<aside> 💡 Last edited on: January 18, 2024
Contributors: @Jessica Zwaan, @Adam Horne
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Remote working is a part of the fabric of our day to day. Since 2020 people have expected clarity and guidance on what “remote” means for you. Even if your team is in-office 4 days per week, you should still have some guidance on what remote work looks like so your team can be well informed of their expectations, and so they are successful on the days they work remotely from the rest of the team.
Any occasion where an employee may be working away from a centrally defined place of work (e.g. HQ or office). This could include working from home, working from abroad, or even occasions where you are working on client sites.
Remember: Remote working is a spectrum of sorts. It will mean different things to different companies, so our advice is to define it for your business. Make it clear to your employees what it means for you.
Clarity on expectations working remotely is essential to ensuring alignment on work, but also essential to maintaining effective communication and wellbeing too. Being clear about what you expect from employees, and also what they can expect from you in return when working remotely is crucial. Breaking down expectations into these two (What to expect from us, and what we expect from you) could be a nice way of framing this. You should think about:
👉 Communications 👉 Wellbeing 👉 Conduct 👉 Working Hours 👉 Practicalities (e.g. Internet connection)
Our advice would be to cover all these areas and any others that might apply to your business in detail. You may even decide to break it down to provide detail on how expectations might differ in different scenarios…e.g.
Remote working while you travel (i.e. digital nomad)
Remote working while you travel temporarily
Remote working from a client office, or a customer space
Remote working all the time
This could be a nice way of framing expectations around communication, and information sharing when working remotely. E.g. where can you access the information you need, how do processes change vs being in the office, and what ‘best practice’ process do you have in place to ensure people can work effectively and efficiently.