Speaker 1: Hi, good day. My name is Frederik Rijntjens, also known as The Boxologist. Here in my vlog related to remote working practices, I'd like to focus today on HR policies, and in particular, remote working policies. Policies that will help us to govern and structure remote working in the benefit of companies and individuals. So, today I'd like to provide you four tips when you're going to develop policies related to remote working, and how to improve the performance of the organization and individual working remotely. Remote work. Let's recap. Remote work is a way of working, not proximate to your work, somewhere remotely, in your own time, free of when and where you like to work. For most people, this is considered the ideal future of work. I work when I want, and how I want it. But is it really so ideal? Let's question this. First of all, there's not many people from statistics that can be saying, I am proud to be a remote worker. Most of us actually do work remotely, half of us, but accidentally. And when we say accidentally, there is a risk involved, many risks. And most of these risks are actually penalized, not to the company, but to the individual. Let me give you some ideas. First of all, you could be sitting in a conference or training like mine today, and receive an email or a message or a PowerPoint presentation that you had to review, and you forgot about. So here it goes, you start working. It is not organized, it is not in a work environment, it's not in a place where you have to work. It's actually just accidentally, you choose, now I have to do something for work. Now, from an information security point of view, we might ask ourselves, are you working in a secure environment? Do you use the right Wi-Fi connections? Is it public or private? Is there a VPN? Also, other questions relate to who can watch you, can see people, the documents you're handling, and so on and so on. A lot of us do actually want to remote work when they're home, but actually don't do it for the simple reason that companies will not consider the time you spend for work at home is work. So why would you do it? So very little group of people actually can say, I'm a proud remote worker. So there are hidden dangers to remote work. And that's where the risks lay. And when you develop a policy, you want to ensure these risks are covered. Let me give you a few examples. The four main risks that you can find actually are the following. First of all, remote workers should not work in isolation. Second, remote working is not something you do in secret or uncontrolled. Number three, remote working goes completely opposite of micromanagement practices. So what is your management culture here? And number four, when you work remotely, it doesn't mean you work always, all the time, everywhere, at any time. There needs to be also a work-life balance. Make sure you don't get any burnout. So let's focus on these four topics and see what is remote working in the context of an HR policy. So the first mistake we should try to avoid is that our remote working policy fosters isolation. We need to ensure that people are equipped with the right solutions, tools, procedures to actually solve problems when they are working remotely, because they just can't go and see their colleague or go to IT. Do they have the full access of all the tools to do their job? Also, stagnant career growth should be avoided. Is our remote working policy aligned with our career planning and the practices around performance management and review and individual development planning? Do they? And also, silent communication should be avoided. We need to ensure that our policies really encapture proper communication standards and procedures. I'll talk about that in my second point. So to avoid isolation, we need to create channels and ensure these channels are available. These channels are not just related to processes and procedures. It's also about an engaging culture. Also, we should be having troubleshooting resources, even for remote workers. How do we actually troubleshoot what are resources we have available when we are remote working somewhere not in the proximity physically from our workplace? And also, of course, as I mentioned, consistent communication is a very essential point in remote working. The second mistake we should avoid in our policies is secrecy. We need to make sure that we don't have individual remote working agreements. It should be a standard across the company or for a large segment of employees. Also, we need to ensure that our policies are linked to security, because security leaks are the first thing that will kill our remote working culture. And also, incomplete policies need to be avoided. This is part of the whole conversation we have in this vlog. It is about do we have a remote working policy that is aligned and integrated with your existing other policies, or do we need to change our policies related to, for example, performance management, individual development planning, and so on. So, prevent secrecy by transparency. Transparency in remote working is essential. We need to make sure that we have remote working policy, the whole topic of this vlog, information security and alignment to information security policies, and standardized communication. I was mentioned this in my first mistake as well. Mistake number three we should avoid, and we have a tip on that as well, is micromanagement. Of course, visual supervision might become difficult, though there are solutions for that. I'll come back to that in a second. Proximity-based accessibility is really something we need to avoid as being a driver for management, because for the simple reason we are not proximate if we are remotely. And templated work is also to be avoided. So, how do we solve that and prevent micromanagement? It's actually having clear measurements, clear and managed measurements of our KPIs, our key performance indicators. When they are smart, focus on the M. The M of measurement is essential here. Also, it has to be result-based. And also, we need to track that. Do we have the tools in place for that? And ultimately, collaborative objectives. Do we have objectives that are building team capability and not just individual performance? It's really important that we have to benefit from remote working by creating virtual workspaces. Have people online and available at any time, but in a reasonable context. We cannot ask them to have their video on for eight hours a day. But there has to be an ability to work together using all the tools and technologies we have today to work together through virtual work environments and virtual team groups. Ultimately, the fourth mistake we absolutely should avoid is burnout. Overworking to inflate results, because sometimes when we work remotely, the boss doesn't see. Remember mistake number three on micromanagement. That shouldn't force people to work more, because they have to prove themselves somewhere. Also, planning override productions and lack of motivation can be killers for a proper remote working policy. So, prevent burnout. By how? By providing structure. Structure around diversified productivity, cross-functional, cross-collaboration, cross-teams. Also, equip and educate. Provide a program on implementing remote working. It's not something you plug and play. And also, celebrate benchmarks. It's really about appreciation and showing people we're working remotely that they are part of a team. Provide them they are accessible, make them accessible, and make sure that you use the virtual teams and the virtual workrooms through webcams, conference call, video conferencing, and provide structure around time and hours of work. Let people log in like they work to go to office. Let them log in and show on video, hey, let's have our first hour meeting, first half hour video conference at 8.30 in the morning, as we used to do when we would all work in the same proximity. These are actually the four elements I'd like to really emphasize when you develop a policy related to remote working. Number one, from isolation to collaboration. Number two, from secrecy to transparency. Number three, from micro visual management to measurement of KPIs and result-based tracking. And number four, remove the burnout and have structure around your work as a remote working community. These four elements will help you to write a proper remote working policy. Now, all that together will actually bring the remote worker to be a proud remote worker, not just 2% of your community or your company, but everybody or all those who will remote work for you in the near or long-term future. This will make them very happy, engaged, and motivated staff. So, my four tips for remote working and for remote working policies is foster collaboration with it. Be transparent with your policies, only measurable KPIs please, and work-life balance, put that into the context. So, if you like to know need more or you want to help me to write your policies on remote working or create an engaging culture for remote workers, don't hesitate to contact me. My name is Frederik Huygens. You can also visit my website voxelhub.com. And please, when you finish watching and listening to this vlog, like, share, and comment, so everybody can benefit from this learning. Thank you very much. Cheers. Bye.