITIL V3/V2
Best Answers in: Information Storage (5), Job Search (2), Organizational Development (2), Career Management (2), Facilities Management (1), Government Policy (1), Staffing and Recruiting (1), Internationalization and Localization (1), Advertising (1), Public Relations (1), Equity Markets (1), Computers and Software (1), Computer Networking (1), Databases (1), Software Development (1), Using LinkedIn (1)
It is very ironic that with the development of cities in North America, and the growth in "knowledge worker" jobs in offices, everyone moved from the country to the city. Office culture developed over decades to the point where we are so used to the social aspects of working in teams in office cubicles that many of us have trouble working at home. True, the current dream of every worker is little or no commuting, but there are a significant number of challenges.
That lack of social contact can be mind-boggling for many. I had the experience a few years ago of managing 12 very technical staff who all worked from home. I noticed that they fell into three categories. Two of the three categories were very social people: some of them stayed home but tried to stay in constant phone or email contact with others, to the extent of neglecting their work. Some of them found excuses to get out of the house visiting clients unnecessarily and attending meetings in person when they didn't need to. The final category liked being alone, but tended to isolate themselves. They were hardest to manage because they were reluctant to share information on what they were doing, and did not easily collaborate with others.
Managers MUST have a very highly developed skill in managing performance, and use a formal and structured approach to set objectives, measure progress, and have staff regularly report on it. This sounds like a common approach, but as managers we often feel we are on top of things because we get those hallway conversations, people dropping into our offices, etc. This doesn't happen easily when workers are remote.
Also, regular conference calls with the entire team are mandatory; they need to get to know eachother and the manager needs to spend time with everybody. Time must be made for listening to workers' concerns and working things out as a group.
Managers must be alert to those workers who call regularly to talk and veer off into personal discussions. Rather like a doctor, the manager must allow some personal sharing but has to put limits on it in order to get the work done. Encouraging workers to complete tasks is the best focus, and the manager may have to remind workers of that more often than one might think.
Virtual workers absolutely HAVE to have adequate equipment. Companies are not saving any money by not providing up-to-date computers, Blackberries, cellphones, printers, or whatever is required for the worker. Not only will computer malfunctions or lack of performance hamper productivity, but the frustration caused will become the focus of attention. This frustration focus will lead to apathy about their work, and virtual workers will tend to isolate themselves more if their beefs are ignored by their companies. Companies must trust their workers, and listen to them about what they need to do their jobs.
One unexpected aspect for me was discovering how isolating it was as a manager to manage remote staff. I was provided with an office in another department, but rarely spoke or socialized with these other workers because I had no relationship with them. I rarely saw my own staff in person, and spent most of my time on the telephone or email. This was a very different way to manage than I was used to, and I must say I left the role quite early into it because I found it so difficult.
1. What have you found most challenging about this?
I've worked remotely for about 6 of the last 8 years in a handful of places and for me, the biggest challenge is socialization with co-workers and knowledge management. The organization that chooses to have a remote workforce must be ready to make significant efforts to include 'remotees' into the culture and make geographical location as irrelevant as possible. Of course, the position and work itself dictate how feasible this is to a degree, but I've found that when the corporate culture is geared around embracing technologies and practices that encourage and promote a remote workforce, the socialization of a remote worker is dramatically enhanced and 'water cooler'-type idea sharing is enabled.
Knowledge management becomes a critical concern to a remote worker because he or she cannot overhear nearby conversations of co-workers, peer over cube walls to chat, or otherwise have opportunities to share and receive tacit knowledge related to their job. Companies who culturally embrace a remote workforce spend time on knowledge management technologies that enable and encourage the capture of this sort of tacit knowledge for other remote employees to use.
Contrast this to the company that merely -tolerates- remote workers and you will often find many significant, though perhaps unintentional, barriers to working remotely. There are not always meaningful ways to talk in real-time to fellow employees without making a phone call, for example. There may not be any good methodology at all to share knowledge between employees doing similar work, and the remote employee is often left feeling like 'well, if I had been in an office, I would have known that...I wish someone would have told me'.
2. Most rewarding?
A couple of issues here. First, once someone gets their mind properly adjusted and disciplined to working remotely (and this is not as easy as one might suspect), there are some significant productivity benefits to be gained. Being able to have a tight control over distractions and the freedom to selectively pursue tasks that they prioritize in real-time is, for many, a profound enabler of productivity and an immensely gratifying liberation from traditional work modes. "Happy workers are productive workers" and all that.
Secondly, allowing someone to work remotely is easily one of the cheapest ways to provide an implied salary/benefit adjustment to an employee. According to the 2005 census data, the average American spends 100 hours commuting to work each year. Giving this to the employee has, in essence, the same life quality effect as giving them an additional 12 days of vacation a year, or if they are up for an average of 16 hours a day, over 6 days of their life back. The mileage calculation is a bit harder, but if the average person commutes 33 miles a day, it's not too hard to see the monetary offset to this person's wealth when gas is hovering around $3 per gallon.
Great question. As technology improves employers will be faced with more and more vitual employees. When I'm asked these types of questions my suggestions are:
1. The most challenging issue is communication between the employee and the company, the employee and their manager, and the employee and other employees. To overcome this challenge I encourage Managers to put together a communication plan that incorporates several types of communication with an employee. Another challenge as a result of poor communication is having the employee feeling connected and loyal to the company. Again communication is key. I encourage Company's to send all employee communications regarding functions and events to virtual employees too. Even if the employee can't participate in something it will at least provide them information as to what is going on and provide them with a topic to discuss with co-workers.
Trust is another challenge. Checkpoints need to be established so that Manager's trust that work is being accomplished (although I caution that you don't micro manage) and also the employee needs to trust that their career is not suffering because they are remote.
2. The most rewarding thing for employees is flexibility and freedom.
3. The only lesson I can offer is that when you are managing remote or virtual employees take time to think about how you will communicate and to be curteous when you are talking to someone remote. Turn off the phone, computer and avoid interruptions.
Thomas G
Management Consultant | Partner | Business Leader
Best Answers in: Personnel Policies (1), Organizational Development (1)
Terence,
I actually did a pilot project on virtual team in 1999 for a team of 10 across 8 different time zones - when the idea was still in its infancy. I could discuss this offline in greater detail with anyone interested in this but basically, these are the critical success factors:
a. The team needs to talk the same language. It helps if the team comes from the same company, and have worked there for more than 1 year. Common terms like TQM could mean different things to different people.
b. There needs to be a common technology platform, or at least one that integrates well. I know this is less of an issue these days, but a lot of time was spent connecting one another up, or addressing reception, interferance issues. In a conference call involving multiple parties, there are possibilities that some of the team members might not hear, or could not be hear well, and hence accentuates the communication issue.
c. Set up ground rules from the start. When you don't see one another, and if you don't know one another, there is a tendency to use a language that might not be respectful of one another, particularly if you don't know one another well. This could jeopardize teamwork and team alignment if the members are not mature or professional enough.
d. Support from management. And this is not just an email using management talk. With a team spanning many different time zone, workload, work distribution etc has to be adjusted. Also, in reality, people are not as accustomed to "virtual team" as they admit. You may find people falling sick more often, or appear more stressed, because they are moving out of their comfort zone.
e. Respect personal time. This is the most difficult part really since you don't see one another. But in a virtual world, one good way to do this is to rotate the time of the calls so that each member will get a call at an odd hour.
Hope that helps.
- Thomas
More Answers (9)
The biggest challenge is the discipline to stay focused on the work. It is very easy to get distracted by family needs, children, friends, pets.
The most rewarding aspect is NOT commuting.
N/A
N/A
Concentrate on the work at hand.
Stefano P
Director Sector of Social Research at S3.Studium - s.palumbo@s3studium.it
What have you found most challenging about this?
I think that a relation leader-worker must be based on continous teaching. When you experience virtual work, it is not always possible, it is always not easy, and in a lot of situations you forget it.
What pitfalls have you stumbled into?
It's difficult to make MY boss understand that a virtual worker with good skill is better than a present low-skilled worker.
Simon H
Visibility Extremist and Social Media Campaign Manager
Best Answers in: Using LinkedIn (79), Business Development (8), Equity Markets (5), Customer Service (4), Mentoring (4), Web Development (4), Government Policy (3), Advertising (3), Blogging (3), Software Development (3), Purchasing (2), Education and Schools (2), Auditing (2), Compensation and Benefits (2), Staffing and Recruiting (2), Internationalization and Localization (2), Lead Generation (2), Business Analytics (2), Organizational Development (2), Project Management (2), Product Design (2), Career Management (2), Professional Organizations (2), Ethics (2), Professional Networking (2), Small Business (2), Starting Up (2), Enterprise Software (2), Regulation and Compliance (1), Job Search (1), Conference Planning (1), Accounting (1), Foreign Investment (1), Financial Regulation (1), Government Services (1), Personnel Policies (1), Exporting/Importing (1), Guerrilla Marketing (1), Viral Marketing (1), Mobile Marketing (1), Search Marketing (1), Corporate Governance (1), Change Management (1), Planning (1), Bond Markets (1), Currency Markets (1), Futures Markets (1), Hedge Funds (1), Non-profit Fundraising (1), Manufacturing (1), Packaging and Labeling (1), Quality Management and Standards (1), Supply Chain Management (1), Personal Investing (1), Retirement and Estate Planning (1), Wealth Management (1), Market Research and Definition (1), Engineering (1), Green Business (1), Biotech (1), Telecommunications (1)
Terrence
My Co. runs on four sites............I'm on one only !
1. Allowing myself to trust them to work without me looking over their shoulder.
2. Seeing people grow through their own efforts when they know they've done a great job for me and our Co.
3. I try to stay in touch weekly... I offer to call if they have difficulties... I create a feeling that (if they want it) they can make most decisions themselves if I'm sure they're able.
We used to own a tennanted property and my staff took it on themselves to issue some paperwork.... nullifying our protection under the law... I just shrugged it off.... water under the bridge... the horse had bolted... what would have been the point making a fuss... it was done with best intentions.
Get to know your staff as well as you know your family.
Learn their areas of expertise and their strengths and weaknesses.
Praise their strengths and acknowledge their expertise
Cope with their weaknesses... extra support... slight change of role or duty to fit better etc.
Basic answer... hope it helps.
Simon
Gary C
Innovation | Leadership | Emerging Markets
Best Answers in: Career Management (7), Ethics (6), Education and Schools (5), Computers and Software (4), Using LinkedIn (4), Venture Capital and Private Equity (3), Government Policy (3), Corporate Governance (3), Change Management (3), Organizational Development (3), Software Development (3), Travel Tools (2), Mentoring (2), Planning (2), Quality Management and Standards (2), Professional Networking (2), Air Travel (1), Car and Train Travel (1), Job Search (1), Occupational Training (1), Staffing and Recruiting (1), Exporting/Importing (1), Internationalization and Localization (1), Criminal Law (1), Business Development (1), Sales Techniques (1), Writing and Editing (1), Philanthropy (1), Project Management (1), Positioning (1), Communication and Public Speaking (1), Business Plans (1), Small Business (1), Starting Up (1), Biotech (1), Telecommunications (1), Web Development (1)
1.) The human element of seeing someone, looking them in the eye, shaking their hand and asking "how are you?"
2.) No commute. Plenty of time to think and plan.
As a manager, I can have someone on location rather quickly. And for them, they find a better work-life balance.
The pitfalls have to do with company culture and how they view remore workers and how they support them.
Lessons? If possible, travel to visit them and stay in contact if they are your direct reports.
Terry M
Interim Manager / Service & Operations Specialist
Best Answers in: Ethics (2), Freelancing and Contracting (1), Compensation and Benefits (1), Staffing and Recruiting (1), Employment and Labor Law (1), Business Development (1), Corporate Governance (1), Change Management (1), Labor Relations (1), Organizational Development (1), Quality Management and Standards (1), Career Management (1), Professional Networking (1), Using LinkedIn (1)
For me, the biggest reward is not having to commute as often and being able to start work earlier/ make more productive use of the commute time.
On the downside, depending on the circumstances, you can miss important information that only gets relayed around the office and other more subtle communications.
Sharon B
Technical/Marketing Writing: Our Words Mean Business
Best Answers in: Customer Service (3), Business Development (2), Writing and Editing (2), Organizational Development (2), Using LinkedIn (2), Freelancing and Contracting (1), Public Relations (1), Lead Generation (1), Change Management (1), Personal Real Estate (1), Branding (1), Professional Organizations (1), Professional Networking (1), Small Business (1), Starting Up (1), Computers and Software (1)
As someone who has worked remotely for a multitude of clients over the past seven years, interacting with individuals at all levels, I've experienced only two pitfalls. When I'm not dealing primarily with management and need to speak to someone "higher up" or to someone who doesn't seem to be relevant to my project, it's very hard for me to get past the "gate-keeper," who might be the project manager or a staff member. In an office setting, I could contrive an audience with the person I need to reach. But from a remote location, I'm at the mercy of whomever decides that no one else needs to be involved. This sometimes means an important issue will go in circles for months or goes unresolved because I can't get access. My suggestion is for higher up managers to periodically speak to virtual workers directly, asking if there's any issue that requires a (virtual) meeting with anyone who is not an immediate contact of the worker. In other words, managers should assume there are occasions when the virtual worker will be locked out. The second pitfall is less frustrating. Sometimes when you are talking face to face, the other person will draw a spontaneous diagram that illuminates and resolves the entire problem. This is not possible over the Internet or phone. For this I have solutions: break down questions into small components; ask for an example or a diagram; give it your best shot and let the recipient tear it apart. They all work. These drawbacks don't outweight the benefits of working remotely; that's 100% rewarding.
Kathy K
CTO, Technical Architect, Founder
Best Answers in: Web Development (4), Planning (2), Mentoring (1), Customer Relationship Management (1), Business Analytics (1), Organizational Development (1), Enterprise Software (1), Software Development (1)
1) What have you found most challenging about this?
Sitting all day in my home office instead of walking from meeting to meeting. Since almost all meetings are virtual, this means lack of exercise and having to set up an additional regimen to ensure I stay fit.
2. Most rewarding?
More productive hours because I'm not in as many meetings and I'm not commuting. I get a lot more done in less time. Everyone is more happy because our work schedule is more flexible around our home life.
3. If you are a Manager of virtual work and the workers that do it
- What works for you?
Being available for any question via Email or or IM. Giving clear direction and setting clear completion dates for work.
- What pitfalls have you stumbled into?
None that I can think of. It seems to be working wonderfully.
- What lessons would you offer?
Set the ground rules for communication, work schedule and level of expected performance. Set goals and track them to completion.
Robert D
interim management, Consultancy Microsoft Dynamics NAV, IT management,freelance, mind mapping, problem diagnosis,
Best Answers in: Enterprise Software (7), Organizational Development (6), Computers and Software (6), Business Development (2), Education and Schools (1), Mentoring (1), Corporate Taxes (1), Economics (1), Project Management (1), Small Business (1), Energy and Development (1)
It is important to keep in touch with the rest of the company. There are technical means to achieve this, but face-to-face contact is required every now and then.
An exchange of ideas, methodologies etc must be organised in some way (forum, weekly/monthly meeting, knowledge base,...).
Clear definition of objectives, otherwise not only the working environment will be virtual, the results may get virtual too.
Bill H
Principal Utility Analyst, Energy Efficiency at Snohomish County PUD
Best Answers in: Graphic Design (1), Quality Management and Standards (1), Software Development (1)
1. The mindset of the manager and others in such a system -- overcoming the belief that it doesn't work.
2. The ability to establish relationships and work with people I wouldn't have otherwise, and the low amount of "transportation muda" in my business.
3. I am a consultant who has rarely seen a client in the almost eight years I've been in business. I've blogged about this recently and written about it in the more distant past; I'll simply include the links below.
Incidentally, some think technology will be the thing that makes this work. One of the most engaging and stretching courses I've taken was done using plain text email and ftp'd text files as readings. It was about as low-tech as you can imagine for online work, but it still stands out as one of the best courses I've taken in any venue. That verified for me that facilitation skill can make more difference than technology.
