I think remote is harder. I like working from home but managing work with people all around the place is hard.
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watch out for micromanagers who think they own the corporation and feel the need to do the typical us company simp thing. if you don't trust your teammates, don't hire them. period.
Nope - I have never worked at the same location as any of my direct reports and they are highly productive.
No it's not hard. If you are an effective manager it shouldn't matter who is where. Many of us manage people scattered all over the US without any issues at all.
Fairly rare for managers to have a full team all in one spot. Some areas but not many. In a sense, I managed remote workers long before the pandemic. And did so effectively, even with our broken and dated tools. If you are dependent on breathing their air and staring at them all day to properly manage your team, you aren’t a good manager. Let’s get real. If you look for employment outside of WF, guess what? You’re likely managing fully remote staff, as many companies have discovered actual productivity and leaner expense with this model. And with tools like Slack and others that aren’t used here, they are better connected to their teams than ever. Get out of management fast. You need to be a micro managed contributor. When this ship goes down you’re going to be lost.
Micromanagement Red Flag.
Look for some leadership classes to evolve & adapt.
Coach up or out those who need it & be thankful for your top talent carrying the dead weight.
Hire good people and it doesn’t matter where they are located. If you feel the need to micromanage then seat them in the same row as you sit.
I'm a manager and do not find it difficult. Slightly different, but not difficult.
Set up regular check-ins with staff, listen to them and support them. That is no different whether you're in the office or remote.
A good manager can manage anyone, anywhere. Trust and respect goes a long way.
for good resources , remote is fine, for slackers, definitely harder
My employees are scattered geographically and always have been because of their job function. Going to an office building does nothing for me but waste my time, fuel and creates emissions and costs WF needless overhead. I’m getting less done, but hey my boss has a nice RTO report. Once upon a time before the current regime, I actually had people to collaborate with. They have all been displaced, once they were all gone, there was no need to go to the office.
I likewise have only ever managed a geo dispersed team even years before covid and have no issues with it, in fact I prefer it. if you struggle with managing remote teams I'd rather you also struggle working remotely yourself.
My reports have always been distributed geographically, so it's the only way I know. Where I work is immaterial, if I went to a building the team wouldn't be there anyway, so it'd be equally as challenging regardless of my location.
That's because you suck at managing.