How To Mentor A Remote Employee- Phil Shawe

Posted by Phil Shawe on October 16th, 2019

With remote work becoming more popular these days, managers have to manage distributed teams. Everyone does not experience in this field that means companies cannot always get the best out of remote employees. There are a large number of advantages to people working at home or outside the office, including productivity improvement and improved work-life balance that sometimes not realized due to mismanagement. It needs mentoring often to make sure they are up to date with the best practices.

To create an effective remote mentoring program, focus on four key pillars.

Set The Same Expectations

Remote workers required to be on the same page as in-office workers in terms of expectations and policies says Phil Shawe, co-founder, and co-CEO of TransPerfect, a translation technology company. Make rules on employee spending, business trips,  vacation time, etc. for everyone, regardless of their location. “You don’t want to have a different set of standards for remote and non-remote workers,” he says. To understand how well you’re developing your employees, you need to know that you’re starting with a basic level of knowledge about the company and its policies.

Similarly, get on the same page about what each person expects out of the mentoring relationship, he says. Stay in regular contact without micromanaging, but you need to be sure how your protégé is feeling about issues like workload and deadlines so you can find areas where the individual needs help developing new skills or overcoming challenges.

Use video calls for communication

Video calls are one of the best ways of improving communication. Asynchronous communication like email does have their benefits for assigning tasks and future reference. But, depending upon just these make you less efficient. A video call can save hours of going forwards and backward for writing something for communication. Being able to see your colleague makes them more real and energetic.

Build In More Structure

Remote mentoring relationships need more structure and communication than you might think is necessary, says Nancy Halpern, principal of workforce consulting firm KNH Associates. You need to determine how often you’ll be in touch and through what formats. Keeping that cadence will help you ensure that you’re communicating regularly enough to have an impact.

Select the latest and best tools

Supervising your remote employees through email or phone calls simply cannot work well! Without being in a physical location as your other team member, it is really difficult to collaborate and manage efficiently. Hence making using of the best latest tools within the remote workplaces are the best idea.

For further information and guidance, you can visit Phil Shawe Transperfect.