Build a Virtual Culture On Your Team

3 Min

Make your culture inclusive. Consider your remote employees when expanding company culture.

How do you extend a team culture to remote workers?
Here are four solutions you can adopt:

1. Use chat tools

A huge part of team culture is the relationships people form in the office. Those informal lunch and water cooler conversations are one of the biggest ways employees learn to collaborate with and trust each other.

So for remote teams, use chat tools that will help your people interact informally and build strong relationships.

You can create discussion groups centered around interests or hobbies so people can chat casually about non-work items (during their breaks, of course).

2. Get virtual coffees

Just because you’re not in the same location doesn’t mean you can’t get coffees together. Schedule coffee breaks with remote workers, where you both get coffees, then chat while sipping them in different locations. It’s a small gesture that helps create a more friendly environment.

3. Recognize people publicly and asynchronously

When everyone is together in the same space it can seem more natural to recognize someone publicly. One way to instill a virtual team culture is by continuing that tendency in a remote setting.

When you notice people doing something well, recognize their contributions publicly by sending an email or chat that everyone on the team can see. It helps create a positive environment, and encourages a culture where strengths are celebrated by everyone.

4. Schedule extra-curricular time

If it’s possible, schedule some time for your whole team to get together and interact for a virtual hangout session. Whether it’s for a meal, a team-bonding exercise, or just some time to reflect as a group, nothing beats the occasional non-work interactions when it comes to building team culture.

It’s worth the investment to take time out of busy schedules to create a unified team.

Time for a quiz

Mark regularly sends emails to his team commending individuals for jobs well done, and pointing out specific things done well. Why is this an effective way of building culture?

Quiz 1 of 1

Why is are Mark's emails an effective way of building culture?

a
They create a positive culture where strengths are celebrated.
b
They gloss over any mistakes and encourage people to focus only on positives.
c
They make people like each other more because they know they're all good at their jobs.
d
They lead to people asking each other to catch up over coffees.

Answer: A. They create a positive culture where strengths are celebrated.

Mark’s emails highlight accomplishments and can encourage everyone on the team to not only perform their best, but to call out excellence whenever they see it.

Take the next step:

Schedule a virtual team bonding exercise with your direct reports. Find an activity that’s relevant to your team’s strengths and schedule time during work hours to perform it together as a group.

Build a Virtual Culture On Your Team
Video Transcript

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