Turnover is expected to some degree in most industries, but it’s never desirable because it costs money and time to recruit and train new team members. While some turnover can’t be avoided, companies can make changes to retain their best employees.
The easiest way to retain employees is to make working for your company enjoyable. You might think this means stocking the fridge with snacks and handing out hefty bonuses, but it’s actually simpler than that. What makes a company most enjoyable isn’t the perks, but the environment.
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Remote workers want to feel connected to the team
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Remote employees are especially subject to turnover when they don’t feel like they’re working for the right company. The biggest problem they face is feeling disconnected from their co-workers. If you want to keep your best remote team members, you need an inclusive work environment and company culture.
Since remote workers aren’t in the office every day, their work environment consists of online interactions, cloud-based collaboration tools, emails, and their experience with your company’s intranet. All of these digital tools are useful, but they lack the element of human connection that makes people feel like they’re part of a team.
Technology is essential, but it’s equally important to create a supportive team-oriented environment that includes remote workers. Here’s how technology can help you create a pleasant and inclusive work environment that supports your remote employees.
1. Digital signage makes remote employees feel included
While most employees enjoy working from home, being physically separated from the rest of the team can make remote workers feel excluded. You can bring everyone to a place of inclusion through digital signage.
Digital signage like this one from Visix.com can make remote employees feel included and part of the team. For example, you can publish special messages to your company’s intranet where remote employees can see them. They won’t need to come into the office to see your motivational quotes, employee recognition, and reminders for upcoming events.
Remote employees need a stronger sense of connection
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Remote teams are a blessing to companies worldwide, especially now that the coronavirus pandemic has created a need for businesses to operate completely online. Businesses with remote teams aren’t limited to local talent; they can hire anyone from across the world.
Although remote teams are wonderful, they don’t get the same level of interaction as an in-house team. They lack that daily connection that fosters relationships with their co-workers and managers. It’s almost like remote employees are all on their own islands, doing their own thing until it’s absolutely necessary to contact someone else on the team.
While some remote employees enjoy being isolated from others, most want at least some interaction. Remote employees want to feel like they’re part of a team and they want to know their contributions matter. Without some level of recognition, they’re likely to bounce.
Digital signage makes it easy to make remote employees feel included, especially when you recognize employees. Even when they’re not in the office, they’ll see your messages of appreciation on the company intranet and they’ll know those same messages are being displayed in the office for all to see.
2. Slack fosters outstanding collaboration
Smooth and effective collaboration is the key to getting projects completed on time. You can have the best team in the world, but when collaboration methods are disorganized, projects will be difficult to complete.
Remote teams are at an automatic disadvantage when it comes to collaboration. Team members can’t just wander over to someone else, tap them on the shoulder, and ask for quick clarification. This is a problem because people are most likely to quit when doing their job becomes a source of constant, daily frustration.
Using team collaboration software is the easiest way to improve collaboration. You need an application that will organize conversations, tasks, and client feedback. Nothing does this better than Slack.
Slack is an absolute game-changer for remote teams, especially development teams. With Slack, an entire team can collaborate in real-time in a highly organized environment.
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Teams can set up individual channels for discussion to keep conversations separated and categorized. For example, teams can create the following channels and invite-only the users who need to be part of the discussions:
- Separate channels for each client’s requests
- Separate channels for each general project
- Separate channels for each team to discuss their tasks
- Private channels for managers and executives
Any topic of discussion can be separated into a channel just for that conversation. Team members can even create threads inside of channels to keep multiple conversations even more organized.
Without a collaboration tool like Slack, remote employees have to go back and forth through emails to communicate about projects. Otherwise, they’ll end up with clutter in their task management program.
3. Task management programs help remote employees meet deadlines
There’s nothing worse than being a remote employee and having no deadlines for your assignments. Or, having deadlines, but no way to see them on a daily basis without referring to a series of yellow sticky notes all over your desk.
Although they can be flexible, setting deadlines is a necessity. “Just get it to me whenever” is the worst possible way to set a deadline for someone. When a task has no deadline, the employee is likely to forget about the task completely.
Task management systems like Asana, for example, put tasks and their due dates right in front of remote employees the second they sign into their account. Unlike other task management applications, you don’t have to click around to find projects or due dates.
The right tools will help you retain remote employees
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Remote employees want to do a good job and be a contribution to the company, but they need the right tools. People don’t leave their jobs for no reason. The more organized you become as a company, the easier it will be to reduce turnover and hang onto your best employees.
