Staff in Different Timezones

[SDL]

Do you try to hire staff in different timezones? If so, how is it going with communication etc?

I used to try and hire staff in different time zones to avoid any issues overnight whilst I’m asleep. Communication was pretty decent as me I’d have staff in USA who are only like 5 hours behind so could catch them in the afternoon. I think it worked well for balance and something I’ll consider again in future.

 

[Cedric]

Firstly, that's the cool thing about UK and the US. Major difference in timezone, yet the same language and mentality. Benefits of having staff in different timezones is able to have 24/7 coverage. Your forum can receive continuous support and moderation. Urgent issues can be addressed promptly, even during non-traditional business hours.

Now, there's indeed the challenge of communication. But honestly I share the same timezone as UK minus an hour (I think) and while Rachael is in the US, we often speak each other either at the early morning or late afternoon. Or when I stay up all night, then it's daytime for her. Just to give an example, it's not impossible to communicate directly, even with 7 or 8 hour in difference.

We usually communicate through Discord, which is imo the go to tool for communication in our case. It sends messages to our phone when we aren't on our desktop.

 

[SDL]

Firstly, that's the cool thing about UK and the US. Major difference in timezone, yet the same language and mentality. Benefits of having staff in different timezones is able to have 24/7 coverage. Your forum can receive continuous support and moderation. Urgent issues can be addressed promptly, even during non-traditional business hours.

Now, there's indeed the challenge of communication. But honestly I share the same timezone as UK minus an hour (I think) and while Rachael is in the US, we often speak each other either at the early morning or late afternoon. Or when I stay up all night, then it's daytime for her. Just to give an example, it's not impossible to communicate directly, even with 7 or 8 hour in difference.

We usually communicate through Discord, which is imo the go to tool for communication in our case. It sends messages to our phone when we aren't on our desktop.

Yeah for sure, I have friends in the USA and communication isn’t too bad as they wake up around lunch and when I stay up late, I know they’ll be up which is very beneficial. I guess it would be more difficult for Australians etc to communicate. Discord is a brilliant tool, idk where I’d be without it!

 

[Cedric]

Yeah for sure, I have friends in the USA and communication isn’t too bad as they wake up around lunch and when I stay up late, I know they’ll be up which is very beneficial. I guess it would be more difficult for Australians etc to communicate. Discord is a brilliant tool, idk where I’d be without it!

Yep, that's correct. They usually go to bed when we wake up, so there's a bigger difference, lol.

 

[kensonplays]

I'll definitely be doing something similar, once we have the need for more than the automated anti-spam/word filters we have in place (PG site). But we're low traffic at the moment so automated solutions cover most of the work. Though I do have the same admin & mod I have everywhere in my community. On-stream, Site, Discord, Guilded. Their roles sync to all.

 

[Shortie]

Whenever I hire staff for my forums, I try to hire people from different time zones so that I know staff are available at all times as much as possible to deal with issues and help members if they need any assistance.

At the moment I only have two admins but I myself am in the UK and my other admin is in the US so that helps.

 

[Reverie]

As someone who lives in the United States (CST) I liked having someone in the UK on the staff team in order to at least have one person on when some are asleep. I didn't always seek this out, but sometimes it just worked out that way! Communicating through messengers of some sort always helps and people can go back and read unread messages when they are available and can still be a part of a conversation if needed. I've had staff from other countries and it works when we are a bit spread out as well. Not so many staff members on the forum at one time also and that can be beneficial. I definitely would recommend to anyone to try to get 1 person who is definitely in a different country from you if possible.

 

[TimelessSailor]

Interesting concept! I never went out of my way to add staff from other time zones. I just promoted people who seemed to genuinely be good at the role I envisioned them for and who wanted to help. On one of my forums I had staff throughout the US & in India so having a staff meeting where everyone was present was really hard to organize.

 

[Ravenfreak]

Having staff in different timezones really does help a busy forum. You'll always have a staff member online to help members and keep the forum running smoothly.

 

[Paul]

Yup, has worked for 20 years. Got them in Australia, USA and UK, even one in the Netherlands. Have also had Canada and New Zealand in the past. Do get quite a fair bit of spam (usually people selling windows or stuff) so it's usually dealt with pretty quickly.

 

[Cory]

Having a staff member in a completely different timezone than you can be a good thing for an active community, I think. You have yourself online throughout the day and you have your different timezone staff member on throughout what would be your nighttime. I remember in the days of Zathyus Networks, most spam was posted at night when everyone was asleep and had to be taken care of when we woke up. Having your board active and moderated periodically can help it strive better, I think.

 

[John]

I mean it depends on your member base to whether or not it matters at all. Obviously, if you have a forum with primarily Australian members, having primarily US based staff members would make it almost impossible for your staff and members to communicate. If your forum members are all in one time zone, you should prioritize hiring staff from that time zone. Where it gets difficult is when you have members from every time zone - that’s when you’re forced to diversity your staff members.

 

[Empire]

It has its ups and downs, like if you hire people in another world then hard to able to keep in contact but helps out with the site though. That said from another topic we talked about how many staff we should hire based on the size of the site, so end up having one person running the show and as you are sleeping away your site may get traffic coming from other parts of the time zones. Just think about that if staff is needed and the owner is sleeping.

 

[Clarice]

I understand how some people on the forums aren't in the same time zones. This is just part of online life. I don't make a big deal about it.

 

[~ True Legend ~]

I think it's important because imagine, a bunch of spambots on your forum flooding your forums with a bunch of products no one cares about and possibly even scams. Sure, you could use manual approval, but even so, a member is bound to leave the forum if the management take too long to approve said member's account.

 

[Debashis]

If your forum really needs to be monitored while you are away it's a good idea to hire staff members from different time zones. Now a days English is practiced as a language by most countries so there shouldn't be a problem.

 

[JennyorAlice]

I've not personally done this but I can see that it would help.

The only hard thing would be discussing things with your staff when everyone is in different time zones.