It seems like every week we’re hearing stories of how another company is mandating a return to office for their teams. While there are instances where a co-located workplace makes sense, the reality is that remote work is here to stay, in some shape or form. Given that, leaders and HR professionals should be focused on how we can optimize remote work for both employee experience and business success.
One of the most frequent questions I get as a Fractional Head of HR is how to build and maintain a culture when the team is fully remote. Nurturing culture in a remote setting is hard work—but it can be done. It requires intentionality, thoughtfulness, and an investment of time and energy up front.
But let’s take a step back to understand the remote work advantage. Recent research provides compelling evidence for remote work's effectiveness across various organizational contexts. Studies from Microsoft and GitLab consistently show that remote workers maintain or increase productivity while reporting better work-life balance, increased job satisfaction, and lower turnover rates. And a 2023 meta-analysis from the Journal of Business and Psychology found that organizations reported average cost savings of nearly $15,000 per employee annually through reduced office space and associated expenses.
These positive workplace results don’t happen overnight, and they certainly don’t happen by chance. Successful remote work requires intentional planning, foresight, and action—in how we operate, how we communicate with each other, and how we manage our teams. The most successful remote teams invest time and energy into creating thoughtful and explicit work structures, providing a framework for how employees navigate everything.
Create clear communication frameworks
It’s easy to believe that the absence of clear communication guidelines in remote work leads to organic flexibility—after all, if there are no rules, people can make them up in a way that works, right? Wrong—it actually leads to chaos and burnout. Without structured protocols, teams often fall into reactive patterns: sending constant Slack messages that create pressure for immediate responses, scheduling meetings across all time zones without consideration for boundaries, and burying important information in a maze of email threads and chat channels.
The most successful remote teams have established clear guidelines about which channels are appropriate for different types of communication, setting expectations around response times (for example, what requires immediate attention versus what can wait), and designating core collaboration hours that respect team members across time zones.
Meeting hygiene is another detail that shouldn’t be overlooked: outline when to schedule them, how long they should be, and when to skip them in favor of asynchronous updates.
Far from being restrictive, well-designed communication structures actually increase flexibility by reducing the anxiety of constant connectivity and creating predictable patterns that allow people to plan their focused work time. When everyone understands the rules of engagement, they can work more efficiently and maintain healthy boundaries between their professional and personal lives.
Atlassian's 2024 State of Teams Report analyzed data from 1,500 organizations and found that teams with established communication protocols were 65% more likely to report successful remote collaboration. Their research identified specific best practices, including:
- Defining core hours for synchronous collaboration while respecting flexibility. For example, designate 4-5 hours daily when all team members are available for meetings and real-time collaboration, while allowing flexibility for the remaining hours to accommodate different time zones and personal schedules.
- Developing communication charters that specify which channels to use for different types of interactions (for example, email for detailed project updates, Slack for quick questions, Zoom for complex discussions). This prevents communication fatigue and ensures important messages don't get lost in the noise.
Focus on outcome-based metrics
In a remote environment, managers have to shift from traditional, in-person oversight to a results-driven approach. This means setting specific, measurable objectives and letting employees chart their own course to achieve them, while offering frequent feedback and creating multiple channels for team members to ask questions and share progress.
Rather than measuring hours worked or monitoring online status, effective remote managers track impact: Are projects moving forward? Are deadlines being met? Is the quality of work meeting or exceeding standards? This outcomes-based approach not only builds trust but often leads to higher productivity as employees feel empowered to work in ways that best suit their style and schedule. Regular one-on-ones become less about status updates and more about coaching, problem-solving, and giving team members the resources and support they need to succeed.
The payoff of this management style is clear: A study by Gartner examined performance management practices across 500 organizations and found that companies using outcome-based metrics for remote workers saw 18% higher performance ratings compared to those using traditional time-based measures.
Celebrate virtual community building
Doing team-building activities over Zoom can feel awkward when you’re trying to force traditional in-person exercises into a digital format. Instead, design activities that feel natural in a virtual setting. When we embrace the unique possibilities of digital spaces—like using breakout rooms for small group conversations or collaborative digital whiteboards for team projects—we can create genuine connections without the cringe factor.
This will look different for every company and every team. It might be as simple as setting up Slack channels for book clubs, pets, and foodies, or hosting a monthly virtual happy hour. Some of the more innovative ways I’ve seen companies do this include:
- Leveraging a tool like Donut to randomly pair colleagues from different teams together for virtual coffee chats.
- Starting one meeting each month with a tour of a colleague’s home office.
- Hosting a virtual potluck, with team members sharing recipes in advance along with stories of why the dishes were significant to them.
- Creating a virtual white board using Miro, where team members posted achievements, celebrations and recognition. Every other week, the team would do a virtual “wall walk” to make sure nothing was overlooked and all the contributions were recognized.
Speaking of recognition and celebration, the most successful remote teams make a big deal of this. Managers and peers find joy in celebrating each other’s contributions and achievements. It’s easy to feel like your work is unseen or unappreciated when you’re working from home. Making recognition a core part of the culture lets people know they’re appreciated.
Leverage technology and tools
Having the right technology and tools is critical for job success no matter the environment. In a remote setting, though, it forms the entire infrastructure of your workplace. Here’s how to establish a strong, effective tech foundation:
- Anticipate needs. In a highly collaborative environment, documentation of processes and workflows should be readily available to the whole team, and permission and access settings should be given accordingly.
- Create opportunities for synchronous collaboration. Consider how you structure the use of your video conferencing platforms. Mirror co-located office rituals by establishing meeting room names for different purposes: "Quick Sync" rooms for 15-minute check-ins, "Deep Work" rooms for focused collaboration, and "Innovation Spaces" for brainstorming sessions.
- Maximize the effectiveness of asynchronous collaboration tools like Asana or Notion by creating standardized templates for common workflows. Developing digital templates for project briefs, meeting notes, and decision logs helps maintain consistency across your team and reduces cognitive load.
Success in business today doesn’t depend on location, but rather is driven by results and work product. HR professionals have a unique opportunity to shape this reality by creating digital-first structures that support success. By focusing on clear communication, meaningful performance metrics, and remote-specific culture building, we can create work environments that don't just match office-based work but surpass it in both employee satisfaction and business outcomes.
Let’s approach remote work not as a compromise—but as an opportunity to reimagine how work gets done.