Working on a remote team can be difficult, especially if there’s no clear hierarchy and you don’t have an actual office to congregate in. However, if you want to keep your remote employees engaged with each other and perform better as a group, it’s essential to foster some sort of camaraderie amongst them, especially since they may never meet face-to-face.
It’s important to remember that just because your employees aren’t located in the same physical space doesn’t mean they can’t feel like a close-knit team.
You’ve gathered your remote employees to work together on the same project, but how do you ensure that you’re building an effective and efficient team?
To ensure this, there are plenty of virtual team building activities available that they can do together to feel connected, including these 11 virtual team building activities, which you can use to develop warm relationships with remote employees and grow their skills together, even though they don’t all sit next to each other every day.
Let’s have a look at:
Eleven Virtual Team Building Activities:
1) Virtual Happy Hour
A remote team-building activity in which you have an online happy hour. For example, you and your coworkers can post one photo a day of what they’re doing at that moment and send it to a shared folder, where everyone can see it. That could be them drinking out of their favorite mugs, holding up something interesting they saw on Twitter, or just sitting around a table chatting about their day.
Make sure to take photos during both informal moments as well as meetings. Showing your remote employees interacting with each other and having fun together will help them feel like a cohesive unit even when they’re not physically together.
These virtual happy hours will also help remote workers feel more connected to your company and with each other.
2) Virtual Group Lunch
Nothing beats a good face-to-face lunch with coworkers, but it can be hard to find opportunities to meet up and just enjoy each other’s company when you work virtually. You can organize a virtual group lunch to make up for a lost time.
Whether your team is scattered across different states or in different countries, they can all get together over Skype or Google Hangouts to share a meal and discuss business over food. This personal connection will go a long way toward helping your remote employees feel like part of one cohesive unit.
Virtual group lunch can be a great way to get your team talking about how they feel about their jobs, too. You might find that some team members are unhappy or feel undervalued. By bringing them together and letting them share their concerns with each other, you’ll be able to address any issues that are plaguing your team and make sure everyone is on board with where things are headed.
3) Hold A Virtual Workshop
Get your team members together virtually using a video conferencing platform and hold a workshop to strategize and plan out your goals. If you’re working with people in different time zones, try scheduling a workshop at the appropriate time where everyone can get in on it at their convenience.
You can easily bring your team together by holding virtual workshops, even if they’re all in different locations. These virtual workshops will allow you to get everyone on board with what needs to be done and how it should be done. It will also enable them to ask questions and engage with each other so that they feel like part of a team.
You could also try using collaborative software, which allows teams to work together in real-time on projects from anywhere around the world. They make it easy for team members to stay up-to-date on projects without having constant meetings or conference calls.
4) Do A Group Workout
Have a group workout over Skype. This is an easy way to get everyone together, even if they’re in different parts of the world. Group workouts are also a great way to get people active and moving, which can be hard when you’re working from home all day.
Group workouts will also help your team stay healthy and active which is essential when working from home. The World Health Organization recommends at least 150 minutes of moderate physical activity per week, which is easier to achieve when you have a group of people encouraging each other.
While it might seem like a good idea to work from home all day, it can be easy to get into bad habits if you don’t have any motivation or support. That’s why organizing group workouts are so important, as it keeps your team active and healthy, which is better for everyone in the long run.
5) Plan An After-Work Activity
Plan different activities you can perform after work with your teammates. Try to pick fun activities that everyone will enjoy, like a team dinner or a movie night. Make sure to choose an activity that everyone on your team will be able to attend since it’s essential to create a sense of camaraderie and cohesion within your team.
While planning activity is a great way to build rapport and trust among co-workers, make sure not to go overboard. Planning too many events can be exhausting for your team and may even cause some of them to become resentful if they feel like you’re trying to force them into spending time together.
Instead, try scheduling one or two team-building activities per month so that your team members will look forward to working with you long-term.
6) Set Up A Video Chat
Video chats allow for building relationships and fostering communication while remaining cost-effective. You can use a video chat program like Skype or Google Hangouts to host a team discussion or brainstorming session.
This is especially helpful if you have a distributed team with members and colleagues in different cities, states, or countries. Video chats can help the team to feel more connected, even when they’re not physically together, and can also be used as an opportunity to accomplish organizational milestones and successes.
Video chats are a great way to get everyone on your team on board with an idea or initiative. Plus, they don’t require much technical know-how, which means anyone can jump right in and start using them.
7) Run An Internal Twitter Chat
A Twitter chat is a great way to engage with your team outside of regular team meetings and email. Start by announcing when and where you’ll be hosting your discussion. Make sure it’s public so that people don’t have to participate if they aren’t interested, but also make sure it’s easy to find if people are looking for something different from their regular office duties.
Encourage participation in your Twitter chat, and don’t forget to have fun. Your team should know that you value their input and want them to be part of a cohesive team. While you can run a chat about any topic, it’s best to choose something that everyone on your team is interested in so they will feel like they are actively contributing instead of just listening.
If possible, tie your Twitter chat into an upcoming company event or holiday party so people will look forward to it and participate more enthusiastically when it arrives. This will help your team members to connect on a deeper level and feel like they are a part of something bigger than just their job description.
8) Organize Team Problem-Solving Activity
Team problem solving requires team members to work together to solve a problem with a common interaction. This team-building activity helps distance teams develop excellent communication skills and offers valuable insight into how teammates interact and manage relationships in remote environments.
Assign each person on your team a problem from a well-known story, then divide people into groups of three or four people. When you meet online, each group presents its solution to that problem. This will help your team work together and build common interests that will improve collaboration in working life and make it easier to know about the perspective of other team members.
9) Virtual Coffee Beaks
Virtual coffee breaks are great team-building activities to do with your team. It’s a great way to show that you care about them, and it is also an excellent way to provide some team bonding time. A virtual coffee break between your team members can be as simple as sharing what they did over their vacation or weekend or how their week went.
The point of these kinds of team-building activities is to get everyone on your team talking and interacting with each other in an informal setting so that they can build friendly relationships. It’s a great way to help people feel more comfortable around one another, especially if they don’t see each other every day.
10) Make Hobbies Group
Make different office groups compete against each other in a team-building activity that encourages them to get outside and do something fun. For example, you could have each group compete to see who can make it through a scavenger hunt first or build a puzzle fastest. This is an excellent way to bring people together and bond as a team.
It’s also good for morale, as many people struggle with working remotely, and hobbies are an excellent way to help them feel more connected with their team. Plus, it makes a fun activity you can do regularly to keep your team members engaged and happy.’
No matter what kind of team-building activity you choose, remember that it should be enjoyable. Add in some prizes for winners or bonuses for those who did especially well. The point is to bring everyone together and build camaraderie to have fun.
11) Virtual Celebrations
Celebrate different festivals and events with your team members, even if they’re not physically present. For example, you can celebrate Diwali with a potluck dinner or Christmas by singing a song. This helps create a sense of fellowship among team members, which in turn increases employee satisfaction.
You also get to know your team members better by celebrating events virtually. This helps break down communication barriers and makes your team feel more like a family. It’s important to note that while celebrations are fun, they are also an excellent way to improve employee satisfaction, which can help boost productivity.
Using these virtual team-building activities will improve your team’s overall performance and help you build better relationships with your colleagues.
Conclusion
The most important part of working with a remote team is making them feel like they’re an integral part of your business. These 11 virtual team-building activities will help you stay connected and ensure that everyone feels like they’re contributing to your company’s success.
Spend time getting to know them and building a relationship of trust with each member. You might have to work harder at building relationships in a virtual environment, however, keeping a track of their work is now easy.
To keep a track of their work, you can go for remote work monitoring software. These employee monitoring software are highly reliable, enhance team productivity and let remote employees work smartly. So, develop good relations with your remote team and also ensure to keep their productivity on track.
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