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Originally Posted On: https://www.thebusinesswomanmedia.com/managing-staff-working-remotely/

Around the world, home working has become increasingly popular in recent years. The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) reported in August 2015 that 3.5 million employed people in Australia alone regularly worked from home.

Having employees that work from home offers businesses manybenefits. Hiring remote workers means that you can seek out the very best talent without needing to worry about logistics and costly staff relocation packages. Employing staff that work from home also enables you to have smaller business premises and fewer costs involved in running and maintaining your workplace. It is also believed that employees that telework are often more productive and likely to take fewer sick days.

While there are many positives to employing home workers, in order to ensure that the working arrangements are successful, managers must overcome the barriers that distance creates between staff and the organisation. Luckily, as the number of teleworking employees increases, the technology that facilitates working from home continues to evolve and improve. If you are looking for tips to make managing your team of teleworkers easier, these suggestions should help:

Streamline your business with the right software

Managing staff working in multiple locations can become complicated. Keeping track of your employee’s working hours and expenses can soon become incredibly confusing and a major headache to work out. The solution to this issue is to simplify your processes by finding the perfect Staff Management Software to suit your business.

With the right software, you can save yourself lots of time and hassle dealing with recruitment, payroll and other HR tasks. This will leave you free to focus your time on driving your business forward to greater success.

Keep communicating

To keep your employees engaged and invested in the ongoing success of the business, it is vital to keep communicating with them. The absence of face to face communication can sometimes leave employees feeling ‘out of the loop,’ so it is essential to keep everyone up to date with what is happening in the business.

Arranging regular conference calls that your employees can dial into will help to keep everyone in contact with each other. It will help to foster the idea of your employees being part of the wider team. Where possible, giving everyone the opportunity to speak is a useful way to help your employees get more value from the call.

Boost employee motivation

As mentioned above, communication becomes even more critical when employees work from a distance. A crucial aspect of your communication with employees should be keeping them motivated. This doesn’t mean continually hassling them to be more productive. Instead, the focus should be on making sure that they know they are appreciated. Making an effort to say thank you for a job done well can make all the difference. Teleworking can be lonely, and employees can feel a little lost if they think they have been forgotten about. Taking the time to say thank you and acknowledging their work can give their motivation levels a significant boost.