Remote Workers need to understand their clients to fully deliver the service they require. You need to know basic information about them and how they run their business.

Who Are They?

It may be common sense. But a lot of remote workers work without knowing who their client is. What is their client’s mission and vision? What does the client stand for? Even simple questions like, where is the business located, and who are your bosses?
You should know this when you start your remote working career.

Who is their Target Audience?

Every job in a company is geared towards helping its cause. It can be selling a product, a service, or advocacy like campaigning for a social cause.
Whether you are at the frontline in sales or at the backend in accounting, you should know who is the target audience. Who is your client’s buyer’s persona?
This will give context to what you can and cannot do with your output. It can also facilitate initiative to help improve a client’s business.

Do Their Values Align to Yours?

Everyone wants to be fulfilled in their lives. And your work comprises a majority of the time you live. It is hard to work for someone with values you can’t tolerate. Immerse yourself with your team culture. Are they toxic with tasks? Do they value your time? Do they respect you as a person?
Most of our clients are easy to work with. You can review the past courses to help you adjust to the remote working environment. But worst case, you can seek the help of our relationship managers if you have problems.

Clarifying Job Roles, Responsibilities and Expectations

Why Is it Important to Clarify Your Role and Responsibilities?

You are working because a client needs your service. But what exactly do they need? What do they expect of you? The greatest conflict between a remote worker and a client is not living up to the expectations. In your part, you think you are giving your best, but sometimes that best is not good enough. If there is a disconnect, you will be frustrated and unappreciated while your client will be discontented with your work.

Managing Expectations

We have to manage both our expectations to have a harmonious remote working relationship. Ask them your exact deliverables and give them your best output. Clarify your job responsibilities so that you are in sync. In turn, if you are handling a team, you should articulate what output you need from them exactly.

Ask for a Compromise

Sometimes, our bosses can underestimate the difficulty of tasks. They might give you a target that is quite impossible.
Or maybe as a team leader, you are pressured to produce results, so you are delegating impossible-to-reach quotas.
If the expectations are too high, first think of a way to achieve this. If you really can’t, communicate the reason to your bosses and have a compromise. It is good to show a tiered target for it.

Minimum, Target, Outstanding (MTO)

You can have this framework when you’re attempting something quite hard. Have a Minimum, Target, Outstanding (MTO) goal. For example, you have a target of 1000 members for your Facebook group.

Maybe you can target,

• M – 500 Members
• T – 1000 Members
• O – 2000 Members

With this, if you fail to hit the target, but you hit the minimum, you and your client will not feel that you did not do your job. It is just that it might be hard to gain traction as of the moment.

And if you reach the 1000 target, you have an Outstanding (O) target that you can push your team to hit while the traction is high.
In this way, you can both have your expectations in check whatever the outcome might be.