Our guide to staying creative and maintaining company culture when hybrid or remote working
We’ve all become increasingly sure about the inevitable fact that the future of work will be hybrid to some extent. None of us can know for sure what it’s going to look like but we do know that most of us can’t count on seeing the team every day anymore. Questions that commonly pop up on the topic are How do we stay creative when we’re not seeing each other in person? and How do we maintain company culture when going hybrid?
The answers aren’t simple and yet we’re here to try and give them to you. At least we’ll try to give you some ideas on how to stay creative and maintain company culture in the new workplace and you’ll have to do the rest of the hard work.
Staying creative in the new workplace
Here are three of our top tips on how to stay creative when you don’t see your team very often in the new workplace.
Stay creative with beers and brainstorm – combining the work social and creative brainstorming
On this one we’re coming to you from own experience as the concept is something we’ve successfully implemented in our office. The best thing: for us it works even better than before! By both getting a change of scenery and really setting time aside for thinking outside the box we’ve managed to increase our creativity and become more focused in our brainstorms. Time is money and we’re not wasting any of it anymore.
The concept is simple: combine a fun team activity with creative problem solving and voilà you might find that doors to new solutions open. Here are some excellent venues for brainstorming.
Remember the difference between then and now
Not all companies saw productivity go down during lockdown but many seem to have seen a dip in creativity and innovation. You might be inclined to think that this was due to working from home and maybe to some extent it was but we do have to remember that the world was quite bleak at the time. With no new impressions and experiences it’s hard for most of us to stay creative. In this new world this hopefully won’t be the case for most employees. Try not to place your judgement upon remote working just yet. We need to see this new normal as a clean slate rather than an extension of lockdowns and a covid world.
Start afresh with the team and kick off this new and exciting time with an event for the whole company and emphasize that this is the start of a new era.
Don’t forget the value of meeting in person when trying to be creative
Many employees are pushing for not having to go into the office as much as they used to, or even at all, but remember that a lot of the magic happens when we actually get together. Hybrid may be the future and you might have to give your employees what they want to some extent but make sure to set time aside for meeting in person and make it qualitative.
We even conducted some research a while back where 87% of workers reported that it’s important for their mental health to see their coworkers in person. It’s hard to find the right balance but we think it’s of utmost importance to remember that even though workers might want to stay remote to a large extent the in-person meeting can’t be fully removed.
Maintaining company culture when going hybrid
In order to understand how to maintain company culture we think there are three questions you need to ask yourself and we’ve listed them below.
1. What is your company culture?
This might seem like a given to ask yourself but your company culture is something that you most likely have never put into words. Maybe you can’t put words to it now either but hopefully you can still try to get some sort of idea of what the company culture is and what role it plays for your employees. When you better understand what the company culture actually looks like you can then move onto thinking about how to maintain it.
2. What do you want to achieve with your company culture?
The unique culture at your company and in your team is very important but why is that. What is it that you want to achieve by maintaining it and might there be other ways than how you’ve always done it to get the same results. Ask yourself what role the culture plays in your team and think about if there are other ways you can fulfil those same needs.
3. What does your team want?
Don’t forget to ask your team and understand what they want. In a new changed world you might have to push your employees a little bit more in order to take part in team activities and other things that require them being there in person. Make sure to keep your ear to the ground in order to make decisions that are actually going to stimulate a good company culture and not the opposite.
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