Tele-Managing A Virtual Team: Are You Up For The Job?

Nowadays, managers are being brought straight into the strange social media fold that blends old with new, hired in as a part of a virtual team to handle project management, monitoring employee productivity, and maintain records both from a brick and mortar office and the luxury of a laptop from home. There’s flex-time, on-call time, scheduled work hours – and while it may seem as if you’re working all the time.

Relax – you’re a manager, right? You’re a people person, right? Then telecommuting was made for you – and yet it wasn’t. In truth, your telecommuters are overly productive – and in most cases, you can trust employees to carry out work tasks wherever it makes sense, at home, at Starbucks, in the library, on the bus – anywhere there’s an internet connection and it makes sense. Micromanagers don’t do well with telecommuters at all – employees chosen for these roles perform some or all of his/her work independent of direct supervision. Technology is what enables them to do – but their disciple and skills are the reasons they were placed in the role to begin with.

What parts of the telecommuter’s relationship need to be defined between the manager and the employee? Here is a short checklist to get started :

- Provide a clear definition of telecommuting

- Employee and manager must mutually agree on telecommuting schedule

- Definition of core hours (if used)

- Conditions of employment will not change due to telecommuting

- Telecommuting agreement must be signed by employee and his/her manager

- How to handle changes to the agreed telecommuting days and/or hours

- Description of cancellation rules (by employee or his/her manager

- Providing adequate home office space

- Describing what the employee is expected too provide at home

- Employees responsible for establishing and maintaining a safe work environment at home

A good telecommuting manager needs to be able to be the epitome of flexibility and be able to bridge the gap between authority levels – when you have telecommuters, there should be no such thing as red tape when it comes to simple tasks such as getting copies, ordering supplies, and putting in other requests that normally take unneeded paperwork in the office. Because telecommuting traditionally means increased productivity and accomplishments, a telecommuting manager should develop a bond with his/her employees, and work hard to remain on the same side as them. With proper planning, training, management, and communications, employee productivity can increase dramatically, and you’ll be able to build a powerful and highly respected virtual team.