Today’s 21st century global business model requires companies to operate beyond the brick-and-mortar structure by having virtual settings to accommodate telecommute workforce. This trend has generated controversies regarding implementation of virtual teams mainly due to talent management challenges. In order to mitigate these challenges, companies need to think through some of the key questions –

1.Do we have telecommute work policy with guidelines clearly framed out?

• Orientation/on-boarding process, regular work hours; check-in systems; periodic in-person meetings; measurement of work production and implications in failing to attain work objectives/milestones

2.Do we have the right fit of employees with the necessary personality, attributes and traits to work in a remote work culture?

• Research and surveys conducted in organizations have shown that interdependent work teams thrive in a virtual work settings. Some of the key attributes/traits of individuals in virtual work setting include self-direction, self-motivation, accountability, past experience in remote work setting, collaboration, flexibility and strong communication skills
• Research has also pointed to the fact that companies can hire diverse and specialized skill set individuals as there is no location constraint.

3. Is our technology advanced and supportive of remote work culture?

• Well-established servers, cloud technology, VPN access, privacy and security settings, high-end video and audio conferencing, chat rooms and fast internet and dialing speed with minimal layers to bypass through remote server/s to access the work application/s
• Advanced Intranet that consists of online policies/guidelines, dashboard and metric systems and remote project management systems (like Basecamp, Asana) to facilitate performance management, social connections like blogs/forums and two-way communication systems

4. Are the managers/ supervisors/ leaders and Human Resource practitioners trained and developed to manage telecommute workforce?

• Management by objectives and ROWE (Result Oriented Work Environment)
• Social Intelligence to enhance a collaborative work environment
• Facilitation of self-managed teams

Virtual workforce can be a boon to an organization, provided the systems and policiesare implemented in a well-structured way. Hence, leaders and HR professionals need to come up with innovative strategies to build a globally diversified virtual workforce that fosters a culture of responsibility, engagement and success.