Hybrid Work: How to Collaborate Smartly
If you’re not riding the wave of change, you’ll find yourself beneath it. Not so long ago, managing a work team meant everyone was under a single roof. Today, the situation is vastly different.
Most employees prefer to work from home to retain a degree of freedom and autonomy over their lives. Some prefer to work from an office but only on a few days of the week and still others prefer to go back to the good old fashioned full-time office work.
With all these work preferences, managing the ‘in office’ team members, remote team members, and all other team members can seem like a complicated affair. It’s not as difficult as you might think.
Managing hybrid teams will soon become the new norm, so if you don’t want to get left behind the curve, read on to understand how collaboration will occur in teams post COVID.
What Are Hybrid Teams?
A hybrid team is essentially a working structure where some members work from an office or a central location while team members work from home or a remote location of their choosing. Hybrid team structures give their team members the option to choose what work structure best suits them, and the hybrid work model works best for both individual and team goals.
While this was originally a temporary solution to the pandemic, it’s gradually becoming the preferred choice of work collaboration as more and more organizations embrace teams working from home.
Although collaboration with remote workers and teams has always been around, it was usually the exception and only applied to workers hired overseas or outsourced jobs. Today, remote work has become more widespread and will soon be the norm in most organizations.
Hybrid Work Advantages
There are several advantages to a hybrid team structure that explain why the hybrid model is gaining popularity.
Flexibility
The flexibility that comes with remote work is arguably one of the main benefits and reasons remote employee numbers are rising. Not needing to commute for long hours and working during hours that suit your personal needs means employees tend to prefer working remotely.
Talent
The better working conditions associated with employees working remotely means talented individuals will be drawn to any organization that allows for hybrid workers or a remote-first culture.
Job Satisfaction
Hybrid teams usually leave team members satisfied with their jobs and the flexibility and freedom available. This, in turn, means that loyalty and productivity will be higher, which benefits everyone involved.
Lower Burnout Rates
When employees don’t have to deal with the negatives that office employees usually face, they’re less likely to burn out due to work. The beauty of a hybrid team is that it allows employees to choose when they would like to come into work, and if they choose not to be in-person employees, they can still effectively work from wherever they need to.
Work-Life Balance
When all the benefits of a hybrid team are put together, the big picture is obvious. A better work-life balance for everyone involved.
Hybrid Work Disadvantages
Just as there are advantages to a hybrid workplace, there are also some disadvantages to consider.
Limited Transparency
If you’re a team leader, you may face a few issues with transparency. Not having everyone under a single office means it would be harder to gauge the progress of work. You might also find it a little more challenging to recreate the transparency of a traditional office environment with a hybrid team.
Lack of Communication
When it comes to team meetings and hybrid employees, it could be a huge barrier to progress if you don’t have your communication down to a T. It’s also harder to check up on everyone and communicate about problems with the workflow when people are in separate locations.
Scheduling
Scheduling can be a major issue with hybrid work teams. To successfully manage a hybrid work team, you must make adjustments when you schedule virtual meetings. Especially if employees are working from different time zones.
Strained Work Relationships
In a traditional office setting, everyone works together and has more or less similar hours. There may be issues in hybrid teams when workers who can’t work remotely feel treated unfairly or like they don’t have the same benefits as their team members. This isn’t great for team rapport.
How to Collaborate within a Hybrid Team
While it may seem hard at first, managing a hybrid team isn’t nearly as difficult as it seems. In the next few paragraphs, you’ll find a map to help you navigate this new work environment and better manage your team.
Keep in mind that each company is different, and while these general guidelines will work for almost everyone, you may also need to adjust and tweak rules for your specific place of employment. You can also try some productivity hacks for remote teams.
Choose the Right Remote Work Tools
When working in a remote team, members often need to collaborate closely and effectively, often at the same time. For this reason, you must select the right tools for collaboration. On-site team members and remote employees should access the same tools to ensure everyone can effectively manage their workload and stay on the same page. The right tools can also help you improve time management, especially when everyone is on different schedules.
Cloud-based tools are an excellent option for these situations because you can access them from anywhere. Also, workers who normally prefer working on-site can still use cloud-based tools when working remotely. In fact, by embracing a remote-first approach for your organization, you already cover the entire team since ‘in-office’ workers can easily use the same tools as remote employees.
Set Clear Expectations
There should be no ambiguity about goals in a hybrid environment. Set SMART goals (goals that are Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, Time-bound) for best results. Your goals (both for each individual team member and the organization) should be crystal clear.
You also need to clearly define KPIs for both remote staff and those physically present to ensure that your team is hitting your metrics.
Setting expectations and clear ground rules at the beginning will also allow for better communication and ensure everyone can gauge their own performance. It lets employees know where they stand and makes them feel more confident, which is a huge mental boost for the team.
Set Aside Time for Socializing
Traditionally, work relationships were a huge part of our lives, and in hybrid teams, these relationships can feel strained, especially for remote workers. Managers can be inclusive by ensuring that events, gatherings, celebrations, and birthdays are allowed for participation from remote attendees.
A video conference or a virtual team meeting will do the trick when someone can’t make it in person. This includes casual zoom meetings where people can join during their tea break or lunch hour.
Encourage Team Feedback
Regularly give and solicit feedback. Most employees, remote or not, want to know how they’re doing and don’t always know how to ask for feedback. Giving a team member feedback also shows them that you’re following their progress and investing in them.
Set aside time each month for a one-on-one with each employee if your team is small enough. Even if it’s a hybrid team with most of your employees being remote workers, set up some quick video calls to check in on the progress and encourage your team members. For best results, give employees access to online learning platforms they can use to grow their skills individually.
Remember to ask questions so you can clear up any issues your team may have. Ask your employees what they would change and if they like the current management style. It’s also not a bad idea to schedule a feedback meeting once a month for the entire team so they can receive feedback on how they’re functioning as a group. You can use performance management tools like FactoHR to help with the feedback process.
Prioritize Health and Wellbeing
It’s no secret that the pandemic and subsequent lockdown had a significant impact on mental health. This has affected everyone, from managers and remote leaders to employees. A lack of exercise and fresh air brought about by remote work can impact physical health.
Naturally, you should prioritize your employee’s health and wellbeing. Avoid overloading them with work, give them fulfilling breaks, and avoid sending work messages at night, so they get a good night’s sleep. Remember that healthy employees means work is more likely to run smoothly, and you will avoid delays associated with bad health and emotional wellbeing.
If you are concerned about overworking your employees, you can use online timesheets to measure the hours worked and ensure your employees are working a healthy amount.
Simply being empathetic and approachable can also be a huge plus for your employees when they have grievances they need to share.
Limit Meetings
A huge issue with hybrid teams is that the number of meetings and zoom calls can be disruptive and prevent you from getting into the zone with your work. Imagine if every time you wanted to concentrate and get something done, you were interrupted and couldn’t make any progress?
That’s what it feels like when you have too many meetings in a workday. Before scheduling a meeting, ask yourself if you could skip the meeting for an email. If you can, it’s probably not urgent enough that you need to schedule a meeting.
When you do have a meeting or something to present, use presentation software to keep people engaged. Alternatively, you can schedule breaks and fun activities to keep people’s brains working.
Embrace Empathy and Watch Out for Burnout
Remember that not everyone has it easy and that your workers have struggles they’re going through that you may not know about.
Employees who work from home may have a range of issues from poor internet connectivity to a lack of clarity as they can’t reach out to co-workers as easily as stopping by their cubicle, the way they would in a traditional office.
You can address this by using software to help with professional communication and team collaboration. But be careful that this doesn’t cause workers who work in the office to feel like they’re being supervised more than their co-workers working from home.
There’s also the fact that all the changes may take a while to get used to, and employees have to work harder initially to overcome this. This could lead to burnout if you’re not careful and don’t regularly check in on your workers.
Improve Hybrid Work with Smart Collaboration
No one is instantly amazing at remote work. It can take a while to get used to, but time is definitely on your side, and you’ll get better as the days go by.
Remember that everyone is struggling to adapt to this change, and nothing happens overnight. However, every piece of effort you make will be noticed and appreciated by your employees. Hybrid or not, you’re still a team at the end of the day.
About the author:
Mark Quadros is a SaaS content marketer that helps brands create and distribute rad content. On a similar note, Mark loves content and contributes to several authoritative blogs like HubSpot, CoSchedule, Foundr, etc. Connect with him via LinkedIN or twitter.
