Staying Connected: Together, Apart

Go Home 2020, You're Drunk

Who knew that a normal part of 2020 would be that the entire world was going to be working on the same problem together - and that we'd all be "hibernating" through the spring? We’re all living in this surreal time, where “doing your part” means seeing the streets empty, parks closed, schools cancelled, travel curbed and offices being situated at home.

While we wait for that curve to flatten – pressing pause on daily life has made it hard to plan. Companies have the ultimate challenge of maintaining relevance with their customers. But also making sure that the entire business stays glued together from employees’ homes across the globe... Video calling has become much more relevant in than ever to daily life. It's created a real learning curve.

In previous weeks, as we’ve all worked to clear out room for our new “corner living room office," one thing has become very apparent – We need to go pick the lemons before even thinking about drinking the lemonade! The office space changed overnight and for many of us, the product is no longer in front of us. The luxury of bouncing ideas between teams can’t be done by walking a few feet. Companies are having to adapt and adjust quicker than ever.

One of those adaptions comes directly with the concern for the safety and health of employees and their families. Many companies have completely switched with working from home policies, causing many new discussions and challenges for the normal workflow.

To tackle this change, businesses are creatively finding ways for their teams to stay connected and keep customers confident and engaged. Discovering new ways to maintain that line of contact, has resulted in many teams doing what they do best together – being a team! Natural Insight, a division of Movista Inc., is currently on a work from home policy but we have found ways to be closer than ever.

Make it Work

Just our first week at home, we managed to send over 36,000 messages among the team. We may not physically be working together, but we are still doing things the Movista way! (We call it FITFO… which is to figure it out, try new things and find the best way forward.)

Some of the ways we’ve kept the team connected, keep morale high and maintain a level of camaraderie that makes us Movista:

• We have weekly photo challenges in Slack that offer unique ways to stay connected with each other.
• We’ve done Zoom happy hours, and are testing out “Coffee & Connect” time, Virtual Bingo, Trivia & games. (One of our interns is even having team members test out a board game she’s designed!)
• Utilizing a Slack channel dedicated to music throughout the week to share new albums, concert videos, songs for your work mood … and remembering musicians we love.
• We’ve been sharing tips in a wellness channel – how to help with anxiety, meditation tips, tackling feelings of isolation, combating cabin fever (anyone?)
• We're doing Yoga together twice a week.
• The ever-popular “random” channel has been fun for any topics that don’t fit into the above activities, where people share funny memes, gifs or jokes. 
• And oh... TikTok, don't even get us started.

Businesses are utilizing video conferencing much more than normal. No meeting is missed, and no conversation is left out. And in some cases, companies are creating a new digital "water cooler" where employees can stay connected with banter and shared experiences. 

The New Normal

Making sure your business has all the correct essentials to run perfectly away from the office is a must for any team during this time:

1. Utilize video conferencing and chat programs to always be on the same page with decisions and plans with your team. (There are even some free programs out there if you just need something temporary.)
2. Create a special workflow, if needed, to ensure things are being blocked and tackled - and that people aren't duplicating work.
3. Make your customers aware that business is still being conducted as usual.
   • Share examples of what you're doing to offer the same quality and level of excellence they've come to depend on.
4. Flexibility open and patient to changing planned events or meetings last minute.
5. Use social media to keep customers engaged during potential downtime.
6. Use this time "on pause" to look for ways to continuously improve.
   
   1. Take some online classes
   2. File cleanup
   3. Learn some new productivity hacks
   4. Start creating a plan for how to reengage when we "re-emerge" from our burrows

Check out our blog for other tips on working from home successfully.