Remote work, hybrid workplace, working from home, virtual meetings. Although not net new ideas, these themes became much more common within the last year. Even as more and more people plan to return to work in person, the concept of a distributed workforce will be the new “normal” for many, and companies and employees will need to learn to adjust accordingly. Distributed workforce best practices will need to be applied to be successful in this new landscape. There are new ways of working across the board – this includes a combination of remote employees, physical offices, and working with colleagues and team members in other locations and time zones (even if they are in another physical office). 

The Voltage Control team has always been remote (outside of our in-person workshops and events) so this shift to virtual work and the distributed workforce wasn’t new to us – we’ve documented best practices for remote teams, and even assembled a toolkit that allows our remote team to facilitate virtual meetings that are as, if not more, effective than traditional face-to-face interactions.

Many large corporations are making the decision to offer permanent remote work options for their employees, including Twitter, JP Morgan, Facebook, Amazon, and Microsoft. A distributed workforce, when directed by effective systems and processes, can and will be successful with adjustments and best practices.

Employees have demonstrated the ability to work productively in a distributed and/or remote fashion, in large part due to available tools and technology. However, it will take more than simply downloading Zoom and a good Wifi connection (though they are both very important) for a successful distributed workforce. We outline 5 distributed workforce best practices below.

Distributed Work Best Practices

1) Implement recurring check-ins and meetings 

Communication is key. Ensure communication flows between all team members, regardless of physical location. This is increasingly important as workers become more spread across different time zones and locations. Consider daily standup updates on Slack, end of day status emails, all hands/town halls, check-ins with direct reports, and virtual meetings–with video when possible–to include everyone on the team. This isn’t to say you should have a million meetings just to have them by any means. There should always be a clear purpose to avoid wasting time (among other Meeting Mantras). Keeping an open line of communication through all levels and team members will help align and push forward projects and initiatives in a distributed workforce setting.

2) Utilize the best tools and tech

These tools played an obvious role when the majority of office workers were forced to be remote. They will continue to be critical to keeping everyone aligned and organized as the virtual, remote + in-person worlds merge into a distributed workforce. Some of our favorite tools for a distributed workforce include: 

• Asana – Project management tool to help teams organize, track and manage their work.
• Basecamp – Real-time communication tool to keep track of everything you’re working on in a shared space. 
• Doodle – Calendar scheduling system for time management and to easily coordinate one-on-one and team meetings. 
• Focus To-Do – Pomodoro time and task management app that helps you perform tasks efficiently. 
• Google Docs – Smart editing and styling tools support joint teamwork to flow smoothly and easily and keep ideas in one place. Teams can work on different pages or in different docs accordingly. 
• Google Slides – Interactive work templates with multiple pages to allow individual and collective work.
• Google Sheets – Collaborative spreadsheets to organize and update tasks and information. 
• Google Drive or other cloud storage – Drop all assets and work content into a shared space for easy access for all team members. Use different folders to organize information. 
• Harvest – Time tracking software with multiple integrations and extensions.
• Loom – Screen recorder that allows you to capture video screen messages instead of sending long emails. It’s also helpful for sending team members visual directions if you cannot screen share in real-time.
• Process Street – Make checklists for your team to help you remember and keep track of all of your to-do’s. 
• SessionLab – Dynamically design, organize and share workshops and training content.
• Slack – Team messaging platform that is a smart alternative to email. It allows the team to have a shared view of work progress and purpose
• Trello –  A place for assigning work and tracking work progress using a Kanban-style list-making application.
• World Time Buddy – World clock, time zone converter, and online meeting scheduler to coordinate and plan across different time zones.
• Zoom – Videoconferencing platform with breakout room capabilities.

3) Establish and define clear goals for everyone

The success of a distributed workforce depends on meaningful goal-setting. A distributed workforce provides flexibility, in the sense that employees aren’t held to the same confines of a traditional workplace. However, this also means goals and tasks need to be defined even more clearly since the full team won’t be together in person and important details can get lost in translation. Set reasonable goals then make sure that all team members are on the same page so you can accomplish them as a team. Many companies and employees use SMART goal setting:

• Specific: Make your goals specific and narrow for more effective planning.
• Measurable: Define what evidence will provide you’re making progress.
• Attainable: Make sure you can reasonably accomplish your goal within a certain timeframe.
• Relevant: Goals should align with values and long-term objectives.
• Time-based: Set a realistic, ambitious end date for task prioritization.

4) Track projects and productivity

With any team, but especially a distributed one, tracking projects, and productivity is important. You are unable to stop by a team member’s desk to check in like in-person offices so you need a way of making sure that everyone is on task. There are many ways of doing this even if you are not together in person, such as Asana or Trello for project management, and Harvest for time tracking. Team members are able to see what everyone else is doing, what stage a project is in, and coordinate with one another in real-time. Monitoring responsibility online leads to more productivity and collaboration. It also saves time being able to view the status of all projects across all team members, in one platform.

Start our Design Thinking Foundations course today!

Learn and practice Design Thinking to help your team solve problems and seize opportunities.

Get Started

5) Promote team bonding 

Host offsite/virtual social events so remote workers can get together in person or via video conference for team-building and socializing. The specific events will depend and differ based on location and circumstance. Virtual happy hours or game nights are a fun way to bond. Connection is often more elusive online, so setting aside time for your team to relax or have fun together when distributed is more important than ever. These sorts of social events can have a big impact on your distributed team’s morale.

Numerous experiments have shown how employees are much more productive and engaged when they’re given flexibility on where, when, and how they’ll get their work done. A distributed workforce can boost not only productivity but also retention. Turnover is 25% lower at companies that support remote work environments. The evidence is clear: Remote and distributed employees have great potential to be highly productive and extremely engaged, as long as you know how to engage them. Testing the distributed workforce best practices outlined above is a great place to start.

At Voltage Control we are exercising and sharing the best tools and techniques needed for teams to thrive in the hybrid and distributed workplace, through productive meetings (in-person and virtual), remote work team collaboration, considerations for return to work, facilitation skills, virtual events, meeting culture, Magical Meetings and design sprints.

The post 5 Distributed Workforce Best Practices appeared first on Voltage Control.

The following information is a sneak peek from our upcoming Hybrid Work Guide. 

Stay home, go back to the office, or combine both for a hybrid work environment? This is the loaded question currently floating around the business world. Hybridity is the hottest topic–a flexible workplace model that combines in-person and virtual work by allowing workplace flexibility and prioritizing connection.

As companies adjust to the possibility of being back in person again, the possibilities of a hybrid workplace have also opened the exploration of hybrid meetings and hybrid events. It’s important to note that “hybrid” has several distinctions: there is a hybrid workplace–where workers spend their time doing work (remote or in the office); hybrid meetings–how we design meetings that occur with a blended audience (some people in person, some participating remotely); and hybrid events–when meetings become large and specialized, the needs from a standard hybrid meeting shift. Also, note that the hybrid landscape is still evolving. It’s an ongoing and dynamic situation. Therefore, there is no single way to approach it because there are copious factors that influence different variations of what it can look like (and even those can change). 

In this article, we will talk specifically about the possibilities of hybrid events. Experimenting with running hybrid events is a great way to dip your toes into returning to in-person work. You don’t have to take a stance on hybrid permanently; you can use hybrid events as a transition if you so choose. They can also be their own type of event post-transition back to the office.

Let’s take a look at the benefits of hybrid events and how to prepare for them, so you can decide if they’re the right fit for your organization. 

Benefits of Hybrid Events

Just like virtual events, hybrid events have the expanded possibility to bring more people together than the restrictions of in-person alone. Remote work has shown us the power of connecting with people from around the world with a single click of a button. People who may not be able to make an event in-person or who want to save time and money traveling can still attend a hybrid event as a remote attendee. It is also a more comfortable option for people who do not yet feel ready to be back with others in person. 

How to Prepare for Hybrid Events

Planning hybrid events will require much more prep work than remote or in-person events to get everyone organized and set up all necessary tools; there is must more to consider. First, you must decide on the appropriate virtual event platform that supports your specific event’s needs. This includes:

• Live streaming support
• Integrations that offer the highest production quality
• Networking capabilities that allow easy attendee engagement
• Management capacity to run the event smoothly behind the scenes

Then, consider the setting from which you’ll run the event:

• Will you be on a stage with cameras to capture the experience?
• Will you be in an office and operate more like a typical video conferencing call?
• Decide the best scenario that supports the event–from the background to the props that will appear in the frame–then gather the materials you need to bring it to life. 

It’s vitally important to properly set up all attendees (in-person and remote) beforehand so that everyone is equally prepared. This may include:

• In-person walkthroughs to set the scene and ready cameras
• Lighting and other production gear
• Virtual walkthroughs on the virtual event platform to teach remote attendees how to navigate the space

Will the event require attendees to have certain materials? If so, send event packages to distributed attendees beforehand. Make sure everyone is on the same page and has what they need to participate before the event begins.

Keep in mind that hybrid events will have many different models: 1-to-1, 1-to-many, and many-to-many. Therefore, they will require variances in the structure around how they are clustered and organized.

• Are there cohorts that are together and how does that impact design?
• How many facilitators are needed and how will they work together? (More on this in Hybrid Facilitation).
• Similar to hybrid meetings, how will you bring people together when some are together and some are dispersed? 

Map out your event so you can consider the attendee experience. As you experiment with different event structure variations, be mindful of the trap to cater events to the in-person experience and unwittingly neglect the remote experience. We have to custom-design events for the type of collective interactions and equanimity we want to create. To do this, we must keep social norms top of mind. For example, we can’t throw all in-person attendees in a bar and expect them to go across the room to the camera in the corner and engage with remote people. It just doesn’t work. If we design against social norms, we fight against them. Instead, use them to your advantage.

Consider offering different tiers for your event with different expectations. What is your version of “exit through the giftshop”– a practice used by museums to force all guests through the gift shop?  Here are some examples:

• Implement a fun game that requires in-person attendees to find answers or engage with other attendees upon arrival in order to make it past registration. Some of these people might be online, some may be in person. Individuals must interact with one another and the tools–think finding the person’s video on Zoom + their designated spot in the event MURAL board (or some other point of engagement)–to find the answers to unlock access.
• Pair each event attendee with someone, or multiple people, that they have to locate and connect with throughout the event. Pair folks who might have things in common, or might be well suited to work together or learn from one another. Design in moments of interaction where they might discuss prompts or share experiences and reflections.  

Start Experimenting

If a hybrid event speaks to you and your organization, give it a try! Remember, there is no one size fits all way to do it. Even within an organization, different teams work differently. This article is merely meant to offer suggestions about things you can do to run your own hybrid event. Choose what works best for you. 

Hybrid is always changing, it’s about exploring options that exist now and even the ones that don’t exist yet. Stay curious and keep the needs of your organization top of mind. Hybrid events could end up being an asset in a permanent hybrid work environment or as their own entity within your organization. 

Want to learn more about hybrid?

Subscribe to our newsletter to get notified on the release of our upcoming Hybrid Work Guide: Define & navigate a hybrid workplace for your organization + run effective hybrid meetings and events.

The post Want To Run A Hybrid Event? appeared first on Voltage Control.

The idea of a “normal” office workplace is now something of the past. Remote work and work from home are a new norm. There is another shift in the workplace occurring as offices are starting to plan their reopening. The idea of a hybrid workplace is becoming more critical and attractive as employers and employees revisit recent learnings and their needs moving forward. Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO, believes the hybrid workplace is “here to stay” as the productivity of working from home will remain vital during this time. 

A hybrid workplace is a flexible workplace model that is designed to support a distributed workforce of both in-office and remote workers. The hybrid workplace isn’t a completely new idea, with many companies (especially in the tech and start up worlds) allowing flexible work from home policies or remote hires. However, there are nownew ways of working across the board – businesses have been forced to rethink what it means to have a physical workplace. 

The global shift to remote work was drastic at first, but opportunities quickly presented themselves. The virtual business landscape brought many positives that most people didn’t even think about before. For example, virtual workshops and conferences allow hundreds of people across the globe to connect without the cost of travel or timing limitations. Cost savings in general for both employees and employers emerged. Time was also saved across the board – instead of needing to plan for a busy commute, parking, elevator ride up to the office, setting up a conference room, etc., joining a meeting became as quick and easy as clicking “Join a Meeting” on Zoom. The Voltage Control team has always been remote (outside of our in-person workshops and events) so this shift wasn’t new to us – we’ve documented best practices for remote teams, and even assembled a toolkit that allows our remote team to facilitate virtual meetings that are as effective, if not more effective, than traditional face-to-face interactions.

More and more companies are making the decision to offer permanent remote work options for their employees, including Twitter, JP Morgan, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft, and Dell. Other large employers like Google and Facebook have extended work-from-home options for employees through the end of this year. Remote work, when directed by effective systems and processes, works.

Employees have demonstrated the ability to work productively and successfully, in large part due to available tools and technology (discussed in more detail below). However, many also can’t wait to get back to the office. Being in person with other colleagues provides a sense of collaboration and inclusiveness that isn’t easily replicated, especially if used to it before. Working from home also has its own set of distractions, especially for those with families, spouses, roommates, and pets. 

As more and more companies and offices are planning their re-openings keeping all this in mind, we predict both remote work and in-office presence will co-exist. Therefore the workforce will need to approach this hybrid model strategically, leading us into 5 best practices of a hybrid workplace:

1. Remember the importance of technology + tools

These tools played an obvious role when the majority of office workers were forced to be remote. However, as some employees return to the physical office and some remain remote, they will continue to be critical to keep everyone aligned and organized as the virtual + in-person worlds merge into a hybrid workplace:

• Zoom – Videoconferencing platform with breakout room capabilities
• Trello –  A place for assigning work and tracking work progress using a Kanban-style list-making application. Assign individuals to cards to create clear to-do lists and organize priorities.
• Google Docs – Smart editing and styling tools support joint teamwork to flow smoothly and easily and keep ideas in one place. Teams can work on different pages or in different docs accordingly. 
• Google Slides – Interactive work templates with multiple pages to allow individual and collective work.
• Google Sheets – Collaborative spreadsheets to organize and update tasks and information. 
• Google Drive or other cloud storage – Drop all assets and work content into a shared space for easy access for all team members. Use different folders to organize information. 
• Basecamp – Real-time communication tool to keep track of everything you’re working on in a shared space. 
• Focus To-Do – Pomodoro time and task management app that helps you perform tasks efficiently. 
• Process Street – Make checklists for your team to help you remember and keep track of all of your to-do’s. 
• SessionLab – Dynamically design, organize and share workshops and training content.
• Slack – Team messaging platform that is a smart alternative to email. It allows the team to have a shared view of work progress and purpose
• Loom – Screen recorder that allows you to capture video screen messages instead of sending long emails. It’s also helpful for sending team members visual directions if you cannot screen share in real-time.
• Doodle – Calendar scheduling system for time management and to easily coordinate one-on-one and team meetings. 
• World Time Buddy – World clock, time zone converter, and online meeting scheduler to coordinate and plan across different time zones.

2. Take Care of Your People

Your employees are your most important asset. Ask them what they actually want – don’t assume everyone wants the same thing when it comes to remote vs. in-person work presence. This is a benefit of the hybrid workplace – it allows flexibility depending on employee comfort level, schedules, and physical location. Consider offering your employees options of working at your company, for example:

• Remote First: Primarily working from home
• In-Office First: Primarily working from the physical office
• Something in between: Splitting time relatively evenly between working from home and from the office

Also, try to maintain company culture for everyone in the hybrid workplace, regardless of what they choose. Just because someone is not in the office does not mean they should be overlooked. Hold informal online meet ups, virtual town halls, and ensure they’re included in any perks that those in the office receive (for example, if food or coffee is provided to office employees, consider giving remote employees a snack stipend or coffee subscription).

Start our Magical Meetings course today!

Learn the methods to make your meetings magical.

Get Started

3. Make Your Job Listings Remote

If you are offering existing employees the option to work remotely, include this hybrid workplace strategy in your recruitment efforts. Wherever you can, make new job listings remote. This may also allow businesses to unlock talent that may have been inaccessible previously. Perhaps the best candidate for a job opening lives in another state. With remote hiring options, you are not bound to proximity to get the best for your team.

4. Communication is Key

Ensure communication flows between in-office and remote staff. This is increasingly important as workers become more spread across different time zones and locations. Consider daily standup updates on Slack, end-of-day status emails, all hands/town halls, check-ins with direct reports, and video meetings to include everyone on the team. It will take extra effort to ensure all employees feel connected and can communicate effectively, but it is what will make your team successful.

5. Be Adaptable

Experiment with different workflows and processes to discover what works best, and be open to change. This idea of the hybrid workplace becoming the “norm” is new to many – there will be a learning curve so employees and employers should remain patient and flexible. It will definitely take some time to get used to, but testing new and different processes will allow for more improvement and better solutions moving forward.

Employees increasingly value flexibility in the workplace, according to a survey by Salesforce, resulting in the rise of the hybrid workplace. For employers, the hybrid workplace can offer better and more diverse talent when location isn’t a constraint. Companies may also see a positive impact in other areas, such as employee satisfaction, productivity, and cost savings. Changing the way a business runs will no doubt have its challenges – but it’s clear the hybrid workplace is here to stay, and embracing the opportunities it offers will likely be well worth it.

Here at Voltage Control, we are exercising and sharing the best tools and techniques needed for teams to thrive in the hybrid workplace, through productive meetings (in-person and virtual), remote work team collaboration, considerations for return to work, facilitation skills, virtual events, meeting culture, Magical Meetings, and design sprints.

The post A Hybrid Workplace: The Rise and Future appeared first on Voltage Control.

A return to work is around the corner, but what will that look like? For many businesses, that will not mean “business as usual”. The adjustment to remote work has many people considering a hybrid workplace. However, hybrid work has become a blanket term used to meekly describe the dynamic that the future of work suggests. Hybridity in the workplace is much more than the location and time we work; it’s not that simple. The merging of in-person and virtual work will mean the emergence of completely new a paradigm for all workers. Just like we had to shift to different processes and systems for remote work in the virtual landscape, we must consider the full picture of what hybrid roles and hybrid workers will look like in order to be successful in a new kind of work environment.

First of all, returning to work in person is a question of who is comfortable doing so. While some people are eager to be back in a collaborative office space, others aren’t so ready for various reasons–be it health concerns, a preference for remote work, or a resistance to getting back into an in-person work routine. Make no mistake, getting back together face-to-face is going to be a transition. It won’t immediately revert back to how it used to be because too much has happened since then. We’ll have to readjust our schedules–like organizing care for kids and adding a commuting routine back in–and get reacquainted with social norms and behaviors that come with an in-person work environment. From seemingly little things like questioning, “Do I shake my co-workers’ hands?” to larger concerns about whether employees will start back full or part-time, returning to work will mean ironing out kinks and getting readjusted. You’ll also need to consider the configuration for your hybrid environment–will there be multiple offices? What does hybrid mean to your organization–does it mean Mondays and Fridays in the office and every other day remote? This transition will take time. 

As employees begin to reestablish patterns and norms, they will be faced with new and potentially unexpected thoughts and feelings. They may find this process difficult and unsettling. Make sure to listen to their needs and give them time to adapt. While many may be excited to rush back, we’ll need to support those that need more time. We also don’t want to rush into hasty decisions that don’t sere our long-term needs and unnecessarily alienate team members.

It is our responsibility as leaders to establish clear expectations and “new norms” while also holding space for team members’ needs so that everyone can transition as painlessly as possible. 

I was recently chatting with some of the facilitators in our community and they declared that there is no such thing as a hybrid workshop. Their point was that if you are seeking full and equal participation from everyone we need to ensure that the interface for everyone’s ideas has consistent and equal bandwidth. In order to do that, all of your in-person attendees need to join the virtual session individually, making them all virtual participants as well. 

There is currently no software specifically made for hybrid work; software that exists assumes for remote work. We will need tools and processes that not only seamlessly support the merging of productive in-person and virtual work, but that also make connection a priority. Perhaps the greatest challenge for remote teams is genuine connection. It’s the essential missing element of in-person connection that cannot be replaced by technology–no matter how innovative. There is no substitute for human interaction. That’s why many businesses are prioritizing physical togetherness for their employees even if they have the choice to remain fully remote. The value for connection–however you create and maintain it–is paramount to do meaningful work together. 

Start our Magical Meetings course today!

Learn the methods to make your meetings magical.

Get Started

The word of hybrid also ushers in new concerns around co-location and who is actually in the room. Many workers have relocated during the pandemic and may no longer be near an office. What are the lines of collaboration that have been severed locally? Co-location will impact our design choices and skew our perspective. For example: When designing hybrid meetings, workshops, and other gatherings, there will be a natural pull to group co-located individuals during breakout sessions. While this may work out sometimes, we certainly shouldn’t take it for granted.

Do you see room for hybrid work within your organization? If so, how are you preparing for the shift in the workplace? If you decide to support a hybrid workplace, how will meetings work with some team members in a physical room and others dialing in virtually? What will you need to do to encourage equal connection amongst dispersed and in-person team members? How will hybrid work change talent acquisition? Will in-person team members have advantages or disadvantages that virtual workers won’t and visa versa? What technology needs to exist to fully support an effective hybrid work environment? The intricacies of a hybrid workplace are vast, but it’s a puzzle that can create a full, functional picture. 

If you are considering a hybrid work environment, keep this in mind: at the center of productive work is the people who make it happen. Keenly focusing on your team members and what they need to thrive is essential, especially in a hybrid environment. There is definitely no one-size-fits-all approach to getting the best performance from individuals and creating the best experience for them to succeed in. Learn your team members’ strengths and create opportunities for them to utilize them. One person may work best in person, while others may soar when they’re able to buckle down and hone in on their duties alone in their chosen workspace. It may seem like a game of Tetris at first, but leaning into the specific needs and preferences of your team, paralleled with how everyone can work best together, will create the most effective and inspiring work environment for all. 

It’s important to remember that we are entering a new age of experimentation. While it may seem familiar, this is new territory, so everyone will have a different perspective and approach. We must find what works best for our teams while also merging with the methods and preferences of other companies and people we work with. For example, I’ve recently been asked to facilitate a session where I’m remote and everyone else is in person. Each experience we have in the hybrid workspace will be a prototype to help us build new and innovative ways of collaborating. 

This transition will be interesting and we’ll all have to decide for ourselves and for the betterment of our teams which approaches, systems, and processes create the most advantageous results. Stay curious and stay safe.

The post Exploring Hybrid Work Connection appeared first on Voltage Control.