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How to Motivate Your Remote Workforce

 Over 50% of our personnel ended up working remotely by the year 2022. This translates into greater demand for flexible work settings and greater employee propensity to leave businesses that don't provide it.

Creating a sense of inclusion and belonging for remote employees is one of the major problems organizations confront. This raises the issue of how to maintain distant workers' interest. This problem may result in poorer engagement, lower productivity, and higher turnover if it is not addressed carefully.

1. Obtain leadership support

Even while remote work is growing more and more common, your leadership team may still be skeptical. Here are some suggestions to win their cooperation and buy-in:

Make a business case. Companies that permit remote work have a 25% lower employee turnover rate than those that don't. If your firm's leaders aren't convinced by this figure, you can also compute the Employee Lifetime Value at your company to bolster your argument with numbers. Flexibility promotes retention. Find out more about the financial advantages of lower staff turnover using our Recognition ROI Calculator.

FIGURE 1

Show how it affects recruiting. Consider that a football or soccer team is being founded by two individuals. While the other manager will recruit from all around the world, one manager will only recruit from their hometown. Who will have the superior team in the end? From a recruiting standpoint, this comparison is supposed to demonstrate the advantages of providing remote work possibilities. The more talent you can access, the broader your net can be spread.

Hear it straight from the workers. Let the workers speak for themselves if your leadership team is still not persuaded. In the upcoming employee survey or checkpoint, make sure to include a question on flexible work arrangements. At Blueboard, we poll employees on a Likert scale and ask them if they feel "we are genuinely supported if we choose to make advantage of flexible working options." Your leadership team will find it far more difficult to discount evidence that originates directly from the source.


2 Do away with the "we vs. them" attitude


It's simple to adopt a "us vs. them" mentality when your workforce is split between those who work remotely and those who regularly attend the office. This may result in conflict amongst teams, issues with communication, and general stress at work. Here are a few suggestions to promote harmony inside your company:

Over-communicate. Contrary to office workers, remote workers are unable to strike up informal talks with office workers in the kitchen or run into senior management for a quick pow-wow. Because of this, it's crucial to communicate with them frequently (much more so than with office coworkers), and to encourage others on the team to do the same.

Promote a "tribal" way of thinking. The authors Dave Logan, Halee Fischer-Wright, and John King's book "Tribal Leadership" served as the source of inspiration for this idea. The goal of this concept is to establish a company culture that is so strong that it encourages the perception that everyone is a member of the same tribe rather than being on different teams or sides.


3 Create a purposeful workplace environment

For remote employees, the employee journey might look a little different. While it’s easy for a new employee in the office to turn to the person sitting next to them with a query, this isn’t the case for a remote new recruit. Consider these suggestions as you plan and develop an employee experience for your remote workforce:

Be considerate. There are many simple but effective methods to add thoughtful gestures to the employee experience, beginning with the job offer. As an illustration, at Blueboard, we gather the entire interview panel to celebrate the candidate and foster a sense of community. Alternatively, during the onboarding process, give employees a meaningful welcome package or an experiential gift to help them feel enthusiastic about their new position. Additionally, we provide all new hires with a Blueboard Ivory incentive so they may consume our own dog food, take advantage of their downtime in between employment, and provide insightful feedback on our customer experience.

Use the appropriate software and tools. Technology ought to facilitate the development of human connections rather than standing in the way. Whether you accomplish this via online buddy systems like Donut cross-team connections or mentorship programs, use the correct tools and strategies to promote an inclusive employee journey.

4 Maintain open lines of communication

In any workplace or team context, communication is crucial, but it is crucial when it comes to a remote workforce. Here are some pointers for maintaining open channels of communication:
Pay attention. When working with remote personnel, be mindful, especially during meetings. When others are talking over one another or having side discussions, it can be extremely difficult for the lone individual participating in the video conference to express their ideas. When you notice that those who are far away from the conversation want to join in, provide them the opportunity to do so. Make sure that everyone has the opportunity to experience what it's like to "be on the other side" in order to foster empathy for remote workers.

Figure 2




Eliminate friction. Sending welcome gifts to all remote employees when they first join your 10-person company might not seem like a big deal, but as your team expands, that will inevitably become untenable. Use a platform that makes it easy to send virtual presents or to express praise in a smooth manner to reduce any friction. a hint: Blueboard can be of assistance!

Make the recognition your own. Always make sure the team or individual receiving your acknowledgment is the focus of your recognition. Understanding their language of gratitude in advance is crucial since not everyone appreciates a public shoutout at all-hands meetings. Doing so will make the praise feel even more special and meaningful. a unified experience. a hint: Blueboard can be of assistance!

Make it easily shareable. Experiential awards, as opposed to money or gift cards, are easy to share and give workers a chance to be more personable at work. Teams can continue the festivities and learn more about their coworkers' passions and interests outside of work by giving recognition stories a home on their shared communication channels like Slack.

Figure 3



Reference

Blueboard Lee S,(7th June 2019)

https://www.blueboard.com/blog/how-to-engage-your-remote-workforce-webinar-recap

Accessed 16th August 2022


Comments

  1. Small corrections to be done for citations. Content is oerfect 👌

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    Replies
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  2. your blog is very nice missing part is citations. thanks for sharing this information

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