Navigating the “New Normal” Part 3: Building Culture in A Virtual World

As leaders, we all recognize the importance of our organization’s culture. Having a strong, positive culture means better performance and increased job satisfaction. But culture building in a remote work environment can be a challenge, and it doesn’t happen by accident.

When your teams aren’t meeting in-person, and nothing is business as usual, how do you build and promote the culture you want?

When it comes to remote workplace culture, there are three things to consider implementing now:  

Create and define your mission, vision, and values.

Especially in a virtual workplace, it is easy for undefined or poorly articulated core principles to get lost. Ensure your mission, vision, and values are clearly defined in a way that truly reflects who you are, where you’re headed, and how you operate. As a leader, it’s your job to make sure everyone on your team is on the same page, and that means spelling out for them how they can contribute to a cohesive culture. To that end, the best mission, vision, and values statements can help define expectations and provide guideposts for virtual teams in a way that no amount of training and operating procedures can replace. In short, if you haven’t revisited your strategic direction in a while, it’s worth it to invest some time in this now!

Create a virtual gathering place.  

In the “real world”, organic communication happens frequently between coworkers. They see each other in the lunch room, or pop by each others’ offices for little touch points throughout the day. They’re built in, so no one has to think about it! These little moments of connection might seem like a small thing, but they’re an important element in building significance and team bonds. In a virtual setting, these natural connection points need to have a bit more intention behind them. Create a virtual way for team members to connect regularly. This can be as simple as a designated slack channel, or a weekly standing video conference happy hour date for the whole team. Send out weekly touch base polls to vote on non work-related topics, to get people chuckling and chatting virtually about something other than KPIs (Think voting on favourite superheroes, best breakfast pastry, etc.).

Double up on recognition.

Especially in a remote environment, it is easy for employee recognition to fall off the agenda. But with team members geographically dispersed, it’s even more important to prioritize. Consider implementing a weekly fun award with a different category each week, where employees nominate people to be recipients of prestigious awards such as “Most Creative Video Conference Location”. Hit an important project milestone? Bring the celebration to team members by sending baked goods or other treats to their houses. The most important thing to remember is consistency: build reminders to recognize staff into your calendar so it happens regularly!

As we all get into the rhythm of working remotely, how are you building or maintaining the culture you want? We would love to hear your ideas and share some more of ours, so reach out to connect!