Managing your team effectively is essential; it leads to increased motivation, higher productivity, improved staff satisfaction and ultimately achieving your team’s goals and targets.

Managing people comes with its challenges, as well as a requirement for specific skills and knowledge: communication and listening skills, problem-solving and conflict management, and knowledge about each team member – from their language of appreciation to their learning styles. Adding to this, managing a remote team can bring extra challenges into the mix.

In October 2024, 13% of workers in Great Britain worked fully remotely, and another 28% of workers split their time between working from home and the office.

Working remotely, also known as telecommuting, is when a team member works outside of the traditional office environment, usually at home. This brings great benefits for the employee – no commute, more flexibility, reduced associated costs – and to the employer – happier employees, reduced costs associated with providing office space, and even higher rates of productivity. However, it can also come with downsides, such as increased loneliness, difficulty in delegating tasks and tracking progress, and reduced opportunities for training and self-development.

To minimise any negative impacts of working remotely on your team, there are several strategies you can use to manage your remote team effectively.

How to Manage Remote Teams Effectively

Virtually… leave your office door open

In an office environment, a team member could simply knock on their manager’s door if they wanted to speak to them about an issue or a query. Working remotely is not an option, and so it is important to create a way for your team members to be able to contact you easily and informally.

This starts with being approachable. You can do this by actively listening to the other person when they talk, for example making eye contact with them and nodding along as they are speaking. You can also summarise what you have heard and say it back to them to ensure you have fully understood their point. Showing understanding and compassion for your team members can encourage them to trust you and to come to you when they are facing a problem.

It is also important to be available. Share your calendar so that team members know when you have availability to talk. Schedule regular meetings, both on an individual and team basis and set these up as video chats so that everyone is digitally face-to-face.

How to Manage Remote Teams remotely

Virtually… set up a productive space

When people picture working from home, they envisage a beautiful home office space, with an ergonomic chair and thriving pot plant. However, the reality is often work whilst reclined on their sofa, sitting at their dining table, or simply in bed.

To help your team work as effectively as possible, it is important to ensure they have a practical but comfortable space to work in at home. The first step is to check that each team member has the tools they need: for example, an adjustable desk chair, dual monitors, a quiet space to work, or an ergonomic mouse and keyboard.

You can also encourage everyone to personalise their workspaces to make them a pleasurable environment to be in. This could involve putting up pictures of friends and family, installing good lighting, buying potted plants, or having a stationery organiser to keep the desk space clean and tidy.

Virtually… chat around the water cooler

It is unlikely that when working in an office, you take note of all the little breaks to socialise; make a coffee, walk past someone else’s desk, or catch up at the start of the day when you arrive. When working remotely, it is important to encourage team members to check in with each other and to build relationships as a team. Some ways to do this could be setting up a team WhatsApp group and by organising online social events outside of work time, such as a classic “lockdown” Teams quiz. This allows the team to get to know each other, without waiting until the annual Christmas party!

There are also many tools that your team can use to communicate; keeping them connected and informed. Sites such as Monday.com or Asana allow team members to track, assign, and comment on tasks. Having the space for continuous communication between team members throughout the day allows team members to ask questions as they arise and be clear about what is expected of them. It also helps to prevent team leaders from micromanaging their team, or certain team members from being overloaded with actions, as all tasks and responsibilities are clearly shown on your team’s account.

Managing teams remotely

Virtually… host training days

Group training sessions are easily organised when the whole team is in the same space, however, it is important to ensure that team members also have the opportunity to access training whilst working remotely. By encouraging self-development, you enable your team to work efficiently whilst reducing their stress and speeding up product or service delivery.

At Mantralis, all employees have access to an online training platform, iHASCO, which hosts both compulsory and optional courses that staff can work through at their own pace. Everyone also has an individual training budget which they can use to book on to additional training, or for other activities that will improve their performance at work, such as coaching sessions.

We also still organise group training sessions, all carried out online, covering all sorts of topics from Excel skills to personal money management masterclasses. Doing training sessions as a group can help create a team bond, and encourage team members to aid each other’s learning.

Back to reality… provides the opportunity for team members to meet in person.

Ultimately, even once you have made sure your team can regularly talk to you and each other, have a suitable working space, and keep upskilling themselves, it is still important to get everyone together in person when possible.

To give you some ideas, over the next few months, our team will be meeting up for our quarterly meeting, going to the pub to play Jury Games, and completing an inflatable obstacle course.

The Mantralis team at a local concert in July 2024.

Final thoughts

Having a fully or partially remote team does not need to be a barrier to leading them successfully. Let us know in the comments below if you have any other strategies to manage your remote team effectively!

If you would like to find out any more about Mantralis or our project management consultancy services, head to our website.