Work Together Anywhere E-Book

Lisette Sutherland

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Fachliteratur
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 560

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2020

Beschreibung

"An excellent guide on how teams can effectively work together, regardless of location." --STEPHANE KASRIEL, former CEO of Upwork IN TODAY'S MODERN GLOBAL ECONOMY, companies and organizations in all sectors are embracing the game-changing benefits of the remote workplace. Managers benefit by saving money and resources and by having access to talent outside their zip codes, while employees enjoy greater job opportunities, productivity, independence, and work-life satisfaction. But in this new digital arena, companies need a plan for supporting efficiency and fostering streamlined, engaging teamwork. In Work Together Anywhere, Lisette Sutherland, an international champion of virtual-team strategies, offers a complete blueprint for optimizing team success by supporting every member of every team, including: * EMPLOYEES advocating for work-from-home options * MANAGERS seeking to maximize productivity and profitability * TEAMS collaborating over complex projects and long-term goals * ORGANIZATIONS reliant on sharing confidential documents and data * COMPANY OWNERS striving to save money and attract the best brainpower Packed with hands-on materials and actionable advice for cultivating agility, camaraderie, and collaboration, Work Together Anywhere is a thorough and inspiring must-have guide for getting ahead in today's remote-working world.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Cover

How to Use This Book

Foreword

Introduction

PART I: SETTING THE SCENE

CHAPTER 1:

Why Are Individuals Going Remote? Workplace

Flexibility

Some Terminology on Remote Working

The Face of Remote Working

Workplace Flexibility: Results-Oriented vs. Hours-Oriented Work

Remote Reminders

NOTES

CHAPTER 2:

How Remote Working Benefits Employers

Reasons to Offer the Remote Option

Common Concerns About the Remote Option—and Their Solutions

Reasons to Try Out Remote Working Now

Remote Reminders

NOTES

PART I

Extras

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

AT A GLANCE:

How to Replicate Online the Benefits of Working On-Site

PART II: INDIVIDUALS WORKING REMOTELY

CHAPTER 3:

Remote Working 101: Getting Started

Pre-Remote: Deciding for Yourself

Ready, Set, Remote: Getting Set Up

Remote Reminders

NOTES

CHAPTER 4: Remote Working 201: Perfecting Your Game

How to Deliver What Your Employer Needs

How to Tend To Your Own Needs

How to Be a Team Player

Remote Reminders

NOTES

PART II

Extras

QUESTIONNAIRE FOR INDIVIDUALS:

Are You Ready to Work Remotely?

CONVINCING YOUR BOSS (OR TEAM)

SEEKING REMOTE EMPLOYMENT

FLEXJOBS LIST:

100 Top Companies with Remote Jobs in 2022

NOTE

PART III: SUCCESSFUL REMOTE TEAMS 101

CHAPTER 5:

Transitioning Toward the Remote Option

Establishing the Office as Remote-First

Actually Going Remote

Remote Reminders

NOTES

CHAPTER 6:

Hiring Remote Workers and Teams

Hiring Strategy: What to Look For

Interviewing: How to Screen for Desirable Traits

Onboarding: Set Them Up to Succeed

Remote Reminders

NOTES

PART III

Extras

HIRING CHEAT SHEET:

What to Look For When Interviewing Remote Workers

REMOTE-ONLY MANIFESTO

PART IV: SUCCESSFUL REMOTE TEAMS 201

CHAPTER 7: Commit and Lead, Trust and Succeed

The Basic Tech Tool Set

Remote Reminders

NOTES

CHAPTER 8:

Facilitate Their Success with Leadership, Alignment, and a Full Arsenal

Efficiency and Accessibility

Productivity and Collaboration

Trust

Bonding

Addressing Conflict

Remote Reminders

NOTES

CHAPTER 9:

Tune Your Team with a Team Agreement

Communication

Time Zone Concerns

Cross-Cultural/Multilingual Game Rules and Etiquette

Creating a Team Agreement

Remote Reminders

NOTES

CHAPTER 10:

Bring It All Together

Run Effective Meetings

Boost Team Morale and Camaraderie

Strengthen Your Relationship with Each Team Member

Experiment with Small, Reversible Steps

A Few Words on Growing

Some Closing Thoughts

Remote Reminders

NOTES

PART IV

Extras

MANAGER'S ACTION PLAN

REMOTE TEAM AGREEMENT:

Instructions & Template

TIPS FOR ONLINE MEETINGS:

Facilitators

TIPS FOR ONLINE MEETINGS:

Participants

CONCLUSION:

Doing Great Things Together

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS:

Early Adopters

RESOURCES

GLOSSARY

NOTES

INTERVIEWEES

TECHNOLOGY & TOOLS

NOTES

FOR FURTHER READING, LISTENING:

Consultation

WORK TOGETHER ANYWHERE:

Workshop

About the Authors

INDEX

End User License Agreement

Guide

Cover

Table of Contents

Begin Reading

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LISETTE SUTHERLAND and K. JANENE-NELSON

foreword byJURGEN APPELO

WORK together ANYWHERE

A HANDBOOK ON WORKING REMOTELY—successfully—FOR INDIVIDUALS, TEAMS & MANAGERS

Copyright © 2020 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, [phone], fax [phone], or on the Web at www.copyright.com. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, [phone], fax [phone], or online at http://www.wiley.com/go/permissions.

Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this book, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives or written sales materials. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a professional where appropriate. Neither the publisher nor author shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages.

For general information on our other products and services or for technical support, please contact our Customer Care Department within the United States at [phone], outside the United States at [phone] or fax [phone].

Wiley publishes in a variety of print and electronic formats and by print-on-demand. Some material included with standard print versions of this book may not be included in e-books or in print-on-demand. If this book refers to media such as a CD or DVD that is not included in the version you purchased, you may download this material at http://booksupport.wiley.com. For more information about Wiley products, visit www.wiley.com.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

ISBN 9781119745228 (Paperback)ISBN 9781119745259 (ePDF)ISBN 9781119745242 (ePub)

Cover and interior design by Erin Seaward-Hiatt (www.erinhiatt.com)Photo of Lisette Sutherland by José Ignacio de JuanPhoto of Kirsten Janene-Nelson by Jeremy Lindston Robinson

How to Use This Book

GENERALLY stated, to work remotely successfully calls for a particular combination of tool set, skill set, and mind set. More specifically, different settings and contexts call for different combinations of tool set, skill set, and mind set. To help you determine which combination best suits your needs, this book is organized into four parts to guide you—be you employee or employer—straight to the information that will help most now, whether you’re just considering working remotely, ready to start out, or perfecting your game.

If the concept of working remotely is new to you, begin with Part I, which relays the primary reasons why both employees and employers have opted to go remote. The Part I EXTRAS are geared toward those uncertain of just how to be effective in the virtual realm; there you’ll find both answers to frequently asked questions and an at-a-glance view of some essential benefits of working on-site—as well as how to replicate them online.

Part II focuses on the details applicable to individuals working remotely. For those just contemplating the leap into remote work, chapter 3 begins with a section on deciding for yourself—after which it addresses what you need to get started. The Part II EXTRAS further the exploration with a questionnaire to help you determine if you’re ready to work remotely—the results of which specify what you’d need to do to get ready. There is also guidance on taking your decision to the next level, be that convincing your boss (or team) or seeking remote employment. Chapter 4 expands the scope to discuss wider concerns: how to work well for yourself, as well as how to work well with others.

Part III begins the consideration of the remote option from the managerial perspective. For companies or departments first venturing into the virtual realm, chapter 5 shares how to prepare for the expansion, while chapter 6 and the Part III EXTRAS cover how to hire remote employees.

Part IV outlines the full range of what it means to manage remote teams. It walks you through how to make the experience productive, effective, and fun for everyone—from assessing how to translate your on-site needs to the online realm to crafting a team agreement on how everyone will work together. Chapter 10 also includes guidelines on running effective meetings, how to experiment in iterations—even how to scale up when the time comes to grow. Among the Part IV EXTRAS is the Manager’s Action Plan, which consolidates the action steps discussed in the individual chapters.

Following the conclusion chapter, the extensive RESOURCES section identifies where to head next, whether you seek details on the plethora of technology & tools available or need more ideas on a wide range of topics, from etiquette and HR to icebreakers and Retrospectives.

Another note: because much of the material relayed here applies to a variety of readers and situations, there is some necessary overlap. So, some information appears in more than one spot and in more than one way. As it happens, those points of overlap emphasize the most important aspects of how to work together well, and so are worth repeating.

Join me in exploring the wonderful world of remote working!

Foreword

TODAY’S meeting with my Agility Scales team was a good one. In the first five minutes, we discussed the most fashionable carnival costumes for our kids. (This season, it’s LEGO ninjas, apparently.) The discussion was part of our mandatory chitchat ritual, which both forbids us from immediately diving into work mode and challenges us to be more human and personal with each other. For five minutes.

After the chitchat, we had a vigorous discussion about how to describe the nature of our online product, as well as what terminology to use to best explain it to our customers. We also talked about the priorities of new product features, the role of our user community, and several important decisions we had to make. It was a delightful conversation, one in which everyone participated equally and which felt like a strange mix of marketing and existentialism.

We finished the meeting after precisely one hour, which is how we like it. As usual, we finished with our return on time invested (ROTI) ritual. At the count of three, everyone signals how useful the meeting was by holding up between one and five fingers. Everyone rated the meeting a five—except Kirill, who offered a four. An almost-perfect rating! We joked that we’d never invite Kirill again, and he joked back that he hadn’t been invited; he had just shown up to annoy us. A big laugh followed, and then I clicked the LEAVE MEETING button.

I took off my noise-canceling headphones, put away my Android tablet, looked around the airport café to see if anyone had stolen my stuff during the meeting, and then gathered my belongings to go and find my departure gate.

I am a remote worker. I can do my work anywhere.

In my opinion, work is something you do, not a place where you go. This attitude requires a particular way of thinking, a different approach to organization, and a bit of planning.

Where do you keep your documents when your office is wherever you happen to be? How do you work as a team when you rarely get to see each other face-to-face? What are the best tools for online meetings, schedules, workflows, design, and development? And how can you do your work when you’re in an environment that’s not conducive to focused, creative thinking?

The world of business is not used to this style of working. In fact, the terms that people in “normal” companies use for my kind of work life are all inept, in my view. Why do they call it “remote” working? My company has no office, so there’s no central place for me to be “remote” from. And what’s the deal with “virtual” teams? Is our team not “real” because we’re not physically colocated? And don’t get me started on IRL (in real life). I think I enjoy more of a real life than do most office workers, who are slowly dying between four gray walls.

Speaking of both “virtual” and “office” workers, in 2013 I hired Lisette Sutherland to be the virtual team manager for Happy Melly, a global professional happiness association dedicated to helping people be happier at work. Considering that I wanted to build a company without a physical office, and since Lisette was a pioneer in this realm, it made sense to let her do all the learning and exploration and then ask her to show us all the tips and tricks. It turns out that was a great decision. Now Lisette has done the same all over again: she’s done all the learning and exploration about virtual work life and teamwork—and now she can teach you everything you need to know to also be a success in this arena.

I started writing this text at Toulouse–Blagnac Airport in France. I’m now completing it in one of my favorite coffee bars in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. In between, I’ve been writing to you from Düsseldorf, Brussels, and Amsterdam. At the same time, I’ve also been remotely managing distributed teams spread out over a dozen or more countries on four continents. I’m sure you didn’t notice all the smooth transitions.

Does it all sound unfamiliar or challenging? Don’t worry. Lisette is here to tell you how you can organize this for yourself and for your teams. So stop going to work; start doing the work!

—JURGEN APPELO, author, speaker, entrepreneur

Introduction

IN 2006, I lived in California and belonged to a social community interested in technology, the future, and staying healthy. Every Sunday we went hiking together. One person in the group particularly interested me because he was working on a peculiar start-up idea: he wanted to eradicate death.

I learned there are a lot of longevity devotees out there experimenting with and researching anti-aging: rocket scientists, theoretical physicists, entrepreneurs, software developers. Some practice calorie restriction. Some research cryonics. Some work on nanotechnologies. Through his networks, my death-defying hiking friend was introduced to others working toward the same goal—but no one was talking regularly or sharing data. So he dreamed of building an online project-management tool to enable longevity scientists from all over the world to collaborate and solve the problem of aging.

It was an aha! experience for me. For centuries, employers have hired the most qualified workers who were able to convene at a central location. The location was by necessity the constant; the variable was the most qualified workers able to convene. That didn’t necessarily mean the team was populated by “the best and the brightest”—just the best who were nearby or willing to relocate. Of course, that’s the employer’s view. From the employees’ view, the job offers they accepted were the best they could get at the time—whether or not those jobs made them excited to get up in the morning.

But if instead we found a way to make location the variable—indeed, immaterial—then we could have the constant be the far more important concern: qualification, including enthusiasm. Employers could hire the best, the brightest, and the most dedicated—wherever those workers happen to be.

I love this concept. I’ve held a job that I took on because it was a “good job”—despite the fact that it didn’t excite me. And every day, when I arrived at what I called my gray cube (a cubicle like in a Dilbert cartoon), a part of me thought, Ugh. This is not the life I envisioned for myself. After several years, being rather young and naive, I quit my stable, good-paying job and pursued work that allowed greater self-expression, work that made me feel more alive. It wasn’t glamorous and it didn’t pay well for a long time, but I eventually found my niche and my own version of success.

It just thrills me to think that technology could make it so that everyone can engage in work that jazzes them. So I started talking to others who were thinking this way too, and I found a lot of people to talk to. I’ve interviewed directors and managers from more than eighty companies whose business models depend on successfully bridging distance—companies that, for example, provide consulting services, outsource work, and offer training courses. In addition I’ve talked with hundreds of people—from software developers to HR directors to neuroscientists. Everyone had a lot to say about how they make working remotely work for them or their teams. Some things I already knew or had guessed, like the need for regular contact and team building. Some things really surprised me, like how much connection can be created just by turning on the video camera, as well as how reluctant we all can be to try new things.

One of the biggest takeaways I got from all those conversations is that there is no “one solution fits all” for remote working, no single formula to follow. Each person, each company, will need to experiment with various tools and processes to find what makes him, her, or them most productive. But what are the tools available? What processes are effective for different kinds of remote teams? I rustled the virtual bushes to learn everything I could about how to make working remotely not just workable, but undeniably productive—and, in some cases, even preferable. All that and more has been collected in these pages.

To best help you navigate this terrain, this book is divided into parts and chapters suited to different kinds of readers at different stages in the going-remote process. (Please forgive this repeat if you’ve already read “How to Use This Book.”) If all this is completely new to you, start with Part I, which offers a bird’s-eye view of the current landscape of remote working, detailing some of the who, what, where, and why of it all. Part II is for individuals, whether you’re considering going remote or you’re ready to start out (chapter 3), or you’re perfecting your game (chapter 4). Parts III and IV are for team leaders and managers/owners: those transitioning to the remote option (chapter 5), those hiring remote workers (chapter 6), and those looking to perfect their game (chapter 7 through 10). Following the chapters in each part are Part EXTRAS: additional resources particularly applicable to that group. After Part IV is the RESOURCES section, which includes additions applicable to many—especially “Technology & Tools.” And for those who would benefit from more personalized guidance, you’ll also find information about the Work Together Anywhere Workshop, which is available both online and in person.

Be sure not to miss the conclusion, where I wax poetic about how people from all corners of the globe have figured out how to flourish working remotely—and how in so doing have achieved marvels previously thought impossible. And, finally, I want to give a shout-out to the remote-working experts I interviewed for the Collaboration Superpowers podcasts—which as of this writing has aired its 175th unique episode. In the “INTERVIEWEES” section I share a bit of what each professional has to offer—as well as information on how to further your acquaintance should you wish to learn more.

ONE of the premises of this book is that to be better informed is to be better prepared. So I strongly recommend that you at least skim the portions written for those you’ll be interacting with. The more you understand their perspective, and they yours, the better you’ll be able to forge something undeniably productive together. This broader perspective magnifies everyone’s understanding of how to make it all work well.

For those who haven’t yet made the leap, the prospect of going remote can feel daunting—but it doesn’t have to. Whether you’re an individual, a manager, or an owner, in the pages that follow you’ll find all you need not just to get started but also to get ahead. The information collected here paints a bright picture of the possibilities available to us today. Plus, given that businesses are constantly adapting, and the technology of remote collaboration is always improving, the future looks even more promising.

As I continue to interview people who work remotely, I meet ever more people from all over the world who actively pursue work they love. When I think back to my gray days in that cubicle, I think about all the people who currently view their work equally dimly. But they don’t have to—the technology exists to bridge distance between a dedicated worker and a job worth getting up for in the morning. In the pages to come, I’ll share how to do just that.

By the end of our journey, it’s unlikely we’ll have eradicated death, as my ambitious colleague aspires to do. But with the tips, tools, and to-do lists that follow, I hope to open your eyes to the possibilities that exist right now for working remotely—and to inspire you to do great things too. Just think of what we could accomplish when we get the right people working together!

PART ISETTING THE SCENE

Some of the Who, What, Where, and Why of Remote Working

As noted earlier, Part I aims to succinctly convey the terrain in which remote workers and employers find themselves—as well as a bit of what brought them there. Chapter 1 takes the viewpoint of the worker, sharing just what makes the remote option so appealing. (In a word: flexibility.) Chapter 2 demonstrates what a win-win for employers that flexibility can be. And for the more skeptical readers—or those who answer to more skeptical figures—that chapter shares both some common concerns about the remote option and possible solutions. The Part I EXTRAS section continues that discussion with “Frequently Asked Questions,” whose answers cross-reference where in the book more information can be found. And “At a Glance” encapsulates some of the many ways to replicate online the benefits of working on-site—material covered in detail in chapter 8.

As for further down the road, individuals ready to move forward can head to Part II—Individuals Working Remotely. Managers ready to move forward can head to Part III—Successful Remote Teams 101: Transitioning and Hiring. Those managers already in remote waters can seek out Part IV—Successful Remote Teams 201: Managing Remote Workers and Teams.

CHAPTER 1Why Are Individuals Going Remote? Workplace Flexibility

“A lot of what we’re looking at is not new. It’s just that technologies make working from anywhere possible for a lot more people.”

—PILAR ORTI, director, Virtual not Distant1

Most of this book tells you how you can make a success of working remotely, whether you’re a team member, a team leader, or flying solo. But before we get into that, some—especially managers—might wonder how it’s possible to get valuable work out of unsupervised employees. The answer to that question has multiple aspects, the most significant of which hinges on why workers seek remote employment options in the first place. We’ll return to both questions later in this chapter. But to best understand the full picture, let’s take a look at what kinds of people work remotely.

Some Terminology on Remote Working

Individuals who work remotely can be full-time telecommuting employees, contract freelancers—even digital nomads. [Note that all terms identified by bold italics are included in the glossary.] They typically fall into one of three “employee” types: telecommuter, self-employed, and business owner.

A telecommuter is someone who works remotely (usually from home), either full time or part time, on a fixed team for one company. According to research firm Global Workplace Analytics, a typical telecommuter in the United States is forty-five or older, college educated, and works as a salaried, non-union employee in a professional or even management role. He or she earns about $58,000 a year and most likely works for a company with more than one hundred employees. (In addition, 75 percent of employees who work from home earn more than $65,000 per year, which puts them in the upper eightieth percentile of all employees, home or office-based.)2

Many remote workers are self-employed freelancers. They run mainly service-based businesses and usually work with more than one remote client, whether simultaneously or consecutively. (As noted in the sidebar to follow, Upwork and Freelancers Union define freelancers as “individuals who have engaged in supplemental, temporary, or project- or contract-based work within the past twelve months.”3)

Some self-employed freelancers are also small business owners, whether solopreneurs or entrepreneurs (with a few remote employees or contractors).

Any of the above could also be a digital nomad : those who use portable technology to maintain a nomadic lifestyle.

The Five Types of Freelancers

Originally, the term “free-lancer” described a medieval lancer for hire, one not sworn to defend a particular lord. Today there are five main types of freelancers, defined by Upwork and Freelancers Union as “individuals who have engaged in supplemental, temporary, or project- or contract-based work in the past twelve months.”

INDEPENDENT CONTRACTORS (40 percent of the independent workforce/21.1 million professionals): Rather than having a steady, full-time employer, these “traditional” freelancers do project-based freelance, temporary, or supplemental work.

MOONLIGHTERS (27 percent/14.3 million): Professionals with a primary, traditional job might also moonlight doing freelance work—perhaps for lower-paying non-profits whose missions they support.

DIVERSIFIED WORKERS (18 percent/9.3 million): Some cobble together a living from a mix of employers. For example, someone who works steady hours as a part-time receptionist might also wait tables, drive for Lyft, and write freelance articles on the side.

TEMPORARY WORKERS (10 percent/5.5 million): This category includes those with a temporary employment status, whether that be one day as a film shoot makeup artist, several weeks as an office or warehouse temp, or several months as a business consultant.

FREELANCE BUSINESS OWNERS (5 percent/2.8 million): A freelancer can also be a solopreneur (with no employees) or an entrepreneur who employs others (usually between one and five employees or subcontractors).

Source: Upwork and Freelancers Union, “Freelancing in America: 2017.”4

Though working on-site is still the norm in certain sectors, not all telecommuters are seen as an anomaly in their department. Indeed, some companies have turned the concept of “normal” employee on its head, and have teams partially—or even entirely—made up of remote workers.

Remote teams are groups of people who work together on a project: sometimes for the same company, sometimes as a group of freelancers, and sometimes as a combination of both. They typically fall into one of the four following categories, often determined more by location than by function. In some teams several members work together in the same location (“colocated”), while others work remotely; this is what’s meant by the term “partly distributed.” In some teams everyone works remotely, regardless of location; this is also known as being “fully distributed.” Expanding to the company level, some companies are made up of several teams in different locations. And, of course, there are global organizations with offices in different locations. To follow are some examples.

IN PARTLY DISTRIBUTED COMPANIES, SOME WORKERS ARE CO-LOCATED, AND SOME ARE REMOTE. Targetprocess is a company of about eighty people. The majority of the team—90 percent—works together at the company headquarters in Minsk, Belarus; the remaining 10 percent is spread across the world. For Suitable Technologies it’s more of a 40/60 split: roughly 40 percent of its staff commutes to the headquarters in Palo Alto, California, while the other 60 percent beams in to drivable robots.

IN FULLY DISTRIBUTED COMPANIES, ALL WORKERS ARE REMOTE. Happy Melly is a global professional happiness association that provides access to resources promoting job satisfaction and professional development. The members of its remote team—myself included—work from Belgium, Canada, Finland, India, the Netherlands, Russia, Slovenia, Spain, South Sudan, and the United Kingdom.

StarterSquad develops software for start-ups, all care of their international team of highly skilled developers, designers, and “growth hackers.” Their team has an interesting “How did you get together?” story. A client with a software development project hired various freelancers using the online working site Upwork (formerly Elance). Though they didn’t know each other before the project started, over time the team clicked—so well that, when the client unexpectedly ran out of money, the team members weren’t ready to part ways. They’ve operated as a self-organized team of entrepreneurs ever since.

SOME COMPANIES WORK WITH SEVERAL TEAMS IN DIFFERENT LOCATIONS. Before starting his own company, Ralph van Roosmalen worked at an office in the Dutch city of  ’s-Hertogenbosch, where he managed three teams based in three countries: the Netherlands, Romania, and the United States. The partners at Radical Inclusion also live and work from three different countries: Belgium, Brazil, and Germany.

Geographic and Cultural Definitions

Geographically speaking, remote teams can be in the same location, near-located, or far-located. Near-located generally means that team members are within driving distance of each other. Far-located teams include one or more people who are far enough away that getting together in person requires planning. (The farthest far-located prize goes to the six people who work on the International Space Station, which orbits the Earth once every 90 minutes at a distance of 250 miles from our planet. Back on Earth, a team works to support them remotely at NASA—the National Aeronautics and Space Administration—themselves working from all over the world.)

Another aspect of remote working involves different cultural characterizations, which are often referred to as “near-shoring” and “off-shoring.” When people from countries with a similar language and/or culture work together, it’s called near-shoring, such as a team with members in Europe, Scandinavia, and the United States. When people from countries with rather different languages and/or cultures work together, it’s called off-shoring, such as a team with members from Colombia, Europe, Pakistan, and the United States.

The Face of Remote Working

What about the individuals working in these capacities and configurations—what kind of people seek work outside the traditional office setting? A wide range, actually. Since working remotely usually requires some sort of technology, one might imagine such workers are mostly members of the millennial/ Gen Y generation or younger (namely those born after 1985). Globally this is likely true; according to the 2018 Payoneer Freelancer Income Survey, more than 50 percent of respondents—21,000 people in 170 countries—are under age thirty.5 But in the United States the average skews higher. According to 2017 State of Telecommuting in the U.S. Employee Workforce report, half of telecommuters are forty-five or older.6

In August 2017, the online employment resource FlexJobs, which specializes in professional flexible employment, published the results of its annual survey of those in the United States seeking flexible employment—5,500 respondents. Baby Boomers and “Gen-Xers” (together, those born between 1945 and 1984) comprise nearly three-quarters—72 percent. And the survey pool self-identified as a diverse group of working parents and entrepreneurs, students and retirees—the vast majority of whom (81 percent) sought to telecommute for their entire workweeks.7 (See the sidebar to follow.)

Stats from the 2017 FlexJobs “Super Survey”

RESPONDENTS (5,500) SELF-IDENTIFIED AS

Working parents (35%)

Freelancers (26%)

Entrepreneurs (21%)

People living in rural areas (15%)

Stay-at-home moms (14%)

People with chronic physical or mental illness (14%)

Digital nomads (12%)

Caregivers (9%)

Students (9%)

Retirees (8%)

Super-commuters (8%)

Military spouses (2%)

Stay-at-home dads (2%)

AGES/GENERATIONS

Gen X (41%)

Baby Boomer (31%)

Millennial/Gen Y (21%)

Silent Generation (6%)

Gen Z (1%)

QUANTITY OF WORK SOUGHT

Telecommuting 100% of the time (81%)

Flexible schedule (70%)

Telecommuting some of the time (46%)

Part-time schedule (46%)

Alternative schedule (44%)

Freelance contract (39%)

8

Such a diverse group has numerous reasons for preferring to work remotely. For many it’s about schedule—specifically, the ability to maximize the time spent with their families. Indeed, a separate 2017 FlexJobs survey found that parents rank work flexibility (84 percent) ahead of even salary (75 percent).9

For some, the answer concerns their SITUATION, such as stay-at-home parents or adults caring for their parents, and military spouses—who appreciate not having the family’s next deployment disrupt their own employment. Retirees are also keen remote workers. Entrepreneur, speaker, and author Leslie Truex notes that “a lot of people are looking at how they can supplement their retirement. Or they are already retired or want to retire sooner—and know they need an income to do that.”10 Writer and career development expert Brie Reynolds agrees, sharing: “Both my parents are in retirement now. They want to stay active, but they don’t want to commute every day—and they don’t want all the office politics. What they do want is to apply the knowledge and the skills they’ve learned across their lifetimes to something meaningful in retirement.”11

But one of the biggest reasons remote working is on the rise derives from sheer opportunity. With the proliferation of online work websites (like Freelancer.com, SimplyHired, and Upwork), there are ever more opportunities for contract work. The survey “Freelancing in America: 2017” notes that “71 percent of freelancers say the percentage of work they have obtained online has increased over the past year,” and that 77 percent of those “who have found work online” start projects “within a week.” Indeed, at the “current growth rate, the majority of the U.S. workforce will be freelancers by 2027.”12 As for the income from that work, in early 2018 annual freelancer earnings on Upwork.com reached the $1.5 billion mark.13

An additional factor within sheer opportunity is how working remotely allows an employee to test out a new position before relocating. As financial services executive Jeremy Stanton puts it: “There’s a lot of risk taking a job, especially when you have to uproot your family and move. What if you get six months in and it doesn’t work out? That’s an awful conversation to have with your spouse. If you start remotely, there’s more room to ramp up into the company, and everybody gets a chance to see if it works out.”14

And many seek remote employment in the face of insufficient in-office opportunities. Leslie Truex reports: “Though some people are scared to become freelancers because they want the salary and benefits they’re used to, we’re seeing that more and more employers are cutting benefits, even if they aren’t going out of business. The idea that the in-house job is the safe route isn’t necessarily true anymore.”15 In other words, many freelancers feel they have more stability working for themselves—because they don’t rely on one company for their income. I faced this scenario myself. One company I worked for went out of business overnight because their one and only investor was involved in a scandal. I was at my next job for two years until the company was sold, leaving me unemployed again. That inspired me to stop looking for “regular jobs” and instead take things into my own hands; essentially, I switched to full-time freelancing for job security.

An additional, widely shared reason for preferring the remote option concerns COMMUTING. For some, it isn’t so much that they don’t want to work on-site—it’s the getting there that’s the problem. As SourceSeek cofounder Dave Hecker puts it, “The world is changing. A lot of people don’t want to come to the office anymore.”16 Among my own interviewees, the number-one reason people want to work remotely is to end the dreaded commute. Around the world, commuting times vary, from a few minutes to a few hours per day. According to the 2016 “PGi Global Telework” Survey, the majority of surveyed “non-teleworkers” commuted thirty to sixty minutes round-trip per day; the figure exceeds an hour for one-third of those in the Asia Pacific region.17 Every minute we commute is a minute we aren’t working or doing something we love—or being with someone we love. On top of that, the journey itself is often stressful, rife with traffic jams, crowded buses and trains, delays, smells, and noise. The world over, a large number of workers feel a bad commute can ruin a great job.

Another factor about commuting concerns expense, both of the commute itself as well as the cost of living within a decent commuting distance from work. Several of the people I interviewed appreciated being able to enjoy a metropolitan income while also residing in a region with a low cost of living.

PRODUCTIVITY

As for the time when people are working on-site: while some benefit from the nose-to-the-grindstone atmosphere of an office, a significant majority find they’re least productive in that setting. Why? Many find it too distracting. Meetings, side conversations, noise, celebrations … all these and more get in the way of productivity. Citing several years of FlexJobs survey data, career development expert Brie Reynolds relates how people want to work remotely “to get away from office distractions. They don’t want the office politics and the quick pop-ins to their cubicles. They want to be able to focus and actually get work done.”18

FlexJobs’s 2017 Survey: Productivity Outside the Office

To follow are the top reasons respondents said they would be, or are, more productive working remotely:

Fewer interruptions from colleagues (76%)

Fewer distractions (76%)

Reduced stress from commuting (70%)

Minimal office politics (69%)

Quieter noise level (62%)

More comfortable clothes (54%)

More personalized office environment (51%)

Less frequent meetings (46%)

More efficient meetings (31%)

Source: “Workers Are More Productive at Home,” FlexJobs, 21 August 2017.19

Entrepreneur and author Leslie Truex agrees: “The reality is we’ve all been in a workplace where our colleagues are present but they’re not getting things done. Lots of studies show that productivity among telecommuters is actually high. They get a lot done in less time.” 20 For example, in 2017 Forbes reported that, “according to the ‘State of Work’ productivity report, 65 percent of full-time employees think a remote work schedule would increase productivity. This is backed up by more than two-thirds of managers reporting an increase in overall productivity from their remote employees.”21

In 2014, Harvard Business Review interviewed the authors of a half-remote, half-in-house productivity study at a call center of the Chinese travel website Ctrip. The study found that “people working from home completed 13.5 percent more calls than the staff in the office did—meaning that Ctrip got almost an extra workday a week out of them.” As Nicholas Bloom, a professor of economics at Stanford University, reported: “One-third of the productivity increase, we think, was due to having a quieter environment, which makes it easier to process calls. At home people don’t experience what we call the ‘cake in the break room’ effect. Offices are actually incredibly distracting places. The other two-thirds can be attributed to the fact that the people at home worked more hours. They started earlier, took shorter breaks, and worked until the end of the day. They had no commute. They didn’t run errands at lunch. Sick days for employees working from home plummeted.”22

Even the technology giant Best Buy “reported in 2006 that productivity had on average increased 35 percent in departments that shifted to working from wherever they wanted, whenever they wanted.” And though Best Buy famously ended that option, it was apparently because “working together, in person, has a different set of benefits.”23 (This point gets revisited in the FAQ section in the Part I EXTRAS.)

Productivity When Working Remotely

The title of this 2016 Hubstaff article says it all: “Are Remote Workers More Productive? We’ve Checked All the Research So You Don’t Have To.” Based on “a number of different studies, conducted by both big companies and civil society organizations,” they conclude that the option to work remotely yields greater productivity. In sum, the findings suggest the following:

Remote workers PERFORM BETTER AND FASTER the same type of jobs as those of office workers.

Remote workers LOG MORE HOURS. This happens in part because they TAKE LESS SICK LEAVE, since it’s possible to work from home without infecting the office. The fact that they “also show better engagement with the work and report higher levels of personal satisfaction and happiness” (as noted below) likely adds to their productivity.

Remote workers are MORE ENGAGED.

Remote workers are HAPPIER WITH THEIR JOBS.

Remote workers are BETTER AT COLLABORATION.

Remote workers REDUCE EMPLOYERS’ COSTS.

Hubstaff cites the following among their sources: ConnectSolutions (now CoSo Cloud), Gallup’s 2017 “State of the American Workplace” report, GlobalWorkplaceAnalytics.com (based on analysis of 2005–2015 U.S. Census Bureau data), Harvard Business Review, and Remote.co.24

Given that the working world of today has in many cases outgrown its former cookie-cutter mold, there is no longer a singular approach to working. And for many workers, in many industries, the most productive workspace is not the office.

My first aha! moment was when I was on a holiday and had to do some work. And I noticed that the work was some of the best I had ever done, and I had done it faster than when I was in my office. That’s when I realized that by changing where I worked, I could improve what I did.

—TEO HÄRÉN, creativity expert, interesting.org25

Everything is in the cloud. I’m as effective from home or when I’m traveling abroad as I would be if I was in the office.

—NICK TIMMONS, director of sales, Personify Inc.26

Without question I’m more productive when working at home— at least when it comes to tasks that require almost no collaboration. Focus is best achieved when I’m isolated, and at work I’m constantly interrupted. Often for work-related stuff, which is fine, but I’m also drawn into conversations about non-work-related topics.

—ABRAHAM HEWARD, senior engineer at Carvana27

The plain fact is that different people thrive in different environments, and we appreciate being free to choose a location and setup that works for us. But this concept of choice extends beyond just one work environment: quite a few of my interviewees opt for a different workspace depending on the task at hand.

Where I work depends on the job I’m doing. If the job requires thinking and designing and needs concentration, I like coffee shops. I concentrate best when there are a lot of people around me. When the job is routine and I just need to check something, I stay home.

—YEGOR BUGAYENKO, CEO, Zerocracy.com28

A hybrid model is my preferred situation, because efficient pair programming and training happens when I am colocated, but focus is best achieved when I’m isolated.

—ABRAHAM HEWARD, senior engineer at Carvana29

Personally, I don’t define an office. I look for the office I need to solve my task. I find it very boring to do invoicing, so I want to do it at a very beautiful place. I save invoices for two or three months, and then go to the ocean and sit at a café, and do that boring stuff at an inspiring place. My twin brother hates invoicing as well, but he solves it in another way. He likes to sit in a room with no windows to make things so boring that he works as quickly as he can.

—TEO HÄRÉN, creativity expert, interesting.org30

There’s a psychological aspect to this too. It’s undeniable that the freedom to choose one’s workspace is a boon for the worker—and a boost to the worker’s mood. But note that that opportunity, that autonomy, translates back to benefit the employer as well as the worker. Employees who have a positive association with their work and work environment can’t help but produce better work. As Troy Gardner, CTO of Cloud9 Brewing Systems, puts it: “I love not being in a 72-degree, noisy, fluorescent-lit room. . . . I love my sit-stand desk, my comfy chair, and my gazillion monitors.”31 (We’ll return to this point later on.)

Of course, some endeavors require participation on-site. Workers don’t begrudge that; they simply appreciate some flexibility regarding other aspects of their responsibilities. For example, when employees of the headquarters of Gap Inc. were given the option of choosing their work hours, many still came into work—they just chose to commute during off-peak times, reducing their commute time by as much as an hour or more each day. And they usually spent that additional time working. Ultimately, the flexible option made them more productive.32

Remote Solutions Provide the Best of Both Worlds

Putting aside for the moment the legitimate need for in-person meetings and face-to-face collaboration, some don’t know how they’d get ahead on the job—let alone cultivate a successful career over time—if they didn’t work in a central workplace. Many can’t imagine working without being able to easily find their teammates to ask a quick question. Many cite the importance of being privy to the unplanned benefits of working together—notably in overhearing conversations. As interviewee Laura Rooke puts it: “What you miss out on when working remotely is what you would overhear if you were in an office. Sometimes the conversations you overhear are just as valuable as the conversations you have with somebody.”33 Plus, of course, there are the social benefits of working in an office—the spontaneous moments at the water cooler, the shared lunches and drinks after work, and the simple fact of being with others as opposed to working in isolation.

Fortunately, both technology and ingenuity have produced numerous means of addressing all these valid concerns. And, since the whole point of this book is to share them with you, you’ll find specifics about all of them throughout these pages, especially in “Technology & Tools” in the RESOURCES section and in the chapters concerning teams (Part IV). For now, here are just a few of the many solutions available to the points mentioned above.

EASY ACCESS TO COLLEAGUES

First, just plain-old digital communication: phone, email, text, and instant messaging (IM)—combined with informing one’s colleagues on how best to be reached when—solves the problem of getting a quick answer to a question. Second, more advanced visual communication, such as video chat (see next entry), as well as the communication capabilities of virtual office technology, offer more meaningful interaction. Note that some studies suggest that these digital communication options are necessary for even those who work on-site; an internal study conducted at biotechnology giant Genentech found that employees were not at their desks for 80 percent (!) of the standard workday.34

THE BENEFITS OF “FACE TIME” INTERACTIONS

The following anecdote demonstrates how effective digital face time—video chat—can be. While working on a six-month special project in London, England, associate professor and neuroradiologist Marion Smits needed to maintain high-quality interaction with her PhD students back at Erasmus MC in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. Before she left, her students were concerned that they wouldn’t have enough contact and would lose touch. However, thanks to Skype calls replacing their in-person meetings, they found that they worked together just the same, especially since they already used email to communicate and Dropbox to share files anyway. In fact, when Marion returned from London the students joked about the inconvenience of having to walk the fifteen minutes across campus to meet her in her office.

THE UNPLANNED BENEFITS OF WORKING TOGETHER

The solution to this concern fuses digital-age technology with modern-day methodology in a practice known as “working out loud.” (This is covered more in chapter 4 and throughout Part IV.)

THE SOCIAL BENEFITS OF WORKING IN AN OFFICE

Since humans are so enterprising, it’s not surprising that quite a few digital solutions address our needs as social creatures. For example, workers utilizing a company’s virtual office can identify if they’re available to chat—if their digital door is “open” to virtual pop-ins. And as Stephan Dohrn, Managing Partner at Radical Inclusion, puts it, “Group chat makes a great virtual water cooler.”35 Video chat also enables spending time together over lunch—or over drinks after work.

THE DOWNSIDES OF WORKING IN ISOLATION

For those who simply prefer to not be the only human in the room during the workday, thanks to portable technology (such as cellphone, laptop, and cloud-based software) there’s always the option of snagging a corner table at a café or renting a spot at a coworking space—the latter available on-demand or year-round.

THE BENEFITS OF ACTUAL FACE TIME

As for the endeavors that require more than just digital face time, even far-located employees can schedule in-person interactions when such is preferable. In fact, most remote-working experts encourage making a habit of getting together in person when possible.

The point bears repeating: we love having options concerning both our schedule and our workspace. And we love getting to choose work that’s meaningful to us—with colleagues who also love their work, who also take pride in the work they do. It was said over and over in my interviews: while salary is important, there came a point when people valued working on interesting projects with people they liked more than they valued their pay package.

I enjoy programming and I like to work with people who share the same passion for writing high-quality code. My work is not just about making money. It’s not just a job, it’s a pleasure for me. Every day I get to work with people who care about the same things I do.

—YEGOR BUGAYENKO, CEO, Zerocracy.com36

In my company, we are working on defending people against all kinds of security threats. It feels good to work on something that makes a difference in some of the not-so-pleasant things of online life.

—MARK KILBY, Agile coach, Sonatype37

There’s a certain wonderful feeling when you are doing something that you are passionate about and making money with it. There’s nothing better than that.

—GERARD BEAULIEU, cofounder, Tornadosedge.com; and founder, Virtual Ice Breakers38

Workplace Flexibility: Results-Oriented vs. Hours-Oriented Work

“There’s a presumption that people are slacking off [when working outside the office]. What we’ve found is that people don’t want to get fired. . . . They know they can’t slack off.”

—ERIC SEVERSON, former co-CHRO, Gap Inc.; Appointee, National Advisory Council on Innovation & Entrepreneurship 39

This chapter began by noting that those of a managerial mind set might wonder how—or even if—it’s possible to get valuable work out of unsupervised employees. The quick answer to “if ” is yes. The larger context of “how” is to be found in the philosophy of results-oriented working.

There’s a quiet, steady revolution taking place in the work arena regarding worker autonomy. For hundreds of years, workers came to a central workplace during set hours. Today, technology has made it possible to produce valuable work at any hour, from any location. This capability could make some managers nervous, thinking that it takes a supervisory eye to keep workers productive. But that concern is an artifact of hours-oriented work: work where, if you put in your time-clocked hours, your work is done.

In 2003, Cali Ressler and Jody Thompson created a workplace strategy that focuses not on hours but on results. They trademarked their creation Results-Only Work Environment, or ROWE. As Ressler and Thompson put it, ROWE is a “management strategy where employees are evaluated on performance, not presence.”40

Web-developer agency 10up Inc. offers:

How do businesses measure productivity of colocated workers? By how busy they appear to be when you walk by? By whether they enter the office at 9:00 AM and leave around 5:00 PM? Any business that effectively measures employee productivity surely isn’t relying on anything having to do with physical location.

In truth, well-managed distributed teams are often far more productive than colocated teams, because, indeed, you’re forced to measure productivity by far more objective metrics than things like “time in the building.”41

This isn’t to say that hourly workers don’t track their time; the difference concerns the company’s expectations of those workers. ROWE-minded organizations often break down larger work into “granular” or very-short-time-frame work phases that employees commit to delivering. By this means, any potential obstacles to the long-term project can be identified and resolved much more quickly.

According to the CultureIQ website, the ROWE “strategy puts the role of working directly into the employees’ hands. They become more empowered at their ability to contribute to the greater good, which builds their passion and willingness to strive for greatness in the workplace. As employees’ performance is ultimately their responsibility, they have more of a drive to get things done well and expediently.”42

Put simply, giving workers the flexibility they want is good for the bottom line. For more on present-day employee preferences, see the following sidebar. In the next chapter, we’ll revisit the issue with additional data identifying how remote-working options ultimately benefit the employer as much as they benefit the employee.

Big-Picture Reasons Individuals Favor Remote Working

Of the 5,500 respondents in the 2017 “FlexJobs Super Survey,” the percentages below indicate how many regarded the following as the “most important factors” when considering a job:

Work-life balance (72%)

Flexible schedule and salary (tie) (69%)

Telecommuting (60%)

Meaningful work (57%)

Work schedule (48%)

Location (45%)

Company reputation (40%)

Health insurance (37%)

Professional challenge (36%)

Company culture (34%)

Career progression (30%)

401(k)/retirement benefits and vacation time (tie) (29%)

Skills training and education options (28%)

Amount of travel required (25%)

In addition, when assessing how much flexible options in the workplace would impact their quality of life, 45 percent identified such would be a huge improvement. More specifically, 78 percent of people believed they’d be healthier; 86 percent said they’d be less stressed.43

To bring the discussion back to the beginning: one of the secrets to successful remote working is going from a nine-to-five, time-oriented mind set to a results-oriented one. More and more, work is not a place we go, it’s something we do—and what matters is that we deliver by the deadline.

Remote Reminders

Advances in technology have made working remotely easier and more affordable than ever before.

Remote workers worldwide are a diverse group: young and old, working parents and entrepreneurs, students and retirees. They include full-time telecommuting employees, self-employed freelancers, solopreneurs, and freelance business owners.

The top reasons workers wish to telework include schedule, commuting, family situation/caretaking, preferred work environment, increased productivity, increased opportunities, even “trying out” a position or role. Additional people who seek remote work include those wishing to supplement their income, retirees wanting to stay active, military spouses, and the disabled.

Many seek the remote option just for the flexibility of not commuting a few days a week.

Embracing the remote option calls for shifting from a mind set of hours-oriented working to results-oriented working or ROWE.

NOTES

1

   Pilar Orti, “Humanize Remote Work,” interview by Lisette Sutherland, 3 November 2014,

https://collaborationsuperpowers.com/4-humanizing-remote-work-pilar-orti

.

2

GlobalWorkplaceAnalytics.com

, “Latest Telecommuting Statistics,” updated June 2017,

http://globalworkplaceanalytics.com/telecommuting-statistics

. Global Workplace Analytics provides statistics on the work-at-home/telework population in the U.S. based on an analysis of 2005–2015 American Community Survey (U.S. Census Bureau) data.

3

    Upwork and Freelancers Union, “Freelancing in America: 2017,” Results Deck, slide 65, 28 September 2017,

https://www.upwork.com/i/freelancing-in-america/2017

.

4

    Upwork and Freelancers Union, “Freelancing in America: 2017,” 28 September 2017,

https://www.upwork.com/i/freelancing-in-america/2017

.

5

The Payoneer Freelancer Income Survey 2018

,

https://explore.payoneer.com/freelancer-income-survey-2018

.

6

2017 State of Telecommuting in the U.S. Employee Workforce

, Global Work-place Analytics and FlexJobs,

https://flexjobs.com/2017-State-of-Telecommuting-US

.

7

    Brie Weiler Reynolds, “Workers Are More Productive at Home: Here Are 25 Companies Hiring for Remote Jobs,” FlexJobs, 21 August 2017,

https://www.flexjobs.com/blog/post/productive-working-remotely-top-companies-hiring

.

8

   Brie Weiler Reynolds, “Workers Are More Productive at Home.”

9

   Brie Weiler Reynolds, “Working Parents in 2017: What They Want at Work,” FlexJobs, 11 August 2017,

https://www.flexjobs.com/blog/post/what-working-parents-want-at-work

.

10

 Leslie Truex, “Be a Work-at-Home Success with Leslie Truex,” interview by Lisette Sutherland, Collaboration Superpowers, podcast audio, video, and transcript, 20 April 2016,

https://www.collaborationsuperpowers.com/91-be-a-work-at-home-success-with-leslie-truex

.

11

 Brie Weiler Reynolds, “Communicate Proactively and Build Culture,” interview by Lisette Sutherland, Collaboration Superpowers, podcast audio, video, and transcript, 5 August 2015,

https://collaborationsuperpowers.com/56-communicate-proactively-and-build-culture-with-brie-reynolds

.

12

 Upwork and Freelancers Union, “Freelancing in America: 2017,” Results Deck, slides

38, 39

, and 5, 28 September 2017,

https://upwork.com/i/freelancing-in-america/2017

.

13

 Upwork, “Fortune 500 Enterprises Shift Their Contingent Workforce to Upwork Platform Saving Both Time and Money,” press release, 6 February 2018,

https://www.upwork.com/press/2018/02/06/fortune-500-enterprises

.

14

 Jeremy Stanton, “Being Deliberate with Onboarding and Culture with Jeremy Stanton,” interview by Lisette Sutherland, Collaboration Superpowers, podcast audio, video, and transcript, 17 November 2014,

https://collaborationsuperpowers.com/10-being-deliberate-with-onboarding-and-culture-jeremy-stanton

.

15

 Leslie Truex, “Be a Work-at-Home Success with Leslie Truex,” interview by Lisette Sutherland, Collaboration Superpowers, podcast audio, video, and transcript, 20 April 2016,

https://www.collaborationsuperpowers.com/91-be-a-work-at-home-success-with-leslie-truex

.

16

 Dave Hecker, “Effectively Managing Remote Teams with Dave Hecker,” interview by Lisette Sutherland, Collaboration Superpowers, podcast audio, video, and transcript, 20 April 2016,

https://www.collaborationsuperpowers.com/93-manage-expectations-on-distributed-teams-with-dave-hecker

.

17

 “2016 Global Telework Survey,” 27 July 2016,

https://www.pgi.com/blog/2016/06/2016-global-telework-survey

.

18

 Brie Weiler Reynolds, “Communicate Proactively and Build Culture,” interview by Lisette Sutherland, Collaboration Superpowers, podcast audio, video, and transcript, 5 August 2015,

https://collaborationsuperpowers.com/56-communicate-proactively-and-build-culture-with-brie-reynolds

.

19

 Brie Weiler Reynolds, “Workers Are More Productive at Home: Here Are 25 Companies Hiring for Remote Jobs,” FlexJobs, 21 August 2017,

https://www.flexjobs.com/blog/post/productive-working-remotely-top-companies-hiring

.

20

 Leslie Truex, “Be a Work-at-Home Success with Leslie Truex,” interview by Lisette Sutherland, Collaboration Superpowers, podcast audio, video, and transcript, 20 April 2016,

https://www.collaborationsuperpowers.com/91-be-a-work-at-home-success-with-leslie-truex

.

21

 Andrea Loubier, “Benefits of Telecommuting for the Future of Work,”

Forbes

, 20 July 2017,

https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrealoubier/2017/07/20/benefits-of-telecommuting-for-the-future-of-work/#16e712ec16c6

.

22