In recent times, it has become very important to create a workplace that promotes engaged, productive teams. These teams are also learning how to work remotely and are faced with unique challenges while trying to set up a remote environment.

The remote team management is the need of the hour in the healthcare industry for carrying out tasks like scheduling patient appointments, patient assessments, preparing medical reports, carrying out medical research which needs proper work arrangements, and planning. This can be carried with the help of cloud computing and digital communication tools.

Research conducted by Gallup states that remote workers are more engaged than an onsite employee they can be up to two times more likely to work more than 40 hours per week, and 20% more productive.
(Anon., January 24, 2020)

Let’s explore the 4 effective methods to manage our remote project team members with regards to any industry:

1. Digital Collaboration
As in the physical work, environment employees take short breaks and these small talks often improve the productivity of the team members. So it is important to create spaces for team bonding even while working remotely. You can use tools like Skype, Microsoft Teamviewer, Slack, Zoom, Google Hangouts for casual interactions. This helps the employees to catch up on each other and relax with some casual interactions.
These interactions can be more relaxed and transparent if they follow a no-manager rule. As we all know that most of the employees don’t speak freely and express any concerns if there is a managerial person present.

2. Project Management Tools
It is important to use online tools that make remote project management a lot simpler to handle. This helps to eliminate the blame game and makes every member take ownership of the tasks and projects assigned to them for that particular week or month. This helps both the manager as well the team member areas when we need to complete the project deliverables thus boosting the overall productivity.

3. Short Virtual Meetings
The modern way of handling projects is to conduct the meetings as and when the need arises, thus also save time over unproductive and long meetings that are the major road bumps for successful project delivery. Muse reports that businesses waste over $37 billion annually on unproductive meetings. (Editor, 2020)

4. Quarterly performance reviews
Working remotely might not be easy for all and some may feel lost or isolated so to get them back on track or to reality, it is important to give them proper reviews. The quarterly performance reviews are important for remote teams as it helps them know their productivity vs the management expectations. This makes the review more vital as it is directly proportional to quality and project success. These review meetings should help the team to grow and boost its performance.

So these are some of the important pointers to use when working remotely. If followed in the right way can help the team to remain focussed and contribute to a successful project outcome.