Do you know what the biggest challenge of remote workers is and how to overcome it by making slight changes in your work-life?
Buffer’s annual report on The State of Remote Work explores and comprehends the world of remote workers. They conducted a survey of nearly 2,500 remote workers to learn about the benefits and challenges that come with remote work. According to this survey, the biggest challenge is loneliness and isolation.
Physical separation of coworkers has resulted in more people feeling as if they don’t have friends at work. As a result, they are less loyal or connected to their company due to zero face-to-face interaction. From a business perspective, employees’ challenges with social isolation can lead to decreased productivity and an increase in employee turnover. Also, loneliness leads to poor outcomes for physical and mental health and productivity.
Simply put, loneliness and isolation experienced by remote workers is a team issue, not an individual one. As such, the responsibility to struggle and avoid this problem falls equally to both employers and employees.
There are, thankfully, tips to avoid feeling isolated while working remotely. In this post, we provide suggestions for remote workers and employers on how to implement remote work while making everyone feel included in order to increase productivity and have a better work-life balance!
For Remote Workers
1. Work outside of your home at least once a week
Working in the same place and environment makes you feel more isolated and disconnected from the rest of the world, home office environment. The first step toward overcoming feelings of isolation is to get yourself out into the world, be surrounded by people and normal background noise, and get fresh air. It doesn’t matter if you’re in a library, a coffee shop, or a university; just be somewhere in which other people exist, which is like an in-office work environment. If you have a co-worker in the same city, work together and create a co-working space.
Putting yourself in situations where you are surrounded by other people, even if you cannot communicate with them directly, will help you feel less isolated and more connected to society. Simply taking the first step will reveal that you are part of a much larger community than you realize.
2. Make plans after work especially if you are feeling isolated
When you work from home, it’s more difficult to distinguish between work and personal hours, and to make plans for after-work dinner or drinks will get you out of the house and away from the computer. Only knowing you’ll be able to socialize later will make you feel less isolated during the workday and more like a member of the community. It will also push you to take breaks when you need to in order to avoid becoming overworked or burned out. So, you will not lose your productivity and your motivation for the following day!
3. Use video calls and phone calls to communicate with your team
It is much easier to communicate with your team through messages and emails. It may feel great at first to have so much flexibility and independence. However, using non-verbal communication methods may result in misunderstandings and miscommunications, especially when you are trying to explain a complex idea. Face-to-face interactions can be supplemented with video conferences, online meetings, text conversations, and phone calls. It also increases your chances of blurring the line between work and personal life because you send and respond to messages at all hours of the day.
To avoid burnout from remote work and isolation, make sure you communicate with your team regularly and schedule meetings and check-ins to brainstorm, discuss ideas, or present your point of view on a subject. Not only does this help structure your workday and increase productivity, but it also makes you feel more connected to the team as a whole. It’s critical to feel like you’re a part of something bigger and a community.
For Employers
1. Arrange virtual team meetings to make employees feel included
It is clear that remote employees need social interaction during the working day. Because when they are working in the office, they can take breaks to have coffee, eat dinner together, or smoke. But when they work from home, they can’t easily talk to their coworkers, so they feel isolated. Even though team members communicate via social media platforms or project management software, these communication channels are largely non-verbal. This can often result in misunderstandings and miscommunications.
Ensure that you have regular check-ins with staff, both individually and in groups. This allows employees to raise concerns, debate sensitive topics, or just present thoughts that may be difficult to communicate via instant “water cooler” chat. In addition, a weekly video conferencing “social hour” can be good for employees who need only informal face-to-face employee engagement.
2. Schedule all-company events at least once a year
Although virtual meetings and calls help to reduce the isolation, the employees still miss the opportunity of daily in-person interactions they’d have in an office environment. Employees are presumably most isolated when there is a lack of this type of communication since, basically, humans crave human connection. Remote workers are also physically alone during the workday.
So, planning an event with time for collaboration, fun, and socializing will help your teams work better together and make remote workers feel more engaged in the company’s mission and company culture. If you’re concerned about the cost of organizing an event like this, consider that it may be less expensive than constant employee turnover or employees missing deadlines because they don’t work well together.
3. Create a culture of transparency & support
One of the key things that businesses may lose while working remotely is the ability to just tap someone’s shoulder and give them support or gather everyone for a meeting quickly; in a nutshell, the sense of belonging to a community and feeling included. As a result of this, employees may struggle to feel like they are part of a team.
To remedy this, you should show your employees that you are open to listening to them and that you are there for the taking as if you were in the office. Also, you must encourage all members of your team to act in the same way you act. The more people encourage and communicate easily with each other, the more the culture is developed.
Loneliness is emotional. Isolation is structural!
At Gini Talent, we prioritize managing remote employees and their motivation. We don’t just find and hire the best people for you. We can also help you with remote work management solutions to bridge the gap between you and your team. If you’re looking for ways to expand your team with remote workers, contact us!
