5 WAYS TO BUILD REMOTE TEAM COMPANY CULTURE

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As you may know by now if you have been following my blogs, company culture to me is the backbone of an organization. However, your team being remote and working in various parts of the world can be challenging to create that awesome company culture feeling.

In this blog, I am going to provide 5 helpful tips on how to be social within a remote team which ultimately helps with building on your company culture. 

Effective teams are built on meaningful connection, inclusivity and trust. Thankfully, there are a ton of ways you can build on your remote team culture and connects with your team.

Let's jump right into the ways and tips for socializing remotely. 

Tip 1 is to Hold virtual lunches and coffee breaks

• Going for coffee or having lunch together is a normal way for office workers to connect.
• There’s no reason why home workers can’t do the same.
• You could make it a weekly get-together where your team stops for an hour and everyone connects virtually and has lunch together.
• The same goes for having coffee breaks, where you encourage your team to take a quick 15-minute coffee break together.
• Your team could post it on your networking platform such as slack that they are taking a quick coffee break if anyone wants to join them and have a quick catch up.
• The rule of thumb here should be that they are not allowed to talk about work and should rather use this as an opportunity to connect personally and form personal relationships. 

Tip 2 is that you could hold virtual dance parties

• This could be every Monday morning to get the spirit up after the weekend and to get your team excited for Mondays.
• The day is totally up to you but I think it is a fun way to start the week.
• Play some fun 80s, and even encourage your team to get dressed up to the theme of that week's dance party.
• Now the idea behind this is just a fun catch-up to the start or end of the week, your team doesn’t necessarily need to dance but it's a fun way to break the ice and build strong connections with your team.
• You could even host it on Fridays and encourage your team to buy an end-of-the-week beer that is on you.
• Provide your team with a weekly beer allowance.
• How cool would that be on your job description when advertising trying to find a new team member to join the team? 

Tip 3 is setting up weekly virtual well-being classes

• Get a well-known yoga instructor or fitness instructor to host weekly fitness classes.
• Anyone in your team can join, and you can even hold a few at different times zone so that everyone in your team has the opportunity to take part.
• Employee wellbeing should be at the top of your priority list and this is a great way to show you care as their leader. 

Tip 4 is not virtual, it is setting up random or planned meet-ups in the world

• It can be a company benefit your that once or twice a year for team-building activities your company brings your team together in a col location somewhere in the world and you work together in a coworking space for that week.
• You can also plan awesome activities such as morning sunrises and hikes, 4x44  trails, and dance classes.
• You can be super creative and it is a great way for your team to connect and get to know each other.
• Another way is that if your team are digital nomads, in every weekly team meeting your team can mention where they are or where they are going next and if anyone wants to meet up.
• You will be surprised how small the digital nomad world is, usually, digital nomads travel to the same places that support working online such as Bali and Thailand. 

Tip 5 is to create nonwork-related communication spaces

• You can have a chat room on slack or Trello that is dedicated to catching up and non-work-related conversations.
• You could also host a weekly video catch-up that your team has the opportunity to drop in and make it a rule that no work-related conversations happen in this catch-up.
• You can talk about where are currently traveling or what your travel plans are, and any dates that you may be going on.
• Take the lead here and put yourself out of your comfort zone to break the ice with your team by starting the conversation with a funny story of recent date or an embarrassing travel story.
• Be creative and fun if that is your company culture.  

Those are my 5 awesome tips to build on your company culture, break the ice and form great relationships with your team.

I hope that you found this blog fun and helpful. 

If you're turning business away because you don't have the team and time to cope and are struggling at hiring. I created a FREE course, The Basics Of Remote Hiring - to help teach you how to hire more efficiently and easily, so you can get back to working on the things that matter most.

Read the course curriculum and join here

Until next time I am wishing you peace, happiness, freedom, and success. 

Shannon Teague, 

CEO Of Scaling Up Simplified.