When you have a hybrid team, some of your team works in the office, some work from home, and some work who-knows-where depending on the day. That can make it hard to create a cohesive team. It isn’t that the team intentionally doesn’t want to work with people who don’t share their workspace, or that managers mean to exclude certain people from team tasks. But whether or not … [Read more...]
Effective Brainstorming Across Distance
One of the most common complaints about working on a virtual or hybrid team is, “People can’t brainstorm and collaborate the way they do in the office.” For many teams, this is a critical issue because the whole point of being in teams is to create a sum that’s greater than all of the talented parts. Can you brainstorm, share ideas, and innovate even if you aren’t locked in … [Read more...]
How Do You Define Your Team?
by Kevin Eikenberry It seems like a pretty simple question – how do you define your team? Most leaders would immediately describe or list their direct reports. Most teammates would list their immediate co-workers. Then ask people to think about their working relationships and they will think about that same list of people – the people on “their team." That is … [Read more...]
Inventing Fire and Getting People to Use Teams
Humans have a love-hate relationship with technology. We curse the need to be tethered to email and Slack for work while not being able to avoid our personal screens for more than a few minutes at a time. Everyone complains about the tools they have at their disposal, but shudder at the thought of learning even one more software package or remembering another password. As we … [Read more...]
Culture is THE Thing
by Kevin Eikenberry You don’t have to go far or read very widely today to find people talking about the future of the workplace – and if there will be a collective “place” at all. Those reading this are likely not all in the same place with their personal thoughts and feelings about this future, or their specific reality. To simplify, you largely fall into one of two big … [Read more...]