Remote management of a services business?

by a searcher

3 years ago

I am under LOI for a services business (>$4m revenue) and was wondering if folks here have experience with remote management of such teams? 

I know many tech businesses and marketing agencies are run fully remote. Staff in older economy businesses like landscaping, facilities management, machine shops etc are unlikely to be familiar with being managed remotely. Perhaps this is also a question about whether I am underestimating the difficulty of changing the culture in the team.

Thanks much for any thoughts!

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6 comments

professional from Temple University

This thread contains excellent advice on culture and management. I want to advise on establishing a network of virtual machines and email security protocols. In terms of VMs, employees will log into their VM and perform all company related work. The company will control installed software, accessible websites, ingress/egress of data, etc. If for some reason an employee leaves the business, you mitigate the risk of company data leaving with them. In our current remote culture, there is a multitude of risks with employees conducting work related tasks on personal laptops. Remote setups typically rely on heavy email usage. Email security protocols should be setup to reduce the risk of ransomware attacks.

If you are interested in having an offline conversation, feel free to email me at --@----.com

3 years ago | like reply | 0 likes

searcher from Columbia University - Columbia Business School

I have run an entirely remote tech business, but the format is well-suited. I would echo the same concerns about physical delivery businesses. If you do decide to go this route, some suggestions:
1) SLA Agreement for team members.
2) Consistent tools for communication, email and Zoom is not enough.
3) Annual (or even monthly) get-togethers. This is huge for morale.
4) An expense policy that takes the home office expenses into account.

3 years ago | like reply | 0 likes

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