Thriving in the Virtual Workplace

One of my most popular learning programs is a series of four webinars entitled, “Thriving in the Virtual Workplace.” It actually started out as a three day training program for OPM and, over the past few years, has since gone many iterations and updates resulting in four 90-minutes webinars:

• Creating a Remote Work Culture sets the foundation for the program by helping individuals and teams establish “Rules of Engagement” to work better remotely.
• Making Remote Work looks specifically at what research says about working remotely and gives you insights into your work habits and how you can be more productive in a remote environment.
• Building the Virtual Team focuses on how to use technology to maintain collaboration, camaraderie, and productivity as more teammates work remotely more often.
• Virtual Team Management closes the circle on “Rules of Engagement” and introduces Results Based Management.

As the program evolved over the years, I’ve incorporated lots of research and other great resources, but was much too lax on building a single resources page for it. So this post is to rectify that. What follows is an assuredly incomplete and rather scattershot list of some of the resources that went into the design of the program, organized by which webinar they most closely track to:
Creating a Remote Work Culture

• Leading Change by John Kotter
• Drive by Daniel Pink
• The Shallows by Nicholas Carr
• KPCB Internet Trends

Making Remote Work

• OPM’s Telework.gov
• Quiet by Susan Cain
• Lyve Remote Worker Assessment – A free self-assessment about how you work remotely – try it!
• Remote: Office Not Required by Jason Fried and David Hansson
• The effects of telecommuting on productivity by E. Glenn Dutcher
• Does Working from Home Work? Evidence from a Chinese Experiment by Nicholas Bloom (et. al.)
• Is Telecommuting a Good Idea? by Ray Fisman
• Work from Home: 7 Tips for Telecommuting Success by Amy Levin-Epstein
• 20 Working From Home Tips to Boost Your Productivity by Erik Devaney
• 10 Tips For Working From Home by Kerry Hannon

Building the Virtual Team

• Alone Together by Sherry Turkle
• A Manager’s Guide to Virtual Teams by Yael Zofi
• WorkFlex: The Essential Guide… (SHRM: Multiple articles from multiple authors)

Virtual Team Management

• TOTAL Team Management by Curt Buermeyer
• Absolute Beginner’s Guide to Project Management by Gregory Horine
• Getting Things Done by David Allen
• HBR’s 10 Must Reads on Managing People (Multiple articles from multiple authors)
• Rethinking the Relationship Among Monitoring, Evaluation, and Results-Based Management by Robert Lahey & Steffen Nielsen

Well, there is the (spotty) list thus far. I will update this post as I discover (or remember) other resources. If you have any suggestions for things that should be added to the list, please leave me a comment!