Remote work culture has overgrown in recent years, and employees look for remote work appreciation ideas more often than ever. Telecommuting can be fun, but over time, employees can become isolated. Many telecommuters often feel anxious and unmotivated because they must balance work and family.
When managing a team of remote workers, it is essential that team members feel their contributions are valued. Therefore, rewarding telecommuters is very important to their job satisfaction.
However, making employees feel valued is more complicated than you think. Here are some ways to show your remote workers that you appreciate them.
How Do You Show Appreciation to Remote Workers?
If you manage an external team, these seven ideas on how to show appreciation to external employees will go a long way in the sometimes complicated process of external management.
1. Go Through a Structured Orientation Process
Every new employee needs a few days to understand the company’s culture, mission, and vision. When hiring remote workers, don’t overload them with tasks and expectations from day one. Give them time to get used to the company culture and settle in.
Remote workers don’t share the same workspace as their colleagues and have few opportunities to communicate with others in the company. This makes it difficult for them to create a strong bond with the company and feel valued.
Implement a robust onboarding process to make new remote employees feel comfortable. When defining the orientation process, focus on what will help the new employee understand the company, its employees, and the tools and resources they will use. This will help them integrate smoothly into their new job.
2. Provide Professional Development Opportunities
All employees value professional development, whether they work remotely or not. However, over 30% of employees report limited professional development opportunities due to the pandemic. This may be due to a lack of conferences, seminars, and other industry events. Therefore, switching to online events and courses can be a solution to provide employees with professional development opportunities while working remotely. In addition, it also makes sense to recognize remote workers.
For example, you can enroll remote workers in webinars or offer them one-on-one training to improve their professional skills. If you don’t have enough budget for specific training, you can gradually give them new and challenging tasks to encourage them to step out of their comfort zone.
3. Educate Remote Workers Through Regular Feedback
Consistent communication with staff is essential to keep them in the remote work environment and to recognize remote workers. Poor communication via email can make employees anxious and worried, leading to decreased productivity.
Employees want to be appreciated. So timely feedback is a good idea to encourage remote workers. Detailed feedback, whether positive or negative, can put employees at ease. It also helps field staff understand their place in the organization and the value they bring. They will also be more motivated at work to improve any shortcomings reflected in their performance.
4. Express Your Appreciation
Employees may not have many opportunities to express appreciation in a remote work environment. However, please don’t neglect to thank remote workers directly for their work.
You can provide examples of employees who have exceeded expectations in group meetings. “Employee of the month” on your social media pages, you can also recognize them. If you want to be personally appreciated, you can express your sincere admiration via email or phone.
Depending on your company’s culture, you should modify the criteria for recognizing remote workers.
5. Emphasize Two-Way Communication
Another valuable recognition idea for remote workers is to prioritize effective communication. Instead of just assigning tasks to remote workers, encourage them to share their thoughts and feedback and involve them in the project.
Even if a previous project wasn’t as successful as you envisioned, listen to your staff and think about how you can improve your collaboration in the future.
Talking to a remote worker and asking questions can encourage cooperation and build trust. You can also speak openly about how your work is going and what problems you’re experiencing.
Whether challenging or enjoyable, sharing with your employees what you expect will make them feel valued and realize that you care about them and their role.
6. Invest in Technology to Make Your Work Easier
Remote work allows for teams to be spread around the world. Therefore, one of the most effective ideas for recognizing virtual teams is to offer technology solutions that make it easier for remote workers to work.
A wide range of employee pc monitoring software free is currently available. Investing in technology ensures that your team has fast, secure, and reliable access to the business information and data they need anytime, anywhere.
They can also use various real-time tools to distribute work and track project progress. These tools make it easier to organize, prioritize and synchronize the work of remote workers.
Because you can’t see your remote workers in person, you may be reluctant to share personal information with them. But with the proper security measures in place, you can ensure that confidential information shared by remote workers is protected.
7. Offer Flexibility
Remote work is preferred because it offers more vacation time and the freedom to work in a comfortable environment. People who move from a fixed office job to remote work want a flexible work environment. Therefore, one employee recognition idea that can implemente for remote workers is introducing a flexible work system.
Instead of forcing remote workers to work a fixed schedule, please give them the freedom to choose their work hours. This shows that you trust and value the decisions of your remote workers.
Conclusions On Incentive Ideas for Remote Worker
Whether full-time or remote, valuing employees is the best way to build a long-term, trusting relationship with them. But remote work requires special attention to make employees feel valued and motivated. It may not be the most straightforward task you have as a manager, but it’s worth it.