Effectively Manage

Remote Teams
Six guidelines for managers to effectively
manage their teams during COVID-19
office closures

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 Six guidelines for managing
remote teams effectively
1. Maintain your normal work routine.

2. Hold daily team and one-on-one check-ins by video.

3. Be accessible and available.

4. Be clear. Set clear tasks and goals.

5. Focus on results. Don’t micromanage.

6. Adjust your approach. C-players will require more

guidance to keep them on track.

Sources: McLean & Company research; LinkedIn articles by West, Houston, Lemaitre. Tips also
shared by Joel Martin, Scott Bickley, Rob Anderson, and Bob Prevette. Thanks to all for sharing
their insights.
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The good news is that remote employees
tend to be more engaged overall
Offsite employees tend to be more engaged than onsite ones
in terms of overall engagement.

Overall Engagement Scores

80%
Taking everything into
account, I love my job
60%

40%

Taking everything into

20% account, I love working
at this organization

0%
Engaged Almost Indifferent Disengaged 70% 75% 80% 85%
Engaged
Offsite Onsite

Source: McLean & Company, 2019; N=26,548 Offsite Onsite

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However, they also tend to be less satisfied
with their relationship with their manager
Remote employees are:

16% less likely to strongly agree their manager involves them in

setting goals at work.

28% less likely to strongly agree they continually work with their
manager to clarify work priorities.

29% less likely to strongly agree they have reviewed their greatest
successes with their manager in the last six months.

30% less likely to strongly agree they have talked with their
manager about progress to goals in the last six months.

Source: Gallop, 2017

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Remote employees also face unique
challenges
Remote employees identified their biggest struggles
with working remotely:

Source: Buffer, 2019; N=2,471

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Guideline #1: Maintain your normal routine

Get ready for your day as you Protect your mental health:
normally would:
• Working from home can be very
• Exercise isolating, especially if you live alone

• Shower • Plan to reach out to friends more

often than usual
• Get dressed for work
• Be mindful of the need for extra
• Keep regular work hours self-care around exercise
(important for stress release), eating
• Remember to take breaks (it’s easy to properly, and getting the support
keep working and take fewer breaks you need
at home)

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Guideline #2: Hold daily team and one-on-one
video check-ins
1. Set up a running Teams chat for your team.
• This is your community. You must be the biggest cheerleader Why so many check-ins?
and keep the team feeling like they are contributing. Make sure
• Maintains regular work
everyone is involved. routine (same start time)
2. Start each workday with a video scrum to discuss what’s coming • Using video replaces a
today for your team. little of the daily face-to-
face interaction you’d
• Ask: What are you planning to work on today? Are there any
have at the office
roadblocks I can help with? Technology working okay?
3. Right after your team meeting, set up an “every morning video call” • Protects mental health by
reducing loneliness and
one-on-one meeting with each team member (5-10 minutes max).
sense of isolation
• Ask: What are you working on today? What will your • Ensures your team has a
momentum metrics be? What do you need from me? regular opportunity to ask
for support
4. Set up a separate video call at the end of the afternoon to review
what everyone did (5 minutes max).
• Ask: What went well? What went poorly? How can we improve?
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Guideline #3: Be accessible and available

1. Be accessible: Why?
• Ensure your team knows the best way to get in touch with you. • It’s a huge adjustment to
work all day, every day from
• Email is not ideal for informal, frequent contact – use messaging home – your teams need
support to stay on track.
instead.
• You model the behavior they
2. Be available: will follow: if you’re not
accessible, they’ll be tempted
• Keep a running conversation going in Teams. to check out too.
• Respond in a timely manner; address issues quickly so that • Lack of timely response from
your team has what they need to succeed. you means more likelihood of
distraction and loss of focus
• Let your team know if you’ll be away/offline for longer than an for your team.
hour during the workday and ask them to do the same (i.e. for an • Being readily available to
appointment). provide support keeps your
team engaged and reduces
• Help address roadblocks, answer questions, clarify priorities, etc. their sense of isolation.

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 Guideline #4: Be clear
Set clear expectations around:
• Tasks: What are the daily and weekly
expectations?
• Goals: Clarify any adjustments to strategy based
on the situation; clarify metrics.
• Communication: How often and when will you
check in? What should they come to you for?
• How roadblocks should be addressed: Involve
your team in deciding how to handle roadblocks
and challenges.
Why?
The level of distraction is higher than normal (other
family members working from home, distressing
news, etc.), so clarity helps to keep everyone on task
Source: Lemaitre, 2020
Create a “Winning Remotely Team Agreement”:
During the first week of working remotely, hold a quick
brainstorming session during your team meeting on the
following (3-5 mins/question):
1. What challenges are you expecting from the COVID-19
disruptions and working remotely?
2. What opportunities does this situation create?
3. What do you need from your manager or the
company to tackle these challenges and opportunities
and meet your team/organizational goals?
4. What behaviors/strategies will be most useful in
tackling these challenges and opportunities? What
behaviors will be least useful?
Summarize and document your answers into a Winning
Remotely Team Agreement and review once a week.
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Guideline #5: Focus on results

Avoid micromanaging o Don’t make team members feel constantly

monitored (i.e. “Where were you from 10-
• Focus on results: Be flexible about how and when 11am?”); trust them until you have reason not
work gets done, as long as team members are to.
hitting their targets.
• Encourage your team members to unplug: If
o For example, if they have child-care duties they’re sending you emails late at night, and they
from 3-5pm during school closures and want haven’t made an alternate work hours agreement
to work later in the evening to make up the with you, encourage them to take time away from
time, that’s fine – as long as the work gets work.
done.
o It’s harder to unplug when working at home,
o Set clear expectations about which work and everyone needs a break to stay
must be done during normal work hours (e.g. productive.
attend team meetings, client calls) and which
can be done at other hours.
o Team members must arrange with you any
non-standard working hours before they start
using an altered schedule. It is your
responsibility to keep track of hours and any
alternate arrangements.
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Guideline #5: Focus on results (cont’d.)

Reminders about child-care coverage • Ask your team to communicate with you if they
have significant child-care responsibilities so that
you can make an alternative plan to get work
If an employee has children off from a public school:
done. Managers can approve adjusted work
hours to work around child-care coverage. A more
• Please ask all team members to try to make detailed policy is coming soon.
arrangements for childcare so that they can
focus on work while they work from home as
• If the employee doesn't want to work from home
much as possible.
during this time then they will need to take
personal leave or vacation days to be off work to
• If your team members are working at home with watch their children.
children present, they need to confirm with you
that they are able to focus 100% on their work
• Once the employee has used all of their personal
(e.g. they have older children who are
leave days and vacation days for child care, then
independent.)
any further days would be taken as unpaid days
off.
Download The Essential COVID-19 Child Care
Policy for Every Organization, Yesterday

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Guideline #6: Adjust your approach

Tailor your communication frequency and level of

support to your individual team members Remind your teams:
Now is your chance to
• A-players: Top performers will dig in and do their work as usual; prove that you can be
they’ll also be more likely to ask for help when they need it and ask
for more work if they run out. They may even be more productive at just as productive
home. Stay in regular contact to ensure they have what they need. working from home!

• B-players: Middle performers will need clear direction – ensure

they know what to work on, set clear expectations, and check in
regularly (daily).

• C-players: Low performers are the hardest to manage remotely,

just as they are in the office, and will require more frequent check-
ins (at least twice daily) to see how they are doing. It will take more
time and effort to outline their tasks and set up check-ins to
ensure productivity is at an acceptable level and they’re meeting
expectations.

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Guideline #6: Adjust your approach (cont’d.)

Be mindful of your communication style

Performance management tips
• When talking through chat or email, short,
for all levels of performance
terse sentences can come across as if you’re
upset. • Recognize positive behaviors and
successes: say thank you and be
o Since 55% of communication is visual, it’s specific about what they did well.
hard to get the full intent without seeing a
person’s expression and body language. • When mistakes are made, stay
positive and focus on what they
• Use video as much as possible to ensure your will do to improve, not on what
team members know where they stand with they’ve done wrong.
you.
• Use emoticons to express intentions or
general mood of the conversation (happy face,
thumbs up).

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Remember to use the 3i model to
communicate effectively with your team
Inform
Relay information down
from senior management
to employees.
• Ensure they’ve seen and
understand any
organization-wide
communication.
• Share any updates in a
timely manner.
Interact
Connect with employees
on a personal level.
• Ask how they’re doing with
the new work arrangement.
• Express empathy for
challenges (sick family
member, COVID-19 diagnosis,
etc.).
• Ask how you can support them.
• Schedule informal virtual
coffee breaks a couple of times
a week and talk about non-
work topics.
Involve
Get information from
employees and collaborate
with them.
• Invite their input (e.g. have a
“winning remotely”
brainstorming session).
• Escalate any challenges you
can’t address to your VP.
• Give them as much autonomy
over their work as possible –
don’t micromanage.
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 To conclude: Follow these six
guidelines for managing
remote teams effectively
1. Maintain your normal work routine.

2. Hold daily team and one-on-one check-ins by video.

3. Be accessible and available.

4. Be clear. Set clear tasks and goals.

5. Focus on results. Don’t micromanage.

6. Adjust your approach. C-players will require more

guidance to keep them on track.

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