Hiring the Right People

Creating an effective virtual team starts with hiring the right people for each role. Before you hire someone long-term, look at their past experience and test them out with a small project. If possible, hire full-time workers so that they will be completely focused on working for you and will be more likely to stay long-term. Also, consider the time zone that your worker needs to be in, if this is important for the job.

Make sure to have a proper onboarding process that teaches employees about your company and have standard operating procedures that train them on how to do their work. Videos can be very effective for this.

Company Culture

Company culture is important not only for in-person teams but for remote teams as well. The people working for your company should feel like they are a part of a strong team where they fit in well. Here are some things you can do to encourage this:

1. If possible, have team members meet in person a few times a year. This can help them to build a stronger bond.

2. Have your team participate in video meetings using a tool such as Zoom.

3. If you have both a virtual team and a non-virtual team, make sure everyone is kept equally informed about changes, about the company vision, and how things are progressing.

4. Celebrate milestones and special occasions such as birthdays.

Decide What Tools You Will Use

These days, there are many tools available for teams to communicate and share files. In addition to email, you can use chat software such as Google Hangouts or Skype. You can also use tools such as Basecamp for managing projects, and share files using software such as Google Drive and Dropbox. There are also tools that can allow you to share your screen with a team member or to control their screen. All these tools help to make it much easier to manage teams, both in-person and virtually.

If you need to explain to a team member how to perform a certain task, you can record a video of yourself doing the task and send it to them. This is a great option because the team member can watch the video as many times as they need to in order to follow and learn the steps.

Track Team Member Productivity

For each job role, create measurements for success. For certain jobs, you may need to measure productivity and hours worked to determine whether or not a worker is being productive, or how many hours they worked to complete a certain task. You can find software online that tracks hours worked and productivity.

Review Results

Every few months, do a review of how things are progressing with your virtual team. Make sure that everything is on track and ask your team members for their feedback. This can be in the form of a questionnaire. Work to improve your systems and processes so that everything works as well as possible both for your team and for your business.

Consult a coach for more guidance and training on how to effectively manage your virtual team.