Team Building - How Do You Create a Strong Foundation and Build From There?
While the general idea of team building often stirs up collective groans, how else do you ensure your teams have a strong foundation? When team building is done right, it feels less like trust falls and more like fun!
In my former career as a teacher, team building conjured up sighs and so many trust-fall-esque activities. The real team building came from the personal interactions we created on our own - planning together, grabbing a beverage after work, and just finding ways to connect and actually like one another.
Now, after five years of working on fully remote teams, I’ve found that it’s much harder to develop that feeling of togetherness and ensure that my teams know and (hopefully) like one another! Along this journey, I’ve found a few methods that have built a sturdy foundation for the teams I’ve been on.
1. Regularly Scheduled Connections
Tweak your standups - As part of an engineering team, we scheduled 3x/week standups. Rather than reporting out our standups while on the call, we replied to a daily standup post in Slack. Then, on our calls, we spent some time connecting. On Mondays, we discussed our weekends and/or replied to a “Monday Mingle” question (think this or that, would you rather, etc.). On Wednesdays, we tried to share something useful that we recently purchased or acquired - work-related or not! Fridays were for a quick joke. These scheduled connection times led to deeper connections and just generally liking each other as humans.
Lunch and Learns - Even though we are spread across time zones, we gathered together once a month for a lunch and learn. Some months were more specific, learning opportunities, whereas others were a bring-your-own-hot-tips style. If possible, provide your team with a budget to order some brunch/lunch/coffee and spend some time together learning from one another! This is a great option for all types of teams.
2. Face-to-Face Time
Does your company do retreats? If not, I’d definitely recommend trying to have a company or team retreat (at least) annually. These times always brought my teams closer together. That feeling would often last for months and could carry me to the next retreat! My favorite retreats are well-balanced with more fun than work.
3. Virtual Games
⏱ Quick Connection - You don’t always need a long meeting to work in intentional team-building! Virtual and hybrid teams can connect in 5 minutes or less with these 20 activities: https://www.atlassian.com/blog/teamwork/5-minute-team-building-activities-for-virtual-teams
The Emoji Mood Board is a great way to check in with your team and can be used on all team calls to kick off! I also love a good Show and Tell or Messy Desk Photo Share - it’s always a good reason for me to do some tidying of my space.
🔗Longer Link-Up - I love our Lunch and Learns for spending a longer chunk of time together - learning and connecting. If possible, schedule a time for intentional togetherness at regular intervals - monthly or quarterly - and invite your team to strut their stuff and teach the team what they know. Some months, it’s great to ditch the teaching aspect and enjoy an online game such as JackBox (paid) or CodeNames (free!).
🤝Get to Know You - These 7 games are fantastic for building a more cohesive team and especially great when adding new team members or bringing together teams who don’t know each other as well! https://www.atlassian.com/blog/teamwork/icebreaker-games-authentic-connections
My favorites include Three Things (perfect for warming up before a brainstorming session) and 10 Things in Common!
Need a few more ideas? Check out this compilation - https://www.atlassian.com/blog/teamwork/virtual-team-building-activities-remote-teams
💬 I’d love to hear your thoughts on strengthening your virtual and/or hybrid teams below! 💪
Here's a few questions to get you thinking:
What strategies have you found most effective in getting your remote or hybrid teams to engage with one another?
Have you ever tried any less conventional or quirky team-building activities that turned out to be surprisingly AMAZING?
What's the hardest part about creating a remote team that feels like a family, and how do you make it work anyway?
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