Episode D.018 Working From Home

Working from home? The good, the bad and the potential. 
As the world begins opening its doors back up to what will small business look like in the future? Should you downsize? Cost reduction should still be top of mind for all business owners. Balancing on-site and work from home could be the key. Liquidating office furnishings can put much needed money back in the business. Managing remote workers can be a challenge but not impossible. Let’s explore the good, the bad and the potential.


Keep Your Business Moving 
Over the past few months you probably have the tools to keep your remote team in touch. Taking it to the next level, you will need tools to track productivity and keep everyone at home on task. Keeping remote teams productive, like daily check-ins and a recommended dress code might be the answer, but my view is that good employees don’t need to be micromanaged. They need tools and support for meaningful work. 

Now is the time to leverage the productivity tools designed for small businesses to help empower your employees to adapt to remote work and remain productive in their longer term new environments.

Productivity Tools to Consider: 

1. Trello. Trello can help small teams track projects and tasks. 
2. Basecamp Business. Basecamp is designed to help a single business track productivity across multiple projects from a single dashboard.
3. Box, Dropbox Business and Google Drive. Remote businesses need collaboration tools that have file-sharing. 
4. DocuSign and HelloSign. Online signature services can get the signatures you need fast.  
5. Notarize.com. If your business needs official documents notarized during stay-at-home orders, an online notary service can help you keep things moving. 

Your Employees are your greatest Asset 
Happy, healthy employees lead to more productivity, which in turn increases your bottom line. The time you take to invest in your employees will be time and money well spent. Knowing their current struggles is the first step to giving the support they need. Here are some common struggles for you to keep in mind when communicating with your remote employees:

1. Difficulty with Work and Home Life Separation: 
2. Loneliness and Social isolation
3. Time Management Problems and Distractions at Home
4. Digital Miscommunication 
5. Lack of Access to Information 
6. Lack of face-to-face Supervision

How Business Owners Can Support Remote Employees
As much as remote work can be challenging, there are also relatively quick and inexpensive things that leaders can do to help employees cope with their new daily life. Most people like routines and they ultimately want to know they matter. Consider incorporating all or some of these ideas to help your employees with the transition to continue to work from home:

1. Establish structured daily check-ins 
2. Provide several different communication technology options 
3. Set boundaries 
4. Establish a schedule for the workday 
5. Set clear expectations 
6. Trade in-person discussions for phone calls 
7. Rethink urgency 
8. Invest in virtual connection 
9. Double-down on the grace 

​Boost Employee Morale
Don’t forget to spend some time during this work-from-home time to nurture your team—even from afar. The time you  take to make your team feel connected throughout the week will not only be appreciated by your employees but will also boost morale and team cohesiveness which leads to happier employees and more productive work. Get creative and enlist the help of your team to brainstorm and organize your own remote office parties.

Three fun ideas to inspire connection while your business adapts to its new work-from-home normal:

1. Virtual happy hours. 
2. Bring your pet (or kids) to work days. 
3. Viewing parties.