4 Ways to Optimize Remote Work Experience Using These Online Tools

The remote work trend, significantly on the rise globally, presents a distinct set of issues—which necessitates using a specific set of tools to address them. Technology enables us to accomplish the same tasks that are done in offices regardless of where we are located.

People worldwide are attempting to adjust to this new technology, as 25% of professional workers will be working remotely by the end of 2023, and 97% of workers who work remotely want to do so till the end of their careers.

Globally, technological improvements have paved the way for a rise in remote employees. The most stringent rules have accepted the remote work concept and permitted employees to work from home.

The number of tools and pieces of software that support remote employees and virtual teams is expanding. There is no universal recipe for remote work. Everyone works in a different way, with distinct time zones and places.

Regardless of where your employees are located, adopting the correct tools and applications will help you keep them engaged and productive—whether managing a remote workforce or leading a dispersed team in a hybrid workplace.

Let us walk you through the ways to optimize your remote work experience using some of the essential online work tools.

4 ways to improve your remote work experience using online work tools

It takes the correct culture, procedures, and technology to enable virtual teams to function efficiently from any location when working remotely.

Software programs known as online work tools enable working away from the workplace. These technologies perform a variety of tasks designed to replace the accessibility offered by a shared location. As part of your planning, equip yourself with a variety of software tools that will assist you in achieving your objectives.

While several tools for working from home will help you—the below ways of using appropriate tools will improve your remote work experience.

1. Employing project management tools

Scheduling, planning, tracking progress, and reporting are all made possible by project management tools, which are helpful for teams working on a project.

Some of the popular project management tools for remote teams include:

Wrike

Wrike is a well-known project management tool remote teams use to accelerate project processes. It is jam-packed with effective business communication and task management capabilities. Project management teams have the ability to oversee several projects and activities concurrently, thanks to Wrike.

You will easily locate and use its features because of its simplistic design. Moreover— Wrike has a collaborative proofing tool that you will use to annotate and remark on images. With Wrike, updates related to tasks and subtasks are displayed together with updates related to changes made directly to Projects or Folders.

The outstanding features of Wrike include:

1. Simple task classification
2. Time monitoring
3. Task approval management.
4. Integrations with Dropbox and Google Docs
5. Excellent reporting and analytics tools

Microsoft Projects

One of the finest project management tools on the market is Microsoft Project. It has market-leading capabilities that let you decide how to schedule projects and discover the best methods for dividing tasks among your team.

The tool’s distinguishing features include:

1. Forecasting the project’s budget
2. Supports thorough job descriptions
3. Variants in the cloud and on-premise

2. Using communication tools

Text, audio, and video-based methods for communication make it possible for staff members and managers to stay in touch with one another.

Several tools are used by businesses for team communication—some of the popular ones include:

Zoom

With video calls, you will be able to converse more effectively with your virtual teammates since you will be able to hear them, see their faces, and feel their presence like you are in the same room with them.

With the help of the well-known and industry-leading Zoom video-conferencing software, you will be able to connect visually and audibly with several people to stay in touch and allow them to carry on with their everyday activities with no interruption. It is a group calling app with incredible video quality.

Businesses also use the technology for training and webinars. It is also among the finest alternatives to in-person or one-on-one sessions. You will be able to have video webinars and live meetings using Zoom and record such events for later viewing.

It has transparent pricing, is very cost-effective, and is simple to use. To facilitate group conversations, you enable teams to share your screen. In addition to this—Zoom also offers voice sharing, meetings, video webinars, and rooms.

ClickUp

ClickUp is a robust, highly regarded project management application made to simplify corporate operations. It combines tasks, documents, conversations, objectives, etc.—into one App. A separate premium subscription exists for additional features like limitless storage, integrations, and sophisticated reporting tools.

With the variety of capabilities offered by ClickUp, which enables users to manage all of their work in one location, remote teams will easily manage their projects and interact. It makes undertakings seem more attainable by dividing projects into smaller, more manageable chunks and providing tools for establishing tasks, subtasks, and checklists.

For teams who wish to manage all parts of a project in one location—ClickUp is one of the most prominent project management software due to its configurable and exclusive features.

Users have the ability to design unique perspectives that they will be able to share with everyone. The simplicity, adaptability, and use of ClickUp make it a very useful tool for professionals who work from home.

3. Making use of document editors and converters

Have you ever found yourself in a situation where you need to convert a document from one format to another, or maybe you need to edit a PDF file but don’t have the right software? There are plenty of document editors and converters out there that can help you out.

Here’s one of them:

Smallpdf

While working from home, you will find yourself genuinely missing the IT genius who sat next to you and understood how to manage PDF documents as your task list with document administration begins to pile up and your email inbox expands.

Plenty of helpful online tools will help you quickly manage and modify your PDF files. Also, these technologies are really simple to use, which makes working from home a delight.

Drag and drop on any operating system will allow you to quickly convert PDF to word with a high-quality outcome. All files converted online will be removed from the service provider’s servers after one hour, maintaining the security of your documents. You can also use this tool as a PDF editor.

The text is extracted from a scanned PDF file using OCR (Optical Character Recognition) technology—which transforms it into a Microsoft Word document you will be able to download and modify. Due to the cloud-based nature of the servers, big files will also be easily converted online utilizing this tool.

4. Employing productivity monitoring tools

Working in teams presents a unique challenge in terms of time management. Tools for managing time remotely improve the administration of remote teams. Employees will track their hours and productivity with the use of time management software.

There are several tools for productivity monitoring and remote time management—the prominent ones include:

Kickidler

Kickidler is the next-generation employee and user activity tracking tool. It comes with a compelling collection of tools that encourage outstanding team commitment.

You will be able to keep an eye on distant employees’ PCs with this software and monitor your employees’ productivity in addition to the option of making a recording. With time, it will become better as the workers become more responsible and are aware of your monitoring.

Kickidler features include time tracking, analysis of staff productivity, efficiency dynamics, an unrestricted number of real-time displays, and the possibility to save the history of computer operations.

Among Kickidler’s key features are:

1. Online computer monitoring
2. Replaying the employee activity histories
3. Performance assessment
4. Cybersecurity and time tracking
5. Boosting internal communication
6. Task analysis of employees

The software creators introduced an “autokick” upgrade in 2020 that contributes to more democratic employee monitoring. The upgrade incorporates a self-monitoring interface and automated alerts.

Time Doctor

Time Doctor is a practical work-from-anywhere solution for keeping track of work effectively and preventing employees from using distracting programs and websites. It helps to monitor how each employee manages their time and, as a result, holds them responsible for their working hours.

Leaders or managers will be able to quickly identify who is working and who is relaxing—and they will be able to use pop-ups to alert staff. Even better productivity will be achieved by avoiding distractions using alerts and other features. It has a Chrome app, a mobile version, and desktop software.

Users will enter the time spent on each project in Time Doctor and see how many billable and nonbillable hours they have worked. Managers will get daily or weekly statistics to learn more about how their staff members utilize the website and applications and how they spend their time.

It helps to monitor how each employee manages their time and, as a result, holds them responsible for their working hours.

In addition—Hub Staff and Teamwork are some other productivity monitoring and time management tools for remote teams.

Optimizing remote work experience using online tools

Managing a remote workforce is sometimes challenging because they feel alone and overwhelmed without a traditional office setting.

Your productivity will rely on how well your workforce adapts to a new working environment and schedule since remote work has a distinct work culture. Make sure your staff members take advantage of these online tools to improve their work experience.

Career Reload

We help job seekers to better their career by offering career advice & free resources. Download free Word resume templates and resume templates for Google Docs.