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- time zones aren't the problem.
time zones aren't the problem.
three models that actually work for distributed teams and how to pick the right one
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👋 Welcome back to All Things Remote: weekly tips for building a better remote team.
Most remote teams treat time zones like a problem to be solved. They will find hours that overlap, put everyone in them, and call it a schedule.
Some start at 6 am, some others will finish at 11pm.
The team has technically solved the time zone problem, while quietly burning people out in the process. Here's the thing: time zones aren't the problem; it’s how your team manages them.
In today's send:
✅ The three models that actually work for distributed teams
✅ Why core hours alone aren't enough
✅ How to pick the right approach for where your team actually sits
I'd love to know 👇️
How does your remote team handle time zones? |
Top reads this week:
Why core hours for remote teams are growing faster than most leaders realise
How to build an async communication playbook that actually gets used
The real trade-offs of time zone overlap vs opposite time zones for teams
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The issue isn't that your team is spread across time zones.
It's that most teams haven't actually decided how they want to work across them.
They assume everyone will figure it out. And then, slowly, people start burning out trying to be available everywhere at once.
Time zone collaboration is now the second biggest challenge for distributed teams, which is a primary driver of project delays, disengagement, and people quietly looking for other jobs.
But the teams that struggle most aren't always the ones with the widest spread.
They're the ones that haven't picked a model.
Three models that work 👇️
Model 1: Core hours
You agree on a 2-4 hour window where everyone is online at the same time.
Outside of that, people work when it works for them.
59% of remote organisations now have defined core hours. Teams that do this report 23% higher engagement than those without any structured overlap window.
The sweet spot tends to be somewhere like 10am-2pm in your anchor time zone, then adjusted depending on where most of your team is based.
Good for: teams that need regular real-time collaboration, client-facing work, fast decision-making.
Watch out for: someone always gets the bad end of the deal.
If your core hours are 9am ET, that's 2pm in London and 10pm in Singapore.
Know where your people are before you set the window.
Model 2: Async first
Your default comms will become written, but with that, Slack slows down; replies should be expected within hours, not minutes.
Meetings are reserved for things that genuinely need a room: big decisions, sensitive conversations, creative kick-offs.
Teams that go async-first report 20–40% gains in focus time.
What makes it work: documentation.
Everything important needs to be written down with enough context that someone 8 hours behind can pick it up without sending a follow-up Slack message to find out what's going on.
Good for: teams spread across 4+ time zones, deep technical or creative work, teams that have become meeting-heavy without meaning to.