Leading From a Distance With Lessons From Online Teaching to Engage a Remote Workforce

Abstract

With many organizations and institutions now operating remotely due to the global coronavirus pandemic, leaders are now finding themselves in a position where they have to effectively lead and manage people and projects from a distance. Some are predicting that remote work may be a new normal for many organizations, with companies offering work-from-home opportunities permanently (Kelly, 2020). Because of the long-term implications for remote working, leaders will need competencies to successfully engage remote workers using new and creative strategies, techniques, and technologies. The field of online pedagogy has useful applications for engaging remote teams particularly in areas of communication, community-building, and retention. This chapter presents some lessons from online teaching that can be applied to leading a remote workforce. I provide some insights from my experience teaching online and my experience serving in a staff role at a university, using a narrative method. My hope is that women leaders in higher education institutions who have had to shift to leading teams remotely will find useful applications from the field of online teaching to their own remote workplace contexts, particularly from the literature of online student engagement. © 2022 selection and editorial matter, Barbara Cozza and Ceceilia Parnther;individual chapters, the contributors.