A typical employee is always surrounded by his/her colleagues in the office for an average of 8 hours per day and 5 days a week. This direct contact and face-to-face interaction create a sense of belongingness towards each other with the development of a family-like feel in the office.
But the same feeling may or may not be available in remote work setup as employees are not connected physically and that close bond may not be there between team members. Employees may feel disconnected and a lack of belongingness towards the company will hamper their productivity and focus while working.
Thus, it becomes important for HR managers to conduct and adopt some of the best remote team-building activities such that all the employees working in a remote or hybrid setup feel connected and can develop close bonds with the team members as well as with the organisation.
Why is remote team building important?
Nowadays most corporates prefer remote setup or coworking hybrid setup as it results in lower fixed costs on infra and other amenities. Thus, the importance of remote team building increases as those who work from home are in high need of dopamine shots for team bonding and relationships.
Following are some of the prominent benefits of remote team building:
- The quote is rightly said, “The stronger your team is, the better your work is”. A strong team always provides a strong support system to all of its members as well as the managers. The principle of esprit de corps is well established in a team having immense trust among the members, thus, leading to higher productivity.
- If an employee is working from home and just typing on the keyboard while looking at the screen with no colleague sitting on the side, there is a high chance that he/she may feel bored or exhausted after a certain period. Conducting remote team building activities acts as a medium of escape and refreshment for employees.
- A team can function well if all the members are aware of each other’s strengths, weaknesses and interests. It becomes much easier to divide the tasks among the members depending on their skills.
- Team bonding activities also shaped a strong team culture attracting the interest of employees in the industry. Values like teamwork, employee wellbeing and effective collaboration are highly important for any company.
Top 9 virtual team building activities
Now, as you know the benefits and importance of conducting team-building activities, the question arises “What activities should you conduct?”. Though the type of activity conducted depends upon the creativity of the manager and several other factors, it should be undertaken keeping in mind the degree to which it will impact the team interaction.
Following are some of the best and simplest activities that are usually conducted by most corporates and have resulted in the development of close team bonding:
Chill out in a virtual break-out room
Remote teams often miss out on random conversations that take place in an office environment, like ranting about the boss in the cafeteria, roaming in the corridor during free hours, and gossiping with other teams during lunch breaks. However, it is possible to facilitate these interactions in a remote workplace setup.
One effective approach is to use a virtual breakout room offered by many platforms like Zoom and MS Teams, similar to where team members meet during lunch or tea breaks and share their day experience or anything random they want to share to escape the work tension and freshen up.
Hold virtual meetings/chit-chat sessions
Just like offline meetings and conferences, virtual meetings can be organised creating a similar sort of environment. If you treat these meetings just like physical events, complete with schedules, hosts, speakers, and question sessions, it will surely render a feeling of official setup.
The only difference in this virtual meeting setup is of connection through internet audio and video. The effectiveness can be maximised if everyone takes an active part in these meetings with their video turned on and frequent inputs from everyone, whenever needed.
Start a ‘good news’ conversation
Another tried and tested way is to establish a “good news” channel where everyone can share their feeling, emotions, and happiness about anything and everything with whoever they want to. Sharing feelings and emotions sparks a feeling of belongingness between employees.
Whether it’s a personal gesture, a touchy moment, or just a mood boost, it will develop a feeling of camaraderie among team members facilitating effective team coordination.
Reward and recognise good performance
Embed a culture of recognition in teams working remotely by implementing a rewards and recognition mechanism. It can be done by highlighting the names of employees in meetings, sending gift cards like Amazon gift cards, setting up an “employee of the week” system, etc.
Witnessing and celebrating each other’s hard work, regardless of physical distance, creates a sense of unity within the team and motivates all to work hard to be rewarded and recognised for their exceptional performance.
Set friendly challenges
Team bonding and group interaction can be encouraged through friendly competition by introducing team challenges. You can consider implementing a fitness challenge, mystery challenge, puzzle challenge or simple games challenge like chess, which not only adds some fun competition but also helps with reducing work pressure.
Setting up these team challenges and internal team goals encourages cooperation and teamwork, increasing the sense of unity and bonding among distant team members.
Introduce the ‘Learn to do’ lesson
Nowadays many firms focus on enhancing the overall knowledge of their employees facilitating holistic development. Activities like skill development masterclasses, general group discussions, debate/speech sessions or new skills development classes can be conducted to keep employees engaged.
Bonding through “photograph sharing activity”
Using a simple but effective ‘daily snapshot’ concept encourages team members to share snapshots of everyday moments like nature, coffee making, glowing sunrise, funky activities, outings or anything else. This will create opportunities for informal discussion and strengthen team relationships.
It is not mandatory for everyone to share it, but active participation would ensure close informal bonding between the members.
Virtual workout sessions
Engaging in physical activity while working from home might be a challenge for many employees. A recent trending activity is organising virtual workout sessions where an online trainer takes weekly sessions to enhance the fitness and well-being of employees.
Employees can be asked to follow the activities/movements done by the trainer during the session and repeat it everyday morning before starting their work. It will ensure high attention and an active mind throughout the day.
Virtual book club reading
Those who are fond of reading books in different genres like life stories, sci-fi, novels, self-help, finance, etc. will be amazed by this activity. Organising a frequent reading session, weekly or monthly, will ensure that employees are not only focusing on developing technical skills but also expanding their knowledge base.
Reading books together in a virtual setup would ensure that team members are sharing their opinion about a particular chapter/section of the book and would enhance sharing of opining among the employees.
Conclusion
Building remote teams in coworking spaces is a proactive way to build strong collaborative teams. Strategies such as using ‘everyday photography’ for informal communication, exploring common interests through meetings, incorporating fitness activities, and scientific discussions are developed throughout spontaneous book clubs to help build a cohesive and engaged remote team.
The adoption of these practices not only enhances employee relations but also reinforces a sense of cohesion and camaraderie among team members, making up for physical differences in a virtual workplace greater than. You can also set up your coworking physical workspace by looking for office space for rent in Noida.
As coworking environments continue to evolve, prioritising intentional team-building efforts becomes essential for sustaining a positive and thriving remote work culture.