Managing Remote Employees: Best Practices from Doist’s Head of Marketing
Hint: If you’re asking how to monitor your remote employees, you’re starting with the wrong question.
Remote work is better with managers who understand the value of trust. We’ve partnered with Remote-How on a survey to understand struggles remote managers around the world are facing daily, and how they are dealing with them. Take the survey!
Hiring for remote greatness
They show unapologetic enthusiasm for hobbies and/or have active side projects.
They have experience working independently.
They go noticeably above and beyond when completing their test project.
🙅 Hire faster than what your team culture can sustain.
🙅 Forget that “passion for remote work” can actually be a red flag.
Establishing healthy foundations from day one
Post-onboarding: Leading people who lead themselves
Make clear that trust is assumed, not earned.
Take yourself out of the equation wherever possible.
Empower everyone to be leaders.
Red flags — when you sense someone might not be pulling their weight
Turning the ship around
Prioritize an empathetic solution over an easy one.
Communicate quickly, clearly, and concretely.
Then, continue to communicate consistently.
Get more advice on leading remote team members. Our guide, Leading Distributed: The Remote Guide to Management, is packed with effective management strategies from leaders at distributed companies like Stripe, Remote, Buffer, and more. It covers topics like avoiding micromanagement, making time for high-level thinking, tracking performance, and so much more.
Twist is a communication app built by a remote team for remote (and remote-ish) teams. Try it for free
Brenna Loury
Brenna Loury is the Chief Revenue Officer at Todoist. She has led marketing, growth, and revenue strategy. She writes about productivity, remote work, and building distributed teams.
