Remote collaboration: How distributed UX teams build great products

Nearly 42% of people working remotely believe that the most challenging part about working remotely is the lack of in-person communication with their peers. Further, many individuals also struggle with blurred work-life balance and a feeling of disconnection from project goals, feedback loops, deadlines, and urgency. 

Fortunately, remote UX teams can overcome these barriers by creating a remote-first culture, crafting seamless remote processes, and leveraging the right collaboration tools.

Here are some ways people with remote UX designer jobs and other roles can find success while being part of remote UX teams. 

1. Build a remote-first culture and mindset

Embracing the remote-first culture and mindset lays a solid foundation for a successful remote UX team. The lack of in-person interaction and socializing with team members can take a toll on remote resources, making them feel isolated and disconnected from their team members. Therefore, it is crucial to implement open communication and encourage team members to switch on their cameras during daily/weekly catch-ups, internal meetings, and training sessions. 

2. Use the right collaborative remote tools

Just as a bird cannot fly without wings, remote UX teams cannot collaborate and function without the right set of collaborative tools. The good news is that there is an array of advanced tools at your company’s disposal to facilitate seamless collaboration and communication. 

Here are some tools that we think should make it your toolkit. 

• Figma: the most popular real-time collaboration UI/UX design tool 
• Slack: fast and organised team communication
• Google Meet/Zoom: the best tools for video meetings and conferencing
• Miro: a collaborative tool for whiteboarding and visual brainstorming
• Notion: best for creating a centralized repository of key documents and decision logs

3. Use version control systems (VCS)

If you have ever worked a remote UX job or are currently working as a remote UX designer, you know the pain and chaos that comes along while storing and managing design files. 

Typically, organizations use Google Drive or Dropbox to store files. However, UX teams use design-specific version control systems (VCS) to handle and stay on top of file management. Further, VCSs are designed to eliminate file-naming issues and monitor every change, fostering transparency and collaboration in remote UX teams. 

Some popular VCS used by remote UX teams include Plant, Kactus, and Abstract. 

4. Thorough documentation of design decisions

It is worth noting that UX design projects are dynamic with evolving priorities, team sizes, and design decisions. What may seem like the right approach today, may not be the case a few weeks down the line. Therefore, it is crucial to create and implement clear and accessible documentation and maintain project continuity. 

Every decision, remote testing insight, and user feedback, along with the rationale behind it, should be thoroughly documented so that relevant internal and external stakeholders do not waste time in redundant conversations about design iterations and past decisions.

5. Do not compromise on client exposure 

Another major downside of a remote UX designer’s job is the lack of face-to-face interaction with end-users and clients. However, this path is not sustainable and an open invitation to low empathy and poor design decisions. 

The best way to approach this is by including UX designers in client meetings and feedback sessions to ensure they understand the task firsthand and are aligned with the project’s objectives. A remote UX team may have people from different parts of the world, so they may not be able to attend a few meetings and live sessions due to differences in time zones. This is why it is also crucial to record all the important calls and user testing videos and share them with the entire team. 

This way, individuals with a remote UX job are connected with client expectations and make data-driven design decisions. 

6. Help team members create a focus-friendly environment

“Hey, can I borrow you for a minute?”, “Can we head to the cafeteria for a quick coffee?”, “Meeting in the conference room in 15 minutes”. Do these questions sound familiar to you? While working in an office, apart from the main activities of a UX design project, designers also have to navigate frequent distractions, including ambient noise, spontaneous meetings, and casual conversations. 

However, UX remote jobs provide a distraction-free zone where people can create a focus-friendly environment for deep work. Encourage your team members to define their “deep work” to get an idea about when they are likely to be least available for meetings and other group activities.