HR Considerations For Remote Work
HR best practices, tips, and gotchas for managing a remote workforce

For HR managers, the last few weeks have been interesting. There have been all kinds of questions — many of which don’t have clear cut answers. First, leaders had to decide when to make the switch to at-home work definitively. Now, the HR staff is having to figure out how to continue to support employees remotely, which can be difficult. In this webinar, we have three amazing HR leaders here with a few ideas and tips for keeping your organization’s culture strong throughout this time.
First, we have Sandra Smith, the Senior Vice President of Business Operations at Executech. Sandra wears many hats at the office, overseeing the HR department, analytics, training, and administrative groups.
Next up, we have Jeana Hutchings, the Benefits Practice Leader at Diversified Insurance Group. Jeana is a licensed benefits consultant and registered nurse. She has over 30 years of experience in healthcare and insurance and has helped with the planning and design of wellness and insurance initiatives for many companies.
Finally, our third panelist is Kylie Peterson. Kylie is the Director of Health and Wellbeing, also at Diversified Insurance Group. She is a population health professional and has experience in health promotion and public health initiatives.
How Do We Adjust to This New Way of Working?
The most significant recommendation we can make for HR managers and other business leaders in this new time is to focus on communication. Being direct, honest, and transparent will go a long way with your employees and help your organization stay on the same page.
While we all work from home, utilize technology and other tools for this communication. There are products such as Microsoft Teams and Zoom that make it easy to connect with your team — even face-to-face with video calls.
Don’t forget to check in often as well. For example, you could set up a weekly Teams meeting to keep in touch with your staff. It will give you time to discuss work, as well as a chance to connect and have fun with each other. We also recommend using email and group chats for messaging quickly and easily throughout the day.
This is just one tip for adjusting to this new way of working. For more, check out the webinar above, or read our full blog here.
Webinar Discussion Topics
- Considerations for Leadership
- Openness & Honesty
- Communication
- Handling difficult decisions
- Maintain & Build Company Culture
- Working with individuals and teams?
- Tips, ideas, and activities
- What does the future look like?
- Enabling Communication
- Technology
- Ideas and best practices
- Cautions
- Employee Well-Being
- Technology and tools
- Ideas for engagement
- Cautions
- Resources
- https://www.diversifiedinsurance.com/coronavirus/
- https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/pandemic
- https://www.welcoa.org/
Speaker Bios
Sandra SmithSr. Vice President of Business OperationsSandra oversees Human Resources, Finance, Analytics, Employee Development and Administration at Executech. At Executech and the community at large, she is known for her friendly, approachable and positive attitude. She has been with Executech for eight years and during that time she has helped dozens (nearly hundreds) of IT professionals find jobs and career fulfillment at Executech. Sandra has been instrumental in building the award-winning and people-first culture that makes Executech so great
Jeana HutchingsBenefits Practice LeaderJeana is a licensed benefit consultant and registered nurse with 30 years of healthcare and insurance carrier experience. Over the last 20 years of her career, she has focused on the insurance industry. Jeana brings innovative new ideas to challenge the current state of healthcare and employee benefits. She also specializes in plan design, compliance, wellness initiatives, member education, and communication, all of which are an integral part of creating an empowered employee. Jeana started with
Kylie PetersonDirector of Health & WellbeingKylie Peterson is a population health professional with eight years of experience in health promotion and public health. She earned a Bachelor of Science degree in health promotion and education from the University of Utah in 2012 and a Master of Public Health degree from Tulane University in 2016. In her current role as the Director of Health & Wellbeing, she oversees client wellness initiatives.