“How do you feel about staff members working from home?”

If you’ve been interviewing prospective employees recently, then you’ve probably gotten this question more than once. A lot of employees want the flexibility and freedom that a hybrid/remote work environment provides. In many cases, this one perk is the main reason a fantastic candidate chooses one company and rejects another. 

Flexible working arrangements are too important these days to ignore them in your hiring and retention plans. Here’s what to know about hybrid and remote work—and how to make a hybrid-friendly workplace that is effective for your company.

How Hybrid Teams Work

In the olden days (you know… before 2020), in-person workplaces were far and away the most common way to create work teams. The vast majority of American workers, 80% or more, report they worked in-person before 2019-2020. Now, that statistic has flipped, with 60% of workers saying they now work at home part or all of the time.

Getting staff back to full-time, on-site workplaces is tough, especially as remote work is so convenient for so many people. But face-to-face interactions are valuable too, and that’s leading to a new trend, hybrid teams in which employees decide on their own where they want to work. An employee may land anywhere on the spectrum between working full-time in an office, working full-time remotely, or doing some days at home and some in the office.

Hybrid Teams Have Many Pros (and a Few Cons) to Know About

This switch from traditional on-site work to a mix of in-person and remote options can seem dramatic for companies that aren’t used to hybrid teams. But there are many reasons to be open to this approach to staffing:

The Pros

Happier employees

One key to building a productive workforce is ensuring employees are happy. One recent study showed that happy employees are 13% more productive than less contented peers. Hybrid workers report greater satisfaction with their jobs and often get more done too.

Boosted employee retention

Having flexibility about where they work takes pressure off employees who need it—such as when caring for young children and aging parents. Remote workers may be less likely to quit—and your company will retain their knowledge and benefit from their continued contributions.

Bigger talent pool

Making room for remote workers is a smart way to expand your reach when hiring. With today’s tech, it’s easier than ever to work from anywhere—meaning you can hire from anywhere too. You’ll reach better talent, which pays off in better productivity results.

The Cons

As you can see, having a combination of in-office and remote team members offers many advantages for leaders and teams. But it can also present some challenges to address. 

Strained social connections

Obviously, having the team in the same room makes it easier to get everyone on the same page. Faulty Zoom connections may kick key team members offline during crucial meetings, and new staff may find it harder to connect with fellow employees. This can hinder productivity and retention. 

Lack of visibility

Out of sight, out of mind, right? Remote workers may miss out on valuable, in-person networking and career-building opportunities. They may feel unseen and unheard, even in meetings. This impacts employee satisfaction and also may cause your company to miss out on what those staff members have to offer the team.

Communication breakdowns

To ensure everything is done as it should be on a work project, it’s crucial that everyone on the team understand their role, deliverables, etc. But when some of the team is out of the office, it’s hard to be sure they know the latest project updates, and they may feel disconnected from the team.

Hybrid Teams Require Intentional Management 

Given the possible challenges, hybrid teams need employees and management to be proactive. The good news is that it’s not too hard to implement an effective, productive hybrid team. You just have to look at things differently and be specific about expectations and structure. 

Start by recognizing that this is a learning process! Here are 4 ways to provide a positive and productive hybrid-friendly environment that employees and management can both enjoy.

1.    Foster a remote-first culture

This approach makes remote work the default for your team. By changing your thinking and intentionally planning for a remote environment, you’ll find it easier to identify both big and small changes you can make to ensure you’re taking the emphasis off of location and more on collaboration. 

What to do:

• Use tools that team members can access from anywhere (and ideally, from any device).
• Centralize communication in a specific platform so that important messages aren’t siloed or missed.
• Always include a video link with meeting invites, so participants can still join if they decide to work from home that day.
• Ask everybody to join video calls from their own computers (even if they’re in-office), so it’s easier for team members to see facial expressions and interact with each other.

2.    Trust your employees to fulfill expectations

A results-based culture is the best fit for a hybrid team. This requires you to place the emphasis on what your employees are producing, rather than on the details of how they’re doing it.

What to do:

• Set crystal clear expectations about what tasks employees have to complete and what responsibilities you need them to fulfill.  
• Provide clarity about how you define success. 

3.    Regularly offer and solicit feedback

Remember to schedule a recurring one-on-one meeting with each team member (at least once per month). The focus of these meetings is to connect with your staff about their daily work, challenges, and broader career goals.

What to ask:

• You’ve been working (in office/remote/both). How has that been going?
• What do you think our team is doing really well in terms of collaboration?
• What challenges are you running into with team members being spread out?
• What opportunities for growth are you looking for?
• What resources and support would make achieving team goals simpler?

4.    Provide opportunities for social connections

Building trust and connections is key to developing a positive, inspiring hybrid-friendly workplace culture that attracts and keeps employees and boosts productivity. This requires deliberate, intentional planning when the team includes remote and hybrid workers.

What to plan:

• Create a dedicated instant message channel for friendly chatter.
• Reserve time at the start or end of your team meetings for personal updates and small talk.
• Schedule remote-friendly team gatherings and activities, like participating in a virtual trivia contest.
• Set up a standing video conference where people can easily jump in and have lunch or coffee together if they want.

Set up an Effective Hybrid Environment—with Help from Who’s Your HR?

Now that you’ve gained some tips on how to make remote work and hybrid teams viable at your company, it’s time to decide how to implement them—or improve them. That’s where our team stands out. At Who’s Your HR?, we understand remote collaboration because our own company includes hybrid teams, and many of our clients do too.

Let Who’s Your HR? get creative with you to develop clear hybrid workplace policies, effective performance metrics for hybrid teams, and all things remote work. Contact us at 539-215-8868 to schedule a consultation.