How do you ensure that your team stays connected at a distance?
These are, to say the least, crazy times. From one day to the next we had to work from home en masse. As a result, we are feeling differences both large and small: no more good morning greetings from colleagues, no more little chats at the coffee machine, no jokes from that one colleague and no shared enthusiasm and high fives when you’ve done something well. At any rate, we are all feeling that difference. But perhaps the question we are asking ourselves the most: how do you ensure that you connect your team at a distance? Quite right for you to ask yourself this. Since our events can’t provide this at the moment, we’re happy to give you some tips on staying connected:
The most important thing: don’t just keep hearing each other, but keep seeing each other. We are fortunate that there are many digital ways to do this. These include: GoToMeeting, Hangouts Meet, Zoom, etc. But don’t only talk about the day’s to-do’s or the corona crisis. Let the music lover in your team share a daily track, share great recipes with each other, collect fun anecdotes and don’t forget to fantasise about future plans!
Music creates a deep sense of connectedness. Always having the same playlist on repeat, that’s just boring! Therefore… create a team playlist (on Spotify for example) and add music with the whole team! Ideal for discovering new music while working, cleaning, cooking, doing the chores that we’ve been putting off for weeks, months or maybe years (Oops! You’re not alone there! ;-)). And, importantly: it doesn’t always have to be a musical discovery. Now and then, dare to slip in a nostalgic, funny song. Fun guaranteed! Bet your colleagues are secretly singing along!
Stay active and encourage each other. Try to cover as many kilometres as possible with your team! Get on your bike, put on your running shoes, go for a walk or get those inline skates out from the dust again. Every kilometre counts. Share the general score weekly and try to gothe ‘extra mile’ as a team! And submit a before and after photo every week as proof. Sure to create great memories for afterwards. Event Masters is also staying on the move with the Event Masters Trophy.
Is it a team member’s birthday? Don’t forget to put this person in the spotlight. Personalise the lyrics of a well-known song and let each team member sing it in a playful way. Put them all together and forward the surprise during your live meeting. Without a doubt, the best gift your colleague can receive during this lockdown: familiar and smiling faces, fun, and pure and simple happy birthday wishes! And best of all… It creates a whole lot of connectedness now, but it’s also a memory for life.
No better way to end the week! Everyone gets their favourite drink and clinks a virtual “cheers”! To keep the conversation flowing, make sure you set a small task a few days in advance that everyone who wants to take part has to do. Out of inspiration? Here are some tips… find your craziest/most original headgear and put it on, tell a good joke, make a funny video of max 15 seconds (à la TikTok), make the most beautiful cake or pie, etc!
Here at Event Masters we sincerely hope that these personal tips can contribute to maintaining and strengthening your connection as a team. Just like you, we’re also working on this on a daily basis and are looking forward to the future so that we can connect people in real life again soon. Then we can get back to doing what we love doing the most: providing you with a top event!
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