How To Be an Effective Leader in Remote Teams

The year 2020 brought about a remote revolution of sorts — whether they wanted to or not, many companies decentralized their operations.

This decentralization exposed some challenges of remote work to the wider public. As someone who has worked in several distributed teams over the course of a decade, I’ve watched even the most competent companies struggle to grasp the new paradigm.

This struggle is especially apparent in leadership roles. Most workers rejoiced to work from home in 2020, but their team leaders, managers, and bosses scrambled to figure out ways to keep productivity high, the team cohesive, and the bottom line positive.

Here are some ways a leader can make sure their remote team thrives.

Talk about goals, not tasks

There are few things more frustrating for a worker than being told what to do without an explanation as to why. Unfortunately, this is still prevalent in many teams. This is my experience in software development and I’ve been told of similar experiences in several other industries.

The way some leaders envision leadership is: the workers get their tasks, everyone does their thing, and they pay no mind to why you’re doing it. Then we put it all together and we’ve got a working whole.

Except for a minor problem — that’s not how human beings function.

Without explicit context, our brains implicitly come up with their own. Then we complete our task with our unconscious context in mind, we are really happy with our work, we send it for review…and the leader tells us this is not at all what they had in mind. They are flabbergasted that we would build something so out of touch with what they told us to do. The problem is, they didn’t tell us the right way. Such misunderstandings are almost always the leader’s fault.

As a leader, you must explain the overall goal and invite immediate feedback from your team members. They need to understand how individual tasks fit into the overall mission and appreciate the importance of their role. This approach generates more motivation, fewer misunderstandings, and happier employees.

Sometimes you have to micromanage…

Mentoring and oversight can be difficult in remote teams. Junior programmers often curse their destiny for having a senior hovering over their shoulder while they work in an office, but they miss the senior the moment they start working remotely.

Micromanagement is sometimes a necessary evil. Consider this situation: one of your workers has a task to complete that is blocking a release. But, he doesn’t know how to do it. There is no more effective short-term action than micromanagement — go in and help them get it done.

As a remote leader, it is particularly important to stay in touch with any blocking tasks or issues. One person’s failure to complete their task in time can put a whole project on hold, creating strife between the team members and pressure on you. You must take responsibility for avoiding these situations and get your hands dirty from time to time.

…but micromanagement is not sustainable

Micromanagement is a short-term solution for critical problems. The long-term goal is to make every person on the team sufficiently independent — this is good for the team, saves you time, and helps everyone’s confidence.

If a team member keeps failing and you have to micromanage every week to get things done, it will eventually be time to cut them loose. When exactly is this time? That depends on your specific team configuration and the level of responsibility of the problematic person.

Take responsibility

When things go south, poor leaders dump the responsibility on their subordinates. This is not only a sign of weakness but a surefire way to lose the respect of your team and sow the seeds of discontent.

When your team misses a deadline or otherwise fails, you need to take stock of the situation: what went wrong, what could have been done better, and where the problems started. Then you need to take full ownership of the issues.

One of your programmers introduced a critical bug into the system? You didn’t make the necessary failsafes to prevent that.

One of your designers created something that the client hates? You either didn’t transmit the client’s requirements correctly or you didn’t ask enough questions of the client in the first place.

There was a miscommunication between two team members? You either didn’t provide the right communication channels or you didn’t maintain the proper perspective of how their tasks overlap and interact.

Odds are, both the client and your team will respect you more for taking responsibility. They will help you solve the problems and you will collectively do better next time.

Don’t tolerate rogue team members

We all know the type: the Han Solo programmers who like to fight their own battles, are never around when you need them, look down on grunt work, and decide what the priorities are without consulting anyone. Then there are the designers who put their art ahead of user experience and refuse to compromise on anything.

Remote work has a way of bringing these traits into the open. It is your task as a leader to show strength if a team member is putting themselves above the entire rest of the team. No single team member is more important than the project, even if they are a genius.

Handle difficult talks with the client

Clients have a lot of ideas. Some of these ideas are not as clever as they appear to the client.

If the client comes up with a proposal that would bog the team down or demotivate them, it’s your job to explain that to the client. Your team needs not only leadership but also protection.

It can be difficult to tell someone what to do with their money. When doing solo freelance work, it is easy (and usually prudent) to just say yes to nearly everything the client proposes. But, in a team environment, there are far more aspects to consider in view of the overall mission.

Conclusion

Remote work has its challenges, but when approached correctly it can be more productive than office work. Things like flexible hours, no commute, less stress, and fewer opportunities for collective time-wasting add up to higher output.

However, all of this can be tossed down the drain by poor leadership.

A remote leader should be a great strategist who is responsible for everything and available to everyone.