The arrival of COVID-19 has heralded a change of policies and settings of the world, as it continued to spread, the abrupt decision to work from home was made by businesses. Since then, all of us are hustling and thriving through our laptop screens taking water-cooler brakes on WhatsApp chats.
We all had got the hang of hybrid structure but now with Omicron, we are all forced back to go back to work from home. While working from home brought us a touch of freedom, it can also give a sense of loneliness. Fortunately, advanced technology gives us the capacity to fight the feeling of loneliness.
The sense of loneliness-dark side from lack of interaction even affects the efficiency. Connecting with your co-workers becomes so vital to not only survive but to stay updated. Here are a few ways to build and sustain connections with your co-workers.
Keep In Touch
Even the experienced employees find it tough to maintain remote relationships and it becomes a whole new ballgame for the freshers or the newbies joining new businesses. Communicating often for questions, feedback, schedules and even successes is a key to work relationships.
Staying in touch throughout, having lively conversations, replying to everyone, making groups, reacting with emojis are a few tools to revitalize the relationships. Schedule a meeting for professional and non-professional discussions every day helps you regain off-hand conversations that were lost. In this unprecedented pandemic, the feeling of staying connected with frequent check-ins and support is very helpful as we never know how this pandemic is affecting everyone, individually.
Non-Work Activities
Just because there are no coffee or tea hangouts, doesn’t mean those can’t be planned virtually. Arranging non-work activities once a week and chitchat sessions of a few minutes where one doesn’t talk about, what happened in the meeting, but talk about, let’s say- which cuisine is spicier makes everyone talk their heart out.
Anyways you are definitely going to caffeinate yourself why not make use of it. A few games and team activities for smooth connections especially for the new employee is crucial makes the team very flexible. Pizza parties and card games have never ‘not been a hit’. Giving informal introductions, communicating with your new co-worker, and being the hype person for them gives the feeling of companionship and helps in bonding and engagement.
Video Connections
Aren’t there times when you give a presentation and it feels like you are talking to a bunch of laptop screens? We can try making video connections with co-workers, while on a formal or informal meeting, having face-to-face conversations play an extensive role in not losing the non-verbal cues.
You can always look at your boss’s face and figure out if that was a non-scolding look, but we tend to lose a few cues through emails and chats. Even working on a small group video chat increases efficiency, because it creates the traditional- working together feeling and nobody hates hearing someone they know, it makes you work ardently and becomes a mood booster.
We are spending more hours in the office virtually than anywhere else, and having dead connections with co-workers doesn’t help at all. Your co-workers are in the same boat as you, and everybody has their own expertise and knowledge. Being connected to various people helps you gain a lot of knowledge, feedback and guidance on distinct work and non-work linked matters. Almost all of us spend most of the time working, so why not make it fun by staying in touch and getting connected with our peers. Don’t make the virus win over the good-being ole connection. Don’t let the distance create disconnection at work.
Have more thoughts? We’d love to hear them and add more to this list. Reach out to us on FableStreet.
