As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to impact the world, employees and employers everywhere are adapting to conducting business from home offices, kitchen tables and couches. Businesses may have already had a loose remote work policy before the pandemic, but yours should go further than the logistics of working outside the office.
When working remotely, it can be difficult to feel part of the bigger picture, which hurts the overall collaboration process and can ultimately slow down an employee's professional growth and development.
Here are some tips to keep your remote workforce in the fold and their development on track. No one knows how long the pandemic will last, but these guidelines can help you during this uncertain time and beyond.
Keep the learning culture front & center
Organizational culture is a living organism, and this organism requires nurturing and feeding. Keeping the organization's values front and center, with a focus on developing a culture of learning, is a critical first step. Be sure this culture shows in all areas, from how messages are communicated to daily conversations.
A learning management system (LMS) with machine learning capabilities can also nurture development when you can't provide support in person. As workers search for lessons and resources, the algorithm learns which assets best fit their queries and rank those higher on the results page. Delivering in-the-moment knowledge reinforces your learning values and empowers your workforce.
Ask them!
Ask remote workers how the organization can better support their learning needs. Are communication channels difficult to navigate? How can the organization make them feel more included? Devise a quick email, or better yet—send a short survey to your workers through your LMS and get instant feedback to gauge their feelings. The simple step of asking will make them feel valued.
Support communication & shared learning
Social networks connect people. There are a variety of enterprise social tools with which you can build a community to support communication, collaboration and continuous learning. Consider using mobile and virtual tools like Slack or Yammer to make conversations easier. When remote workers can easily connect with their peers, they can feel that their contributions are meaningful.
Use of different delivery tools to share your work
Tools like Zoom encourage group video calls. Seeing faces build connections. Plus, hearing a voice helps with the delivery of learning instructions rather than only depending on the written word. Use wiki tools to allow remote workers to add and access resources in the moment.
Add fun into remote sessions or meetings
Have fun games on hand when managing remote employees training. Challenge the group to a wall decorating contest or invite them to share the most interesting items on their desks. This builds camaraderie between groups and makes remote learning a more interesting and fun part of the day.
Build in collaboration tools for action learning
When considering nurturing the culture of learning, create a place for group collaboration. Use multifeatured video tools that allow for virtual learning, group annotation and collaboration or use a group facetime. For shared projects using Google tools, Dropbox Chat or OneNote will build collaboration opportunities and remove the feeling of isolation. This allows for quality shared learning, action learning sets and project work even while offline.
Connection breeds productivity
Equip your remote workers with the tools they need to build and share their knowledge encourages them to stay engaged in their ongoing development.
Regardless of how you choose to host remote learning, let people have the option to express their own ideas about how to create and support a remote culture. People want to learn and feel part of a bigger picture, especially during challenging times.
Discover how an LMS can mitigate disruptions while working from home. Visit our crisis solutions page to see how hosting meetings and instructor-led training through Absorb LMS can save time and provide easy reporting.
