Working in a Remote Team

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Teams that work remotely have benefits but also difficulties. When our team members are spread out across multiple locations, how can we bring out the best in them? After leading her team in Edinburgh with great success, the company invited Aisha to manage a remote team for a significant two-year project. Aisha gathered her team colleagues for a remote meeting to show off her leadership skills to the corporate headquarters. But she immediately saw that this was going to be a different difficulty after their initial meeting. Archie and Lucia kept inadvertently talking at the same moment, and when they didn't speak, there was an awkward quiet. Aisha had hoped to utilize the meeting to get to know the team members and establish priorities. Valentina didn't say much at all. There was no typical body language or facial expression communication because nobody had their cameras available. Aisha didn't feel like she had accomplished a lot of her goals by the end of the meeting and wasn't sure if anyone had understood what she had said. She pondered how she would create camaraderie among her team members and foster trust.

Remote teams are increasingly frequent as businesses continue to think globally and as current technology makes working from home more convenient. However, using current technologies for communication is not without its issues. Meetings, which are crucial for teamwork and productive collaboration, can be particularly difficult online. Videoconferencing is frequently characterized by awkward silences and people talking over each other, as can be observed from Aisha's example.

So what can managers of remote teams do to improve meetings and encourage successful team bonding? Here are five tips. The first one is to build trust quickly. Next is to discuss preferred communication styles and approaches to work. The third tip is to discourage distractions. Another tip is to try to understand what silence means. And the last and fifth tip is to actively manage turn-taking and be careful not to let one person dominate the meeting.