Remote Teams and How Communication is Key to Preventing Burn Out.

By: Stephanie Diana Wilson-Eubank

As a quick side note to this article this is the first article I get to write with my new married name of Eubank.  So, a small excitement as I attempt to balance life, work, and my educational pursuits into my DBA research.

Now onto the blog post.  With so many working remotely often for the first time there is a desperate feeling of a need to push for higher and higher performance productivity.  However, for many employees this is coming at the price of work life balance because remote workers are working more hours and there is a relative expectation or at least a feeling that one might be expected to work 24 hours a day. 

This is an interesting concept that is normally worked out to make a 24 hour remote team by having a global team.  Which team design allows for this sort of planning in the organizational leadership side of business and team development.  However, it is becoming a big down side for those working an eight hour day on the same time zone.  The reason it is a down side is the fact that this over working attitude and encroachment on live/ work balance can quickly spark burn out. 

Burn Out can be a kiss of death to any team even in a saturated labor pool created by a recession.  Unfortunately it is up to employees to set the boundaries based on their own comfort level and for management to respect it.  Sometimes wiggle room needs to be created as an effort to save the team rather than create a mass exodus of employees.  It also creates more than the extra spending in HR to find and recruit more employees but; it can also hurt a company reputation by hurting organizational good will.

However, many managers I have spoken with have been dealing with push back from either management or teams to go back to the office.  And in an effort to force remote to work the pressure is on to show high and higher productivity.  There is also the profit losses some managers have attributed the pressure to over perform and over deliver.  This pressure tends to trickle down to employees and the brunt of the work falls to them even if unfairly encroaching on personal time.  Setting boundaries between managers and employees will also help to develop realistic quotas and turn times along with showing a mutual respect to team members.  Management can also learn how to reallocate resources by implementing tactics like cross training to help close gaps and meet goals.  Remember employees are any manager or project manager’s most vital resource. 

On that note stay safe, and take care of each other.  If this article was helpful for you please like and share.