Building Culture with a Fully Remote Team

It’s no secret that remote work is continually on the rise, and the idea of working in a traditional office is becoming passé. However, as remote work gains popularity, many managers and company leaders find themselves struggling with how to maintain and cultivate workplace culture when team members are scattered across the U.S. or the world.

First, why is workplace culture so important?

Simply put, your company’s culture is the personality of your organization. It can be defined as the “user experience” — but for your employees. A strong culture in which all your employees support and care about your company’s values can improve your business performance. Motivated, coordinated employees will help your organization meet a set of common goals.

Prioritizing culture is a good move for many organizations. Companies with a strong workplace culture and a great employee experience tend to have lower turnover, better employee performance, reduced attrition, and employees who help fuel overall positive company growth. Here are five tips for maintaining company culture with a fully remote team:

1. Utilize Tools That Match Your Culture and Foster Communication

If your team is fully remote, use a collaboration tool since you can’t speak face to face in a traditional office. At HiringThing, we utilize Slack, which allows us to track all our conversations within specific channels, ensuring communication is both organized and inclusive. This is a great tool for remote teams seeking an easy way to stay connected.

For non-work related “water cooler” conversations, we have slack channels titled “random” and “fit, fun, and wellness” where our employees can share cool and fun things with one another. Channels like these are important as a means to help your team get to know each other better in a more fun and relaxed way.

2. Video Conference Tools

It’s important to get your daily dosage of face time with members of your virtual team. Tools like Google Meet, GoToMeeting, and Zoom are great for arranging individual face-to-face meetings, as well as larger team meetings. Through video calls, you can also easily take a few minutes to catch up and see what others have been up to or working on. This is a great way to make meetings personable and fun.

3. Establish a Solid Foundation Built on Trust

Simply put, remote team members must fully trust one another. Since you can’t track or keep up with others in person, you must have confidence that they are fulfilling their daily responsibilities to the best of their ability. It’s also important to remember that in order to establish trust, you must be trustworthy yourself. Be sure to follow through on tasks and be 100% transparent with your team. This will help you develop a strong culture built on trust and honesty.

4. Annual Meetups Are Important

Working remotely is enjoyable, flexible, and convenient.. However, annual face-to-face time takes on much greater importance in a fully remote environment. At HiringThing, we have a yearly company-wide team meeting. Simple bonding activities, such as cooking together or attending a show or museum, allow us to learn more about one another and establish a deeper connection — things that are difficult in the day-to-day life of a fully remote company. We also take advantage of this time to have company-wide strategy sessions and smaller, cross-departmental breakout sessions. The type of participation engendered by an in-person meeting is invaluable and we carefully plan out our topics far in advance to derive maximum value.

Taking these simple steps will help you develop a strong workplace culture in which employees like working. Time spent investing in the enjoyable element of your organization can show through in your employees’ morale and productivity.

About HiringThing

HiringThing is a modern recruiting and employee onboarding platform as a service that creates seamless talent experiences. Our white label solutions and open API enable HR technology and service providers to offer hiring and onboarding to their clients. Approachable and adaptable, the platform empowers anyone, anywhere to build their dream team.