A reader's question: What's the best way to manage home-based staff?

By William Dunkerley

Q. My publisher is critical of how I'm managing work-at-home staffers. He fears that some may not be putting in full days of work. I've only required that staff be available for a set period of time each day to facilitate communication and collaboration. We have Zoom meetings as frequently as we used to have in-person meetings before. But still the publisher is nervous that he's not getting the work he's paying for. Just between you and me, I think he's a little bit paranoid. I think he'd be happy if we had a camera running on each staffer from 9 to 5. Thankfully, that's not practical. If he tried to impose it, I think some editors would quit in a heartbeat. It would show a lack of trust. Our publication is mostly staff written. Unnecessary loss of experienced people would really hurt. I think we've been doing very well under the circumstances. We've met deadlines and have maintained editorial quality. There's been a sharp learning curve for my staff to adjust to new routines. I think we've done okay. However, I have this problem with the publisher. What in the world can I do?

A. It looks to me like you have actually two problems. One is the impractical outlook of the publisher. The other is how to handle your staff no matter to what extent they remain home-based.

I don't know if your publisher is really paranoid. He does seem to have an autocratic leadership style. Autocratic leaders tend to have a need for visible control over processes and staff. I can understand why he feels out of control when he can't observe your staff at their desks focused on their work.

This is a pattern that is unlikely to change quickly. The publisher has probably been a problem for your organization all along. Now it's just that the adjustments to our present unusual situation has brought this to the fore.

I've worked with a number of organizations that had an autocratic leader in control. In one case the person had her fingers in everything. She had to approve all major decisions. Department heads had no budgets. They had to go to her when they wanted to spend money on anything that was not routine. She rewrote copy for no apparent reason. She even stayed after hours to do some of the production work just as an extension of her control. I hope your publisher is not that bad. The effect of that publisher's style was that the growth of the business was constrained by the limits of what one autocratic manager could handle. Progress wasn't everything; control was. With another autocratic manager I encountered, there was an additional wrinkle to the problem: He was in an advanced stage of his career. Over the years he had hired staff that he thought would be compliant. If a new hire turned out to be an initiator, that person didn’t last long. The kicker came when the manager retired: No one there could function well without receiving orders. The organization survived, but it became a shadow of its former self.

Don't try for a quick readjustment of your publisher. One way or another, he'll resist. I suggest that instead you focus on keeping him apprised of your editorial productivity. Also show him often the editorial quality you are maintaining. Find ways to show him related facts and figures. If over time he sees that you are maintaining momentum under the new circumstances, he may relax his need for control.

However, to do that you might have to change some of your management techniques and methods.

Deadline compliance is one metric you should track formally if you are not already doing so. Report that regularly to the publisher. If you've been lax on deadline compliance, this may be time to change that. It might require an adjustment by some staff members. That could present you with some problems.

I saw that unfold at one special interest consumer magazine. It was largely staff written too. A few of the editors tried to beat the new deadline requirements by turning in copy that still needed polishing. The solution we found was to track the number of instances where copyeditors and proofreaders had to fix things. Monthly we'd issue a report that showed the results for each editor. That seemed to fix the problem.

One reason for its success is that it gave a crystal-clear picture of what was expected. That's something that's more important now than ever before. Work-at-home editors need to know clearly what is expected of them.

Do they have comprehensive job descriptions that spell that out? If not, that should be a priority. Don't hand staffers a job description as a fait accompli. Develop each job description collaboratively with each staffer. Very often staffers are more in touch with details of their jobs than their managers. Tap into that knowledge and experience.

To satisfy your publisher, give him periodic reports on how performance objectives are met.

Deadlines and cleanness of copy are easy to quantify. Editorial quality is more of a challenge. There's got to be a subjective element to that. The answer to that is to maintain an ongoing dialogue with editors so they will acquire an instinctive sense of what you value and what you don't. Give the publisher periodic reports on how that is going.

These factors and others should be incorporated into a documented editorial plan. It should answer:

—What are the editorial objectives?

—What is the editorial decision-making process?

—What is the established workflow procedure?

—Who is responsible for things at each step along the way?

—What are the publication’s deadlines?

—How do you define "deadline," and what are the consequences of missing one?

—Whose approval is needed for what?

—What are the publication's editorial practices (style, text-to-illustration ratio, etc.)?

—What procedures are established for handling the unusual (e.g., late-breaking crises at deadline)?

Your staff may already have a good sense of these things. But having a formal plan will give you something concrete to work with. You can use it to review with the publisher how your staff is complying with each item.

Doing this over time should serve as an alternative way for the publisher to feel a sense of control. But again, don't expect an instant result. It sounds like you might have a tiger by the tail.

The foregoing recommendations are far from being comprehensive advice for managing work-at-home staffers. They should be a first step, however, to addressing the concerns that you raised.

William Dunkerley is principal of William Dunkerley Publishing Consultants, www.publishinghelp.com.

Add your comment.