Darren Ging recently asked the Any Answers forum for tips on communicating with non-office based workers; in this article Stephen Walker, Director of Motivation Matters shares his methods for managing the communication gap.

So much communication with workers is on an ad hoc basis. It is not planned and takes place haphazardly. When you bump into people in the corridor, at the drinks machine or in the car park there is an opportunity to say things that come to mind. When you are managing remote workers this informal communication has to be planned and managed – it will not happen by accident.

The rise of flexible working, over a quarter of us no longer work nine to five at our employer’s facility, has created the need to understand the role informal communications play in maintaining engagement and commitment.

“Remote” is an interesting adjective here. It is not just separation by distance but being remote from management attention. I ran a night shift in a blue chip organisation and we were definitely remote! The IT people who worked days would change computer passwords and not tell us. It was a case of out of sight out of mind.

Formal communications cover things like plans and objectives, measures, tasks and feedback. This must be carefully detailed and communicated well. There is nothing more demotivating than having someone else’s measure of your performance emailed or dropped on your desk with no other contact.

This is the point where you need the face-to-face discussion. Whether praising loudly or discussing failure quietly, being present in person has huge advantages.

One of the employee benefits of remote working may be flexibility. The remote worker’s manager must realise that nine to five may not be the right time slot. Irritation at the remote worker being unavailable needs to be tempered with a discussion about the job design and work flow. Managers should be focusing on achievement and results instead of activity and presence. That applies whether the worker is remote or office-based!

Managing people is a gentle art. We all need gossip and social grooming to know we are cared about. This takes the form of a ‘good morning’, ‘how was the holiday?’, ‘is your cat better?’ and so on. These social interactions need to be built into the communication with the remote worker. This communication is an overhead cost but necessary to maintain the working relationship.

Remote, dispersed teams offer more challenges. Team building is about erecting fences around the team. The team is defined by the boundary: our team not ‘the team.’ Communication is necessary to maintain the team core credibility. There needs to be shared experiences, vision and striving. Team members need to meet each other to develop trust.

The Apollo mission to land a man on the moon provides an excellent example of how to support remote workers. No worker has ever been more remote! NASA put a great deal of effort into determining how to maintain an effective crew of astronauts. That the astronauts were part of a team, including the hundreds of ground staff was made very clear. When technical problems developed with the craft the engineering team worked round the clock to find solutions. The astronauts knew they had that support.

NASA also made sure that communication with their family and friends was possible. They understood the need to maintain their mental health and keep them engaged on the mission.

We would like NASA’s budget I know but the key issues are all to do with the usual motivating factors. The effective creation of a motivational environment is a management task.

The quality of the manager-worker personal relationship is highly important. The difficulties of managing remote workers must not be allowed to create a negative environment.

The worker must have a measure of her achievement, and measured by herself ideally. It is important that each of us knows at the end of the day whether we have had a good day. The success or failure shown by this measure is something on which the manager must comment frequently, several times a week.

As we said earlier, the blanket imposition of company rules and policies, in circumstances which may be very different, is a classic demotivator.

How do we manage to keep remote workers engaged, committed and happy?

Fortunately, today’s telecommunications and people management know-how makes it possible.

Broadband internet, email, remote computer access, instant messaging and video link ups have made communications much easier. Then we add the mobile phone, Blackberries, mobile internet dial up, Wi-Fi and it is hard to be out of communication!

Well planned formal communications can be instant over email: as quick to Inverness as the desk across the aisle.

Thought needs to be given to provide a means to communicate the office banter. The jokes, the gossip, the off the cuff remarks that add flavour to relationships are all important.

Face to face communication, using video links or broadband instant messaging, is now technically feasible. Face time is very important and must be planned for.

Teleconferencing is a useful tool but limited to a small number of people. Unless you contribute yourself boredom sets in!

The “cc” function in email is another way of keeping people involved. A dangerous way of avoiding responsibility in one aspect, it provides the rich picture of what is going on to remote workers who are not able to eavesdrop at the water fountain. Beware of swamping people’s mailboxes though!

Finally, you must meet in person at least every few months. There is a need to have a real inter-personal relationship that the technology can maintain between meetings.

You can call your remote sales people together for a conference, visit their patch or invite them to Head Quarters. It is easy to find a reason to meet, but it is a necessary overhead of this type of working.

All organisations are seeking ways to reduce costs and improve service. As jobs leave the country and people are placed nearer their customers to give better service, the numbers of remote workers is bound to rise substantially.

We have all experienced the poor service that comes from disengaged, disenchanted employees, whether remote or not. If customer satisfaction is to be retained after re-organisation then we must look to motivation management.

Your remote workers represent, indeed are, your organisation to the customer. A bad tempered employee gives a memorably unsatisfactory customer experience.

It is a management responsibility to ensure remote workers are properly motivated.

This benchmarking exercise is therefore timely and interesting. I am sure everyone will look forward to seeing the results.