How To Build a Strong Company Culture as a Team Who Hardly Meets Face-to-Face
+Remote work is a working style that hit the spotlight during the COVID-19 pandemic, coming as an adaptive business response. However, it is not something that did not exist before the pandemic. Millions of people were doing it. Here are some statistics that reflect the same:
In the U.S., remote work had risen by 159% from 2005 until 2018.
At the beginning of 2020, the number of remote workers was 4.7 million, making up 3.4% of the world’s population.
Although remote work was constantly growing, this novel working-style did not come without its challenges, and when it comes to business culture, these challenges become a significant hindrance in your growth.
I work for the remote-first tech startup Process Street. I’ve never met my colleagues, yet we’ve managed to build a positive and productive company culture remotely. And in this article, I’ll explain how.
You’ll learn the importance of business culture and how this can be degraded from common remote-work challenges, before learning simple, actionable solutions to build a happy, healthy, and productive team.
Sound good? Let’s jump straight to it.
The Importance Of Business Culture
Corporate culture refers to the beliefs and behaviors that determine how a company’s employees and management interact.
A positive culture involves trust and respect, giving employees an opportunity to grow within their roles.
Culture is not something you can buy. It’s not something you can invest in and then forget about. Creating the best business culture requires constant attention and investment for happy employees and business success.
According to a recent article published in Forbes, the benefits of a strong company culture include:
- Identity: Corporate culture contributes to the values and identity of a given organization, providing direction for employees.
- Retention: A positive company culture will not only attract better talent, but employees will more likely stick around for the long-term.
- Brand Image: If you treat your employees well and have a fun-loving, supportive atmosphere, your customers will associate the same degree of positivity with your brand.
The COVID-19 pandemic has driven workplace changes that could degrade an organization’s culture through the enforcement of remote work. But this doesn’t have to be the case. It’s possible to maintain — or even improve — your organization’s culture remotely, with the same level of investment. All you need to do is target this investment to remove common remote-work challenges.
The Challenges And Benefits That Come With Remote Work
According to Buffer’s State of Remote Work Report (2020), common remote work challenges include unplugging from work (22%), loneliness (19%), collaboration and/or communication issues (17%), and staying motivated (7%).
This isn’t a recipe for a new and improved corporate culture, is it?
Yet, despite the challenges, many of today’s top companies offer full, half, or partial remote work contracts — including Appen, Dell, and Salesforce (with the COVID-19 pandemic accelerating this trend).
Why?
Because done correctly, remote work gives benefits such as a strengthened work-life balance, better employee well-being, increased productivity, and reduced business costs.
What you want is to obtain the benefits that come from remote work, without compromising your organization’s culture. And for that, you need to target remote work issues head-on.
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4 Tips On How To Build A Strong Business Culture Remotely
Company culture refers to the values, goals, practices, and attitudes characteristic of an organization.
Many startup investors state that building a strong company culture is one of the top things founders should concentrate on — especially for remote-based work, as shall be explained.
Remote Work Challenge #1, Unplugging From Work
The #1 remote-work challenge comes down to establishing a healthy work-life balance.
According to a recent survey, 76% of respondents stated stressed work life negatively impacts their relationships. Once more, 66% of respondents said to have lost sleep due to overwhelming responsibilities and an inability to unplug.
I find these statistics shocking. But then, considering that 85.8% of males and 66.5% of females work more than 40 hours per week in the U.S., should I really have been surprised?
This long-hour culture is primitive, and breeds work anxiety, stress, and an unhappy, unhealthy team. It also doesn’t do business any favors. For instance, a 2014 study found that productivity substantially decreases when individuals work over 50 hours per week, and there is a general consensus among scientists that the ideal working day is 6 hours.
With remote employees finding it difficult to unplug, this working style could incubate unhealthy working hours and expectations.
The Solution
You want to establish a culture that prides a healthy work-life balance, and below are top tips on how you can do that remotely:
- Start meetings with general chit-chat: Begin your meetings by asking the team questions such as what did you do over the weekend? Or what are your plans for this evening? These questions emphasize the importance of relaxing, unplugging, and having fun outside working hours.
- Create informal chat groups: Use an instant messenger application such as Slack and create separate group chats. In these chats, encourage your team members to talk about their passion projects, out of work hobbies, and general interests. This will encourage employees to not neglect other aspects of their life for work.
- Be realistic and trust your team: A healthy work-life balance cannot be established if you’re not realistic about what work can be done in a given time-frame. Create an environment where teams feel comfortable relaying how long a given project has taken them and adjust work schedules in accordance. This ultimately comes down to trusting your employees — they are adults, treat them as such.
Remote Work Challenge #2, Loneliness
Humans are social animals. Our biological and psychological systems evolved to thrive in groups. It, therefore, comes as no surprise that isolation brings negative effects such as artery erosion, high blood pressures, and undermined learning and memory.
Loneliness is defined as sadness due to a lack of friends or company. Loneliness negatively impacts productivity through increased presenteeism and the opposite, absenteeism. Loneliness can also limit innovation, and lower employee wellbeing.
The Solution
So how can you combat remote work loneliness? By establishing a company culture that’s friendly, welcoming, and supportive.
- Arrange company meetups: Arrange company meetups for better workplace relationships.
- Reach out to team members regularly: Message team members privately, or spend time at the end of conference calls to ask members how they’re doing.
- Establish a healthy work-life balance: Use the tips presented above to establish a healthy work-life balance, helping employees find the time to partake in social activities outside of work, and be with family and friends.
Remote Work Challenge #3, Collaborating And/Or Communication Issues
A report by the European Agency for Safety and Health stated that poor communication and support is a significant hazard to employee stress.
Working remotely can compound these issues, with communication limited to digital forms such as email, instant messenger, and video calls.
To combat collaboration and communication issues that come with remote work, you’ll want to establish a workplace culture that champions effective communication.
The Solution
Effective employee communication means information is conveyed in a manner that minimizes confusion, error, and maximizes productivity. Below are tips on how to instill effective communication as part of your remote company culture:
- Make effective communication part of your company’s value: At Process Street, we instill effective communication as a company value — over-communicate everything twice. By abiding by this value, our team is aware of the communication issues that can come with remote work, and proactively work to mitigate this — via over-communicating everything. Twice.
- Learn how to communicate asynchronously: Asynchronous communication is when you’ll send a message and don’t expect an immediate response. This type of communication is common in remote work, especially in teams spread across different time zones. To communicate effectively asynchronously, you’ll want to: Convey enough information and avoid follow-up questions; provide a deadline; add relevant supporting information, and be clear about your needs.
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Remote Work Challenge #4, Staying Motivated
Working away from the office can pose challenges for teams to stay motivated and refrain from distraction. Let’s face it, pajamas and a comfortable sofa seat just doesn’t provide the same type of motivation as you get from a suit and an office chair.
One key cultural trait to help employees stay motivated is to provide meaning to their work.
For instance, a 2013 study asked 2500 workers to analyze medical images for objects of interest. One group was told the work would be discarded. The other group was told that the objects of interest were cancerous tumors — this gave the work meaning.
The workers were paid per image analyzed. The meaning group spent more time on each image, and earned 10% less than the other, discard group — but the work quality was higher.
As a content writer, a lot of my work focuses on employee wellbeing and business sustainability. These are topics that align with my values and interests and are what I want to write about. This gives meaning to my tasks as my tasks mean something to me. I’m motivated to work.
The Solution
Here’s advice for how you can create a company culture that promotes meaningful work:
- Align tasks with employee ambitions: Ask your team what they want to achieve in their career, and draw up a plan to help them reach their goals. This gives personal meaning to the work distributed.
- Set a reward system: Don’t let hard work slip under the radar. Acknowledge and reward achievements in the workplace. For instance, at Process Street, we have a weekly meeting where employees are given kudos for good work, highlighting on a team-level that effort is appreciated.
With An Extra Push, You Can Create A Better Company Culture From Afar
Using the tips given in this article, you’ll be able to address common remote work pitfalls that could otherwise squeeze your company’s culture dry.
Remote work has the potential to offer many benefits, as long as the challenges are acknowledged and dealt with appropriately.
Take it from a team that’s been working remotely since the start. When done right, remote work provides the freedom everyone craves.
About the Author:
I’m a Content Writer at Process Street. While earning my degree in Biology at Imperial College London, I developed an enthusiasm for science communication. I continued my studies at Imperial College’s Business School; and with this, began looking at how Biology can be used to solve business issues, such as employee wellbeing and business sustainability.
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