How we have casual conversations in a remote world

I don’t know about you, but I identified with the group of people that felt working from home was a silver lining at that start of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

To be honest, working fully remote has a bunch of benefits that I don’t want to give up. I love cutting the commute, prioritizing exercise into the workday, and spending more time with family while getting as much or more done at work.

As the remote working lifestyle is being established as the new norm, there is a glaring gap emerging from the lack of interpersonal interaction that an office environment provides a growing team. Those relationship-building conversations at the metaphorical watering hole or in passing in the hallway are crucial for building long-lasting connections and facilitating conflict resolution. 

In my opinion, the time we spend in meetings and spend brainstorming for a product offering are not enough. Those scheduled meetings have too much structure to allow for casual connections to form. We also have established tools like Zoom, Teams, Hangouts, or even Skype (if you are still living in 2008) for that. Growing teams need to connect on a personal level to overcome the obstacles that high growth tech startups face.

At Buildr, we too made the shift to fully remote work in March as the pandemic was gaining momentum. After the first few weeks, it was clear to our team that remote work was lacking a much-needed connection that we had in our Long Beach office. We needed to gather around for casual conversations and games of BUILDR (our company's version of “horse” with a mini basketball hoop in the corner of the office). 

So we made the decision to test out Discord as a place for us all to connect on a daily basis without it being as formal as a team meeting with an agenda. I know Discord has been traditionally a gamer’s tool and, although we are not raiding in WoW or collecting kills in Warzone, we are finding significant value as a high growth SaaS business for staying connected with our teams regardless of where they are in the world. It may not have replaced the mini basketball hoop, but it’s a great start.

Here's a quick look into how we are breaking the discord "guidelines" by not gaming.

We are always looking for ways to improve working remotely and welcome any suggestions.

How has your team improved remote work environments?