4 considerations for a thriving distributed team

As we all navigate the new normal of the business world, below are four critical considerations when building a successful workplace.

Remote workforces require different technologies, resources, and processes than organizations that rely on the physical workplace. (Image: Shutterstock)

As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, organizations all over the world have adjusted to remote work environments. While some businesses have struggled to adapt, others were already distributed by default. In other words, by design, they developed their organizational architecture with team members located all over the country – or even the world.

Many of those businesses have not skipped a beat, as they were already well-equipped with the processes, information flows, workflows, strategies, culture and resources to successfully execute when the world transformed into a distributed workforce by sheer necessity.

Related: Make time to connect: How to keep remote employees engaged

As we all navigate the new normal of the business world, below are four critical considerations when building a successful workplace, distributed by design:

1. Leadership

When choosing leadership for an organization that operates in a distributed environment, it’s critical to identify leaders who truly believe in a distributed workplace. If possible, it’s ideal for prospective leaders to be comfortable, and even prefer leading distributed teams. They likely have already been in hand-to-hand combat learning from multiple mistakes from the past, and have fluency in the “how” of creating one team where all members are equally valued.

2. Teammates

When hiring for a company that operates in a distributed environment, it’s ideal to recruit teammates that prefer working in a distributed environment. If you bring non-believers into the organization, they may operate with confirmation bias and begin dragging down the culture with references to “how much better it would be” if everyone were in the same place. There’s no time for that.

3. Tools and processes

Remote workforces require different technologies, resources, and processes than organizations that rely on the physical workplace. For a shortlist of recommended tools to facilitate collaboration:

4. Culture

Before becoming a founder, I believed culture was developed organically. Now, I largely believe that culture is an organic byproduct of exceptional processes that have been challenged and refined until you’re at a massive executional advantage, with a near-magical mojo across the organization. The final processes you land on will be born from struggle. So, let it begin.

While businesses that are distributed by design are initially better poised to embrace requirements of today’s working conditions, all organizations are learning how to operate and drive maximum productivity, and employee health and wellness, by choice or by necessity. By being open to change, and leveraging collaboration tools across the organization, it’s entirely possible to put new and effective processes in place and create a culture of unity and perseverance during this time of uncertainty—and beyond.

Laurel Taylor is CEO and founder of FutureFuel.io.

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