The Beginners Guide to Remote Work for Rental

Working from home has earned a bad rap. It paints the wrong picture of leisurely lying around in your pajamas half working. In reality, that stigma doesn’t hold true. 

People in the rental industry deal with the assumption that renting is wasting money (even though it isn’t).

Rental is fractional use, just as working from home can be fractional employment. It's efficient!

Therefore, we should be some of the first who can get past the stigma on remote work.

I’m not going to try to argue that everything can be remote and mechanics and drivers no longer need to come into the office, even though one day robotics and VR might make that possible. Rather, I’m going to focus on the positions in small companies, such as marketing and accounting, that don’t get the support or time they deserve anyway.

The first mental wall that needs to be broken down, in addition to remote workers, is gig workers and part time team members. Think about your marketing department. You probably don’t have one. If you are lucky, you might have a person, but more likely you have someone who wears many hats and also wears a marketing hat. What if I told you that you could have a highly qualified marketing director at a cost you can afford, if you are willing to add flexibility? 

There is a whole demographic of highly qualified and motivated people who are unemployed or underemployed because of their need for flexibility. The most obvious example is a stay-at-home parent, but there are many more examples like someone caring for a sick family member, someone with a desire to travel or live abroad, someone with physical limitations, someone working on a degree, someone in a poor job market, someone suffering from agoraphobia, or any number of other reasons. These people often need and want work, and many are highly qualified, but it is a segment of workers that are under appreciated by most traditional companies. Companies that tap into these markets, like Zapier are finding huge success and have highly engaged and effective teams. (Zapier's 200+ workforce is completely remote. Check out their awesome remote work guide here - How to Grow, Manage, and Work with Remote Teams)

It is even possible to run your whole back office remotely. I know this, because I’ve done it. Twice. I’ve been on two teams where most, if not all, of the back office employees were remote and often not full-time. Those team members were just as dedicated, if not more so. In one case, they even handled sales, support, and customer service, and rarely did anyone know that we had no physical office or full-time employees.

The first step in taking advantage of remote workers is to review the holes in your team that can be filled with a remote worker. The best places to look in small to midsize companies are in marketing, accounting, support, accounts receivable, accounts payable, and phone sales. 

Once you have established some places where a remote worker could fit in the team, follow along. If you'd like a cheat sheet on technology for remote work, check out this article 5 Technologies that help your team work remotely

Over the next few weeks will will tackle some other topics like the easiest way to find your first remote team member and how to run amazing remote meetings.