Let Go and Lead - Bringing Out the Best in Your Remote Team

Remote work is trending, as they say. With a pandemic restricting commuting and travel, this may indeed be the new normal. According to telecommuting data from Global Workplace Analytics, a research-based consulting firm, remote work has grown by 173% since 2005, and 4.7 million people in the U.S. alone are working remotely.

Internationally, 70% of professionals work remotely at least one day a week, while 53% work remotely for at least half of the week, according to a study released by the Swiss office provider IWG. 

Whether by choice or necessity, leading from the in-home office comes with its own challenges, especially if you are more accustomed to on-site personnel. Also, leading is different than managing a team remote or otherwise.  As defined in John Eades book, Building the Best, a leader's definition is "someone whose actions inspire, empower, and serve to elevate others over an extended time."

The biggest challenge to leading a remote team is letting go of over-managing them. As Carol Cochran, Director of People & Culture at FlexJobs, sees it, “You have to trust your employees in a remote team. The difference in choosing to trust first is that you ask questions versus assuming that someone is taking advantage or otherwise intentionally underperforming when you see an issue.”

Trust means letting go and trusting in team mangers and members' resourcefulness, which comes with new concerns as team members may:

• Be anxious or distracted due to the Coronavirus 
• Have less work due to economic slowdown
• Be concerned about future employment 
• Have additional responsibilities such as childcare to manage while working from home
• Have new technology issues related to working remotely

To trust others, leaders must demonstrate trust as well. Letting go is not only an essential delegation practice, it invites leaders to reflect on the trust they have in themselves.  This is challenging to do without the assistance of a coach or mentor. However, when leaders are self-aware and supported, they are better positioned to fully support others to work more independently.

Given such challenges, one can implement a few best practices to help lead while letting go:

1. Strengthen Your Emotional Resilience According to the Milken Institute, an organization dedicated to catalyzing solutions to persistent global challenges, leaders need to focus on “...bolstering your emotional and organizational resilience... to marshal resolve in order to stay the course--and to handle the kind of attention that comes from doing so.” To make this happen leaders need to find ways to stay calm and thoughtful. This might involve making time to restore their energy and gain needed perspective, as well as staying balanced in all areas of our lives especially the personal.
2. Communication. No Such Thing as too Much. Regular communication with your team managers is essential. Mandy Brown, the CEO of Editorially, a writing platform, advocates remote teams overcommunicate on purpose. "On a remote team, opportunities for misunderstanding between teammates distributed across both time and geography magnify," says Brown, adding recording meetings so needing clarity on the meeting's expectations can go back and look at the video.
3. More Technology is a Good Thing. As a leader, your job is to encourage collaboration. Communication tools are a simple way to keep everyone engaged, according to Inc. tech columnist Jason Aten. “While email and text messages might be a short-term solution,” Aten adds, “tools like Slack or Microsoft Teams are key apps for greater collaboration and communication adding the some of these collaboration tools are available for free.
4. Manage Expectations. Managing expectations is the role of both leader and manager. Success depends largely on stating clearly both the tasks and the reasons that drive them, and foster understanding of success measures. Indeed.com recommends letting the team know how often you want them to update you. “By letting your team (or its managers) know what you want from them up front, you can make sure you're synchronized."  This includes defining the scope of work, deadlines, and deliverables for each task or project- allowing leaders to avoid asking the often-unproductive question, “What's everyone doing?” 
5. Focus on Outcomes. Not Activity. As a leader, it is not your job to manage every aspect of the remote team’s workload. This is why letting go is critical. It frees you up to focus on the bottom line - successful outcomes. According to the Harvard Business Review, this means not only focusing on metrics and best practices, but also “...stepping back to identify the business outcomes the company is looking to impact and tracking progress regularly to ensure they're moving the needle.”
6. But Hold People Accountable. There will always be a few people who take advantage of their remoteness to waste time. That’s why it’s crucial to establish firm goals and expectations for each team and their manager. Don’t give in to micro-managing everyone because of a few bad apples. Check in that you are communicating your specific expectations. Encourage a coach approach to manage anyone not meeting these by investigating their lack of progress in a 1-1 conversation. Let them tell you what they need to show up more engaged and then hold them to the actions they set for themselves.
7. Encourage a Healthy Virtual Workplace
   Right now, your teams have a lot going on. Kids underfoot. Partners unaccustomed to working in the same space. Elderly parents feeling isolated. In such a situation, work can actually be a strategy to ‘get away from it all”, but this is not an excuse to heap on more pressure.  According to what is known as “The Yerkes-Dodson law," performance increases with physiological or mental stress, but performance decreases when the level of stress becomes too high.

During these uncertain times, reconsider what productivity really means for the success of your team. The days of punching a clock - even metaphorically are disappearing as are rigid work hours. Trust your team. Give them the freedom and flexibility to work when they are at their most productive. Meet your own physical and emotional needs. And let go.

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The author of this article

Merci Miglino ICF Master Certified Coach

Merci is an ICF Master Certified Coach who has been coaching and training coaches for 20 years. Her experience and natural emotional intelligence support executives in enhancing and sustaining leadership skills that drive results.