Work Together Anywhere Book Summary

Book Summary

By Lisette Sutherland and Kirsten Janene-Nelson Wiley

15 min

Audio available

Brief Summary

Work Together Anywhere focuses on the benefits of having a remote team, and strategies to overcome challenges like the communication barrier, issues of trust, and fears around productivity. It also offers suggestions for tools to explore to benefit your team. Though focused in large part on management strategies, the book is valuable for all remote employees. It offers practical solutions to common problems, like how to celebrate success with a remote team, how to communicate effectively in different time zones, and how to make meetings efficient and effective for all team members.

About the Author

Lisette Sutherland is the director of Collaboration Superpowers. She co-founded Virtual Team Talk, a community of more than 500 virtual team managers and enthusiasts.

Kristen Janene-Nelson Wiley is a freelance editor and consultant. She has worked for more than 25 years in book publishing.

Topics

Career & Success Management & Leadership

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Key Insights

Though the remote workforce has been growing in the last few years, the coronavirus pandemic has created an urgent need for remote work solutions - and fast! This book explores the benefits and challenges of a remote workforce, the tools you need to work efficiently from a remote office, and an overview of how remote work is a pivotal part of our changing world. Sutherland and Wiley also discuss the personal benefits that can come from remote work. The book offers an overview for not just managers but all remote employees on how to best adapt to a remote working world.

Remote work is rapidly becoming more common, and offering remote work options can benefit employers.

Between 1995 and 2015, the remote workforce has grown considerably, from only 9% to 37% of people in just twenty years. In 2016, nearly half of all employees reported working from home at least occasionally. The ability to work at home is easier than it’s ever been before because of advancements in file-sharing and messaging technology. It’s much easier to stay in touch and access important information from anywhere in the world.

There are many reasons that employers might consider going fully or partially remote. For one, it reduces overhead cost significantly. Studies have shown that companies can save up to $10,000 per worker per year by going remote. Having a remote workforce also has benefits in terms of finding and keeping the best talent. Many top employees want the flexibility of remote work and will gravitate toward companies that offer the option. Finding good talent is also easier if you don't mind hiring a remote employee – going remote opens up your job pool considerably, and can even mean searching the globe for candidates, rather than focusing your search locally. Companies can save money on salaries by hiring remote employees as well – you don't have to pay someone in Kansas as much as you would someone living in San Fransisco or Manhattan.

To successfully go remote, you need the right tools.

Many companies think they can’t work well together without colocating, or sharing an office space. But this couldn’t be farther from the truth. Startups and tech companies have proven for years that amazing products can be created collaboratively by employees located around the world.

The real key to successful remote work is high-bandwidth communication. You need to have an easy way to access and share files, communicate with your team, and connect on an interpersonal level. There are many solutions to these problems, including video conferencing, virtual office software, messaging programs, and more. File-sharing programs make it easy to access what you need when you need it and move files efficiently among team members.

Global teams might find it challenging to work together and manage differences in time zones. For this reason, some teams have started doing north-south, rather than east-west collaboration - for example, someone in New York would work with a team member in Argentina, while team members in China would work with team members...