Excel at Distributed Teamwork

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“If you’re the leader of a team that includes remote and in-office workers, 2025 is the year to focus on new management strategies and skills that will foster stronger communication, camaraderie, and culture.” – ​Hybrid Work Tips for Leaders in 2025​, MIT SMR Editors.

21^st Century knowledge workers are distributed—on the road meeting clients, visiting other offices, as well as working offsite. Smartphones laptops, and WiFi enable people to stay connected, while other tech advances, including the automation of routine tasks, have increased the complexity of customers’ demands and business operations.

Over just 20 years, projects—a subset of non-routine work—have increased 40X [Deloitte], while time spent in collaborative (team) activities has risen 50% [​HBR, 2016​] requiring use of sophisticated tools and cross-disciplinary teams.  

Digitalized distributed teamwork is our new norm. We need to learn it.

Why bother?

• 60% of workers expect their employer to inspire them to perform.
• Only 33% of employees feel that their manager understands what motivates them while employee motivation is a key performance driver.
• Only 26% of organizations say their managers are very/extremely effective at enabling performance on their teams.
• Only 36% of managers feel they were sufficiently prepared for the people-manager part of their role [Deloitte, ​Global Human Capital Trends 2025​].
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What benefits?

• Organizations effectively navigating distributed/hybrid work see a 28% increase in employee productivity [​McKinsey quoted​].
• Companies adopting structured leadership training for hybrid environments see a 30% increase in employee engagement and a 25% reduction in turnover [​Gartner 2023 quoted​].

Managers must upskill to lead dynamic distributed teamwork focusing on:

• Culture & Connection – cohesive environments and trusting relationships.
• Communication & Collaboration – purposeful new strategies and habits.
• Coordination & Cooperation – results-focus with asynchronous practices.

Culture & Connection

Cultural values determine how people behave when no one else is around. Explicit norms matter more when implicit cues are absent. Managers first need to foster an environment that grounds their team and enables high performance:

• Articulating and embodying values, codifying new habits.
• Bringing human-centric approaches, coaching not commanding.
• Cultivating team relationships, nurturing trust and belonging.

Why it matters:

• 58% outperforming leaders have high EQ, especially managing distributed teams [TalentSmart 2021].
• 27% increase in employee engagement when managers cultivate a vibrant (virtual) community [2022 Gallup].
• 41% of HR leaders say employees’ connection to culture is compromised by hybrid work [​Gartner​].
• 92% of employees said a supportive manager is the most important factor after compensation [Owl Labs, ​State of Hybrid Work 2024​].

“Employees today have more connections but less valuable collaboration due to uncertain connection norms,” said ​Russ McCal​, Director, Advisory in the Gartner HR practice.

Communication & Collaboration

Deliberate communication design and intentional collaboration practices use identified and tested tools. Training is often necessary for effective distributed teamwork—such as avoiding hybrid meetings where people in the office are not speaking to those participating via video (see photo above). Key actions for leaders:

• Agreeing norms for how, when, and where team interactions occur.
• Building openly to make ideas, plans, progress visible to all teammates.
• Clarifying terms and tone, empathy upskilling enhances understanding.

The impact is clear:

• Up to 25% employee productivity increase where collaboration platforms are used.
• 14% higher engagement scores with a continuous feedback culture.
• 25% better customer retention, 27% better profitability where teams have strong communication practices [​Gallup, 2024​].

"Hybrid work gives us flexibility, but also demands greater intentionality in how we communicate, meet, and make decisions." — ​Erica Dhawan​, Author of ​Digital Body Language

Canva's Vibe Team fosters work environments for employees based on two pillars of Flexibility—to do their best work whichever way works best, and Connection—co-creating meaningful moments of connection and collaboration wherever they are. ​Read more​.

HubSpot's "Hybrid by Design" has a 'strategic and robust support system' for employees that assumes one-size-fits-one. They design for (a) clarity—showing what success looks like, (b) structure—how to facilitate collaboration, (c) commitment to connection—how to strengthen the culture. ​Find out more​.

Unilever prioritizes employee health and wellbeing. They developed training for line managers to build awareness around psychological safety and continue to grow trained Mental Health Champion volunteers who offer support resources. ​Discover more​.

Atlassian developed a Team Health Monitor based on eight traits of high-performing teams focusing on emotional wellness, relationships, work-life balance, and efficiency evaluating happiness, moral, communication, trust and psychological safety. ​Read on​.

❓Does my team know “why” we do what we do—our values, not just KPIs?

❓Does each team member feel connected and part of the team, wherever they are working from?

❓Do we have clear team agreements on how we communicate and collaborate across time zones?

❓Are meetings inclusive of different communication styles (e.g., visual thinkers, non-native speakers)?

Did you pause on two or more? Attention is needed in these areas.

​📘 GLUE: Transforming Leadership in a Hybrid World​ by John Gore.

🗞️ ​Hybrid is here to stay. The data is clear​ from ​Nick Bloom​.

📹 ​Adopt flexibility​ insights in my LinkedIn 'Future of Work skills' course.

🎶 ​"We Are Family" by Sister Sledge​ cultivating connections so teams excel.

Ready to elevate your team’s cultural baseline or communication cadence to improve results? I share crucial insights to enable effective distributed work transformations with empathy-centered collaboration to evolve human-centric team practices. ​Click here to book a 30-minute session.​

Next week: we’ll explore the third core pillar of distributed work—Coordination and Cooperation.

See you again then.

Sophie

P.S. My new course will be out NEXT WEEK. Based on what 630,000+ learners have loved—now designed for you and your team leaders.