From virtual pizza parties to Manuals of Me, why culture building still matters in a remote team

A guide to leading teams in hybrid and remote environments

Being intentional in building and maintaining the team while creating cohesion

At the start of this series we introduced the Hoxby Model of Remote Leadership? and the 14 domains in which effective virtual leaders excel. So far we have looked at several areas including agile experimentation, communication and comfort with disagreement. This week we are exploring how leaders can empower teams to work effectively together in a virtual environment, drawing on inspiration and insights from Alex Hirst and Lizzie Penny (co-founders of Hoxby), Avril Chester (CEO of Cancer Central and Ask Ave, and CTO at RIBA) and Richard Grazier (MD at Community Brands).

A talented remote leader thinks carefully about how they put a team together and the culture they create in the team. This might mean organising team-building activities (virtual pizza making, anyone?), or making changes to the team so that it is more effective in meeting a particular challenge. 

One way of cultivating team culture is by creating a shared language for the team’s way of working. There are now many new behaviours that people have to adopt in virtual or digital-first businesses. It comes with a level of autonomy and accountability that many people aren’t used to. That’s why Alex and Lizzie came up with ‘workstyle’, a universal language and way of talking about the choices all Hoxbies make about their work (the when, where and how). Culturally, this is really important. At Leapers, Matthew Knight created the Manual of Me for the same purpose. 

These days it’s often said that working from home removes the need for social interactions in the workplace – that working remotely enables you to spend more time with friends and family so you don’t require the social support of colleagues. But all the leaders we have spoken to disagreed with this. When organisations are remote, team building needs to be designed into their very structure. It is up to leaders to enable social interactions – it’s easy to miss out on the serendipity of an office space (people don’t bump into each other in the corridor, you can’t just ‘grab five minutes, etc). Building this downtime into people’s days can feel scary for a leader because it goes against our ingrained beliefs that you have to be ‘doing’ to be productive. 

To build a team remotely, leaders must create a space where people can come together to share, learn, and support each other.

• Add 10 minutes to the beginning or end of every meeting agenda for people to share anything interesting they have learnt that week
• Build sharing into your structure (at Hoxby, we have the Hoxby Academy and various interest channels in Slack, plus the watercooler where people can celebrate their wins and get support for the sad times)
• Organise in-person meet ups for bonding, not for work. We host an annual Hoxby Refresh event where everyone gets together for the day. It’s amazing seeing the firm friendships born online translating into hugs and high fives. (Fun fact: two Hoxbies, Katy and Vix, spent two years building their friendship remotely; Katy even agreed to be maid of honour at Vix’s wedding, having only ever met in person once!)
• Create moments specifically for sharing – every Friday, Richard Grazier at Community Brands runs a virtual meeting with a group of 10 members of staff, all from different departments, and spends 45 minutes answering their questions on anything and everything. He also schedules end-of-day meetings with general managers that have no agenda, creating a space where anything can be brought up for discussion.

Richard’s weekly agenda-free meetings with different team members provide an opportunity for him to listen – not for the purpose of having an answer, an action plan or to give advice, but just to find out how people are doing. 

Two Hoxbies share a screenshot of their non-work catch up on the #WaterCooler channel in Slack.

Key takeaways

• Reflect on how you can create more social support in your workplace
• Choose five people you haven’t spoken to recently and ask them how they’re doing
• Add 15 minutes to the end of your next meeting and encourage people to chat about their week

Next week we will explore the importance of trust in virtual leadership. We are also bringing the theory to life through real examples of brilliant virtual leadership within each domain in the full article, which is available as a PDF. So, if you would prefer a more extensive read of the entire series as one, you can request the full PDF here