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- Remote Work Policy Basics
- Sharing [your company] employee motto
- Team roles
- Team Availability
- #1 Some tips to share with your co-workers
- #2 Sharing your "Remote Hours Policy"
- Tools and Data management
- Remote team management
- Keep engagement with rituals
- Manage and monitor your team progress on remote
- Keep a fun and positive atmosphere
- Running successful remote Meetings: our checklist
- Tools Library
Before you begin to read, here are 3 key facts about remote work productivity:
- According to a Standford study, remote work may be the key to increased productivity: the study showed that remote employees worked more hours because they had shorter breaks and less sick leave. They also stayed with the company longer and reported a higher level of happiness.
- According to the Harvard Business Review, remote workers have better focus: from 2008 to 2014, the number of employees who say they can’t concentrate at their desk has increased by 16%, and the number of employees who can’t access quiet places to do focused work is up by 13%. Also, the number of people who are worried about their privacy in the workplace increased by 74% over a ten-year period.
- According to Owl Labs’ 2019 State of Remote Work report, remote workers work longer hours but feel better: Remote workers work more than 40h / week, 43% more than on-site workers do. People who work from office stay longer because it’s their management’s requirement, while remote workers often choose longer hours because they like what they do.
But remote work also includes challenges, at personal and professional levels: This chart shows that many remote workers struggle with unplugging from their work, loneliness and communicating.
Remote Work Policy Basics
If you need to suddenly transition to remote work, you won't necessarily have effective systems in place. A Remote Work Policy helps you create cohesion and eliminate confusion or frustration for employees.
Ok but, concretely, what is it ? A Remote Work Policy is a document where you gather :
- Your company employee motto: to share how you expect people to behave at work in general
- Your company stack: tools & data management
- Your company organization: who is doing what, in charge of what
- Your company Work-Life Balance: to highlight separation between work and free time
- Concrete examples of your company culture: publish photos, testimony to support your writing
Sharing [your company] employee motto
Before setting rules, make sure employees are aware of what is the expected employee behavior in your company.
✍️ Write down your company core values. Here is a canva you can use:
Culture is the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an organization.
Following the culture definition, complete the attitudes, values, goals, and practices of [your company].
What goal can you set to guide your employees on a daily basis?
What are the values you want your employees to share? What must be their beliefs?
How do your values translate into daily practices?
How do your values translate into the team behaviour?
Fill your company employee moto following this canva in our Remote Work Policy Canva
Get inspired
Employee moto can take many shapes! Here are some examples:
Team roles
Detail team roles can help your team save time and be more confident in what they are doing. You can do a simple table like the one below:
| Team Members <3 | Team | Job Desc | To contact if : | Related Tools |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Admin | Take care of the company IT safety | #ITtrouble#Cyberattack | Jira | |
Marketing | SEO strategy and website modification | #website_trouble#competition_iniative#new_competitor_identified | Intercom | |
Sales | Deal with new customers | #potiential_client_identified#new_competitor_identified#new_features#non_happy_customer | Hubspot | |
Customer Success | Take care about our customers experience | #non_happy_customer#new_features#repetitive_troubles_identified | Jira |
Emergency Tree
What happen in case of a customer emergency during OR after business hours? Who is the first person in charge? For some use cases, it could be useful to complete an "Emergency Tree" to make sure everyone knows what to do.
These questions might help you manage your emergency:
- What: the use case
- Who: the team members in charge
- How: the communication tool to use
| Emergency Case | Team member n°1 | Team member n°2 | Communication Tool |
|---|---|---|---|
@Batman | @Angelina Jolie | Slack | |
@Asterix | @Leonardo Di Caprio | Phone Call | |
Team Availability
Does your team need to be online during specific business hours or will they be able to set their own schedules? Depending on your activity, you have your answer.
#1 Some tips to share with your co-workers
📵 unpluging after work is important:
- Set expectations regarding your availability
- Share your emergency tree, it would be useful if you are not available (cf: emergency tree)
- Schedule regular blocks of time away in your calendar
- Tackle your biggest or most urgent to-dos
- Send a message to say goodbye to your team
- Set your internal messaging tool status on "off"
- Turn off your phone notifications
- Find some tips to distinguish the work time from the non-work time
- Leave the house and walk in again to start and end your workday
- Use props like work shoes to signal your brain when you are working
- Create a space for work you can leave at the end of the day
- Embrace your hobbies and focus on what you are doing right now
➡️ For the remote work policies: Write down a Slack Agreement as the one Buffer has
➡️ To unplug after work: Ask to your employees to setup their notification on their work schedule
➡️ To know about your availability and your mission: Set their Slack Status
#2 Sharing your "Remote Hours Policy"
Shedule messages to your team to remind them to take some break and to unplug from work:
Tools and Data management
Which tools will the team use to communicate and collaborate effectively? Which tools will the team use to organize and share documents and information securely? No room for doubt, make sure your employees know where to find what tool is used for or not. → There is no need to detailed every tool, only the one that seem essential
The most important factor is that all employees share the same set of expectations for communication. - Harvard Business Review
| Tool | Type | Is the right place for | Is NOT the right place for |
|---|---|---|---|
Communication | ➡️ Social conversations, interesting links, chit-chat ➡️ Questions/requests that need a faster/same-day response ➡️ Sharing some quick praise, love, gratitude, achievements | ➡️ High-level discussions ➡️Making big decisions ➡️Giving in-depth feedback | |
Communication | ➡️ Company announcements ➡️ Prospects / Customers relationship ➡️ Sharing gratitude, achievements | ➡️ Social conversations, interesting links, chit-chat ➡️ Questions/requests that need a faster/same-day response | |
Communication | ➡️ Team meetings ➡️ One-to-One meetings ➡️ Prospects / Customers meetings ➡️ Giving in-depth feedback | ➡️ Sharing confidential information, serious cyber attack were noted on Zoom. | |
Document sharing | ➡️ Stocking all our company documents. All documents have to be on the cloud. | ➡️ Internal meetings notes | |
Document sharing | ➡️ Sharing heavy documents OUTSIDE of the team (prospects / customers / providers) | ➡️ Sharing documents INSIDE our team (use Google Drive for that) | |
Project Management | ➡️ Operational followup (task, todos etc.) | ➡️ To ask follow-up | |
Content sharing | ➡️ Taking notes for internal meetings | ➡️ Stocking very important information that needs to be shared | |
Knowledge Management | ➡️ Gathering all our company processes | ➡️ Take notes on meetings | |
How to Pick the Best VPN
Remote team management
On remote work, key challenges are:
- Keep engagement
- Keep track on projects progress and results
- Maintain a comfortable and friendly work environment
Keep engagement with rituals
No one can feel aside. To engage people, you have to communicate with them and keep everyone connected. From hangout sessions to weekly team meetings, here are some rituals you can establish:
| Rituals | Description | Goals | Tools |
|---|---|---|---|
Take a break with your co-workers to talk about your daily life. One rule : do not speak about work ! | Employee interactionsEmployee Well Being | HangoutZoomMicrosoft TeamsHouse Party | |
2 co-workers are randomly selected to have an online lunch together. Tips : use a Secret Santa online tool ;). | Employee interactions | ExcelDonut by SlackSecret Santa online | |
Say "hello" to your co-workers when starting work and tell them "bye" when you are leaving. | Employee communications | SlackMicrosoft Teams | |
No need to be in the same room to share non working moments with your team. Tips : “Care Packages” can be sent in advance to be opened and enjoyed simultaneously. | Company Culture | HangoutZoomMicrosoft TeamsHouse Party | |
Create an open space online so team members can be "together" while working. | Company CultureEmployee interactions | Microsoft TeamsZoomHangout | |
Dedicated newsletter about co-workers news, company fun facts, it can be news apart from the company work. Photos, videos and GIF are welcomed to increase the opening rate 😉 | Employee interactionsCompany Culture | Email | |
Put a Slackbot to share a message when it's time to think about break and stop working. | Employee Well Being | Slack | |
Ask your team to post three (or more) wins they had that week in a team Slack channel. The wins can be anything, from completed tasks to great meetings. Tips : They created an automatic update asking their team to post wins (including screenshots) every week. | Employee interactionsWorking follow-up | Slack | |
Don't miss out on the chance to collect and reflect upon feedback from your remote employees. | Employee Well Being | SlackMicrosoft TeamsOffice VibesTypeformSupermood | |
Try to gather everybody around a CEO All Hands. Tips : You can ask employees to share their questions 1 or 2 days before the event or in live. Buffer advice on allhands here | Company CultureEmployee interactions | SlackHangoutMicrosoft TeamsInternal Chat | |
Let team members demo something they did that week or tool they love or initiative they want to share. It helps to keep everyone engaged with what others are doing and incentivized productivity through social proof. Tips : Zapier encourages team members to share their knowledge with internal talks. | Company CultureKnowledge ManagementEmployee interactions | HangoutMicrosoft TeamsZoom | |
Pair two teammates and encourage regular meetings to talk about their issues in their day to day job. Tips : In this idea Buffer put in place the Mastermind program: https://open.buffer.com/masterminds/ | Company CultureEmployee interactions | HangoutZoomSlackInternal Chat | |
Allow your employee to take some offline slot where they can focus on their task without being disturb | Employee Well Being | ||
Employees can post their books, movies, recipes, games suggestions | Company CultureEmployee Well Being | SlackInternal Chat |
Schedule your week:
Manage and monitor your team progress on remote
Loosing direct contact with your team can be hard due to:
- Lack of face-to-face supervision for both managers and their employees.
- Effort needed to locate information from coworkers. For a remote worker, a simple question can feel like a large obstacle.
- Social isolation with employees missing the informal social interaction of an office setting.
- Distractions at home, especially in the case of a sudden transition to virtual work, there is a much greater chance that employees will be contending with suboptimal workspaces and unexpected parenting responsibilities.
Here are some quick wins for managers to well organize their team remotely:
Managers are expected to:
| Communication | Tool | Frequency | Timing |
|---|---|---|---|
Zoom | Daily | 9h | |
Sms | / | / | |
Call | Weekly | During afternoon | |
Slack | Daily | End of the day |
Systematize Stand Up Meetings
When: First thing in the morning | Duration: 15 minutes
Daily stand-ups are designed to be quick daily check-ins and they’re easy to do via remote video call. The daily cadence ensures everyone is communicating and synced with what others are working on, in case they can pitch in. Focus your stand-ups on answering these questions:
- What did I work on yesterday?
- What am I working on today?
- What issues are blocking me?
Set "core team times” where all team members are available to collaborate.
"How is this remote work situation working out for you so far?"
Sources:
Keep a fun and positive atmosphere
Helping your team stay engaged will involve more than just meetings about work, projects, and performance. You’ll have to go the extra mile to foster connections and friendships that won’t come as naturally due to the distance.
Here is a list of ideas to challenge the creativity and the motivation of your employees:
🏋♀ 30-day push-up challenge
🎯 Bingo games
🤸♀Organize remote games or karaoke during online after work
🎮 Virtual Gaming Tournament
🤹Origami Challenge
💎 Share non professional tips
🤳 Photo Challenges
🌍 The Birth Map
🤩 Have an internal talk with an inspirational person
🏠 Home office tour
💻 Online video fun activities
👩🎨 DIY Craft Challenge
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🎁⚡ Send flowers with 10% discount with the code XANGE10
➡ JeudiMerci, to make great gifts for your employees, clients, partners only with their phone number!
🎁⚡ Send a gift at the cost price with the code XANGE
BULLE D'ECOUTE
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Running successful remote Meetings: our checklist
1° A successful meeting starts with a good calendar invitation
2° Meeting Start
➡️ Video ON (at least when you are talking)
➡️ Do not work on other things
➡️ Share you screen to illustrate what you're talking about. This helps everybody to be on the same part at the same moment.
3° During the meeting
Task : list all initiatives and ranked by feasibility and fun People in charge : Greg Deadline : For 15 april Priority : high Goal : Find 10 ideas
4° Post-Meeting
- Don’t assume “no news is good news.”
- Only ask for feedback at milestones of your project, not for every tiny detail.
- State which elements of the project you want feedback on.
- Tell the giver the status of the project, if you don’t, they may think that it is complete when it is not.
- Ask them :
➡️ Are the tools we're using helping you work efficiently?
➡️ What could we do to improve communication within the team?
➡️ Were the tasks and deadlines assigned to you appropriate for the schedule?
- Make them feedback
➡️ Mention specific details as “I saw that your latest marketing mailer generated 7,200 new sales leads. That’s twice what our previous one did. Great job!”
Tools Library
| Category | Tool Name | Description | Link |
|---|---|---|---|
Visio conference | L'API ajoute le chat vidéo à n'importe quelle application ou site, en quelques minutes. Nous avons plus de fonctionnalités qui facilitent l'utilisation de la vidéo en direct, afin que les développeurs lancent plus rapidement, expédient plus et évoluent avec une infrastructure mondiale. | ||
Visio conference | Envoyez des messages et passez des appels vocaux ou vidéo. Le service s'intègre à la suite Google. | ||
Visio conference | Une plateforme d'événements en ligne sur laquelle vous pouvez créer des événements virtuels qui connectent des personnes du monde entier. | ||
Visio conference | Enregistrez des messages vidéo de votre écran, de votre caméra ou des deux. Plus rapide que de taper un e-mail ou une réunion en direct | ||
Visio conference | Application de communication collaborative. Le service s'intègre à la suite Microsoft Office 365 et Skype et propose des extensions pouvant être intégrées à des produits autres que Microsoft | ||
Visio conference | Meeting vidéo. Aucun téléchargement d'application ou de logiciel n'est requis | ||
Visio conference | Application. Réunions et discussion Vidéo HD, audio, collaboration et discussion | ||
Time Tracking Software | Le suivi du temps de travail tout-en-un pour la gestion d'équipes sur le terrain ou à distance. | ||
Time Tracking SoftwareHR | Outils de productivité | ||
Time Tracking Software | Notre application permet aux employés et aux freelances de démarrer manuellement une horloge lorsqu'ils commencent à travailler sur une mission pour les employeurs. L'application prendra des captures d'écran d'ordinateur au hasard ou à des intervalles assignés par l'employeur, qui peuvent être consultées en ligne, comme preuve que le travail est effectué. | ||
Time Tracking Software | Suivez votre temps, gérez vos projets et envoyez des factures plus rapidement et plus efficacement avec RemoteOne. Nous rendons la gestion d'entreprises distantes plus productive pour les freelances, les entrepreneurs | ||
Time Tracking Software | Obtenez un enregistrement numérique sans faille de tout le temps du projet et de l'équipe, le tout sans les tracas des minuteries manuelles et de la prise de notes. | ||
Time Tracking SoftwareHR | Outils de productivité | ||
Internal messaging | Contrairement aux e-mails, les conversations dans Slack sont faciles à suivre. De plus, vous pouvez même passer des appels, partager des fichiers et connecter des applis externes. | ||
Team / Project managementHR | Créez des plans de projet, coordonnez les tâches et atteignez vos objectifs | ||
Team / Project management | aide à planifier des réunions sans envoyer et recevoir d'emails | ||
Team / Project management | est conçu pour que chaque membre de votre équipe logicielle planifie, suive et publie | ||
Team / Project management | Work OS qui permet à votre équipe de travailler ensemble en s’adaptant à votre quotidien et votre activité. | ||
Team / Project management | Les tableaux, listes et cartes de Trello permettent aux équipes d'organiser les projets et de définir leur ordre de priorité de façon amusante, souple et enrichissante. | ||
Productivity | Automatisation facile et connections inter-outils.. Zapier déplace automatiquement les informations entre vos applications Web afin que vous puissiez vous concentrer sur votre travail le plus important. | ||
Documents Sharing | Rassemblez vos contenus cloud et physiques avec vos outils favoris. Dossiers en lecture seule. 30 jours d'essai gratuit. Liens avec mot de passe. Historique des versions. Sauvegarde simple. | ||
Documents Sharing | Stockez et partagez vos photos, vidéos et autres fichiers dans le cloud, en toute sécurité. Avec votre compte Google, les 15 premiers Go de stockage sont gratuit | ||
Documents Sharing | le moyen le plus simple d'envoyer vos fichiers dans le monde entier. Partagez gratuitement des fichiers volumineux jusqu'à 2 Go | ||
Knowledge Management | US. Espace collaboratif pour vos notes, vos wikis et toute vos tâches | ||
Knowledge Management | FR. Pour concevoir un usage collaboratif des documents, Slite centralise au même endroit l'ensemble des notes de réunion, les documents de travail | ||
SurveyHR | Sintègre à la suite de Google. formulaires dynamiques | ||
SurveyHR | logiciel en ligne en tant qu'entreprise de services spécialisée dans la création de formulaires en ligne et les enquêtes en ligne. Son logiciel principal crée des formulaires dynamiques en fonction des besoins des utilisateurs. | ||
Admin / Legal | Gérez la vie de votre entreprise : modification des statuts de votre société ou modification de votre capital, protection de votre marque, résolution de litige ou encore fermeture de votre société | ||
Admin / LegalHR | US. signature électronique et gestion des transactions numériques, en vue de faciliter les échanges et validation électroniques de contrats et de documents. | ||
Admin / LegalHR | Jenji Studio est un module d’audit et de reporting avancé. Nous vous proposons un outil permettant d'analyser et d'exploiter encore mieux vos données de dépenses pour mener des campagnes d’optimisation, de gestion de la fraude ou de prévisions budgétaires. Jenji Studio est activé sur demande. | ||
Admin / Legal | Nous gérons l'ensemble de vos Démarches Juridiques | ||
Admin / LegalHR | Partenaire Siparex for Business. Les services en ligne Lucca remplacent vos fichiers Excel et optimisent la gestion de vos processus internes | ||
Admin / LegalHR | Un logiciel adapté à toutes les PME pour la gestion de la paie et des employés | ||
Admin / Legal | Facturation, gestion des impayés et relances en 1 clic Gestion des dépenses automatisée par une simple photo Trésorerie, CA et tableaux de bord actualisés en temps réel Prévisionnel de trésorerie : vos projections à 90 jours | ||
Admin / LegalHR | Partenaire Siparex for Business. FR. Editeur de logiciel qui propose des prestations de signature électronique afin de numériser les processus de contractualisation sur le marché européen. | ||
Password Management | Ce logiciel est un gestionnaire de mots de passe et permet de générer et de conserver des mots de passe de façon sécurisée, ainsi que des notes et documents | ||
Password Management | CyberGhost VPN est une sorte de logiciel qui masque votre adresse IP et redirige votre trafic Internet via un tunnel VPN crypté. Ainsi, vous serez en mesure de protéger votre identité numérique de votre FAI, autorités et autres regards indiscrets. | ||
Password Management | gestionnaire de mots de passe et une application de portefeuille numérique multiplateforme disponibles sur macOS, Windows, iOS et Android. Dashlane utilise un modèle de tarification Freemium qui comprend à la fois un niveau gratuit et un abonnement premium. | ||
Password Management | un outil de confidentialité et de sécurité qui crypte le trafic Web des utilisateurs et masque leurs adresses IP. | ||
Password Management | gestionnaire de mots de passe freemium qui enregistre de manière sécurisée des mots de passe existants ou générés dans un compte privé du nuage du même nom. | ||
Online white board | une plateforme collaborative de tableau blanc en ligne conçu pour les équipes distantes et distribuées. | ||
Employee well being measurement | Une plate-forme d'engagement simple pour les gestionnaires occupés pour établir la confiance, renforcer les relations et réussir en équipe. | ||
Employee well being measurement | Suivez le bien-être quotidien de votre équipe au travail et améliorez votre management. | ||
Event management | Eventbrite est un site Web de gestion d'événements et de billetterie basé aux États-Unis. Le service permet aux utilisateurs de rechercher, créer et promouvoir des événements locaux. | ||
Customer Success | Partenaire Siparex for Business. fonctions de ticketing, des options de libre-service, et d’assistance à la clientèle | ||
Customer Success | fonctions de ticketing, des options de libre-service, et d’assistance à la clientèle | ||
UI / UX Design | Canva est une plate-forme de conception graphique qui permet aux utilisateurs de créer des graphiques, des présentations, des affiches, des documents et d'autres contenus visuels sur les réseaux sociaux. | ||
UI / UX Design | InVision est une plateforme de gestion de la conception au développement dotée d'outils et de fonctionnalités intégrés permettant aux individus et aux équipes de créer des prototypes web et mobiles haute-fidélité, de collaborer en temps réel et de gérer facilement leurs projets.$ | ||
UI / UX Design | Zeplin est un logiciel qui permet aux graphistes et aux concepteurs (travaillant sur Sketch et/ou Photoshop) de collaborer simplement avec les développeurs | ||
Link management | Bitly, anciennement bit.ly, est un service de réduction d'URL. La compagnie Bitly, inc. a été fondée en 2008 et est basée à New York | ||
Emailing | Mailjet, la solution emailing tout-en-un pour créer et envoyer vos emails marketing et transactionnels, newsletters et SMS. |
Want to improve your team management in remote ? Here are all the resources to avoid any confusion or frustration from your team.
- Remote work policy template
- List of internals rituals you can use
- A tool list
Want to improve your team management in remote ? Here are all the resources to avoid any confusion or frustration from your team.
- Remote work policy template
- List of internals rituals you can use
- A tool list
- Remote work policy template
- List of internals rituals you can use
- A tool list