Remote work is the future of work and the impacts of the pandemic really fast-forwarded the trend of working from anywhere. Generally, digital nomads learn the skills along the way but many people working from an office need to adjust. The cool thing about this trend is that everyone working remotely has access to more knowledge, recourses and tips to master how we work remotely effectively. So also the digital nomad community benefits from this and the number of digital nomads really spiked in the past two years.
Remote work doesn’t always come naturally and many people, including digital nomads, struggle to make it work. It makes sense because you don’t learn remote office ethics at work and since it is so new, many organizations struggle too. Luckily there are many remote work experts like digital nomad Anna Maria.
She started her journey abroad as an expat based in Spain. She dipped her toes into the digital nomad lifestyle and did it part-time. In 2018 she went fully remote and today she is talking from Bucharest, an emerging digital nomad destination.
She helps individuals and organizations to work remotely more effectively. She focuses on transferable skills such as communication, critical thinking, and virtual teamwork. These skills you learn in one work experience and can take to your next work experience and are worth mentioning on your resume.
One of the most important skills for working remotely effectively is becoming really good at communicating with whom you work. Communicating new ideas, problems, and regular tasks or project updates needs a unique touch in remote work environments. Anna Maria shares a couple of examples in the podcast.
Remote communication is visual:
The communication needs to be more visual. Instead of writing long emails, you will use screenshots and screen recordings to share your thoughts with colleagues and clients.
Remote work requires self-motivation:
As a remote worker, you become in charge of taking the initiative and action to complete tasks and pursue your goals. Organizations can support this by providing workshops and training, but this is very challenging for the entrepreneurial folks.
The remote global workforce has to master time zones
As a global organization or business, mastering time zones is a top skill that comes to life in how you organize your work for yourself and others.
Organization and planning
Your online work hub needs to be accessible from anywhere and make it easy to collaborate with others. Using work management and collaboration tools will empower your work and eventually give you more freedom.
Remote needs more explicit boundaries:
When you work in the office, your schedule is more defined by when you show up at work. It doesn’t work like that in the remote work world so you need to set clear boundaries when you work and when you’re unavailable.