4 ways to engage global remote teams

At the beginning of 2025, almost half of all jobs allowed some amount of remote work. This means teams operate not just across screens, but across time zones—creating challenges around real-time learning and building genuine connection between team members who never share the same "now."

Traditional training—which is often conducted live by an instructor—can diminish:

• Engagement and attendance: Live sessions may force remote employees into late-night or early-morning training when they're not at their best, reducing engagement or causing them to skip entirely.
• Connection: Traditional training often fails to foster team problem-solving and collaboration, contributing to feelings of disconnection that remote workers already experience. 
• Knowledge gain: Poor engagement and connection undermine content retention and can contribute to the forgetting curve.

Strategy 1: Design for async-first learning

Asynchronous learning is foundational for time zone-flexible team engagement. To accomplish this, L&D leaders should:

• Build experiences that work independently: Remote employees need the right materials and equipment to succeed. For L&D leaders, this means providing self-paced modules, autonomous progress tracking, and personalized learning paths that enable employees to take ownership of their learning.
• Create connection points that span time: Asynchronous communication has a positive impact on productivity. Foster this by creating dedicated learning discussion threads, virtual study groups that meet across different time slots, and peer mentoring programs that connect employees regardless of location.
• Make it feel live when it's not: Use cohort-based learning and “launch” groups together even if they're learning at different times. Additionally, partner with a content aggregator that consistently releases new content, ensuring employees never have to work through outdated material.

Strategy 2: Leverage the "follow-the-sun" model

The "follow the sun" model—traditionally used in global customer service and IT—offers a powerful approach for L&D leaders looking to create continuous, flexible learning experiences around the clock:

• Turn time zones into advantages: Pair early and late shift workers for mentorship or global project handoffs, enriching collaboration through regional diversity.
• Offer real-time, regional support: Stagger L&D staff or learning ambassadors so employees always have access to help during their working hours.
• Create problem-solving chains: Kick off a challenge in one region and let teams in other time zones build on it, creating continuous progress around the globe.

Strategy 3: Create micro-moments of connection

While remote interaction may never replace face-to-face connection, global teams foster camaraderie with:

• Small touchpoints with big impact: Share short videos, pop-in virtual spaces, or quick shoutouts that people can engage with on their own time.
• Ritual-building across distance: Celebrate wins, start learning prompts, or use shared Slack channels to foster weekly rituals.
• Open office hours: Host casual Q&A or mentoring blocks at rotating times to give everyone a chance to connect.

Strategy 4: Build inclusive learning cultures

Whether a team is remote or not, inclusivity remains essential. Create true learning equity by:

• Considering culture: Provide content in multiple languages and formats and be sure the content includes examples and case studies from different markets and regions.
• Creating psychological safety across distance: Provide multiple ways to engage—chat, audio, video—and encourage curiosity and questions without judgment.
• Giving employees choice: Partner with a content aggregator that offers personalized learning paths tailored to each employee's specific learning needs, preferences, goals, and roles.

Remote learning across time zones isn't about finding compromise solutions that work "well enough" for everyone. It's about designing experiences that are genuinely better than what co-located teams can achieve.