Why “remote team” term is confusing

If you google “remote team” you’ll find many articles with contradicting explanations…
I wonder what remote team actually means
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If you google “remote team” you’ll find many articles explaining the term. Some of these articles explain that a remote team has a physical office, others explain that it doesn’t, some articles explain that it may have an office.

Such differences in explanations mean the term is not self-explanatory.

Hearing the phrase “remote team” for the first time, I would have thought that we are talking about the team that works together in the remote office.

You have to research to learn what Remote Team means. And, as I mentioned before, explanations around the web are different and complex. That’s why you have to research. Making one Google query is not enough.

When researching you’ll immediately run into terms like Distributed Team, Dispersed Team, Virtual Team, etc.

It is like going into the forest. The deeper you go, the more you surrounded by trees. The deeper you research, the more different terms you have to study.

I think it is much easier to say “team of remote workers” instead. It is clear and doesn’t need explanation or research.

I assume, one of the reasons the remote work community introduced the term “remote team” because “team of remote workers” sounds too long.

Because of everything I mentioned above, I decided not to use “remote team” on this website but use “team of remote workers” instead.

It sounds long, but it is much easier to understand for people who are not familiar with complex remote work jargon.


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Author: Oleg Galkin

Founder of VideoWorkLink. Software engineer and entrepreneur with 12 years of experience.

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