With the pandemic increasing the number of people requiring flexible working options, now’s the perfect time to consider how you can simplify the current work models you have in place. The number of people working from home in 2021 has increased to reach 47% in early February, a growth of 20% based on the data from 6 months earlier. I’ve gathered 5 ideas of how to streamline flexible work models to best suit your companies needs.
- Encourage employees to be open about their needs: flexi-work, WFH.
This all starts with encouraging employees to be honest about what they need. Do your employees need to work from home several days, or every day, during the week? Would they benefit from slightly altered hours on a Monday and Friday? Talk to your employees about what’s not working and how they feel things could be improved. If your employees aren’t fulfilling their full potential, what do you think is going to happen, or already happening, to the company as a whole?
- Offer remote work and distributed teams.
Consider offering remote work or distributed teams where possible to your employees. With ON24 there is no risk of employees falling off the wagon when having trouble communicating with each other. This webinar software and virtual event platform offers virtual events and content experiences that push engagement with audiences, all from the comfort of your own home – or office. If employees work better in a non-office environment, offer that to them. It will only benefit their work and your company as a whole.
- Provide the right technology for work and for collaboration.
In order for flexible working to run effectively, everyone needs to have the right technology not only for the work itself, but for the necessary collaboration between employees and employers. Apart from laptops and working telephones, employees need software to allow them to manage their work remotely but efficiently. Collaboration tools and services such as Skype, for example, cost nothing but ensure members of a team can communicate as easily as if in office. In terms of media collaboration and project management tools, Cage is a piece of software that makes it easy for teams to share work in a single place with no added confusion.
- Communicate (and evaluate the effectiveness of work models).
This point seems basic enough but is vital when it comes to managing teams, especially remotely. As drawn on previously, without communication everything falls apart. As well as encouraging employees to be open about their needs, ensure they have the opportunity to update you on what’s going well regarding the flexible work models and what they don’t feel is as effective.
- Automate work processes where possible.
Where possible, automate processes so that employees can focus on prioritising tasks that really need their attention. Customer engagement and marketing platforms can save time, money and a whole load of unnecessary stress. Instead of emailing back-and-forth with a remote employee about their planned social media timetable, set up a schedule that posts on these sites automatically and gives your employee the opportunity to concentrate on writing some copy that an automaton can’t do.