Introduction
The COVID-19 pandemic has increased the significance of remote working and put both employers and employees in front of multiple challenges. These challenges have created a call for assistance from the confused workers and their managers. Gurchiek (2020) composed a clear and concise list of tips for those who are not confident with managing remote teams. She made ten points based on the opinions of professionals from various spheres, ranging from the CEO of an IT company to a business leadership coach. In my opinion, Gurchiek’s article provides a rather simplistic take on the issue and gives the most general, almost self-evident advice.
One should understand that simple solution are not inherently flawed, especially when an apparent need for them exists. Gurchiek (2020) recommends managers set clear expectations, be flexible, track workers’ progress, listen to employees, build connections with them, avoid micromanaging, and celebrate success like in usual office settings. I find it difficult to disagree with these suggestions since they sound reasonable and come from experienced professionals. The arguments provided by the interviewed professionals seem logical to me, and I cannot find the reasons to oppose them.
Nevertheless, my agreement with the author’s points does not mean that their work is impeccable. The original goal of the article was to provide useful tips for managing remote workers, and in that regard, it does the job quite well. However, at the same time, the text consists almost solely of someone else’s opinions. As a result, it feels devoid of the author’s input, which makes their work somewhat shallow. In addition, a strong emphasis on a handful of expert opinions weakens the article in comparison to works based on empirical data and quantitative research methods. In that regard, a survey among the remote workers with corresponding suggestions on problem-solving from the experts would have made the article stronger.
Writing a quantitative research-based work would require more time and effort than several short interviews; however, it would result in a better research design. As an example, I would like to compare Gurchiek’s article with a paper by Rudnicka et al. (2020). The subject of the study was almost identical — the development of strategies for effective remote working during the COVID-19 pandemic. In the beginning, the researchers recruited 347 participants who had passed an online survey. In addition, twenty-five respondents agreed to have a 1-hour interview for a $20-25 payment (Rudnicka et al., 2020). In the end, the researchers managed to determine the most prevalent challenges of remote working, such as distractions, lack of connection, poor workspace setup, and damage to work-life balance (Rudnicka et al., 2020). The article in HR Magazine does not have this component in the design, which separates the expert’s suggestions from the empirical evidence.
On the other hand, the viewpoints expressed in the second article stem directly from the empirically revealed issues. For example, organizations were recommended to adopt digital boundaries to help remote workers with work-life balance (Rudnicka et al., 2020). The evident problem with remote meetings can be alleviated by implementing remote meeting etiquette within organizations (Rudnicka et al., 2020). This approach provides an important logical transition between the problems and solutions, whereas the article in HR Magazine concentrates solely on the result in the shape of tips.
Conclusion
Gurchiek’s article succeeded at providing the most general recommendations for managers. However, it consisted almost entirely of expert opinions, thus having little to no personal input from the author. In addition, it lacked depth due to the absence of any quantitative base. Overall, even a small-scope survey among the employees or their managers would have made a positive impact and improved the impression from the article published in HR Magazine.
References
Gurchiek, K. (2020). 10 tips for managing remote workers. HR Magazine, 1.
Rudnicka, A., Newbold, J. W., Cook, D., Cecchinato, M. E., Gould, S., & Cox, A. L. (2020). Eworklife: Developing effective strategies for remote working during the COVID-19 pandemic. In Eworklife: Developing effective strategies for remote working during the COVID-19 pandemic. The New Future of Work Online Symposium.