The workplace, and what the typical workplace looks like, is constantly evolving. Maybe one of the most dramatic recent examples of this is the growing numbers of field employees in the workforce. Field employees are different from the image of the desk-bound worker that’s permeated the public consciousness for the last half-century. For one thing, field employees tend to be much more mobile, and more flexible. They’re not stuck at a desk or at a single fixed location. Often, they don’t go to the same locations every day or stick to a strict routine. Field employees also tend to provide specialized services. Common examples of a field employee include folks like your local home healthcare worker, handyman, or electrician. These types of field employees are vital to the communities they work in every day. So, how can you as a company ensure that your team of field employees grows and remains strong as the seasons change?
1) Pick the Right People
Even if a field-based team is the best fit for your business, not every employee is the best fit for a field-based team. Field employees have a different work environment from what’s typical, and not everyone will thrive in it. Working in the field provides unique obstacles, problems and distractions, and businesses should ensure that their team has characteristics that will make the perfect fit to meet those challenges. These characteristics include:
- The drive to succeed
- Self-discipline
- Time management skills
- Willingness and ability to adapt to new technologies
- Exemplary communication skills
If your field employees have these qualities, they’ll be able to adapt quickly to changes that happen as they perform their jobs in the field, as well as be able to communicate problems, ideas and results to their supervisors.
2) Prioritize Communication
As outlined above, the ideal field employee has good communication skills. But communication goes both ways! When your business employs workers with a high level of mobility and flexibility, their employer must be deliberate and thoughtful about communication. After all, it’s not like you can stop by their desk for a quick check-in on your way to make another cup of coffee.
It’s important not to micromanage field employees, or make them feel like their every move is being scrutinized. Instead, the best way to communicate is to offer direct, clear feedback on what works and what doesn’t, with clear, concise directives on what needs to change (if anything does). This will make your employees feel like their work is being seen, evaluated and understood, and give them the consistent drive to excel and improve.
3) Give Them the Correct Tools
You can have the best field employees in the world, and the most clear lines of communication in the universe – but that doesn’t amount to anything if they don’t have the correct resources to succeed. After all, the world’s best nuclear engineer, given a simple stone hammer, is just a guy with a rock. Workplace solutions for office employees will, most of the time, be unsuited to your employees in the field.
Having the correct management software will ensure the most efficient, streamlined workflows for both field employees and their managers and supervisors. The best management software should provide the following benefits:
Mobile management: Your field employees are quick, flexible and adaptable. Shouldn’t the software used to manage them be, too?
Streamlined and efficient: By digitizing and automating the workflows used by employees in the field, you as their employer drastically reduce the room for error and mistakes, giving them more space and time to do their jobs.
Communication and collaboration: You need a quick and concise way to relay necessary feedback to your mobile employees. Software that employs messaging as well as clear notifications will serve you better than a solution that doesn’t.
Workforce tracking: You don’t want to crowd your employees – but you still need to know where they are and what they’re up to. Managers who can see where their field employees are (and where they’ve been!) will be able to monitor employee progress and create accountability.
4) Set Expectations – and Stick to Them
Because they’re – say it with me – in the field, field employees tend to work independently without direct supervision. So how do you guarantee that they’re staying on track and performing the duties of their jobs as intended?
The best way to do this is by setting clear expectations for your employees. It’s not enough just to verbally express the standards of your business, but to enforce best practices through clear policies and defined processes. And then be prepared to stick to your guns! When you can’t be in the field to physically supervise employees as they perform their jobs, you have to be able to rely on the authority of the standards you set to ensure employees act accordingly.
Set Your Field Employees Up for Success with CompanyMileage
When a sizable portion of your employee workforce consists of field employees, you want those employees to be the best they can be and have the best resources at their disposal. When it comes to expense management for mobile employees in the field, look no further than CompanyMileage and SureMileage, our mileage reimbursement software.
Not only is SureMileage a fantastic tool for tracking mileage and streamlining the employee reimbursement process, it provides managers and supervisors with helpful insights into how employees are spending their time and how they conduct their routines throughout the day. This includes monitoring how much employees drive, and how long they spend at each location they visit.
SureMileage is the solution you’ve been looking for when it comes to being able to monitor your field employee schedules’ and time management, while still giving them the freedom to complete their jobs efficiently. Contact CompanyMileage today for a free demo!