Not so long ago, the concept of remote work was almost coming to fruition. In fact, it was tested many times and was often used by top level executives in case they were on a long break or were on vacation and were often needed for making executive decisions.

Today, the world is in the grasp of the COVID-19 (also known as the Novel Coronavirus) resulting in temporary closure of businesses and entertainment venues. This is where remote work came in handy; and it has affected the way the world does work and yes, it did so for the positive aspect.

In many parts of the world, remote work has become a large tidal wave affecting the way people work and the way businesses are run. One of the best things is that fears of workers slacking off have been debunked.

In countries like the United Kingdom, around 4 million people have been working remotely. Fears of workers slacking off have been debunked to a large extent. If there is anything, then evidence suggests that a considerable number of employees became more productive at home. Though this does not indicate homesickness, it indicates that a stress-free environment helps quite a lot.

This also translated to a lot of money saved by organizations when it comes to getting work done as well as reduction in wear and tear in employees and productivity. In short, around GBP 1500 per employee was saved by each organization.

Are there just only benefits, or are there a lot of security nightmares in remote working?

However, just like the benefits; there is now a myriad of security issues of the ultimate kind. One third of companies in the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland as well as The Netherlands and a quarter of French firms revealed that they had to review data security measures and even had faced breaches due to remote working.

Data which was once protected by enterprise-level measures is now accessed from many locations and that is through public Wi-Fi connection hotspots.

Another issue is that of coordination. A lot of remote workers have been well on their own. But when it comes to team projects; the workflow is disturbed and is quite hard to control. Employees can face unforeseen incidents.

How can managers teleconference with their team members? And at what times? In case there are teams/employees/subsidiaries/affiliates overseas, how and when do they contact them? How is the workflow controlled? How can organizations ensure that their employees are still enjoying a healthy balance of work and life?

How can managers and organizations effectively manage the team of remote workers?

As determined by expert professionals at a renowned web design company Toronto, here are some fool proof ways for organizations to fully utilize the benefits of a remote workforce and its emerging vulnerabilities:

Set reasonable limits for work

Remote work has somehow blurred the definition of a real workplace, limits and boundaries are still important. Remote workers are quite productive in comparison to their counterparts working in offices. However, this notion is still questioned.

Remote workers are also more prone to burnout. A lot of remote employees reported having a hard time taking a time off when working remotely, reporting detrimental effects to their health.

Office workers can often mark their time-out and walk right out of the door. However, it is hard to ignore the siren call of an email or an urgent task, regardless if it’s a notification away from the phone. It is a must for organizations to help employees manage their time effectively.

Setting a limit on working hours is a must and each employee must follow it. It should be made evident that these working hours should be respected. No employee should reply to emails or any messages once they have timed out.

Making communication channels that are pertaining to work

Taking out face-to-face communication with other options to replacing with email, text and Skype can work. If unmanageable communication channels are left to break down and become a mess, no one should be scrambling for other channels just looking for relevant information.

An app that allows firms to create work specific channels works a lot and among them is ‘Slack.’ This can help employees separate work from personal chats.

Definition of productivity and performance

A boon about telecommuting is defining productivity in a broader term., beyond how long a person works. Hence, measuring performance based on how long employees spent working online is not the real thing. Each firm wants meaningful work, not how much time they spent online.

Hence, expectations for outcomes at day’s end should be set (same for the weekly basis). Ensure the measures set make sense to each and every employee. Also, no rule is same for every employee so this should be set as per function i.e. different for developers, salespeople, content professionals and the freelancers (how make money online).