Focus & Simplify - Life as an Entrepreneur using social media

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Lately during my trip to India to meet my team, i faced a few opportunities that helped me analyze a few instances of team management and bonding. Now a days in the work place many times we forget the small simple things that keep us going, one such thing is Trust. Trust is key to the effective functioning of any team, whether distributed geographically or not. This post is for small businesses and team leaders who have to manage teams not located physically in the same place.

Most managers find handling remote teams extremely challenging, but with the new Web era this can change and make life more practical and efficient. In order to get the best out of your team, it is very important to establish a clear communication routine, build trust, and review processes often to make sure they’re working for everyone. It’s not about writing long emails or asking every one to document their life. It’s about simple plain communication and agreed work flows. The tips listed below worked for me and i hope they shall work for you too. I have broken this topic into two parts so that its not that tedious to read and be engaged.

Summary Tips – The basics

Create your team starting with You: A remote set-up won’t work unless your team consist of self motivated individuals. Each individual needs to take responsibility and if you are leading this team then you need to ask yourself am i going to get annoyed if my IM (Instant Messenger) is constantly active and team members randomly have conversations with me?. You do not have to start each day wishing each member but what you may have to do is constantly type to someone or the other when they are feeling down or are stuck with a problem. If you do not have the patience to communicate via Instant Messenger or find it time wasting to have conversations with the team off and on then running remote teams is probably not your cup of tea.

Being there for your team: With time differences there can always be communication problems. Good remote communication requires energy and effort. There are times where you may be having dinner and your IM window is buzzing, are you prepared to take the call and deal with the issue? For your team member it’s still probably working hours and they need guidance to move forward on the workload. Its tough to show support at times especially when you have called it a day but if you are able to establish reasonable guidelines about your availability and your team feels comfortable calling you at odd hours you know that you are on the path of being their support arm.

Do what you say you will do: The saying says it all. When there are brain storming sessions and action points are agreed upon, make it a priority to have the list completed and give updates to your team so that they too feel that their requests are not just in the air, they are being actioned. Trust is particularly important in distant relationships.

My Next Post details a few steps that you could use along with a few tools that you could use to help you be a practical leader in this space. PLease feel free to drop your comments.