It is commonplace in start-ups for teams to move from a traditional office environment to working remotely. However, even if you have a central office it is highly likely you will have some team members working elsewhere – and with the world now being based so online you probably now have clients or people you work with on a regular basis, in different cities and counties.
Working remotely can cause major communication issues for your business but luckily there are plenty of tools to help you and your team out. Below are some of our favourites.
1. World Time Buddy
Time difference giving you a headache? This smart site allows you to easily see on screen what time it is in the countries in which your colleagues are located and works out the best time for group meetings based on these times.
2. Slack
Save sending hundreds of unnecessary group emails by inviting your team to join a group chat in Slack instead. Conversations can be easily grouped into ‘channels’ and it’s straightforward to share documents.
3. Join.Me
A little bit like Skype but with the addition of screen sharing. Works perfectly when you need to see a customer’s screen, or working with colleagues on a shared project.
4. Zoom
Video platform for online meetings, conferencing, webinars, and screen sharing. Schedule your meetings weeks or months in advance. Ability to host up to 100 participants for up to 40 minutes or unlimited time for up to three participants on the free plan. Record your meetings for playback and review.
5. Groovehq
Simple help desk software ideal for businesses that need to deal with customer service emails. The software allows you to assign team members to incoming emails, and leave private notes for each other about how to best respond.
Related reading: 6 Productivity Hacks to Save Time and Money
6. Google Drive
Access your documents anywhere you have internet thanks to Google’s online ‘office’ style software. Easily share and edit text documents, slideshows and spreadsheets with colleagues and clients, and store files remotely.
7. Skitch
Sometimes explaining something is easier done with pictures, not words. Skitch is a handy tool created by Evernote, that lets you scribble on your screenshots before you send them to colleagues.
8. LastPass
Stop faffing with lots of different passwords and instead have your team sign in with LastPass. This will give them instant secure access to everything they need and you can decide who has access to what. Creates extremely secure and practically unhackable passwords, and stores them in a secure vault.
9. iDoneThis
A great way to measure performance within your business and raise morale. iDoneThis emails team members at the end of each working day asking them to spend 30 seconds telling the team what they have achieved. The next morning it then sends out an edited version of everyone’s responses so people can see their colleagues achievements.
10. 15Five
Another tool for monitoring your team’s progress and stop problems in their tracks. Once a week you send your team a set of short questions which shouldn’t take longer than 15 minutes to fill out. From these answers, you should be able to gauge what’s on everyone’s mind and act accordingly.
11. Cloud9
If you have web developers in your business they are more than likely going to benefit from this. Cloud9 combines a powerful online code editor with a full cloud style workspace so web development projects can have team members working remotely from anywhere in the world.
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