If you’re a remote worker, you’ve probably heard the buzz about how great it is to work from home.
But if you’re not sure how much flexibility your employer will provide or what the process of working remotely is like, some things will help make sure your job is fair and effective.
Here are five tips for setting up policies that work for both parties – the dedicated software development team and you!
Working from home, sleep, and productivity
Working from home isn’t necessarily the best way to get things done. It may help with productivity but many other factors can affect your productivity as well. For example, if you work at night then it is harder for others to reach out to you about projects or questions. Sleep is important for everyone but not as important as we think it should be! The fact that our brains need sleep has been proven time and time again. It’s also worth noting that while most people think they need eight hours of sleep every night this isn’t always true since many factors determine how much sleep we take each day like stress levels etc.
Management Issues
It’s important to remember that the way you manage your team will depend on the person in question. If you’re managing a remote worker, he or she likely has a different set of goals and priorities than those who are physically present. For example, if someone is working remotely for the first time but already has experience with other companies and their policies, then it might be easier for them to adjust to your company’s approach than someone who has never worked remotely before.
If this sounds like something worth keeping in mind when deciding how best to manage remote workers at home or across oceans (or even within offices), here are several things we recommend:
- Allow employees some latitude when deciding which projects they want to take on first; try not to let anything get in their way! This means being flexible about when certain tasks have deadlines so long as those deadlines aren’t arbitrary—and also being willing not only to give feedback but listen carefully when someone asks questions about why they should do something now instead of later.
Flexibility, burnout, and mental health
Flexibility is important, but it’s not a cure-all.
Work-life balance is important and can be difficult to achieve when you’re working remotely. However, you should be aware that burnout and mental health issues are common in remote workers—even more so than in those who work from home full-time or have an office at home. You need to know what’s going on in your team so they don’t fall into bad habits that may lead to burnout or poor performance due to exhaustion (e.g., sleeping too much).
Setting clear boundaries and expectations
- Set boundaries for when you will be working, and set clear expectations for those times.
- If you are going to be working from home, make it clear that the time is included in your day’s schedule. If someone needs something from you during this period (e.g., an urgent customer issue), they should ask before sending any messages or emails at all! Otherwise, they may assume that if there isn’t an answer within five minutes of their request being sent out (which only happens rarely), then it’ll just wait until tomorrow or later—and then it never comes back at all because nobody ever checked back on them again either way!
- Don’t let people assume that everything is okay just because they see how many hours are left on their clockface widgets here instead of there: set up a policy about when employees should check in remotely via email so there’s always accountability around visibility into whether someone did want help after all; otherwise, we could end up having even more issues with burnout than we already do now.”
1-on-1 Meetings
The 1-on-1 meeting is the most important. It’s where you set goals and expectations for your remote worker, ensuring they understand what it means to work for your company.
If you have a performance plan that outlines how each employee contributes, use this time to discuss each person’s role within the team and what they need to do to succeed at their job. This can include things like:
- How often should I communicate with other people who are working remotely? How long should I wait before sending out another email message? Do we need more meetings or fewer meetings overall? What do I need from my co-workers in terms of regular feedback (like “Didn’t see this coming?”)? How much autonomy will I have while on vacation/traveling etc.
Remote work is not as simple as working from a home office — it requires its policies.
If you want to offer your employees the flexibility to work remotely, you must create a policy that is fair and effective.
- Remote work policies should be clear and well-defined. In the same way, in-office policies are important for business continuity and employee productivity, remote work policies must also address those concerns. Employees need to know how they will be protected from potential legal issues (and what happens if something happens), as well as how their personal information will be protected from outsiders who may try to access it through their computer or phone (for example, hackers).
- Remote workers need clear expectations about when they can use their phones during meetings or other times when they could otherwise be at home instead of working in an office setting — this includes what kinds of calls are allowed and whether or not these calls count towards overtime pay rates if they occur during regular business hours versus after hours while driving back home from where they started earlier today so far away from here now way back then when I was still living down south where everything was different than up north here now but still pretty much just like anywhere else really except maybe more expensive too depending on which city/state does.
Conclusion
I hope this post has helped you understand the impact of your remote work policies and how to create an effective one. If you’re not already, I highly encourage you to start a process of collecting feedback from your team members and managers on the current state of things. This will be helpful and valuable in understanding what needs to change for both parties involved with remote workers.
