Remote Work Tools and Products

The Top Remote Work Tools and Products in 2020

Indispensable Tools for Companies Today

Technology has managed to change how people work. The structured office environment of yesteryear is fading into extinction. In its place comes rapid technological advancement that allows employees to take work on the road and operate as digital nomads.
As a result, remote work is not just feasible, but preferable and even necessary in some cases. The only determining factor of success, as agreed by many remote employees, comes from finding the right remote work tools.

Potential Benefits of Remote Work Tools: Why it is Important to Leverage these Tools

Cloud Access and Flexible Storage. Cloud-based storage is what facilitates remote work. This means remote work cannot survive without it. The major benefit of cloud storage is the flexibility and scalability associated with it. Businesses can easily scale down and up depending on their specific storage needs at a given time.

Instant Messaging. Emails are great, but they’re not the most effective way to communicate when looking for a faster response. Luckily, professional remote work tools such as Twist, Slack, and Google Hangout have a direct messaging features that allow one to send and receive messages in real-time – no excuse for sluggish colleagues responding after 24 hours or longer.

Boosts Productivity. According to a recent study, both companies and remote employees find remote work tools beneficial. 30% of businesses have even gone ahead to report that remote tools and custom apps have helped them improve their staff productivity. Confirming this is another study, as conducted by Airtasker, which after gleaning insights from 500 employees that work remotely, found out that – on average – remote employees work an extra 33.6 hours compared to their office-based peers.

Better Work/Life Balance Equals a Happy Workforce. It’s subjective, but many employees prefer working remotely. Apart from enjoying the flexible working hours, in general, they had fewer distractions. Plus, there’s no wasting time on commuting or on getting ready for work.

How Teams Can Benefit from Different Remote Work Tools

• Communication Tools. When communication fails within a company or organization, productivity suffers. It is therefore essential to ensure that real-time communication between managers and remote workers is not only simple but also seamless. Luckily, that’s where communication tools for remote workers come in handy.
• Productivity Tools are exactly as their name says. They streamline processes, save time, and simplify communications and collaborations. They also work to ensure there’s a fair allocation of workloads. Organizations that invest in time-management applications generally want to see measurable improvements in their team’s input.
• Project Manager Tools: Every organization boasts a unique workflow that can benefit from a project management system. They each need a project management system to monitor their progress and organize tasks. Popular choices of project management systems include Podio, Quip, Trello, Asana, Basecamp, Confluence: team workspace, and Remotely from Zoho.
• Finance products control the spending behavior within remote teams. One major difference to note is that financial decisions are no longer made by a centralized purchasing department but by individuals within an organization. With remote teams, the existing distance between individuals that are making these spending decisions and the management team responsible for monitoring the decisions may put financial leaders in a complicated position.
• Insurance products allow organizations to provide healthcare insurance for their remote workforce. With these tools, employers can provide comprehensive insurance for their team, whether they’re employed remotely or working on-site.
• Organizations should learn to protect their devices and software systems. It’s their job to ensure their products and devices are properly protected using up-to-date antivirus, VPN's firewalls, and device encryption. There should be cyber securities designating which organization-owned devices should be used for certain business activities.
• There are tons of other tools that organisations use to keep their remote teams efficient and energized. Examples include: Calendly: an appointment scheduler (They have a FREE option), Help Scout: customer support platform, LastPass: password manager (They have a FREE option), Noisli: background sounds for focus (They have a FREE option), Timezone.io: time difference calculator (completely FREE) or Donut: teammate pairing app (They have a FREE option).
  • File-Sharing Tools. Working remotely means there’ll come a time when digital files or important information will have to be shared among concerned parties. The easiest way to go about it is via a file transfer program. Options abound, but here are a few suggestions: Google Drive: Online cloud service for storing digital files and sharing them. It’s a useful file transfer tool, especially for those using Google products such as Gmail, Google Docs, etc.; Box: An easy to use cloud storage and file transfer tool. The tool can also integrate with a range of applications and services; Onedrive: An online cloud storage tool for saving files and photos and accessing them from anywhere and from any device. SpiderOak: A secure way to transfer and exchange files online. The transfer is encrypted, which makes them the ideal choice of tool when transferring sensitive files.

In this section, you'll find the top remote work tools and products in the market today! If you know of a useful tool that can be used for remote work that is not yet listed here, submit it for free now.