Without being able to open offices, stores, or other non-essential business premises, many companies have to look for new ways to make money. Remote working has been one of the most popular of these, with countless workers building new offices within their homes to enable them to keep working. Using remote workers can offer benefits outside of a lockdown, though. This article will be exploring these benefits, along with some tips that will help you to move your own team over to remote work. (Image Credit: Mimi Thian/Unsplash)
The Benefits of Using Remote Workers
It’s always worth exploring the benefits of action like this before you decide to take it. These won’t apply to every business out there, and this means that you will need to assess your current situation before you can confidently start working to make your team remote.
Cost Saving
Offices, warehouses, and other workspaces tend to be quite expensive to run. Not only do you have to pay for the building itself, but you also have to spend money on utilities like electricity and air conditioning. Having your team working from home will lower these costs dramatically, and you may even be able to avoid buying computers, phones, and other devices, too.
Greater Flexibility
Flexibility can be very important to a business, but it wouldn’t really work to allow people to come into your premises to do their job at all hours; it would simply cost too much. Having people work from home takes away this limitation, giving you the ability to stagger shifts and make sure you’re able to cover as many time slots as possible. This is ideal for businesses that need to talk to customers in other countries.
Productivity & Task Management
It’s easy to make sure that your team is working hard when everyone is sharing an office together. You will be able to check on everyone as they work, will benefit from the collective pressure that people feel when they work together, and you will have direct contact with each of your team members.
Once you move your team to remote working, though, this can get a lot harder. Tools like Asana give you everything you need to monitor and keep track of the work your team is doing, while also ensuring that everyone knows that they need to do. This can solve the problem of having to chase people up for their work.
Computer Problems
Offices and other workplaces tend to be filled with computers, and this means that team members can simply swap to a new machine if they ever find themselves unable to do their work properly on one. Remote workers won’t benefit from this, though, and this means that you’ll need to find ways to help them with their computer problems when they are at home.
Thankfully, there are a lot of services out there that can help with this. Managed IT services can be offered almost entirely remotely, nowadays. Engineers will be able to control and repair machines using remote desktop tools, and your team members will have the opportunity to make work requests through a variety of different channels. This can be one of the best ways to keep your team working when they are at home.
Meetings
Meetings can be hard enough to handle when you have everyone in the same room, and chaos will often come when you try to manage something like this when everyone is at home. Having a solid meeting plan will help with this, giving everyone the chance to speak and helping to avoid disruption. Of course, though, you also need to have the right tools to make sure that you can host the meeting properly.
Video chat tools like Zoom have surged in popularity over the last few months. More people than ever before are using services like this, and this means that new features are being added all the time. Even the largest of meetings can be handled with tools like this, though you will have to be careful to make sure that everyone pays attention throughout the calls.
Happiness & Wellbeing
While the idea of working from home can seem great at the start, a lot of people find themselves getting quite lonely when they work like this. The social aspect of working in an office can’t be ignored, and there are a lot of people who don’t get many other opportunities to see other people in their daily life.
This means that hosting regular meetups with your team can be a good idea. Not only will this give you the chance to make sure that everyone is happy, but it will also satisfy their social needs, too. Some companies give their team the choice between working remotely or from the office to combat this.
With all of this in mind, you should be feeling ready to turn your office or other workplaces into a remote business. This sort of process can be challenging, and a lot of companies struggle along the way. If you use the right tools and tips, though, you should be remote working from home in no time.