We know there are a lot of you who are experiencing remote work for the first time. Maybe it’s going smoothly, but chances are you’ve had some bumps along the way. It’s pretty clear that this home-based workforce will be in place for weeks or months to come. Better settle in and establish some best practices for the success of your remote teams.

If you haven’t already, we recommend working collaboratively as a team to establish the following team agreements (and feel free to share this helpful infographic!).

1. Communication – Team agreements start with creating appropriate communication protocols – what to use and when to use it. This includes email, text, phone, video, Slack channels, etc. Be sure to consider the level of risk for misunderstandings and emotions before you choose your communication vehicle.
2. Connection – Make sure there are opportunities for connection for your remote team on a personal level. Ensure that your team connects on more than work topics. Check out these helpful virtual connection tips.
3. Conflict – No team is perfect. So get in front of any conflict escalation issues and make a plan for how teams will manage disagreements before they escalate.
4. Technology– Establish the technology or software tools you will use for tracking time, project progress, team updates, messaging, sharing calendars, security, etc.
5. Meetings – Create expectations and rules around meetings. For example, rotating or sharing the meeting leader role, creating and distributing agendas ahead of time, keeping cameras on and using collaborative, note-taking and brainstorming tools.
6. Availability– Determine service level agreements (SLAs) for response times. Establish boundaries to ensure that people don’t feel that they must always be “on.”

Remote work is our new norm, so embrace it. Team agreements are essential to making it all work. Our thoughts are with all affected people – especially our vital healthcare workers – and we are hoping for a quick resolution to this global health crisis. Stay safe everyone!