It’s pretty hard to remember things before the pandemic hit, but when it came to working, remote jobs were never really a huge necessity.

However, once the lockdowns took place around the world, physical workspaces had to change to virtual spaces overnight, and this left many with varying opinions.

As we begin to leave the pandemic behind, employers are now faced with a big decision: do they bring their employees back to the office, or do they continue to let them work remotely? The answer to this question can vary depending on the business, but virtual collaboration has become so important in these past three years that it should still be considered a real option.

Virtual collaboration has become essential to many businesses across the globe. From 2019 to 2021, nearly a quarter of all workers in the US were working hybrid or completely remote jobs. Interestingly enough, as more people work remotely, their productivity increases by nearly 50%.

This post will go over why virtual collaboration is so important.

Read on to learn more!

Virtual collaboration from home opens a lot of doors. Employees can improve their workflows through the simple practice of new software. As they gain experience, their problem-solving will improve as they learn ways of troubleshooting issues.

Communication will also improve as employees learn the ins and outs of new messaging applications. And, of course, as your employees learn these new technologies, they will also boost their overall computer literacy.

If you have a remote position, this means you can hire someone from anywhere in the world. This allows you to find more diverse people with unique backgrounds, skills, and experience that can be used to upgrade your workforce. Diversity in your employees means you’ll have a wider range of knowledge and culture in your business.

Different backgrounds also mean that you will have different points of view. By combining the knowledge of your employees, they’ll be able to brainstorm new ideas for products, advertising, social media, and more with newer, fresher ideas.

Since you’ll be able to hire from anywhere in the world, this means you will have more applications to review. Although this may sound time-consuming, it will all be worth it when you establish the right virtual team. And remember: investing in your employees is never a waste of time.

One of the unique benefits of virtual collaboration is that a business doesn’t have to lease or take out a mortgage for a physical location. Although office and property management companies may not like this, there’s no reason to spend more money than you need. Each property comes with different costs, but it is usually anywhere from $10-$25 per square foot when renting office space.

Other costs that can vary are electric and water bills. There’s always the money that’s needed to keep a property looking nice like lawn care, housekeeping for trash, bathrooms, and more.

If you are a fan of office spaces or require some for your employees, you can always opt for smaller rental spaces for your remote workers. You could also choose hybrid offices for employees who enjoy working in an office setting.

Currently, many startup businesses have a competitive edge over their competition. They are beginning to focus on lowering their budget and putting money into more important areas like software improvement, virtual events, employees, and more. When employees are taken care of, they are far less likely to leave.

A proper work-life balance is crucial for any job so that an employee can feel like they are getting the most out of their job and personal life. When you have a good work-life balance, you’ll have better employee retention. Employees leave when they feel like they are missing something, or when another job offers better options for their needs.

Virtual collaboration can be used to reduce a lot of the reasons why employees leave a job. Working long hours in an office can lead to burnout. Of course, virtual collaboration can lead to its own form of burnout, but there are a lot more restrictions to office work than remote work.

Some pros include:

• more family time
• no commute
• flexible hours
• less micromanaging
• taking fewer sick days
• healthy eating at home
• overall comfort
• work wherever you want

Some cons include:

• distractions from work (TOO much family time)
• virtual/computer literacy issues
• equipment costs (if your employer doesn’t pay for it)
• less in-person communication (some people may be incredibly social and this can affect their mental health)
• less social time with coworkers

As you can already tell, the pros and cons of remote work and office work usually depend on the person. One person may love all the freedom that remote work offers, but if someone likes having a hard schedule, they may have a harder time or dislike remote work altogether.

The easiest way to avoid employee burnout is to let them decide what their ideal environment is based on how they like to work.

If you can reduce or eliminate the big reasons for an employee to leave, then you’re on track for keeping your employees longer than your competition.

For employees in remote positions, the responsibility of equipping them with the right tools falls on the employer. There are all kinds of apps and software available for messaging, video chat, and other kinds of communication tools.

You can also look for the best collaborative software that lets multiple people work on a project together. Read more about these technologies below.

Here at Ultimate Technologies Group, we are proud to say that we have partnered with Microsoft Teams and Zoom to make sure that our customers get the best online real-time communication on the market.

The nice thing about these two companies is that you don’t have to choose one. In fact, Microsoft and Zoom and been working together on many different projects, so you can mix and match them as you please.

For face-to-face meetings, Teams and Zoom both offer exceptional video conferencing software. Teams have a more organized messaging system compared to Zoom, but it can still be integrated with other apps too.

Teams have multiple communication channels, like group chat rooms, and project management tools for working on a common goal.

If you need something that focuses more on employee and customer feedback, you may want to check out a CRM. These tools are used to improve virtual communication for customers, and help employees collaborate with one another.

Microsoft Teams also comes with online software like Excel online.

Teams is ideal for formatting and customization. You can switch around images and summaries a lot more than you could in a place like Google Docs. Microsoft Powerpoint also allows employees to create custom presentations that can be accessed for free online. Employers can also have access to build databases and have control over it.

If a business is looking to be more hands-on through color coding, graphing, and formatting, they should check out Microsoft Online.

There is a learning curve to Microsoft’s software, but once you know how to use it, it will make other collaborative software a lot easier to understand.

There are still a lot of reasons why employees and employers are hesitant to go remote.

One of the major employee fears is security. If an employee joins a public network, they could expose a whole database to malware or viruses. However, it’s important to know that employees are faced with this risk no matter where they are working.

Security measures like software protection could be used to keep business data safe. For some companies, it may be safer to stay in the office or go hybrid so that special files can remain secure. Some companies may not want to go remote at all because they want to keep certain documents safe through restricted access.

Another big concern for office and remote work is noise. If you’re in a busy office setting, it may be hard to hear your customers. It may also be hard to hear customers at home if you have kids running around making noise too. Music at work might be distracting while music at home might be relaxing. Just like so much of what we’ve talked about, preference varies from person to person.

The third biggest concern is internet costs and equipment costs. These can be a burden on both the employer and employees and the decision should be weighed against the benefits of working remotely.

Employers also worry about the amount of accountability an employee will take if they are working from home. Concerns about focus and time management are regularly brought up. Although being in an office can seem like it’s work time, that’s not the case for everyone. Focus and time management can still be neglected in the office, and these things aren’t that big of an issue when we see that productivity can increase by 50% through virtual collaboration.

Studies have shown that when employees have fewer restrictions, they are more likely to be far more productive. Allowing employees to work from home build trust and keeps them accountable for their own work.

The final concern is social isolation. After seeing the effects of the pandemic, employers are concerned that their employees will become depressed and struggle with communication after being away from the office for so long. Thankfully, hybrid offices allow employees to return to the office if they’d like to.

A remote business can also schedule check-ins with their employees to see how they are doing. There could also be non-work-related events hosted online for employees to reconnect and socialize about things that have nothing to do with work.

If you have a business that doesn’t require your employees to be on-site while they work, then there’s a high probability that your company could see positive results from going hybrid or fully remote. It can improve productivity, and the work-life balance, lower housekeeping costs, and as a result reduce turnover in departments.

There are still benefits to going into a physical space for work, though. The best thing an employer can do is give their employees the option of where they want to work moving forward. Your employees will be happier, and you will have a net positive for your business in the long run.

If you are looking for virtual collaboration tools or you want to learn more about virtual collaboration as a whole, contact Ultimate Technologies Group today to get completely filled in!