Integrating Virtual Employees into the Fold: Solving the ProblemIntegrating Virtual Employees into the Fold: Solving the Problem

In my last post, I talked about how hard it can be to include virtual workers in the corporate culture—essentially, to ensure all employees can see and be seen, and that they know not only what they’re supposed to do, every day, but also how to do it. It’s amazing to me how many companies neglect basic training of new employees on software and business process; forget about supporting those employees in social and cultural ways down the line.

Clearly, there are plenty of reasons to keep employees engaged and connected to one another, as well as to the company overall. The need to do so proactively only grows in the virtual workplace, because those connections don’t occur as often or as automatically as they do in the physical work world. Here, some suggested best practices for doing so:

Train, train and train again. It’s important to get users up to speed on technology—but it’s amazing how many companies forget to train new employees on the tools they’re expected to use every day. And here’s a concept—before you train users on technology, make sure they know which apps they’re supposed to be using in the fist place. That may sound ridiculous, but I can’t tell you how many times new employees start a job without knowing what tools are at their disposal, beyond the Office apps they know to look for on their desktops. This is especially true of back-office and Internet-based applications, which may serve specific functions that many employees do only occasionally and therefore don’t come across very often. But when they do, they need to know what tools to use and how to use them.

It’s reasonable to assume experienced employees know how to use Microsoft Office, including Outlook; it’s not reasonable to assume they are “power” users, or that they know how to use Office in ways that specifically support your organization’s needs. If you’re a Notes shop, train your users. If you deploy any other software to end users, train them on it. And even though one of the touted benefits of social software is that it’s so easy to use, employees can figure it out for themselves, don’t assume they will. IT managers are geeks—they like to play with technology. Many end users are not—and they won’t spend five minutes trying to get a “cool new software tool” to work without clear instruction.

Train, train and train again—on business processes. It’s not enough to make sure employees know how to use software to do their jobs—they need to know what those jobs are in the first place. By that, I mean they need to know the processes in place for getting their work done, as well as those used by co-workers and team members that might be a bit outside their purview, but which still affect their work lives.

Create org charts that truly reflect the relationships among various employees, managers and reports. These should show not only the official lines of command, but also unofficial ones, to clearly indicate relationships among employees, managers and business groups. Sound oh-so seventies? Maybe it is. But while today’s businesses should be flexible enough to allow employees to work outside the official lines, they shouldn’t forgo drawing the lines in the first place. Virtual employees don’t get to see the interactions in the office—they need to see them on paper (or online) instead.

Map the business, so employees understand exactly what the company does. This is especially important at large organizations, where multiple business units may perform multiple, often disparate functions. It’s important for employees to focus on their specific job roles, within their specific business units, but they also need to know what other people in the organization are up to—and how their skills might be able to help their co-workers achieve their business goals. This also helps employees shape their career growth, as they become more familiar with other areas of the business.

Imitate MySpace, and offer employees a way to post information about themselves, their work, and their extra-curricular interests. Make sure the site includes contact info, as well as tags to favorite places (on the Web as well as on the corporate Intranet), people, and other sources of information.

Encourage your employees to share their knowledge. Make it part of the job for employees to share information about what they’re working on with their co-workers, and with employees in other areas of the company. Create blogs that let managers and staff post regular updates on what they and their teams are up to, and answer questions or take suggestions about that work. Make information sharing part of the performance metrics on which employees are judged for raises and promotion.

Bring people together, virtually, for live interaction. You don’t want to force the issue here—no awkward virtual costume parties with bad food and weak drinks—but you do want to give employees the opportunity to meet and interact with one another on a casual basis. Host weekly or monthly Webinars in which employees can present their recent success stories, process changes and new initiatives.

Take advantage of in-person opportunities to get people together. Few organizations of any significant size can afford to host company-wide meetings on a regular basis, and the value of such meetings is questionable, since they force interaction when often, the stickiest encounters are spontaneous. But make it easy for employees traveling to other offices, trade shows or customer sites to connect with other managers and employees at those locations. Set up regular lunch tables for visiting staffers, for instance, or encourage managers to ask other managers to meet with their direct reports in person when they can.

Other than the initial training, none of these initiatives should require participation—after all, you wouldn’t demand that employees socialize in the cafeteria or network in the halls. But if you make the interactions compelling and participation simple, at least some of the initiatives will take off, with at least some of your employees. Within that group may lie the company’s next great leader—or at least the next great idea.