Setting Up a Virtual Office in Hong Kong for Remote Team

Today’s digitalized world doesn’t require four walls to exist in the business market. Control your future success and take advantage of a popular service in the market called virtual office services. Virtual offices offer many benefits to business owners and employees of the firm.

Businesses can establish a corporate image with a distinguished business address in a desirable area, like in downtown Hong Kong, and employees can work wherever they want. It allows businesses to hire employees anywhere in the world and plays an important role in a business’ success.

Virtual Office for Remote Teams for Hong Kong Company

If you are looking for a tool to increase the productivity, flexibility, and happiness of your remote workers, then virtual offices would be your best bet. In this digital era, many businesses embrace the remote trend and are hiring remote workers from all over the world. But before diving into this article to understand the benefits, let’s understand the meaning of a remote team and virtual office.

What is a remote team?

A remote team is formed by combining professionals of various niches, time zones, culture, and skills in a group for a unified project. Working as a remote worker is one thing, but managing a whole remote team is another challenge that managers face. With the advancement of technology and the internet, remote work culture is everywhere.

This new trend removes all the differences between when the team is working in the office or working outside. However, there are some challenges that managers need to overcome to manage remote employees. While working remotely, maintaining a long-distance relationship with your employees becomes quite cumbersome. Thanks to technology and communication tools like Skype, video conferencing, and TeamViewer, people are now working as remote workers and are able to keep this long-distance relationship.

What is a virtual office for a remote team?

Virtual offices are those spaces that facilitate remote teammates to meet, bond, and work together. Basically, virtual offices are used by remote workers. It provides the same office environment to the workers without forcing them to commute to the office.

For a successful startup in Hong Kong, businesses need to develop a professional and reputable image. It doesn’t matter whether you want to operate the business, a professional image is essential. That’s where virtual offices may be a good fit.

With virtual offices, employees don’t have to follow a dress code or the traditional working hours. In short, employees will have greater flexibility. When the employees feel satisfied and enjoy greater flexibility, the firm’s retention rate increases in turn. So, it is a win-win situation for both the remote workers and the managers.

Why Use Virtual Offices for Remote Teams?

Virtual offices are becoming the optimal solution for modern entrepreneur’s, with the biggest problem being the cost of rent. No matter what type of business you are operating, you have to pay a monthly fee to work under a roof. But when you think of hiring remote workers for your business, virtual offices are a great option. Virtual offices bring numerous benefits to the employees as well as employers. Below are some benefits of using a virtual office for your remote team:

#1 Sustain a Work and Life Balance

The first benefit of using a virtual office for remote workers is that it helps them maintain a work-life balance. People struggle to maintain a work-life balance because of long-office hours and long-commuting hours.

As soon as flexible working hours move up the corporate agenda, many people choose a remote working lifestyle compared to brick-and-mortar jobs. Now, employees don’t have to travel to a physical office space to work.

In fact, they can start from the virtual office provided by their managers as an alternative location to work from. This gives remote workers flexibility to work from the best environment, which eventually boosts their productivity.

#2 Improved Productivity

Virtual offices help keep workers motivated and empowered. When the staff works remotely, they are not judged based on their working hours. It is all about how productive work they are for the company. Managers basically switch their focuses to a results-based system, and as long as the company is getting the right results of completing the work on time, there shouldn’t be any problems.

As per a recent Gallup poll done on the productivity level of the remote workers, it’s reported that remote workers experience the highest rates of engagement and productivity while doing their jobs.

#3 Communication Matters

Fortunately with the exposure of digitalization and communication tools, virtual offices now provide workers with numerous ways to stay in touch. Communication tools like Slack and video conferencing tools like Zoom are some of many. These tools make communication between employees a lot easier without being physically present in a specific location.

#4 Flexibility and Diversity

Another benefit that remote workers can enjoy while working from a virtual office is flexibility and diversity. These offices normally offer the flexibility to work from a new location without traveling. In fact, this type of working also promotes diversity within the workforce, where people are no longer restricted based on location.

Example of how a company took advantage of a virtual office and hired more remote workers to expand their global team.

When the concept of remote work comes up, business owners start doubting their managing and motivating skills. How will they convince workers to complete the work on time? And how can they help them to remain productive throughout the project? Remote working involves connecting entrepreneurs and the project team members residing in various continents. It sometimes becomes tough to empower the team. However, the benefits of virtual offices for remote workers overcomes potential problems.

Let’s take the example of Automattic to explain the benefits of a virtual office for remote workers.

Automattic started its business operation in 2005 to change social media marketing and content marketing with its development of the WordPress platform. This company has given the trademark of WordPress to all over the world. This is an open-source content management system that helps websites upload their blogs with a wide variety of features and customization options.

However did you know that Automattic achieved this success with the help of remote workers, employee base, and virtual workspaces? It offers its employees to work from anywhere in the world while providing a monthly stipend of $250 to access the virtual office space.

Automattic didn’t opt for this remote work trend to save money. In fact, they wanted to improve their reputation and inclusion of international employees. But unforeseen benefits of this virtual work environment increased employee productivity towards the company’s objectives.

Important Requirements for Remote Employees

In order to set up a virtual office for remote workers in Hong Kong, some important requirements need to be followed. All the remote workers need basic computers, software tools and project collaboration software. So, companies have to manage these requirements in order to have flawless collaboration between office and remote workers.

Setting up digital tools and communication tools

The main issues that affect remote working are loneliness and communication. But virtual offices can deal with both of them effectively. Managers should work to build culture & closeness to reduce loneliness by using communication and digital tools. For example, cloud software can be used to stay in contact with remote employees. Below are some of the communication and digital tools that can be used by the company owners:

• Teamviewer – Teamviewer can be used by the company to transfer files and wake-on-LAN. This is available for OS X, iOS, Android, and Linux, and it’s free for personal use. This is one of the easiest setup options for remote workers who want basic desktop access. It also supports two-step authentication.
• Project tracking/management tools – In every remote team, project management tools play an important role in keeping employees in touch with one another. Project tools, like Trello and Monday.com, can be used to get projects done from any location. This tool also includes go-to features like task management, time-tracking, collaborative editing, and role-based access.
• Slack – For real-time communication, Slack is one of the best tools for employers to stay connected with remote workers. It is a clear frontrunner in a real-time team chat application. The basic benefit of this tool is that it reduces the number of chunky emails like cc’s and bcc’s that you need to manage for your business transactions. Messages are sent out to teams over the transom, or you can DM individuals for smaller groups.

Startupr Provides a Virtual Office in Hong Kong

Building a proactive remote working environment has become a key to seeing your company thrive. That’s where a virtual office plays an important role. By now you may have a better idea of how to set up a virtual office for your remote workers. Starting a new business and attracting employees towards it is challenging, even in the business-friendly city of Hong Kong.

By choosing a virtual office, you can reduce the stress, risk, and expenses to set up the business. If you are looking for an excellent virtual office place, Startupr can help. We offer a virtual office to business owners at low cost.

If you want to hire staff from all over the world, Startupr’s virtual office is the perfect solution. For more information on virtual office plans, contact Startupr today!