Developing Remote Workers - Can You Do It?
Last week, news outlets shared the results from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York placing a large share of the blame for new graduate unemployment on remote work, rather than the commonly-perceived culprit that is AI.
Today, I’m going to discuss less whether or not remote work or AI is the bigger culprit (hint: I do think the interpretation of the data is leading to some inaccurate assumptions), but rather, to look at what are some common pitfalls in coaching, managing, and developing your people - regardless of their career stage - and how you can implement better practices if remote work is a reality for your business.
What is missing
The study compares unemployment rates for young graduates in “remoteable” jobs (such as software engineers), and “non-remoteable” jobs (such as nurses). Because post-pandemic unemployment rates have returned to baseline for non-remoteable jobs but stayed elevated for remoteable jobs, the study is concluding that as much as 64% of the increased unemployment rate for new graduates can be attributed to remote jobs. However, a few things that weren’t touched upon include workforce behaviors during the Great Resignation period, how those that did land jobs during this time progressed during their career, workers that chose to not change jobs or take a promotion in order to stay remote, and how much of this data is due more to company reluctance than actual employee performance.
What is different when developing remote workers?
The study did point out some examples where companies are either not adjusting, or choosing to deprioritize, their development of remote junior employees. For example, the study notes that remote junior employees receive roughly 20% less feedback than their in-person peers. Why does this happen? While some may place the blame on the location of an employee, it could be a symptom of passive management. In a traditional office, mentorship happens by accident (hallway chats, leaning over a desk), as well as in planned structured meetings. However, in a remote setting, mentorship must happen more intentionally. If feedback is dropping, it means we haven’t built intentional, structured digital check-ins. Most current managers built their entire careers in physical offices. They learned how to coach, read body language, and onboard talent purely in person. When the world shifted, many leaders simply tried to copy-paste their old management playbook onto Slack and Zoom and expected the same results. The friction we are seeing isn't because virtual training or coaching is impossible, but rather because so many managers haven’t learned how to manage virtually.
What can I do to help my young remote employees succeed?
Luckily, today’s recent graduates are true digital natives. They spent years navigating remote learning, collaborating across digital time zones, and building projects entirely online during their university years. They are deeply capable of learning and absorbing culture digitally. So, we know the graduates aren’t the bottlenecks.
To help your younger workers succeed, set up more intentionality, which means embracing asynchronous tooling, improving documentation and information organization, and encouraging manager engagement.
Some examples worth exploring include:
Digital shadowing - whereas in an office environment people often invite junior colleagues to sit in on meetings or trainings, doing the same with a virtual employee can help provide them with the exposure to higher-level discussions they need. Include a dial-in number or virtual link, have the employee listen in, and, most importantly, follow up the same day and check in with the employee. Let them ask questions and ask them what they’ve learned or are still unsure about.
Strengthen your documentation approaches - a lot of companies, especially smaller ones, lean on subject matter experts (SMEs) for historical knowledge and for coaching new employees. Creating a robust documentation approach takes a lot of upfront work, but doesn’t take away from the value of those SMEs. What it does is help all employees - new and tenured, to easily access the documentation and information when they need it, without having to find the expert each time.
Peer buddy system - especially true during an employee’s onboarding, pairing a young employee with a peer - not their manager, and ideally not necessarily on their team, to provides new hires a space for questions that they may feel are “silly” or aren’t comfortable bringing up in their 1-on-1 conversations with managers. Provide a stipend for coffee to reward the peer and encourage the meetups.
Train managers to conduct mini coaching sessions - rather than wait for 1-on-1s, encourage managers to provide virtual mini coaching sessions. When in an office setting, these come more naturally as you walk back to your desk from a meeting, or stop by for a “quick chat”. Virtually, this would require more intentionality. and some habit-forming, but something as simple as a Slack message, or building in 5-minute syncs after a presentation or a call to go over questions and feedback.
Focus on the output - Clear onboarding plans that articulate “by the end of Day 90, you should be able to do x, y, and z” gives everyone transparent goals to work towards, track, and measure, Continue doing this after your young employee has “onboarded”, and branch out into development goals to help build their career skills.
Shunning Fresh Talent Creates a Dangerous "Talent Cliff"
Finally, I want to provide some caution for any company pausing entry-level hiring because virtual onboarding feels too difficult. First of all, by creating this barrier right off the bat, you are excluding yourself from talent that could drive your business goals, or even become a future leader. You put yourself at risk of hiring from a lower pool quality. Furthermore, it creates a severe talent vacuum that you end up paying for heavily a few years down the line. Instead of avoiding the challenge, forward-thinking organizations should view this as an opportunity to upskill their leadership and set themselves up for the future, perhaps even at a discount. If you invest in teaching your managers how to coach effectively regardless of location, you gain an edge for the best talent pipeline for the future.
Are you looking for ways to attract, develop, and retain your talent for a sustainable and growth-focused future? Work with Sound Talent Strategy to get this work started!
