How you can be a better manager of a remote team

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Are you struggling with managing your remote team while meeting expectations and retaining your remote talent? Leadership might come easy in an office setting. After all, it is easier to build rapport, observe behavior and interact with people much more closely when you are face to face. But, what happens when most of your workforce is spread out throughout the country?

For a good leader, it's important to build the right environment to watch team members thrive and deliver great results. In a world where everyone works remotely, unique challenges arise, private life plays a bigger role and communication becomes a real challenge. Here are some tips on how to lead a remote team.

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1. Be there for your team

Remote working gives leaders much less room to create team building, supervise them and built a trusting environment. A worker who trust their leader will be able to take more risks without fear of being published and ridiculed. This happens a lot when there are not clear instructions and workers end up getting things wrong, preventing innovation and active participation.

One of the most challenging parts of managing your team is the lack of supervision, which opens the door to misunderstandings and mistrust. Leaders need to provide the right kind of support, starting by being there, available to answer questions and guide team members. One-on-one meetings are a popular practice to set common goals and make sure tasks and responsibilities are met.

2. Create a social routine

Being in an office creates routine. From the moment workers arrive to the office, say hello, grab lunch and walk home together everyday from Monday to Friday, bonds and connections start growing. These social connections allow people to express themselves, give opinions and actively engage on challenges. This is harder when working remotely.

As a virtual leader you need to rethink how to keep your team connected and keep that momentum going. You can try these fun and engaging online activities for your team and work on strengthening personal relationship with all team members.

Read more: 4 fun activity ideas to keep a remote team engaged and happy.

3. Know your tools

There's no point on having the best intentions to stick your team together if you don't master the tools that will actually make it happen. That's why it's crucial that a virtual leader becomes tech savvy, they can not only take advantage of them but also guide team members in need.

Some of the best tech hacks for virtual leaders are:

• Knowing what the best project management tools for remote teams for your company are, and training your team to use them effectively.
• Make sure all the team has the right home working conditions and understand how to use the tools.
• Set up a CRM as a control panel to share all company and customer's information with the rest of the team.

Learning how to be a great remote leader is a new challenge. Misinformation, lack of trust and interest and problems managing online tools are the main reasons why working remotely is harder than in an office. However, being around when your people needs you, create a routine to somehow mimic the same office feeling through engaging online activities and being tech savvy will make your life as a remote manager a lot easier.

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