Don’t forget that just because meetings are in a different time zone doesn’t mean your distributed employees shouldn’t get the same perks as employees in HQ. If you’re catering lunch for a lunch and learn in the office, consider https://remotemode.net/ sending distributed employees gift cards or letting them expense whatever mealtime it is in their time zone during that meeting. Team building might be easily overlooked or pushed to the side when working across time zones.
Are you expecting team members are able to travel to the office multiple times each year? By setting clear expectations, you won’t be faced with unwelcome surprises in the future. Those working with a team in a different time zone must consider splitting shifts and workdays to attend to time zone differences. It will help if you consider splitting the workdays as part-time in the office in the morning hours, and the rest of the hours could be remotely done in the evening. To bypass these obstacles, it is crucial to implement best practices, strategies and effectively leverage essential tools.
Determine A System For Async and Sync Communication
Elon Musk said that entrepreneurs spend too much time in meetings and too little time on making their service or product exponentially better. The Southeast Asian time zone is perfect for getting in that quiet, creative time in the morning. But if your business does not require so many meetings and phone calls, you might have more quiet time for creative work. In this case, you have more runway in choosing from a wider range of timezone options.
This is foundational to working in a distributed team spread across time zones where quick check-ins aren’t feasible. Remote collaboration is difficult and productivity can halt if digital tools fail. Read our guide on remote collaboration to learn how to overcome these challenges. It’s easy enough to understand time zones where you live, but if you’re working in a remote team spread across the world, it gets harder to remember what time it is for your team members.
More diverse and inclusive workplace
To help your distributed workforce connect, consider facilitating live meetups when possible. The actual time difference poses one of the biggest barriers to effective communication across distributed teams. Diversity and inclusion drive innovation and positively impact overall business targets within remote companies that span across time zones. Understandably, this approach largely supports innovation and ultimately leads to more profit in the long run. In fact, one prediction by Gartner shows that 75% of companies employing diverse decision-making teams can expect to outperform their business objectives in 2022.
- By the time they read your second message and take action, an entire day (or more!) could have passed without them doing anything.
- Make sure you are utilizing the best tools available, and work with your teams to determine the most efficient methods to continue moving forward as a cohesive team.
- Simply enter your team’s current locations, and these calculators will calculate the best times to meet (and even show local holidays being observed).
- It’s always fun to learn something new and it’s a great way to bring people a little closer together even when they are physically far apart.
The pandemic shifted the world of work to become increasingly remote, and it’s showing no sign of slowing down. Embracing remote work and global collaboration is essential for modern businesses that want to grow. However, working with teams in different time zones comes with its own set of challenges. Once companies open the options for flexible work locations, it’s important to set clear expectations.