Effective Communication as a Remote Leader

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If you're a team leader, how do you remain an effective communicator and facilitator in a virtual environment? How do your interactions with your teammates change? You'll likely provide more communication, coaching, and feedback when working with remote teams. Let's discuss some best practices that will help you do these tasks. Being a leader for a virtual team isn't that different from leading a team face to face. One way that things can change is when using technology. Team members can experience connectivity problems or they may become easily distracted while working from home. In these instances, there are three areas where you'll need to shift your interactions. (air whooshing) The first is over-communication. When teams are meeting in person, leaders often rely on one-time communication to get a message across, and assume that team members will catch whatever they might've missed from a coworker in passing or in the break room. But in the virtual environment, we can't rely on casual opportunities for teams to recap information. Because of this, you should email consistently and send invitations to meetings that offer reminder notifications. Having a rhythm to your emailing habits will allow you and your teammates to have reliably consistent communication. Whenever you're connecting via video conference, preview all major points in your agenda, deliver these major points, then recap them at the end. It's also a good idea to send any major points or up items to the team via email. Another way to help with virtual-based communications is to use collaborative documents. As a leader in a face-to-face environment, you might post information on a bulletin board or keep records in an accessible file cabinet. (air whooshing) During meetings, you might notice your team taking notes. If they aren't, you can ask someone to act as the scribe for the day. In the virtual environment, using collaborative documents can provide a central place for your team members to view announcements on key info. This allows your team to keep track of items and data and contribute as well. And finally, role model the kind of communication you want to see. This might be the most important method of all. In face-to-face teams, we rely on the overall office culture to influence how people communicate. But when connecting virtually, you'll need to set an explicit tone. During video conferences, if you want people to be on time, you must start on time yourself. If you wanna keep things casual, start with light check-ins. Share pictures if you wanna set a more interpersonal tone. Tell your team how they should use the chat. With emails and chat, show your team how you expect them to use REPLY All in shorthand sentences. Leading by example allows you to set the tone of communication that your teammates can easily follow.