How To Effectively Manage A Cloud-Based Remote Team From The Auto Accident Attorneys Group

Managing a remote team poses a unique set of challenges, key among them keeping members in different physical locations connected as a group and focused on the same goals. Ali Salimi, co-founder of The Auto Accident Attorneys Group by Salmi Law LLC (theaaagroup.com), shares his secrets behind effectively managing a remote team to attain efficiency and success for his law firm.

Ali Salimi looks at managing a remote team as two issues to tackle. First, how can you understand and effectively use the technology and tools available to aid with remote work? Second, how can you manage a remote team?

For the first issue, one must recognize that technology is vital in any office setting these days, but especially when there are team members working remotely. A business with team members in different locations must utilize the proper remote tools. Understand all the tools available to help with remote capabilities, and see which ones your business can benefit from.

For instance, Salimi has found a VoIP system to be an important tool for his office. Instead of using a regular phone line, his office’s phone calls are delivered over the internet. His law firm’s head office is located in Georgia, and with team members located in California and Tennessee, the VoIP system allows staff members to work virtually from anywhere. Conference calls, screen sharing, messaging, and sharing data through this solution all provide more of a connection between remote employees and head office employees.

Cloud-based systems are another technology tool that help to connect remote team members with a head office. Using cloud-based systems for data storage, databases, and software, all team members can access and share information from any location and connect with each other from anywhere, at any time, and from any device. This eliminates information being lost and provides a common space for the team to work in. It also makes things convenient and accessible, which contributes to connections and achievements. Google Office apps is one particular cloud-based system that has worked really well for Ali Salimi’s team. Other types of programs where cloud-based systems could be a benefit for an office with remote members are case management programs and accounting programs.

Secondly, and just as important as the first, the business leaders must properly manage a remote team. A business with team members scattered across different states will have its own unique set of challenges than a business with team members all in the same location who see each other daily.

Salimi believes that there is one major element of managing a remote team that truly makes the difference between simply working on the same things and motivating a group to work together as a cohesive remote team. That motivation comes from helping people, a mission that is summed up in his firm’s slogan “ We take care of you.” That motto applies to customers and team members alike.

Reminding his team that they work every day to take care of people, and to make a difference in someone’s life has played an exponential role in keeping his team inspired. “Sharing our slogan, getting them excited to positively impact people’s lives, reminding them that we make a direct impact on people’s lives, as a guiding principle,” is an approach that has helped to keep his team motivated when they are working in different places.

Salimi and his entire team works from a place of asking themselves if something they are doing is going to take care of the client. That responsibility of taking care of others keeps the team connected and motivated. Salimi points out that a remote team manager can easily get encumbered and overwhelmed with grunt work, like managing things through dashboards, looking at reports, and making sure people are on task. So he works to constantly remind himself and his team of the underlying reason the law firm even exists – to take care of people.

As Salimi explains it, successfully managing a remote team is much more than just specific technology tools; it is about attitude, motivation, and taking responsibility for keeping a team truly connected even while members are thousands of miles apart. Even though technology makes remote teams possible, it is vitally important to remember that people are not technology tools, and individuals need a manager who supports them and guides them to be a better connected unit in working towards a shared goal.