Four ways to Stay Connected to your Remote Team
Remote work is all the buzz for big to small businesses in 2021, and if you’re here you know all too well the joys and challenges this “new normal” has unearthed.
Women are known for leading with empathy and being good at relationship-building and connections, but our usual methods may be disrupted when transferred to the impersonality of instant messaging and long video conferences.
The irony of our digital age is that the more time you spend plugged-in, the more you can feel disconnected, and this likely goes for your employees and/or colleagues too.
So take some time to foster some connections within your team, by thinking outside of the chat-box.
Ditch the Keyboard
If you work at a computer, chances are you spend a lot of your time typing.
Make connecting with your team less of a chore-associated-with-work by mixing it up with different types of interactions.
You can use tools like Teams, Slack and Discord to chat on voice, while working and typing away on a project together, so you can ask each other questions in real-time without the formal process of email pleasantries and even laugh, chat and listen to music together.
Screen-sharing (and saving the recordings) is one of the most effective ways to onboard and train teams on new tools and workflows, rather than explaining via email or lengthy instant messages.
Making video calling mandatory can make interaction less impersonal than a voice or typed chat. You can also notice all the body language, facial expressions, that make communication easier and limit misunderstandings. Even video calling when people are working and not talking can be useful as the sound of hearing someone typing away next to you can provide a welcome boost to productivity and morale.
You can even reward your teams with physical exchanges like hand-written cards, equipment and momentos. Although everyone can see each other on a video call, receiving actual physical things can be very refreshing and rewarding, especially for tactile team members.
Try it as a Team
If Zoom fatigue is kicking in, you are not alone. For many, working remotely has lasted a lot longer than expected, and it’s natural for productivity and drive to wane in times such as these, even for seasoned remote-workers. Especially with the rise of doomscrolling, a term that has shot to popularity since the pandemic, describing the tendency to excessively scroll through bad news (especially around coronavirus or politics) despite the negative feelings it brings about.
Try out productivity methods with friends/colleagues/teams (like Kaban, Pomodoro & Eat the Frog) – and then discuss your experiences during and after the process. Learn from it, and see what is effective for different people. It may vary between them, and this could help you adapt communications as you get more insight into the most effective learning styles for those individuals too, while offering support, accountability, compliance and morale.
It also illustrates compassion as a leader. Take steps to show you’re invested in your team being happy and healthy in their working process. Show you recognize remote-work during a pandemic is a challenge but a shared one, that you can work together to overcome.
Virtual Vacations
No, not a video-meeting party you have to dread dressing up for, and spend ever-increasing time planning and organising.
From livestreamed Yoga to digital drawing classes and cookalong workshops, you can team-build whilst giving yourself a break by outsourcing to another digital expert (and a lot of women own and run these types of businesses too - 72% of yoga practitioners are female!)
Splash an (affordable) pot of cash on thanking your team during these times where many are feeling their connections are fraying, whilst supporting another woman-owned business.
Celebrate (sm)all Wins
Lack of visibility for work done well is a real danger when we’re not sharing a physical space. It’s easy to miss extra hours that have been put in; from carefully crafting emails with a difficult client to that all-too-familiar unexpected technology battle, waged in order to complete a seemingly simple task, like uploading a video that’s in the wrong format!
Encourage your team to mention 3 things they’re grateful for overcoming that week. It’s been shown, doing this regularly can increase positivity overall, in and out of the workplace.
Schedule it into meetings. Ensure it’s not only ‘big business achievements’ but the little challenges overcome that are celebrated too. Giving every small win maximum clout, minimizes the effect of the inevitable odd disappointment, and offers a safe space to speak about issues when they arise.
Final Thoughts
Remote Work has opened many doors for female entrepreneurs, leaders and business-owners, especially those looking for a more flexible workforce. But those doors open both ways, and you need to ensure you’re fostering a culture that your team wants to stay a part of.
Increasing cohesion and a sense of community means that whether we return to the office or not, we’ll be in a better place than where we started.
Written for Empowering a Billion Women, March 9 2021
