What do you do if your enterprise software company wants to boost productivity through remote work?

We can boost productivity by considering some key elements needed for remote working: 1. First and foremost, foster a remote-friendly culture/mindset and trust your people. 2. Clear Communication and set clear expectations while assigning any tasks to avoid any gaps 3. Ensuring the right set of tools are in place be it laptop, internet connectivity and communication software 4. Focus on outcome/result as per the given timeline and avoid of micro-managing your people

The first step is recognize that remote work environments aren't that different than in-person environments. The proverbial "hallway conversation" doesn't happen as often as people think when everyone is working hard. Back in my in-person days, I usually had to schedule time to chat with people, but if I tried just to "stop by," they'd usually be in a meeting, or talking to a customer or prospect, or involved in deep work / in "do not disturb" mode. So, you may have more of the tools and norms in place already that you need -- and just need to do a better job using them.

Ways to maximize remote team productivity: 1. Create working agreements that the team co-creates - write down what the team agrees are core working hours, is it acceptable to be off camera on zoom meetings, can you take calls from you car, etc? The more you align up front the better. 2. Enable hybrid work that is driven by team desire - if employees want to gather in person for certain days or certain meetings, enable them to do so in a self organizing way. 3. Give your employees a tech buget. Something like $1-$3k per person per year enables individuals to do the things that make their home office more productive.

What is more crucial than assessing the specific needs of your enterprise? For one, did you define your go to market strategy? Does it outline the market problem that you will solve. Is it inspiring to your team? What's great about today's tools and resources is that they are accessible from anywhere, work or home. If yes, it enables flexibility to explore remote and onsite resources combinations. Assuming that you have a strategy, rather than a strategic plan, you must transform it into daily operations. The best method for doing so is with workflow tools. They help you visualize what and how to best transform your strategy. The ability to see your workflow helps you ID bottlenecks. This is a snapshot of how you begin.

I would first build trust with my Team, then i would setup strategy and Project management to fallow all of the team, after that we can track our process very easily

Investing in tools such as Insightful will help to track the progress while working in remote. However, organizations need to track quality rather than quantity and embed the culture of accountability at every levels.

Does your business strategy outline the market problem that you will solve. Is it inspiring to your team? The best method for transforming your strategy is with workflow tools. They help you visualize what and how to best transform your strategy. What's next is the opportunity to further inspire and influence your team rather than force compliance. It is time to create engaging standard operating procedures. Do it right with visuals and effective writing. The result is inspired engagement, boosted productivity, all done responsibly secure and of course profitably.

One of the most important factors for the company in case of remote working is to ensure the policies are clearly communicated and understood by its employees. Regular mentoring of the employees are very much needed in such a case so that employees feel committed to the company and their jobs. Creating a conducive work culture that instils confidence, trust and commitment towards their goals are very important in a remote working scenario.

While there are quite a few capabilities out there, this is my general tool kit :: - google cloud/ cloud services - google admin/ accounts - notion/ wikis +notes - slack/ internal comms - pulley/ cap table mgmt - github/ code repos - jira/ product mgmt - figma/ design +decks - hubspot/ crm - docsend/ data rooms - qbo/ financial & budgets - theorg/ org chart

When a company needs to manage its teams outside of its campus, investing in the right tools in commensurate with the companies requirements is not just necessary, but mandatory. While the flexibility of remote working is always given, it should be ensured that the same is used to the best of trust and honesty by the employees. There are a lot of apps and tools that apply to different natures of businesses. Right from communication, virtual meetings, managing sales pipeline, HRMS, project charters etc., these tools are already available in the industry. The culture of the organization should be that usage of such tools must be a top-down approach. The first mile person in the company should start using such tools.

It’s very critical to invest in tools. For team to stay productive outside the office walls, the company must put some money aside for tools to structure work flows. Tools like project management tool, CRM, time sheet at all.

It’s all about making everyone’s position easier. Sales wants sales. So marketing and sales need to attract the right buyers. They want leads. Contact us firms to be filled out, OUTSIDE, of their efforts. If the low hanging fruit or all the training, software, etc isn’t improving their job - then remove the investment tools. I’ve seen too many company that send their people to get trained or certificates that mean nothing to help them “sell” better - when they need to improve their website traffic conversions instead. Be smart. Not assuming.

The right tools is one challenge. Too many tools actually reduce productivity. Consider that we are less productive today, than in the 70's. Yet, we have so much more available to us to be productive. That is likely the issue. It is time to tackle enterprise software and make it work the way we do. Effectively, less is more. First, figure out what are your best workflows. Likely, 20% of them produce results. Use these 20% that probably make it easy for customers to buy and for you to sell. Once these workflows are ID, use them to define what enterprise software will enable your productivity. The results is achieivng 80% of your productivity potential. Consider that success is better than 80% of your competition.

Fostering a great culture is key within a group, but also understanding the needs of the individuals within it. It’s easy to assume that everyone in the team is the same, when individuals may work in totally different ways and totally in different environments. This approach caters for a diverse, collaborative and cohesive team.

We make culture part of our OKRs and operationalize how to do it - so a KPI is to "operate with colleagues from a benefit of the doubt perspective" and that is 100% measurable - you can tell if someone is assuming the best or the worst of others pretty easily in their interactions. We also have it as a major part of performance reviews and reward being a standard bearer of our cultural values

Covid revealed the relevance of remote work. With your staff working remotely especially with enterprise softwares, yes, you can train but you must be keen on encouraging best practices such as setting clear goals and deadlines, establishing regular check-ins, and fostering a culture of accountability and autonomy.

Delegation and train-the-trainer, especially in region, help encourage dissemination of information among team members. Recording sessions and posting to share locations are key to encouraging a team to come up to speed quickly.

Using voicemail features in Slack, Teams have been a game changer for allowing communication / updates that include 'tone of voice', which is often lost in email/messaging platforms.

Invest in training managers to work with remote teams. Many managers still think if you do not see someone, they are not working. They need to learn how to monitor productivity by output. Therefor need to have clear tasks and criteria to measure progress. Training needs to include how to build a remote team culture, support and to encourage recognition. There is nothing more demoralising to hard working team members if it is not recognised due to lack of visibility of their efforts.

If you do not want to be under the same roof only, you should first become a practice or set of practices and prepare the technology foundation and ecosystem for that with a superb onboarding process for new joiners. If you spread across time zones, remember to embed in practices inclusiveness and respecting differences and cultural values.