Since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, the traditional office has changed rapidly. Many employees consider that working from home is the ideal work environment. However, there are others who still prefer the traditional workspace.

You might be asking yourself “Is remote work sustainable beyond the pandemic?”

Short answer, yes… but with the right tools and updates to work models and processes.

We have to acknowledge the fact that most of us were thrown into remote work in early 2020 without even fully understanding what that meant and what it looked like. Working from home for most businesses was implemented as a temporary contingency plan. However, as companies embrace workplace flexibility, it is not sustainable to be operating on that once-temporary contingency plan anymore.

Said Laurel Farrer, CEO & Founder of Distribute, a consulting firm specializing exclusively in remote work and virtual organization development.

The change management process to become a fully-remote business sounds overwhelming, but it is not. All it requires is careful intention, attention, and prioritizing tasks (we will get into this soon). Before you know it, you are setting your team up for long-term success.

Thanks to technology nowadays, enabling collaboration across continents and time zones, workers and companies are embracing remote work like never before.

According to Gartner, by the end of 2022, 31% of all employees worldwide will be fully remote or hybrid. The United States is leading the way with 53% of its citizens working remotely.

It is a no-brainer that the complexity of running a business in today’s highly interconnected world has introduced various challenges for leaders. Negativity aside, if you are a leader and you can succeed in embracing this new era of work, you will be unleashing disruptive power of diversity, resulting in greater productivity, innovation and growth.

So, what should leaders consider when preparing their remote workforce?

Make culture location-independent

Culture is not about perks and benefits; those are expressions of culture.

To reimagine your culture for the virtual environment, it is about returning to the foundations of the company and supporting your teams through the lens of your mission, vision, and core values. Embrace the opportunity to create new remote-first rituals for your team if you have not already, and work with intention to ensure the team is engaging with and getting the intended result.

Focus on creating a location-irrelevant model

Leaders should strive to create a location-irrelevant model, where everyone has access to all of the tools and resources needed to be productive no matter where they are – be it at home, in the office, at their local coffee shop, or even in another country. This is what would contribute to sustainable success.

‍Collaboration technologies help improve productivity

The use of collaboration technologies helps organizations of any size improve productivity. For example, the ICP survey found that companies using Slack reported an average 49% reduction in email volume, a 25% drop in the number of meetings, and a 32% increase in productivity.

So in what specific areas can collaboration improve productivity?

  1. To eliminate silos by allowing team members to communicate with each other across departments. This minimizes friction and delays in business processes while helping to build a customer-centric company, so employees can focus their time and efforts on what matters.
  2. To improve the customer experience by connecting customers with the right team member to reduce the time and resources required for customer service so fewer employees can serve more customers without compromising quality.
  3. To improve collaboration and external communications to strengthen supplier relationships and reduce friction in the procurement process, thereby lowering costs and increasing profitability.
  4. To enable real-time information exchange (eg, data synchronization, file sharing) to facilitate company processes while minimizing delays and errors that reduce productivity and affect the customer experience.
  5. To streamline workflows by improving communication between departments (eg, manufacturing, sales, marketing, procurement, IT) to create an agile company that can respond to market demand profitably.
  6. To make project management easier by increasing transparency and visibility, keeping an open line of communication, and making sure everything is on track to avoid costly mistakes and mix-ups.
  7. To enable knowledge workers to gain real-time access and locate data quickly and accurately with a content management system.
  8. To facilitate the execution of projects and initiatives by ensuring that information can be shared quickly and concisely. It helps improve time to market, increase agility, and optimize the utilization of distributed resources.
  9. To promote team problem solving, especially for remote workers, by enabling employees to meet, discuss, and make decisions with agility and precision.
  10. To eliminate version control issues, which can cause delays, errors, and inefficiencies, with real-time file sharing so team members don’t have to email documents.

In addition: Globalization is the Future of Work

We are all aware that work has changed immensely in the past couple of years, and the benefits of a remote global workforce are endless. By incorporating employment strategies to hire globally, companies can begin to attract experienced and in-demand talent, regardless of where they live.

As leaders continue to rethink their remote work strategies, it is essential that they enable employees with the right tools and technologies to be effective and connected from anywhere in the world.

Need help boosting your business towards the future of work? Contact Latamforce, there is no turning back.