5 essential tools for remote teams

Remote work and distributed teams had been on the rise for some time but, when the COVID-19 pandemic hit, their popularity skyrocketed.

Now, more than a year into the pandemic, teams around the world are going remote at a faster pace than ever before, especially in the world of software development, which seems particularly fit for this type of work.

From Spotify to Salesforce, some of the industry’s biggest names have announced “work from anywhere” policies in the past year, so it looks like this trend is here to stay, even after we’ve returned to our old maskless way of life.

However, as popular as the trend might be, going from working at an office to being fully remote isn’t always a smooth transition. More often than not, it takes some adjusting and, if you want your remote team to be successful, there are certain tools you will need to have in your arsenal.

These tools aren’t necessarily unique to remote work. In fact, you might already have used some of them while sharing an office. However, as useful as they might have been in the past, these tools grow in importance when a team transitions to remote work.

So, whether you are looking to transition into a distributed team or you are already working remotely and looking for ways to improve communication and productivity, here are 5 tools we believe every remote team must use.

1. A project management platform

This is one of those tools that most non-remote teams also use. This is especially true for software development companies, where agile methodologies tend to be the norm. If you work in such a setting, you probably already use a project management tool and are familiar with concepts such as tickets and release versions.

When you work remotely, however, these tools become even more important. It is much easier for tasks to be overlooked or priorities to get mixed up due to miscommunication when your whole team isn’t sharing a working space.

To make sure everyone is on the same page and has a good overview of where the project is, you will need a tool that can easily communicate what needs to be done, what has already been done, and what is being done, as well as who is accountable for each of these tasks. With this in mind, the most popular project management tools often display tasks as tickets that can be placed on boards, so you can easily see a project’s status just by taking a quick glance at those boards.

Most tools also allow you to associate time estimates and actual working hours to each ticket, as well as extract reports, so you can analyze your project’s progress, or report back to your client or to management.

Finally, these tools also allow for file sharing and comments, keeping all the relevant information well organized and in one place.

As to what project management tool is best, there is a lot to be discussed, as there are plenty of options out there and new ones seem to pop up increasingly more often. Some common names in the business are Jira and Trello (both currently owned by Atlassian, but with different approaches), and newcomers Monday.com, and Clickup.

2. An online office suite

Whether you are a content team that produces articles, a software development company that needs to write documentation, or an accounting firm keeping track of their client's finances, chances are, you already make use of an office suite.

If you choose to go remote, however, you might have to evaluate whether the suite you are using right now is the best. In particular, if your team will no longer be sharing an office, you will want to consider a cloud-based online office suite where workers can collaborate in real-time, share documents, and access version histories.

The benefits of cloud-based suites are so great, that many companies were already using them even before going remote. The most common of these platforms is arguably Google’s G-suite, which is often associated with Google Drive.

However, there are other players out there. G Suite’s biggest competition is likely Microsoft Office 365 Online, which offers the familiarity of the Microsoft Office suite, paired with the benefits of working on the cloud.

Whichever alternative you chose to use, you’ll find that an online office suite makes collaboration and communication much easier, and helps recreate some of the working conditions your team might’ve had when sharing an office.

3. A video conferencing platform

Video conferencing software has undoubtedly been the star of the pandemic, especially for remote workers. When misused, it has been the source of many viral videos, but it has also shown how powerful it can be when used correctly.

For businesses, video conferencing has an obvious use in allowing teams to hold all the meetings they would usually hold in person in a virtual setting. Although some of these communications could technically be replaced by written means of communication, there is no doubt that being able to hear someone’s tone and read their gestures goes a long way in improving communication.

But, outside of strict business, video calls can also be a great way for teams to have strictly social interactions, where they can work on their relationships, get to know each other, hold after-hour meetings, and feel closer, even in spite of the distance.

There are plenty of available video conferencing platforms out there, with Zoom, Google Hangouts and Microsoft Teams dominating the market. Which one is best suited for your team will depend on factors such as the purpose of the meeting, your team’s size, and your budget. You may even want to consider exploring different platforms for different types of meetings.

4. A messaging app

As great as video calls can be for certain meetings, not every communication that used to happen in the office can be recreated in a remote working environment using a video conferencing platform.

Some of the shorter and more spontaneous communications could actually suffer if people had to go through all the steps of joining a video conference (like checking their lighting or making sure their mic works) before starting them.

In these scenarios, synchronic written communication is the way to go. And how can this be achieved? By something as simple as messaging apps.

The most common among these is Slack, which has become almost ubiquitous in the tech world. However, other options like Microsoft Teams or Google Hangouts, each with its different set of features, are also out there.

As a plus, some of these platforms also offer video conferences, so you could end up killing two birds with one stone.

5. A version control tool

Finally, if you work in software, you should already be using a version control tool. But even if you work in a different industry, you might want to take a look into incorporating something like this into your workflow.

Version control tools allow you to keep track of what was changed in a given project or file, as well as who changed it and when (and, if used correctly, even why).

This way, you can easily juggle different versions for one single project, and even determine when mistakes were introduced and pinpoint them so you can roll back changes.

Among other things, these tools can help remote teams by making sure teammates don’t overwrite each other’s work, and that they are all on the same page as to what version of a project they are working on.

Truth is, transitioning to remote work from one day to the other hasn’t been easy for everybody, but we hope the tips in this article will make the path smoother for you. With the productivity provided by project management platforms, the collaboration power of a good office suite, the communication potential of messaging and video conferencing appscut and the accountability of versioning tools, you should have all you need to make your remote teamwork as smoothly as it would if it were sharing an office.