What do you do if your sales development team's culture is struggling in a remote work environment?

To improve the culture of your sales development team in a remote work setting, prioritize open communication, clear expectations, and virtual team-building activities. Recognize and celebrate team members' achievements, fostering a sense of belonging and camaraderie. Encourage collaboration through cross-functional projects and knowledge sharing, while promoting work-life balance and flexibility. Invest in training and development opportunities to support career growth and skill enhancement. Conduct regular check-ins to provide feedback and support. These measures will help create a positive and cohesive remote work culture, boosting motivation and productivity within your team.

Clear communication doesn't mean "Hey team make sure to turn your camera on for the team standup at 8am" Clear communication with a remote team is a lot more about setting the right expectations, and instead of managing based on a dashboard, managing based on the conversations that you have with each rep on your team. As a leader it is on you to provide them with what they need, and unbox their time so they can be productive day in, and day out.

In a remote environment, it's vital that you celebrate the wins, no matter how small they might be. Sharing whats working, alongside what is not working, is a great way to engage the entire team and level-up everyone at once. You must be using a tool like Teams or Slack for rapid asynchronous communication on a daily basis. It's absolutely vital.

Technology has evolved to enable SDRs to work together, one such technology is Call Blitz. A platform designed for outbound reps to co-work together in a LIVE format. Your remote team needs to have a collaboration and coaching platform where you can replicate the feeling of being in a collaborative office environment.

A remote work environment can cause anxiety and stress and a feel of insecurity. There can be trust issues and the feel of a loss of purpose. In order to relieve the anxiety &/or stress it needs to be ensured that everyone feels supported and there is active participation from everyone in the remote workspace. People need to feel comfortable to share their feedback without fear of retribution. The team members should be encouraged to take risks and they shouldn't be afraid to take risks and make mistakes.

Sales development is a tough job because it involves ego. When your reps are getting "beaten up" on the phone all day and getting negative email responses, they will struggle emotionally. Get ahead of that, create a positive culture where you acknowledge the problems your reps face everyday and provide them with the coaching and training necessary to overcome them.