The key to taking care of your team remotely

Covid-19 triggered the world’s biggest work from home experiment, and although initially it may have sounded like an ideal scenario for some, it’s turning out to be far tougher than many imagined. 

From fridges to deliveries, home-schooling and living with family, the working from home dream for many employees is not as easy as it sounds. Rest assured, it’s not too late to salvage them with a few remote employee engagement activities and ideas. 

Employees finding it difficult to stay motivated while working from home isn’t anything new either. A 2015 study shows just how difficult it is for employees to stay motivated while working from home. So if you’re wondering how to be a remote manager, or simply trying to figure out how to motivate your team remotely, it’s important to know that you’re not alone. Instead, consider implementing these managing remote teams best practices, and a few pleasant incentives, along the way:

Apps that facilitate communication via instant messaging and video conferencing are integral to maintaining clear and open communication with remote workers. Build up an ecosystem of apps and best practices when it comes to regular communication. 

But even with this in place, it’s more important than ever to define goals, offer clear and constructive feedback on tasks, and to proactively manage teams. Communicating expectations and desired outcomes, with more lead time than usual, can help employees come to grips with the complexities of working remotely.

Working from home means some employees are pushing through the day without any downtime – but if you’re wondering how to engage remote employees, the best solution might be to schedule in regular breaks.

Encourage remote teams to take a walk around the block, do a short crossword, or even schedule virtual team building activities like lunches that’ll allow employees to catch up on non-work related matters.

Setting boundaries at work isn’t always easy – and knowing how to keep teams motivated at home while family and work life begin to blend is tricky. The solution isn’t to push your employees harder though! Rather show them you, understand that boundaries are harder to set now than ever before. Forbes offers a comprehensive overview for setting boundaries in the workplace that’s useful for both employers and employees.

Healthy habits are more important than ever, and rewarding employees who embrace them with some remote employee engagement ideas can be a great way to keep staff happy and healthy at the same time. 

Encouraging your team to adopt a work life balance, will of course include regular exercise and getting enough sleep, but these are aspects largely out of your control. However, if you’re trying to figure out how to motivate your remote employees to eat healthily, this is definitely something you can help out with.

Setting up employee meal programs and allocating a food budget to employees for lunch time breaks will get you on the right track to healthy eating habits for the team. You could even offer them a free healthy lunch, delivered via Uber Eats to their doors!

As in physical office environments, formulating a remote company culture will help focus, motivate and reward employees. This should incorporate your business’s goals and cultures from the physical office environment, but with adaptations for the remote working world. Hold weekly online awards or shout out sessions, offer incentives for achievements and milestones, or foster a bit of food culture with meal vouchers for shared virtual lunches. 

Taking care of your remote team isn’t easy, but there are many solutions at hand to make it easier. If you’re looking for quick and easy solutions to integrate into your remote teams management policies, then Uber for Business has several seamless options at your disposal. 

Why not offer your employees Uber Eats vouchers, or schedule weekly virtual lunches, all with seamless integration into your Uber for Business account?