It’s been an odd couple of weeks. How many of you suddenly found yourselves creating make shift office spaces on dining room tables and in spare rooms? Many of you may suddenly be realising that you usually spend more time with your co-workers than with your family and are probably missing the day to day banter of being amongst them. For employers it’s really important to keep team spirits up. At some point the lockdown will end and it’s important to keep your team feeling that they are working together as a unit, even though they are all in separate buildings.
In previous blogs we’ve discussed how to manage remote and flexible workers in order to maintain productivity, but it’s also vital that they have an opportunity to have downtime with the rest of their team. As a result, the Dakota Blue team put their virtual heads together to come up with some ideas for keeping staff spirits up when you can’t see them face to face.
Don’t just use Zoom, Skype or MS Teams for business
Hopefully you’ve all embraced the power of Zoom or other tech platforms for team meetings, it’s a really great way of keeping everyone up to date and checking in, but it’s also worth considering setting up conference calling for other reasons. Workplaces are more than just a space where people complete tasks, they are also places where there are coffee machine and lunchtime chats, where people arrive at the same time and have a natter as they walk in, and where people bring in donuts for their birthdays.
Setting up a tea break or lunchtime conference call can provide the opportunity for those chats to carry on, even if it is just so your team can discuss whether Carole Baskin did feed her husband to tigers.
Encourage your team to do online workouts
Joe Wicks has designed a YouTube channel for children to replace PE lessons and there are also loads of programmes out there for adults. Encouraging your team to keep fit can not only keep them healthy and fit, but can also help with mental health. You could even consider setting up a virtual keep fit challenge which you could even carry on once the lockdown has finished.
Start an online quiz
Again, this is about the social aspect of your workplace. If your team used to regularly meet up out of work hours to socialise it’s really important to try to keep that going. An online quiz provides a competitive edge and gives them the opportunity to socialise and let their hair down. Virtual Pub Quiz runs on YouTube and has nearly 90,000 subscribers.
Offer a listening ear
Most importantly, check in with you team using one to one calls and video chats. This is really important and gives them the opportunity to not only feel valued but to also let you know how they are doing. None of us truly knows what our team members’ home lives are like and it could be that they are having real troubles.
Having a list of places that might be able to help them, could also really make a difference.
A small gift
As a final thought with Easter approaching fast, if your employees are working hard and you have a little spare cash available, you may consider sending them a small token of appreciation in the form of an e-gift card. There are many online shops that provide e-gift cards and it could be for something practical, like a voucher for a major food outlet, or something that allows your employees to treat themselves either now or in the future to something a bit more special (like a meal, some flowers or chocolate). And if you have time to make it personal to all staff members, even better.
If you’ve created any other initiatives to keep team morale up, the team at Dakota Blue would love to hear them. Share them with us here.