by Emanuela Giangregorio, posted 3rd June 2010

Managing co-located teams is a challenge in itself. Those of you that are managers know that you have to juggle your time between the task, the team as a whole and between the individuals in your team.   Managing remote teams adds further dimensions of complexity to your role as a leader.  Here are my 10 most important recommendations for distance managers:

1. Develop a Communication Plan

 At the start of each planning period (6 months or 1 year ahead), develop a communication plan for your remote team.  This should show when you will meet with each individual, when you will meet with your team of direct reports and when you will meet with the entire team (if there is a broader team beyond your direct reports).  It should also show the channel/medium of communication.  You cannot always meet face-to-face, so you need to indicate which meetings will be face-to-face, via video conference and via teleconference.  You may also want to include a bi-annual webinar with your broader team. 

Having a Communication Plan is important as it will help you:

1. ensure you balance face-to-face meetings with remote meetings;
2. budget for your face-to-face meetings; and
3. ensure you have allocated 1:1 time with each individual appropriately.

Once you have prepared the Communication Plan, schedule in the time through your enterprise-wide calendaring system.

WARNING: Do not get into the habit of scheduling interaction with your remote team members and then cancelling these meetings because you or they are too busy.  In my discussion with remote workers, one of the key things that frustrates them is that their managers often cancel their meetings because of work priorities.  Change the way you think about these meetings… they ARE a priority.  If not, then don’t schedule them in the first place.

2. Establish a Team Code of Co-operation

This is not the company’s code of ethics, code of conduct or standard operating procedures.  This is the team’s code of co-operation, i.e. rules that the remote team members agree and sign up to that will help them collaborate better.  Most of the rules end up being around communication, some around business process e.g.

• If you have not received a response from an email, do not send another email - follow-up with a phone call.
• Respond to all emails by close of business each day, even if you don’t have the answer/information that the other person wanted.
• Teleconferences should be treated as proper meetings.  Do not participate in a teleconference if you are driving - ensure you park the car in a quiet place with a good signal to properly participate.
• All contract translations to be turned around in 2 weeks.

The most important thing is that the team members come up with these “rules of engagement” themselves, i.e. these are not your rules.  It should be positioned so that the primary aim is that these agreements help them collaborate better.  This means that the team needs to hold themselves accountable to holding up these agreements and that the remote manager needs to challenge the team if they are not.   In my experience, most of  the value is not the written up Code of Co-operation (end result) - the value is in the discussion that is held to get to these agreements and that in itself will foster improved collaboration.

3. Create Team Cultures that Supersede National Cultures

This means that the team culture should be the strongest of the individual national cultures.  So many times I have facilitated workshops for a team of remote workers and they all focus on their cultural differences.  Yes, there are cultural differences just as there are personality differences.  It is important to have an awareness of all the cultures represented in the team and those that we interact with outside of the team.  However, the focus should be on what we agree on and how we want to work as a team.  These behaviours should not be in conflict with any particular national culture or any individual personality style. 

Encourage cultural awareness and tolerance for cultural differences.  Also encourage a way of working that people identify with and respect, regardless of their nationality.

4. Keep Remote Team Members Visible

Don’t let out of sight be out of mind. Apart from the formal meetings you will have by way of teleconference and/or video conference, also ensure that the other things you would do in a co-located environment are simulated.  For example, create a virtual office that shows a photo of each person, where in the world they are working, even a photo of what their working environment looks like (e.g. a home office, desk space at the regional office, their car if mostly out on the road, etc).  

Ensure that the calendaring software you are using is configured so that everyone can see each other’s diaries and ensure that each country’s public/religious holidays are shown in their diaries.

5. Give the Team Frequent and Relevant Updates

…but do not overload them with too much information.  If you pass someone in your team in the office and give them an update on what is going on in the organisation, ensure that you immediately contact your remote team members and give them the same news.  What sort of stuff do they want to know ? 

1. Anything that will affect their job security
2. Anything that will affect how they work
3. Anything that will affect with whom they will work
4. Anything that they find interesting. 

It is most important that you use the correct channel of communication, depending on the nature of the information.  An email will suffice for anything they will find interesting but does not impact them.  If the update in any way does (or would be perceived to) impact them, then carefully consider the best way to communicate this information to minimise fear and misinterpretation risk.

6. Established SMARTER Objectives

We all learnt about SMART objectives - Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time bound.  For remote workers particularly, the goals need to be SMARTER.   

Engaging and Resourced.  Engaging means that they fully buy into the importance of the objective and want to achieve it.  This may need you to put the achievement of the objective into context with the overall business process or even business strategy. It may require you to demonstrate how the achievement of the objective will directly benefit the person.  With remote workers, you are not going to be there to watch over the person and motivate them on an ongoing basis to achieve their objectives, so ensure that the way the objective is set, phrased and measured is done so in a way that engages them to the job.

Resourced means that for each of the objectives they need to achieve, ensure that they have the relevant resources to do the job.  If not, you could set them up for failure.  Resources could mean anything from the right tools and technologies, to budget and sign-off power, to access to senior decision makers at the local operation.

7. Develop a Monthly Performance Dashboard

How do you measure performance of your remote workers?  It is largely going depend on the nature of the job. In Sales it is about sales target achievement and customer contact.  In IT Support it is about minimising system downtime and fast turnaround on problem resolution.  In Project Management it is about delivering the agreed scope on time and within budget.  Very often I am told by managers who oversee certain job types that some jobs are not quantifiable.  I disagree - every job has quantifiable measures of performance.   Internal Auditors can be measured as Project Managers - getting their audits done on time, within budget and full scope achieved.  Same with Legal Case Managers and Compliance Officers.

The important thing with performance measures is that the data you choose to collect is (i) relatively easy to collect, i.e. doesn’t require a whole new system or doesn’t take a full day of each person’s time to collect (ii)it can show you performance trends (i.e. not just interesting stats); and (iii) a helpful tool not a hindrance to getting the job done.

It is also important that you are getting this information at least monthly.  This is your early warning system to know what is going on out there.  It is not the full picture, but it is a big part of the picture nevertheless.  What completes the picture ? Feedback from the individuals on how they believe things are going, feedback from their peers and/or local managers, and feedback from customers and suppliers.

8. Create a Sense of Community in the Team

Remote workers often feel detached from the “mother ship”.  Some are working on their own at their home office, others are using office facilities of another department, some are in a team of 2 or more.  Each situation is different. You must endeavor to create a sense of identity with the “mother ship” and a sense of community with their peers in other regions, otherwise they will develop local loyalties and your needs will become secondary.  The Monthly Performance Dashboard is one way of keeping up the momentum and visibility.  Here are some other ways to create the sense of community that they are missing by not being in a co-located office environment:

• Monthly team meetings (tele-conferences or video conferences).
• Rotate responsibility for chairing the monthly meetings.
• Celebrating birthdays.
• Acknowledging local public holidays and religious holidays.
• Allowing them to use instant messaging to communicate informally.
• Creating opportunities for team members to collaborate on a business process improvement initiative.
• Sharing interesting personal stories.
• Creating a personal blog.
• Recognising outstanding achievements.

Note: of course this is not a complete list and I am not suggesting you do all of the above.  You need to encourage the actions that are relevant for your team’s circumstances.

9. Strengthen Relationships through Structured Team Building Events

 One of our areas of Core Competence at Aikaizen is to deliver structured team building events.  Many of our clients tell us of their experiences where they engage specialist team building companies to run a day of fun learning events for them… building bridges, crossing rivers, abseiling, etc.  These are fun and as an adrenaline junkie myself I love doing these things.  But when it comes to business outcomes these sorts of events are extremely high cost without the same level of value returned on the investment.   In fact, most of the actual team building probably takes place in the bar afterwards.  Furthermore, many of these activities will exclude people who cannot take part for various reasons.  I’m not saying rule these activities out, they have they place under the right circumstances and for the right sort of team.

The aim of any company team building event should be to:

1. stengthen intra-team relationships;
2. create a stronger sense of team identity;
3. create learning opportunities in a fun environment tied directly to business performance improvement objectives; and
4. energise the team to achieve once they are back on the job. 

This means that the team building does not end after the team building day.  Follow-up programmes should continue as a reminder of the learning and fun had and to keep the momentum going unil the next event.

If you are running an international or global team, it is a good idea to rotate the event venue to different country locations.  In fact, I’m in favour of the hosting country manager to organise the event and use it as an opportunity to showcase his/her country or city.  

10. Practice Good Management

This seems so obvious and yet… 8 out of 10 problems I come across in coaching remote managers reveal themselves to be problems not because the person is managing remotely, but because they are not practiciing good management and leadership skills in the first place, or they have a problem person that is just not right for that job or that company.  Even if the person was sitting next to the manager in the same office, the same problem would prevail.  Of course, the fact that the person is located in a different place to where you are makes the problem far more complex and challenging to solve.

So please consider your management approach and your leadership style.  When you have a problem with a remote team member, ask yourself “Is this problem because the person is remote or would I still have this problem if they were here in the office with me ?”  Before trying to work out what they are doing wrong, first think about what you are doing right or wrong.  The good old fashion management principles still apply…