How To Build Culture In A Hybrid Work Environment

One thing about the future of work is clear: hybrid work environments will remain the norm for organizations and enterprises of all sizes and across all niches for the foreseeable future.

While many organizations have implemented a blend of remote and in-person work, decision-makers in other workplaces feel fright and trepidation about it.

Employers are worried about the lack of insight into worker activity, new security risks, difficulties in team building, and the challenges of creating a sustainable hybrid work culture for a divided team.

It takes intentionality to build a robust company culture for an organization with remote and hybrid teams. The right technology and tools can enable this to a certain extent, but it is essential first to understand what great culture means to you and then use the right resources to achieve that goal.

Let's figure out what that means for your organization.

Understanding Work Culture & What It Means In Your Unique Context

Workplace culture is a mix of beliefs, behaviors, and attitudes that make up the familiar atmosphere in a work environment. Healthy work cultures align company policies and employee behaviors with organizational goals while ensuring the well-being of workers.

This is important because it affects how your people (employees and clients alike) perceive you, which ultimately determines the success of your endeavor. Evidence suggests that when work cultures in a hybrid work environment are effective, companies can see improved:

• Stock price
• Employee retention
• Revenue growth
• ROIs (return on investments)
• Net income
• ROS (return on sales)

When employees feel a sense of belonging to a team or organization, they are more likely to perform better and feel engaged and motivated, which in turn helps companies reap substantial bottom-line benefits.

Believe it or not, businesses with a solid hybrid work culture achieve a 3x higher return to shareholders.

On the other hand, 70% of business transformations fail due to people and culture-related challenges. Not to mention, a lack of sense of belonging at work increases the risks of underperformance, alienation, and burnout.

A strong workplace culture encourages employees to contribute new ideas, provide feedback and help improve and optimize processes. This leads to enhanced efficiency, innovation, and new ideas, which can help scale your business even in the increasingly competitive market.

But hybrid teams are physically distanced and often work without in-person interactions, so typical team-building exercises don't work in this context. However, building a hybrid workspace culture can still happen organically. It just requires some deliberate and proactive effort to shape up.

Here's how you do it right.

4 Killer Tips To Build A Positive Culture In A Hybrid Work Environment

Although there can be several challenges in hybrid work, the most common ones include a lack of proper tools to be more productive, impaired relationships and collaboration, disrupted processes, and feeling disconnected from company culture.

So, when building a strong company culture for your hybrid teams, rethink all processes from onboarding to project management. Do everything with your employees in mind and implement these four practical ideas to build a positive culture in a hybrid work environment:

1.    Strong Mission – Unify Your Teams At Work

According to one report, 79% of people consider company culture, mission, and purpose before applying to work there.

A shared, strong purpose is crucial to company performance; it will become more so in a hybrid work environment. A strong mission statement gives meaning to your people's efforts at work and helps improve employee engagement. Also, it guides teams and workforces in the right direction, driving business growth.

Also, promote your company mission to every employee, especially new ones and teams. Remind them how their efforts contribute to the organization’s mission.

Moreover, you can feature company values in any marketing collateral or discuss them in routine team meetings. Utilize your values and mission to drive business strategy and growth.

2.    Use An Automation Tool For Office Administration

Office automation tools help teams, managers, and admins keep the office running efficiently and more productively.

If you get frequent visitors, it would be wrong to expect your receptionist to welcome everybody during the COVID-19 pandemic. In a hybrid setup, receptionists are mostly away from the office, like other employees.

Instead, you can use a paperless, interactive, and modern visitor management system to interact with visitors and provide a seamless experience regardless of in-person staffing.

The software has various features for using check-in kiosks, such as visitor badges and photos, capturing signatures, scanning driver licenses, and sending real-time reception notifications.

In short, this touchless system provides the much-needed control your team needs and the peace visitors deserve.

3.    Plan Social Events

Allow employees to build and strengthen relationships in the workplace. Bonding with coworkers increases collaboration, job satisfaction, and productivity.

Company or work social events promote increased productivity and employee engagement.

• For global and international teams, plan virtual company events that all can attend
• Host team-building events and off-site excursions your employees love to attend
• Establish volunteer activities for your employees to attend during working hours

In addition, you can survey your employees and teams to know what types of company social events they want. When planning an event, let your employees know you value them and integrate their input.

4.    Create Transparency

One report suggests that transparency helps improve work culture and employee engagement. Employees who have more visibility into business operations feel valued and become loyal to your company.

When it comes to a hybrid work environment, companies can nurture transparency through a tech stack. Here are a few ideas to get started:

• Employ digital workflows so teams can see progress and impediments in projects
• Establish an employee communication network in which leaders and employees can freely share and give feedback on company updates and news
• Use videotelephony (video conferencing) tools to host meetings and give check-ins and updates
• Set up digital repositories for items such as training materials, employee resources, past projects, and performance reviews

Be active in offering teams and employees what they require to succeed in a hybrid work environment. This can eliminate employee frustration, save time and effort, and improve productivity.

Conclusion

Building a high-performing team relies on the hybrid model you create, the company culture you make, and the collaboration and relationships you create.

Looking for a way to retain your best talent? Provide your team and employees with an effective digital HQ to meet their needs and increase productivity.