The “nonessential” workers able to do their jobs from home, while practicing safe social distancing - including much of the technology industry - today count themselves among the lucky ones. Unlike the frontline healthcare workers and other essential employees like public transit or waste management, the few who can do their normal work remotely are safer than if they were commuting, and are thankful to be closer to their families at this time - but that doesn’t mean the new normal of distributed teams is without its challenges. While there are some clear benefits to working-from-home, the sudden and complete transition to fully-remote teams and video conference meetings does represent a real disruption to how even the most tech-savvy of companies are used to managing their employees and workflow day-to-day.
And for other less-lucky businesses, hard decisions about downsizing and furloughs also need to be made - navigating the waters surrounding empoyee layoffs can be uncomfortable for most, and unfamiliar to many. The following list are Management guides and resources that each speak to specifics of remote teams in the post-COVID world, that the Founder Institute HQ team has found to be useful for entrepreneurs facing new management challenges.
Post-COVID Startup Management: Guides & Resources
- In First Round Review, NerdWallet VP of Content Maggie Leung offers management advice for going from surviving to thriving in distributed workplace team environments.
- Front Co-Founder & CEO Mathilde Collin offers a great list of HR-centric ideas for approaching remote team management via a fun and practical mindset.
- YC Alums offer list(s) of Advice for Managing Remote Teams and YC’s Director of Events Lindsay Selvitelle has this post on Hosting a Virtual Event.
- This a16z advice gets to the heart of sometimes-needed but never-fun topics of planning and managing layoffs.
- Founder Shield has published an updated employer resource guide for workforce decision-making and liabilities.
- The coworking space Upsuite asks leaders questions about management and provides a list of tools and equipment needed to work remotely full-time versus once or twice per week.
- Learn how to move your business forward from Entrepreneur's article "How to Position Your Startup to Weather the Storm."
- Get help managing the impact of the Coronavirus with HoneyBook's regularly updated list of resources.
Special thanks especially to our friends at TechStars, the good folks at Grasshopper Bank, and to JetBlue Technology Ventures’ Ashley Lowes and Sarah Mattina, each of whose own resource lists and guides the Founder Institute team referenced in the creation of this COVID-19 management resources guide.
Founder Institute portfolio companies are creating positive social and environmental impact around the world, using structured processes to define impact KPIs that scale sustainably with their business. Read the most recent featured reports on our impact companies at FI.co/good, or learn about the Founder Institute's own global impact at FI.co/impact.
