WFH (Work from Home) is a new buzzword that drew large attention since March last year. Corporates have largely adopted this new way of working as the pandemic prompted many workplaces to undergo this rapid and disruptive change. Remote working has become a new way of life and it is speculated that this is going to be a new setup in the foreseeable future. Many companies especially in the IT industry have already confirmed that working from home would be a standard feature even in a post-pandemic era. Hence it becomes imperative to determine how well this new way of working has augured with experienced professionals in terms of their output and productivity. It does require a lot of learning and adoption of the right ways to ensure they not only achieve their targets in terms of quantum of work done but also maintain the right mental and emotional well-being, given the missing social-quotient in this virtual world. In this article, we would focus on what set of standards and methods we can set and adopt for one to extract the optimum out of the team. The role a Project Manager shoulders this task wherein they need to strike a right balance between micro-managing and exercising oversight on the team’s work while ensuring timely deliveries.

Excellent Communication & Co-ordination: Communication is the heart of what a Project Manager does. 90% of the PM’s time goes into communication and hence it is inevitable for a PM to have the right tools and standards in place to ensure he communicates with his team members in the required amount. Recurring meetings need to be scheduled with setting an agenda so that the team members come prepared with their talking points and concerns if any. Scrum framework is an excellent approach to take up to have this part aligned. To make things more accountable, online tools like Jira, Asana can be used to get a view of the goals and the tasks that were assigned and their completion status. Kanban is widely used to view the stream of the workflow. Such documentation help streamline communication around delegation and progress.

Exercise soft- skills: In a co-located space, there are a lot of informal spontaneous interactions that take place when colleagues bump into each other around the water cooler or coffee machine. These interactions are essential to foster comradery among the team members required to bring the feeling of belongingness within the team. This is missing in the virtual world when they are working remotely. Hence as a PM, one needs to display certain skills like empathy, emotional intelligence and effective communication to bring about a sense of shared responsibility within the team. These skills become even more important when it becomes difficult to pick up the subtle cues like body language and facial expression in remote working. Research says that remote working has extended the working hours and there is a significant percentage of people who login into the system at night around 2 am and 3 am. A Project Manager also needs to ensure streamlining their team’s work and setting some boundaries in order to prevent any sort of burnout due to work pressure.

Entrusting people: While we have processes and technologies set-up to ensure no communication lapses & have the right skills-set to hold the team accountable, there is one human value that underlines all of them, and that is: Trust. Trust has always put its oar in the way of Work-from-home. This value needs to be embodied among all the employees regardless of its' position, work experience, and role. There can be no healthy work environment formed without this and it is really challenging to keep up with this value when working remotely. For some, organizational culture needs to be revisited to place this value on a pedestal especially with this massive work-from-home shift. Remote working can be made a huge success for both employees and businesses, once the leaders trust their employees and view them as talented multi-faceted human beings.

Being Agile: The business world is changing at a rapid pace with this pandemic creeping in. This pandemic has taught us that we need a tectonic shift from the conventional style of working and adapt to a new way of working. Organizations need to be agile and ensure that this change is being brought at all levels. The project manager needs to take up the baton and be at the forefront in bringing about this change. Remote working is one such change that organizations need to embrace. Likewise, various agile strategies need to be thought upon to keep an organization’s business strategy, their portfolio/product and the external environment incongruence. An organization’s willingness to adapt swiftly based on the constant feedback received would be tested in these changing circumstances. The project manager needs to apply the principles of Disciplined Agile (DA) with a little customization based on their scenario. These will help organizations stay agile and better respond to the sudden developments happening in the marketplace and broader society.

Remote working has brought in the flexible and adaptive workplace and work timings. It has helped employees bring the right work-life balance with an elimination of the long commuting times which further enhances productivity. WFH has never been more than a documented clause in the HR policy. Unfortunately, WFH was never embraced by some companies as it wasn’t in sync with the company’s culture and their trust element. This pandemic has brought in this transformation where companies were asked to look into their culture & policy and setup robust technology, communication and collaboration to facilitate this transition for their employees smoothly. Adaptive organizations will recognize this shift and I am confident that once we are back in the office, there are a lot of organizations who will recognize the value this remote working brings for their employees and their business.

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