Reasons your remote team is struggling with productivity

These days more organizations than ever before are encouraging their staff to embrace working from home and are benefiting from the wide pool of talent that comes with choosing remote-based workers.  

When managed correctly, remote work is an incredibly successful facet of your department and your organization as a whole. With the right framework in place, you and your remote workers should be thriving, and productivity should be at an all time high. However, frustratingly that’s not always the case. One of the biggest issues facing remote-workers, and their managers is keeping output and efficiency high.  

While many studies show that workers who are based at home are happier, and generally keep their productivity levels high, if your team is having output issues then you may need to take a closer look at the problem. Read on for some interesting reasons why your remote team is struggling with productivity. 

Disorganization rules

Is your remote team expected to use digital assets as part of their role? If the company you work for has thousands of digital files, strewn across servers, hard drives and cloud-based storage solutions, then it’s likely that your remote team is struggling with a bottlenecked workflow. Using Digital Asset Management software, like the one you can find on this website, acts as a centralized digital asset library, that is fully functional and accessible 24/7. Meaning users can access the files they need whenever they need them, regardless of working hours or time zones. 

In addition, the better organized your digital assets are, the higher the levels of output from your team. No more wasted time sifting through folders and trying to find the latest version of a particular file, using smart tagging and metadata collections, users can quickly find what they need and move onto the next task.

They have little or no direction

Some remote workers may not be completely familiar with their role or what they need to do. Maybe they’re being extra cautious, and tasks are taking longer than normal, or they’re nervous about repeatedly reaching out for assistance and their confidence is impacting their output. If you suspect that employees in your team are lacking direction, consider creating an “open-door” policy where they can come to you and ask for assistance without judgement, whenever needed.

Too many meetings

When you have a remote team to manage, keeping levels of communication high is important for morale and to ensure that each employee is comfortable in their role, as mentioned above. Video meetings are a simple yet effective way of touching base with your remote teams, however, there’s a fine balance between beneficial contact and distraction. Too many video calls take up valuable time, so ensure that your video meetings are productive and speak with your team to discuss their video call preferences. 

And finally, isolation

Some things can’t be substituted. This includes the camaraderie that comes with being placed in a physical team in a traditional working environment. Feelings of isolation and a lack of team bonding can bring productivity levels down to an all-time low, hindering progress. Continue to work on team building exercises despite the distance between your employees, and remember recognition goes a long way!