Sacha Connor

One of the tactics I teach in our Invested Leader training program to help with understanding communication flow in a geographically distributed or virtual team is to do a Communication Audit. Think back over the last 2-3 weeks, answer these questions with respect to your team members: 1) How often did you communicate with each of them? 2) How often did each of them communicate with you? ​3) Was the quantity of communication just about right, too little, or too much? 4) Has it changed significantly from previous time periods? ​ 5) Rate the clarity and context of the communication (High, Medium, Low) ​ This will help you understand if in fact there is more silence and will give you insights on what to dig into during your next 1:1.

Providing mentorship to interns can be a great way to influence their decision to accept an offer. And in distributed & remote companies mentors should be assigned in a location-inclusive way. When I went remote in 2010 as a business leader at Clorox, a decision was made not to assign me an Intern. It was assumed that an intern could only have a great experience if their manager was co-located. I eventually influenced a mindset change & was able to manage interns.   One intern explained that it was a great real-world experience to learn how to work across distance with me & other team members. And it demonstrated that the company was open to flexible work options. These became factors in her decision to accept a full-time offer.

In our workshops that teach "The Art of Successful Hybrid and Remote Reporting Relationships" we share a template that managers and direct reports should use for their weekly 1:1s that incorporates aspects of what will eventually become their annual performance review. This enables the topic of the employee's "what" and "how" for performance, and their future career goals, to become part of the ongoing discussion, not just something that is created once a year. This helps keep everyone on the same page and avoids end-of-year performance review surprises.

Provide content in social media that showcases your thought leadership. Don't just repost articles, instead include your unique take on the article content that shares your expertise and is thought provoking.

We teach teams to use an "About Me" One-Pager template that captures whatever level of information someone is willing to share about themselves - from their hobbies and hometown to their personal values, hot buttons, and strengths. We recommend that these one-pagers are stored digitally where anyone from the team can access them to learn more about their team members. This is an especially useful tool when onboarding a new team member. And it can be a fun tool to pull trivia questions from to use as icebreakers in a meeting.

Data from Nick Bloom shows that leaders spend -33% less time mentoring on a day they work remote remotely than on a day they go into an office. Be aware of 2 unconscious biases as you mentor: 1) Distance Bias - our brain's natural tendency to put more value on the people and things closer to us than those that are farther away.  2. Recency Bias - our brain's natural tendency to put more value on the people and things we’ve seen or heard from more recently. A simple way to mitigate these biases is by posting a photo of your entire team and your mentees by your computer.    That will serve as a visual reminder to reach out and connect with the many members of your team and your mentees, not just the last person you heard from or saw.