The modern working world means that a team can rarely be sat in the same office. Even if you have one office that is designated as theirs, they could still prefer to work from home, or could find themselves on the road a lot depending on the nature of your work. If this is the case with your office, you need to make sure that you are doing what you can to keep the team as connected as possible. Here are some of the best tips out there for keeping a remote team connected.
Schedule Regular Meetings
Regular meetings will allow your team to come together to chat things over whenever they need to. Some see the value in holding daily catch-ups, others might prefer to only have a meeting once a week. However, you should try to do it on a semi-regular basis to the best of your abilities.
There are many small things that are just easier to catch up on vocally rather than send an email. A regular meeting using a video conferencing software gives you a chance to catch up with each other in a way that an email thread does not do. This is not just a matter of keeping up with each other in terms of workload and progress, but also for the mental health and wellbeing of your team and wider workforce.
Team Building
You need to make sure that you work together as a team across a variety of situations. Though you might get along fine when things are good, the true test can often come when you are faced with challenge. Going through a few team building activities can give you an indication as to how you will work together when you have a challenging moment to go through.
Don’t think that you won’t be able to engage with a little team building simply because you are all spread out. There are plenty of virtual team building ideas that you can use to bring together a team no matter how far apart they might be. It can be a fun way to unwind and get to know each other a bit better, even if you are based hundreds of miles apart.
Live Chats
Make sure that you have some sort of live chat going between all members of the team. This means that they will be able to instantly update everyone when something happens. It might be a better option than having to rely on emails, and having notifications sent to your phone or computer means you shouldn’t miss anything.
There are several options out there that companies could use. Tools like WhatsApp or Microsoft Teams can prove to be useful, or you might decide to use something attached to your project management tool of choice. Whatever you choose, make sure that all members of the team are signed up and ready to go. It could be a formal chat or it could be something a little more casual, allowing the sharing of jokes, memes and more. It all depends on the team and your wider work culture.
No matter where your workers are based, you need to make sure that you are as connected as possible. Make sure that you and your team are able to talk together and tackle anything that might come your way. Keeping such a team connected will be difficult and will require active participation from all corners, but you should be able to hopefully pull it off. Always try to keep your connections going, regardless of how far apart your team might be.