What are remote work best practices for businesses?

To help ensure remote work is a success across your organization, follow these best practices:

1. Maintain a company culture.

Some employees?choose an employer for its company culture. Whether your company is only recently remote or has always been, maintaining the culture that attracted employees to your organization in the first place can help keep employees happy and working for your company. For example, you could support a caring culture by broadening your wellness benefits, as Actualize Consulting did. Its $750 wellness benefit is available to each employee for use toward a gym membership and fitness purchases such as treadmills and classes.

As another example, Sarah Danzl, communications officer and vice president of customer marketing at Degreed, said that a priority for her was to ensure the holistic care and mental health of her team with regular check-ins, specifically to ask about how they’re doing and dedicate some time to non-work chat. Degreed also provides access to mental health support and wellness options like the Calm app.

2. Use video tools to stay connected.

Working remotely can be difficult for people who strive for face-to-face interaction. Utilize the best practice of acting as if you and your team are in the office with the help of technology. Consider keeping spirits high and teams connecting by hosting a Friday video happy hour, video team meetings and virtual employee lunches. The goal here is to stimulate activities that would be done in the office, outside the office.

Tip

Addressing remote work difficulties often involves corporate wellness initiatives with a specific emphasis on mental health.

3. Go paperless.

Just about everything can be done digitally these days. Use a tool like DocuSign for contracts that need signatures, and encourage employees to lean on the?best customer relationship management (CRM) software?and other digital tools instead of paper for notes, project management and other tasks.

4. Invest in internet security.

A network is only as secure as its weakest link. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, many companies have turned their workforces remote. As a result of more people working from home, weak security links are inevitable. By?investing in internet security, you can provide (and even mandate) the tools that keep everyone’s devices safe. This, in turn, keeps company information safe. Most importantly, it minimizes the risk of personal data being leaked through a vulnerability in your infrastructure. At the heart of your internet security is a virtual private network (VPN). It allows for direct, safe communication between all remote workers and the office.

5. Consider employee monitoring.

Employee monitoring is necessary for large organizations. A significant part of leadership and management is keeping people on task; however, with remote work, that becomes challenging.

Employee monitoring systems allow you to see a worker’s computer activity. This informs you as to how much of a workday is actually spent on work projects and tasks. Employee monitoring solutions allow you to track the productivity of the work-from-home model.?[Read related article:?The Best Employee Monitoring Software of 2023]

6. Accommodate flexible work schedules.

There are many benefits that come with remote work, such as reduced overhead and lower liabilities, to name a few. If, though, remote work is hastily or poorly implemented, the downside is lost productivity. The key to preventing lost productivity (which can be difficult for a company to come back from) is to allow employees to work a?flexible work schedule.

Many at-home employees are juggling child care and school. Flexible work schedules empower them to find a better work-life balance that enables them to work productively around their kids’ schedules. One suggestion to make this transition smoother for your company and team is to shift to a completion-based work model. In this model, the focus is less on how many hours an individual works and more on what they accomplish.

7. Invest in collaboration tools.

Collaboration tools are everywhere. Some of the biggest names to rise to the top include Skype and Microsoft Teams. Of course, the most popular by far is Zoom. These tools allow for adjustable online workgroups. They include video and audio chat, and they allow for screen sharing.

You can also look into apps that create shared workspaces. File sharing systems are similarly important. You can even look at dedicated communication servers with resources like Discord and Google Chat.

Original Article: How to Create a Remote Work Plan (business.com)