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The pandemic upended millions of households across the world, causing a seismic shift in the way people live and work. For organizations that were willing to adapt, technological experimentation helped reshape the way their teams collaborate, created new channels of communication, and changed how they hire new employees.
The nature of the modern workplace environment now sees more space for the adoption of digital capabilities, helping to lay the foundation for the future of work. As companies look to introduce more remote-friendly working policies, organizational success strongly depends on their capacity to implement appropriate digital team management infrastructure to oversee the efficacy and productivity of distributed teams,
Among those institutions that have been willing to adapt to the digital revolution in the workplace, the trend of remote and distributed working teams remains a strong driving force to their ongoing success.
Following a 2023 Remote Workforce Report, results indicated that 54 percent of surveyed decision-makers and employees across multiple regions have reported an increase in their full-time remote working employee headcount.
As per the same report, organizations and decision-makers are optimizing their business model and workplace operations, by hiring and managing distributed teams, allowing them to tap into new talent pools outside of their location or country.
Despite seeing headcount costs increase, organizations are still more willing to rather hire employees that live in a different country or region if they are considered to be the best candidate for the job.
The bottom line, the age of remote work is here to stay. However, it begs the question of what comes after it, and how are companies going to improve their digital team management efforts, as their workforce grows increasingly borderless.
Blockchain In The Workplace
For quite some time, blockchain has established itself as a decentralized network, allowing individuals and organizations to securely and transparently transact without the need for third-party intermediaries or banks.
In the high-paced digital world, the blockchain network has become known as the underlying technology that helps to power cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin (BTC).
However, since its inception, blockchain technology has spilled over into various other industries, not only serving the digital asset or crypto market but lending itself as an adaptable digital and decentralized network for the workplace.
How Blockchain Is Changing The Face Of Distributed Teams
The nature of blockchain, within the organizational work environment, has given distributed teams across multiple regions access to a network of advanced capabilities, creating new tools and digital infrastructures they require to improve and manage their remote-working teams.
A key element of the blockchain network or system is the importance of the Decentralized Autonomous Organization or DAO. The understanding of DAO enables companies to create a democratic organizational working model that allows employees to gather, share, and link on one financial account.
With a decentralized autonomous structure, members of the company, from top management to junior level can all share voting rights and equal corporate governance. This further enables organizations to better utilize their employees’ abilities to directly contribute to the forward-looking mission of the company.
While a growing number of organizations are looking to move to a more virtual work environment, blockchain technology is steadily changing the way companies and managers can collaborate, communicate and hire new talent.
Accessibility
The blockchain technology that is being used today by companies is more advanced, and more digitally integrated into business operations since it first came to life. Additionally, this technology can be accessed and managed through the internet. This enables companies to access network capabilities for different corners of the globe and minimizes the need for physical office space.
Collaboration
Seeing as blockchain can be accessed through multiple channels, it increases collaboration among distributed teams. This enables employees to work on various projects or tasks, all at once, from different parts of the world. The importance here, however, is that organizations can decide on systems of networks that are considered a more natural addition to their company structure.
Decentralized leadership
Allowing distributed teams seamless access to the blockchain network, whether it’s for collaboration or communication purposes, companies instill a sense of self-empowerment in their employees. These efforts can help decrease the need for micromanagement, as decentralized leadership enables remote employees to be more self-governed in their work.
Streamlined communications
More effective communication through the blockchain network ensures that remote teams are in constant contact with one another, without the need for intermediaries. Without the physical office space, and with the onboarding of the blockchain network, distributed teams can still encourage engagement and ongoing contribution.
Workplace efficiency
Blockchain technology has been designed to be more efficient and effective, without the need for third-party intervention. Fast, transparent, and reliable communication, blockchain technology ensures that remote employees can access information and data for the same project from any location in the world.
Decentralized authority
The blockchain network is a decentralized system, which in turn means that there is no central authority controlling the network. This however brings the importance of cloud-based technology and networking systems to the discussion.
However, once these systems have been properly implemented, distributed organizations can host their networks on different systems, allowing employees more seamless access to the information and data they require for projects and collaboration.
Company resilience
Operating a distributed workplace model ensures that organizations are more resilient against any unforeseen marketplace disruptions. More so, with the blockchain network, companies can continue their operations, even in the face of unexpected events or circumstances without being fully disrupted or having to adapt to new workplace trends.
Employee retention
Just as the advent of remote work allowed companies to hire employees from various locations, the blockchain network has only enlarged their access to different pools of talent across the world. Through the blockchain network, companies can now find, hire and retain qualified candidates without being restricted to company geography.
Overhead hiring cost reduction
Hiring new employees has become a painstakingly expensive and tedious process for companies, with several sources indicating that the average company in the U.S. spends roughly $4,000 onboarding new hires.
This process can take up to 42 days, only further increasing hiring costs. However, with blockchain technology, there is more room to reduce the cost of overheads, further streamlining the process of onboarding and minimizing the need for recruitment firms.
However one decides to view these benefits, it’s not hard to ignore the immense difference blockchain technology has made within the distributed work environment. While there are still challenges that require more advanced solutions, the overarching benefits often outweigh these problems in both the near and long term.
Distributed Team Management Through Blockchain
As organizations’ workforce becomes increasingly borderless, effective team management requires business leaders and decision-makers to utilize adaptive digital systems to ensure the efficacy, productivity, and oversight of distributed team members.
While remote working can create more autonomy for all employees, it can often lead to crevices in the workplace model, where productivity might be affected by employees' ability to work remotely.
Although there are instances where companies have reported a decrease in productivity due to employees having more autonomy and schedule flexibility, it often comes down to how distributed teams are effectively managed, and how existing systems are utilized to monitor performance through non-invasive means.
Smart contracts
Blockchain technology can increase the use of smart contracts. The understanding would be that team leaders or managers can utilize smart contracts to distribute resources more efficiently among distributed teams, improve workplace schedules, and further fast-track decision-making.
Smart contracts have also become a way for remote-friendly companies to hire freelance employees and manage remote payroll outside of their geographic proximity, ensuring better safety and security of company resources. Through these digital systems, managers can have real-time access to decentralized smart contracts, reducing the need for human intervention.
Borderless communication
Further aspects of the blockchain system enable teams to have seamless and borderless communication with their fellow teams. This can help team managers to create a virtual “boardroom” or meeting place, where they can effectively share project details and incorporate real-time collaboration.
Transparency
Decentralized systems can help result in greater transparency, keeping employees and team leaders accountable. This will help to reduce the risk and potential of fraud within the organization. A further consideration is that having more transparency can also minimize any potential errors that might arise during distributed teamwork and projects.
Increased transparency can keep employees focused, and help them collaborate more effectively in the meeting place, rather than relying on antiquated systems to help manage their content, data, and information sharing.
Real-time decision-making
Finally, blockchain networks ensure that team leaders and managers have real-time access to relevant data. This is especially important during decision-making procedures, which oftentimes require intervention from various employees, management, and stakeholders.
With a decentralized network, managers can have greater autonomy as to how and when they want to use real-time information and can share this across different mediums. Ultimately, the importance here is to ensure that managers have access to relevant data points and that company stakeholders can review real-time decision-making outcomes.
Challenges With Blockchain In The Virtual Workplace
While blockchain is steadily helping empower remote-friendly companies and distributed teams across the globe, it’s important to not overlook the potential challenges it can pose to organizations, team managers, and employees.
Perhaps the biggest challenge of introducing a decentralized autonomous network is the ability of employers and their workforce to accurately understand how these systems can improve their day-to-day activities. This requires them to undergo a thorough onboarding process, ensuring that teams are equipped with the relevant knowledge to maximize the utilization of these systems.
Furthermore, limited financial resources can also be a potential barrier for companies to fully transition from in-office to the virtual workplace. More so, introducing blockchain technologies requires efficient financial investment, which can be a challenge for smaller startup companies.
However, these financial contributions can be considered a long-term investment for the business, its employees, and further improving its resilience in the dynamic marketplace.
Finally, it’s important to keep in mind that the blockchain network has been designed to accommodate the secure and transparent transaction of cryptocurrencies and digital assets on the decentralized network.
This would mean that many of the systems that currently exist within the scope of the business practice are still in the early stages of development, and will require additional oversight and improvement to equip organizations with the appropriate decentralized networks to enhance their remote working ecosystem
Finishing thoughts
As the work environment grows increasingly digital and more remote, dispersed teams could equip themselves with blockchain technology to help improve their collaborative efforts, and communication and further fast-track their onboarding process of new hires.
Ultimately, it would require organizations to pivot the necessary resources towards adopting blockchain technologies, which requires both financial and physical resources.
While short-term challenges may exist, long-term opportunities remain one of the biggest contributors to the overall successful adoption of the blockchain network for distributed teams, and the future of work.
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