How to Manage Time Zone Differences?

Every company wants to expand its business process throughout the globe. Workers across the country can work together in order to develop fruitful results for the organization.

This seems good when thinking as a whole result but the execution and management are quite challenging. Serving clients from different locations all around the country face major trouble in the time zone. Time zone difference plays a vital role when talking about international businesses. Time zone remains the biggest problem to overcome when working remotely. It highly affects business productivity.

In due times, location and time are no more a barrier. We can easily find companies that have team members located in different parts of the globe. Working from a remote location is quite popular these days because of the advantages they serve. Let us discuss some of them:

24-hour Working Environment: If any new task comes in, then there will be always someone to handle the work. In case of any urgent requirement, there always be some team members by your side. This also provides a healthy and happy working environment even at night.

Work Never Stops: Due to differences in time zone, the work will never stop. If someone working in day time then at night, different members will have their working hours in the daytime. In this way, the work will continue and will never stop.

Availability: When the company holds members from different locations then there is very less possibility that no team member is available. Maximum time, you will have someone available to handle the entire process. This is a plus point for the company’s productivity.

Challenges of working in the different time zone

Working in different time zone is not always fruitful. It does increase productivity and connectivity but they are not always a convenient option. One can face many challenges while working in different time zones. Some of them are listed below:

Unable to Collaborate on Time: The main problem when working remotely is the different working hours. Due to differences in the working hour, it is possible that you are not able to collaborate with your favorite teammate on time. When you have your working hour, the other may be having his non-working hour. Therefore, collaborating with them would be a major challenge.

Difficult to Conduct Meetings: Another biggest problem of difference in working time is the conduction of meeting. Meetings are conducted to convey important messages to all the team members on time but due to time zone differences, gathering every team member at the same time will be a challenge.

Unwanted Delay: It is possible that being unable to connect and communicate on time may lead to unwanted delays in some important decisions. While making any decision with the majority of support, you need to wait for every member’s response. Waiting for a response will be more time-consuming and can result in disturbing schedules.

Lead to Misunderstanding: Communicating in live-chats will clear all the doubt at once but asynchronous communication always leads to misunderstanding. Not getting instant replies to certain important messages might create misinterpreted guessing and hence conclude with misguided work.

Tools to manage time zone

A connection with the people is important and so are the tools to maintain them. In order to maintain good connectivity with the people working in a remote location, these tools would help you to some extent.

1. ScheduleOnce
2. Meeting Planner Time Zone App
3. Boomerang
4. Time Zone Converter
5. Spacetime. am

Tips to manage time zone differences

Time zone management is an issue of concern that every international business process faces. In order to enjoy the advantages of remote working, you need to properly manage the time differences. Consider the below-given tips that will help you with the same.

Decline Irrelevant Collaboration: Try to avoid conducting unnecessary meetings. Gathering people with different working hours is waste of time and work. Therefore, try settling out with emails and messages instead of conducting meetings regularly.

Concern with Every Time Zone: The first thing that you need to keep in mind is the time zone of every team member. This will help you to organize the perfect deadline for everyone. Reduce the confusion by mentioning time according to their different zone.

Using Time Management Tools: There are lots of available tools to help you out with time zone management. These tools will save you from time conversion and confusion. It will also be useful in scheduling meetings of people at different times.

Go for the Shared Calendar: Make a shared calendar that can be accessible by all the members. This could help in proper time management and scheduling. Members can notify of their possible time availability which will sort out the time conversion problem.

Maintain Proper Communication: Communication is the key to holding every team member of the company. Due to variance time, it will be difficult to collect everyone at a single time. Therefore, setting up a proper strategy for communication will be helpful.

Individual Responsibility: Give the power to every team member so that no one will be dependable on others. Because of different time zone connecting with each other, every time will be quite difficult, if the members have individual responsibility then they will not be dependable.

Represent Your Expectation: As you are unable to meet the members regularly who are working remotely, so be clear with your expectations. Examine every week the work done by all the employees. Keeping records of work and checking whether their work meets the required expectation or not is necessary to keep everyone in the loop.

Don’t Forget to Appreciate: It is quite obvious that people whom we do not meet regularly are easily neglected. But don’t forget to highlight their work and achievements. This will help to keep every member engaged and encouraged. Proper management of team members either located locally or remotely needs to be managed effectively.

The success of every company depends on how precisely you deliver the services to the clients. Increasing your company’s global reach is good for your business growth. Serving your client with the best possible solution at a favorable time is necessary. The location should not be the barrier to achieving your goals. Using proper time zone differences tips and methods would be a good step towards the development of your company.