Boosting The Morale of Your Virtual Team
More people are working virtually than ever before. Virtual work has so many benefits, like the ability to take your work anywhere, no commute, lower overhead costs, and more. But just like any other team, virtual teams still need a morale boost every now and then. As a team of fully remote teammates and Executive Assistants, we have years of experience in remote work and connecting a virtual community. Here are some of our top tips for boosting the morale of your virtual team!
Get Social
Socializing and connecting with work colleagues is a great way to lift your spirits. In the days of endless Zoom calls, meeting agendas, and deadlines, carving out the time to take off your work hat can seem impossible. But by putting the work aside for an hour and getting to know your teammates in a more casual environment, you’re sure to feel a little lighter, and a little more human too.
One way our virtual Executive Assistant team likes to engage with each other in a casual environment is an online social hour. These casual events can be hosted on Zoom, Google Hangouts, or a similar platform and allow teammates to drop in and out as their schedule allows. Bonus points if you make them family-friendly so colleagues who are also managing childcare are able to attend.
Have a loose theme for your social time, like movies or favorite books, so you can steer conversations instead of making aimless small talk. We’ve seen success by encouraging everyone to wear something fun—like a crazy hat or their favorite concert t-shirt—to drum up conversation and story-telling. These tips for organizing a remote holiday celebration can easily apply to online social hours as well.
It’s always fun to tie games into online social hours too! It’s easy to transform traditional party games, like Pictionary or Charades, into virtual versions with the video and whiteboard tools that Zoom offers. There are also many resources online that may introduce you to new games, like Codenames or Read My Lips.
Another great way to add some variety and fun to online socializing is by incorporating virtual courses and activities. These activities add a little spice to your team’s workday and also provide an opportunity to learn a new skill or explore something new. Virtual cooking classes or online mixology courses are really fun “after-hours” activities for teams. Many online mixology courses allow you to purchase a pass for each participating device and even mail a kit to participants so everyone has everything they need to participate. Many museums are even offering virtual tours that your team can participate in together.
No matter which activity you choose, we recommend setting a start and end time for the event—an hour or so is a good duration—so attendees don’t feel tied down to their computers for hours on end and can still go about the rest of their day. And when possible, making the event a “drop-in” so people can come and go as they please makes it very welcoming and accommodating to a variety of schedules.
Encourage Sharing about Non-Work Activities
It’s sometimes easy for a virtual team to stay behind the screen, losing sight of the things that make them unique outside of work. To combat this, we recommend prioritizing ways that your team can share about non-work activities, such as hobbies, families, weekend plans, and travel.
Many virtual teams have an online platform, like Slack or Microsoft Teams, where they can instantly message each other. Consider using these mediums to prompt your team members to share more about themselves and learn about their co-workers. By setting a theme or topic and giving team members set days to share, everyone has an opportunity to contribute and learn from each other!
You can also add icebreaker activities to already existing meetings to add a little spice to the day and give employees a chance to share, laugh, and connect with each other. One icebreaker we love is to have one employee gather little-known facts from each meeting participant ahead of time and then sharing a few facts at the start of the meeting. Then have attendees guess who the fact belongs to. You’ll learn something new about your teammates and warm up a little bit before diving headfirst into work. This blog has a wealth of ideas for other engaging icebreaker activities.
Send a Little Love
Everyone loves to feel appreciated, and a great way to say thank you and boost team members’ spirits is to send a little gift or treat. Virtual team members are often likely to stay at home all day rather than venturing out for a coffee or lunch during the workday. Sometimes, they just need an excuse to take that needed break. By sending a digital gift card for a treat—even something small like a coffee or ice cream— employees will be encouraged to step away from their desks for a treat. You can even tie food holidays, like National Donut Day or Pizza Week, in with the timing of your gift so everyone can celebrate “together.”
And while digital gifts are great, there’s also something to be said for receiving gifts in the mail. Sending gifts is a fun way to let virtual team members know you’re thinking of them. Merchology offers fun, customized gift boxes with branded merchandise and other fun goodies, and they’ll even ship directly to your recipients so you don’t have to package anything or stand in line at the post office! Another fun and unusual gift, which is sure to add a little flair to your remote workers’ desks, is a plant or a customized succulent like this one from Lula’s Garden. There are endless possibilities when it comes to mailing gifts, so feel free to get creative!
An often forgotten way of saying thank you is the simple handwritten note. In the age of email, Slack messages, and emojis, receiving a quick note of thanks in the mail from a colleague can really go a long way in making someone feel truly appreciated. Consider sending a quick note of thanks or just “I like working with you!” to colleagues for their work anniversaries, birthdays, or even just because!
Lastly, another great way to say thank you to virtual assistants or other remote workers is to give them some much-needed time off. With so many people working from home and always having their work with them, it’s easy to find oneself working outside of typical boundaries. Offering employees an extra paid day off will encourage them to log off and take some time for self-care, family time, or leisure. We recommend offering the paid day off to the full company on the same day so they won’t feel like they’re missing emails from colleagues and be tempted to log on during their time away. By knowing that everyone is disconnected, they will be encouraged to do the same without guilt. After having time being truly disconnected, employees are highly likely to come back to work refreshed and with lifted spirits.
Get Started
Interested in applying one of these concepts with your virtual team? A great way to get going is to assign a team or point person who will be in charge of brainstorming, planning, and executing these initiatives and let them fly! This is a great area for an Executive Assistant to provide support. Need an assistant to help you get started? Let’s talk!
Want More Executive Assistant Guides and Tips?
We have newsletters designed specifically for Executive Assistants and Business Leaders! Sign up to receive our bi-weekly newsletters here and you’ll receive more science-backed productivity tips and tricks directly to your inbox.
33Vincent has many other resources to help you maximize your time and communication with your executive assistant.
