There’s no denying that in the last decade we have witnessed a significant rise in the number of people who work remotely. A study conducted in 2018 by the International Workplace Group showed that 70 percent of the 18,000 employees in 96 countries studied had worked remotely sometime during the week. Just over half of the professionals surveyed had worked half or more of their week remotely.

In addition, nearly 90 percent of business owners thought that giving their employees this autonomy made room for growth, and about 80 percent of the same owners believed that it was necessary to offer flexibility in order to attract and keep desirable talent.

Since having mobile employees appears to be the future, what are the best ways to manage them? It’s true that owners and managers will lose some control as employees work from home, but employees might be happier and more productive too with their flexible arrangement. Here are some ways to manage remote workers.

Keep communication flexible.

One key piece to keep in mind with remote employees is being flexible about how to communicate with them. Whatever form of communication you decide is best for your employees (video conferences, emails, texts, etc.), focus on building relationships with them and among the employees. Keep the interactions interesting. Share stories that are going on among the team and make sure you are relaying the important points you want to make in clear ways.

Establish an atmosphere of trust.

hen you are working with remote employees, its best to operate from a place of trusting them first. In other words, err on the side of trusting them unless they give you a reason not to. Of course, you’ll have employees that will step over the bounds of this trust, and then you know who’s worthy of being on your team. Trust is also a two-way street, so the more you trust them, the more your employees will trust you, and that builds a strong relationship.

Throw away micromanaging.

Realistically, no one enjoys being micromanaged. It might be difficult to resist the urge to micromanage when you don’t see your employees in person every day. However, your workers will find more job satisfaction if you rely on them to do their jobs. So, before you step in, look for identifiable patterns rather than mistakes and then approach your employees in a way that includes them on the workable solution.

Remote workers are here to stay. The landscape of our jobs have changed so much over the last few years, but the flexibility of work is the future. We can work from our phones in our cars or even from our beds. As managers, keeping a few key things in mind will lead to more satisfied employees, who are then more likely to give you better work. In the long run, trust and communication go a long way in making a successful mobile employee.