This article is addressing founders, MDs, project managers and anyone with managerial power over the teams. Managing remote workers has set a series of challenges to previously office-based companies. Since moving forward the trending work model will remain hybrid, we seek to aid you in bettering the processes that involve remote staff.
Starting in 2020, even historically office-only businesses were forced into continuing their operations remotely. This has exposed a massive flaw in regards to flexibility and communication within many companies. Simply put, since they have not considered the possibility of not being office-based, they were not equipped to adapt to an overnight change.
Companies that were predominantly office-based but would occasionally outsource their workforce were in a better position. However, even they found out that their processes need some major adjustments. Similarly to other business elements, such as marketing or sales process, this is another area organisations need to optimise, especially now that the novelty factor has worn off.
Hybrid is the Way Forward
If you have never outsourced the workforce, chances are you’re under impression that remote working is something that will go away entirely once the pandemic is over. However, many signs that range from employee satisfaction surveys to staff productivity growth indicate that the work model of the future is hybrid. This means that even when the companies will be allowed to come back into the office at their full capacity, it wouldn’t make sense to do so for many. We strongly encourage you to go the hybrid route - and this is why we are happy to bring to your attention 5 solutions that will help this transition.
Despite a telling name, our solution’s functionality stretches far beyond the time tracking of remote workers. Timesheet Portal is designed to support a lot of pay and bill operations that can get rather complex with dealing with remote staff. Additionally, it serves as a collaboration tool by offering centralised document storage that enables easy document sharing and tracked editing.
We also tap into territories such as holiday management and expenses approval process, taking yet another administrative worry off your hands. Whether you seek to build a hybrid office and are looking for ways to align your staff or if you’re embracing a fully remote workplace, Timesheet Portal is filled with features to meet your needs. Best of all, instead of coming as a pre-packed solution, it offers you the freedom of building your own functionality package.
Powerful through its simplicity, Basecamp is a project management tool designed to smoothen the communication between the management and the remote workers. It helps streamline remote work through interactive checklists, easy file sharing and discussion board-style communication channels. However, it’s worth noting that unlike the majority of project management solutions, Basecamp is focused on daily task tracking rather than overviewing the entirety of a project.
The permission management feature makes this tool adaptable for both internal and external uses. For example, you can invite both, the remote workers and the client to a project created in Basecamp. While it can be used as a channel for your staff and the client to communicate directly, you can also create elements of the project (discussion, checklists, etc) that, although within the same project, will only be visible to your and your workers.
This solution is designed for agile teams and encompasses a wide range of project management tools that aren’t just compatible with outsourced workforce management but are built to support it. Its most prominent feature is a large-scale customisation option when it comes to building workflows and even setting the tone for team communication.
Whether you solely work with the remote workers or are trying to synch them up with your on-site employees, YouTrack is a tool you’ll benefit from greatly. From in-depth reporting to an intuitive in-app search option, it gives you a centralised platform that is easily accessible anywhere in the world. Also, for teams consisting of lesser than 10 users, the software is completely free.
As the name suggests, EmailAnalytics is a productivity tracking tool that’s built to present your team’s email activity statistics in a visual, digestible format. The reports include data such as an average response time, the number of emails sent/received throughout the day and many others. Additionally, it comes with a comparison feature, enabling team managers to compare their team’s performance with others.
It’s a very convenient and easy-to-adopt tool for external workers' management as it provides data you can then use to improve email productivity. It can also reveal that email may not be the best communication channel in your team - meaning you will have identified a gap and can now address it. In fact, if email proves to be inefficient, the next solution on the list makes a perfect alternative.
You have most likely heard or used Slack at this point. This business-orientated instant messenger software is one of the most popular internal communication tools, both in-office and when managing outsourced workers. From messaging to video calling and file sharing, Slack is an incredibly convenient communication channel.
Additionally, it integrates with a wide range of other solutions: project management tools, marketing tools, CRMs, and many more. This way you get notified via an automated IM if something needing your attention occurred within the other tool - as opposed to hoping you will find it yourself in time. What’s more, Slack is available for free - making it a very favourable solution for small companies and startups.
Summary
The world has recently been forced to adapt to remote working. With this, new challenges arose. And so did the variety of the solutions addressing them. The market is saturated with software that helps adjust and optimise the communication with your outsourced workforce, which can make it challenging to navigate.
At Timesheet Software, we believe there is no such thing as a bad solution - but a bad fit. When building a digital toolbox aimed at managing remote workers, use your team’s working style as a pointer. As a secondary metric, address the goals you are trying to achieve. A combination of these two criteria will surely help you find a set of digital tools you’ll be able to rely on for years to come.
Do we sound like a good fit? Book a demo to see what we can do.
