How to Train Teams for a Flexible Work Culture
Published: 19/05/2025
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The focus of this article is on a flexible work culture. Namely, we will be talking about training your teams to not only operate efficiently in the environment but to also nurture it as they go.
Companies that embraced a flexible working model full-time are still the highest in demand for candidates. However, more and more businesses raise concerns that while their numbers surged initially, they’ve either stagnated or eventually started going down, without an apparent reason. The issue is, indeed, not too easily detected as it has no metrics attached to it and is therefore often not taken into consideration. What prevents most companies from succeeding is the lack of a flexible work culture.
Building an office culture was normally an organic process that required minimal moderation as teams would interact face-to-face every day. However, when your workers work in different locations and/or adhere to different schedules, the traditional way no longer works. So, how do you train teams for a flexible work culture?
First of all, you need to create an environment that supports flexible work. It needs two things: a set of rules and digital tools. The rules set boundaries on how much flexibility is allowed within the company and what standards employees must adhere to. Digital tools, then, help them ensure they stay within these lines.
Although that explanation is rather vague, the details, such as what rules are to be imposed or what tools should be adopted, are highly individual to every business. Your flexible setup should be based on your goals, company structure, quality standards and other criteria that are unique to your organisation.
The success of a flexible work culture lies in your team’s ability to work equally well individually and together. Finding the balance between the two things that are traditionally seen as direct opposites may sound difficult, but it’s more manageable than you think, especially in today’s digital-first world.
If you don’t want to gradually wander into the treacherous territory of micro-management when pushing your teams towards better results every time, training them with self-management skills is a long-term solution you should turn your sights on. It is a particularly important asset in companies that pursue a flexible work culture, for it celebrates an individualistic work approach in which employees tailor their working setup in accordance with their needs and preferences. This puts them in a position of power and ultimately in charge of themselves, and ensures their results adhere to the company’s demands. A high degree of self-management is required for that to be done, and while this could be perceived as something the workers should take care of themselves, it’s beneficial for all parties involved if you, the employer, invest time and resources in helping your workers develop top-tier self-management skills.
Time management workshops and solutions supporting it, such as Timesheet Portal, are crucial for training teams that flourish in a flexible work culture. The ability to get a look at your time expenditure within a pre-determined time frame will expose patterns and trends that, broken down, will point to strengths and weaknesses. As with other skills, self-management gets better the more it's practised. Not to mention, it fosters a culture of trust and ownership, which then feeds back into the betterment of self-management, becoming a closed circle.
The ability to cooperate smoothly is among the foundation blocks of a flexible work culture. Given it doesn’t work in a way a traditional in-person setup does, here’s a mixture of technology and training that goes into establishing it. There’s a good chance you already have solutions in place for basic remote communication, such as Microsoft Teams or Slack, but if you want to build a truly functional, flexibility-driven company, you’ll need to push these lines further.
Since the challenge lies within prioritising individualistic approach yet having to keep the team on the same page, a centralised platform of several integrated solutions is your best bet. The type of tools your teams need depend on what you do and what you’re trying to achieve, but the ability to gather them all in a single accessible hub not only will connect your remote workers but also eliminate the pre-existing departamental siloes. With all data now shared and visible, new opportunities are bound to arise.
Tool integration is a much wider topic than the above passage has covered. It’s an irreplaceable resource, and therefore, we want to expand on it, potentially giving you some ideas of what solutions could benefit your business. While most features and their use vary in usability based on your goals, the following are some of the most versatile ones.
Although many people perceive flexibility to be synonymous with hybrid working, it entails much more than combining physical and remote offices. One of the traits of a flexible work culture is the ability to select the work hours that suit the individual's needs, circumstances or simple preferences. As long as it doesn’t clash with the company’s set boundaries. However, it may be challenging to accommodate everyone’s custom schedules without opening yourself up to delays and miscommunications. But not if you have the right set of tools.
Solutions incorporate various modules that are closely intertwined and feed data into each other. For example, our tool tracks your team’s time and is customisable in how it does that via time rules, deliverables and such. A shift scheduler can be attached to the timesheets, allowing either yourself, your management or the workers themselves to tailor their shifts in accordance with the existing progress. Such an approach only allows schedule customisation that doesn’t overrun your time and deliverables, and still offers a level of flexibility to your teams.
A system of integrated tools has multiple benefits, including offering practically endless optimisation. As we’ve already touched upon, a centralised hub makes data accessible for the teams. Additionally, the more your team uses the solutions, the more data they will record and process, crunching it into digestible reports that are available on demand, leading to a variety of actionable adjustments and aiding your decision-making. The sky is the limit when it comes to what metrics you’re tracking and what sort of optimisation you use them for.
Specifically for nurturing a flexible work culture, an integrated setup can highlight gaps in communication and collaboration, as well as opportunities that are not being taken. For team leaders, this means better planning and scheduling moving forward, efficiency-driven resource distribution and much more. With each change, you will see different results, so don’t be scared to experiment - every result contributes to future success.
Work culture, flexible or not, is static. That said, it’s meant to always be changing. However, not all change is good. So, how do you avoid making decisions that set your teams back? You need to keep a close eye on every adjustment you make to gauge its impact. And the best way to do that is to hear from your workers what their experience is like.
Given that a flexible work culture is strongly oriented towards promoting a healthier work-life balance and overall employee wellbeing, it’s often automatically assumed that it’s the preferred work style for workers. However, we cannot and should not judge for others. Even if everything looks good on paper, it’s important to listen to the people, too.
Unfortunately, there are cases when flexible working backfires, leading to internal disputes and overworking tendencies as opposed to smoother collaboration and healthier work-life balance. Falling productivity metrics are an indicator that flexibility as an approach isn’t working, but workplace hostility, frequent miscommunications and employee dissatisfaction point at flexible work culture issues. To avoid them before they manifest or solve them at the early stages, create a feedback loop accessible to everyone on the team. Be it regular 1-on-1s, monthly feedback forms or other means to let everyone have their say, understanding how your team is affected is a vital part of your success. It allows you to adjust your setup to serve your workers better or, in rare instances, it can tell you that flexible working is simply not suitable for your business. Either way, you will benefit from it.
A flexible work culture stands on two pillars - the ability of the workers to both work autonomously and collaborate smoothly. As an employer, you need to create an environment in which it’s doable and the self-management skills are continuously nurtured. There are multiple solutions on the market that address both areas, connecting your teams in ways they work together and hold each other accountable, all the while being responsible for doing their part in the way that suits them individually and complies with the company’s requirements.
But simply getting the tools won’t bring the results. Linking them through integrations will help you build a centralised platform that connects the entire team on multiple levels. In terms of building a flexible work culture, a setup made of solutions that feed into one another can help your teams manage their schedules in ways that don’t compromise productivity, yet keep everyone happy. Additionally, integrated toolboxes are a trove of actionable data for team leaders, allowing them to adjust and optimise easily. However, don’t assume just because the numbers are good, your culture is booming - it’s important to hear what your staff have to say!
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