If you’re like many employers, you’ve probably already made the transition involved in allowing at least some of your employees to work from home. But making that transition, and adjusting to managing a remote team rather than an on-site workforce, is only half the battle. The other half comes when it’s time to fill remote job vacancies. How do you choose which workers are best suited for telecommuting? How do you conduct insightful interviews from a remote location? And how can you tell whether or not a potential employee is the best fit for your company without meeting that person face to face? Those are questions that many managers struggle with in today’s work-from-home environment. That’s why we’ve collected the information in this article – to provide some helpful tips for recruiting and hiring the right employees to fill remote jobs.

Qualities to Look for in Remote Workers

Most managers are familiar with the skills, experience, and education that are most desirable in a new hire. But remote workers need abilities and traits that go above and beyond basic experience and skills. Work-from-home employees need to be able to work autonomously, and that means they need to be self-starters with superior time-management and decision-making capabilities. Look for people who can prioritize their workloads and who have demonstrated excellent communication skills in previous jobs – preferably involving video conferencing and staying in touch with management and other team members from a remote location. And speaking of remote, it helps if the potential employee has worked remotely in the past. While that’s not an absolute necessity, previous experience in telecommuting is a definite plus.

Interview Questions for Candidates

If you’ve recruited and hired employees in the past, you no doubt have a standard list of interview questions for job candidates. But when it comes to filling remote jobs, you’ll need to add some additional inquiries to make sure the potential employee has a complete understanding of what’s involved in working from home. The following interview questions will provide you with the answers you need to choose the best candidate:

• Have you worked from home before? It helps if a worker understands the challenges of working remotely, and previous experience as a telecommuter is the best teacher.
• What do you believe are the most important skills for a remote worker? Look for answers like “good communication skills,” “being self-motivated,” “the ability to prioritize work projects,” and other answers that indicate the person has the qualities that are desirable in a work-from-home employee.
• How would you avoid distractions when working from home? The answers to this question will tell you whether or not the candidate has the ability to be as productive as possible when working remotely.

Recruiting and hiring the right employees to fill remote jobs can be a daunting task, but following these tips can help you to narrow down the field and choose the best person for your job vacancy. And don’t forget the management tools that help you to assess how your new remote employees are performing once they’re onboard – tools like MySammy, for example. Our cloud-based software allows managers to measure productivity levels of remote workers in a totally transparent way, and can help your new hires to improve their own productivity levels when working from home. Sign up for your free trial today!