Suddenly everyone is at home and having to learn quickly how to handle remote working. Here @data4sdgs we’ve been doing it for years. This is what we’ve learned, and our top tips:
#COVID2019 #covid19 #StaySafeStayHome (1/12)
#COVID2019 #covid19 #StaySafeStayHome (1/12)
@Data4SDGs Say good morning every day. We’ve set up a slack channel called ‘good morning’. As we start work, we put down a few sentences on what we’ll be mostly doing that day. It’s been great to build a sense of working together even if we are 1000s of miles apart. (2/12)
Meet weekly. We have a weekly team call, which is much more often than the usual team meeting, but it’s important to hear from everyone at least once a week to keep in touch. Managers also have weekly 1-1s with their direct reports, for the same reason. (3/12)
Chair meetings! If all your meetings are on virtual platforms (we love Zoom!), they MUST be chaired well. People must mute when they aren’t speaking, and the chair must be alert for people raising their hands or coming off mute if they want to speak. And be brief! (4/12)
Good chairing is so important that it’s worth making sure that everyone learns those vital skills. We have a different person chairing our team meeting every week, and it’s been lovely to see everyone developing confidence and their own style. (5/12)
Use Whatsapp. As well as slack, which we use mainly for work things, we have a team whatsapp group which we use for more informal chats and sharing links. People seem more comfortable using Whatsapp informally, so it works well to separate the two. (6/12)
Culture matters. We have strong team values, focused on being kind and open, which are frequently reinforced in our meetings. It means people don’t take offence if emails seem a bit curt, or calls aren’t returned because we trust each other to have the best intentions. (7/12)
Meet in person when you can. If remote working is the new normal, it’s still important to meet up sometimes. We have an annual in-person team retreat where we combine planning with a year’s worth of after-work socializing! (8/12)
A few things haven’t worked so well. We tried having ‘virtual lunches’ where we gathered virtually to chat about non-work things. We found that the conversation was a bit slow and stilted, even though we are always very relaxed when we meet in person, so we dropped them. (9/12)
We also tried to have a system of ‘weekly bullets’, getting everyone to set out their priorities for the week, as well as the ‘good morning’ slack channel – that was overkill, and we retired the bullets as slack worked better. (10/12)
Two last things: 1. Remote working is great! We’ve always hired the best people, wherever they are based, because we know that remote working works. So we’ve built the absolute best team we could, with the added benefit of perspectives and contacts from all over the world (11/12)
2. Be adaptive. We’re constantly assessing and changing our approach, as we learn and as the team grows and changes. What works this month might not work next month, so you’ll definitely be changing your mind about how to do this as the weeks go on. Good luck! (12/12)
@Data4SDGs @threadreaderapp unroll please
@BonnieKoenig
@BonnieKoenig
