There are a great many books in print detailing how to improve your virtual work effectiveness. A recent search on Amazon yielded over 5,800 books on the topic of telecommuting and over 6,600 on the topic of virtual work. Most of these don’t cover the practical aspects of virtual work such as how best to lead a project where many of the members work remotely. This section describes a handful of things we have found to be very effective at improving the productivity of a virtual team or an individual telecommuter.
Meetings
- Have weekly one-on-one meetings with your manager
- Use face-to-face meetings to meet colleagues and build teamwork
- Avoid hybrid meetings if at all possible
- Use a time zone tool to determine the best time to meet
- Some tips for tele-meeting leaders and participants
Process
- Use whiteboards to brainstorm or construct affinity diagrams to solve tough problems
- Use online games and other techniques to build teamwork and trust
- Celebrate successes with your project team using online events
Hardware
Software
- Use pc-pc desktop sharing tools to share data in real-time
- Use instant messaging to speed decision-making and information exchange
- Use online team spaces to share project data
Explore each of these tips for more detail by clicking on the topic in the left navigation list or by clicking ‘Next’ to explore them in sequence. Check out the templates page for a summary of the templates mentioned in this section.
