Why Zoom happy hours don’t work (But what can)
When I worked at Intel, we used to have an urban legend that if you want to close something with the CEO, you should ambush her on her way to the toilet in the corridor. You have probably heard, “Oh, great that I’m bumping into you,” said in the office a gazillion times, where you close an open work issue or just say hi to a friend from a different team you haven’t seen for a while.
You could have easily bobbed your head up to see who was free or who was available for lunch or a coffee break in the past. Work wasn’t just about work, it was having some fun with your colleagues as part of your work life, and it was good.
Since the pandemic hit the world, we all went remote in one second, and most organizations tried to mimic the day-to-day schedule that we had in the virtual world. I don’t think that works at all.
So many great things came from going Remote. You didn’t need to commute; your office could be at home or around it via Codi. According to Chris Herd, founder of Firstbase, the average person gained one year of full-time ‘work’ on top of their job by avoiding commuting every day to the office.
Remote made us more efficient and gave us more leisure time, but missing the office life and organization culture is still there, and we need to fix that. It has been a year since “home” became the melting pot for our roles that used to be spread throughout the day. Pre-COVID, there was a clear line between work and home. Not anymore.
The “new normal” isn’t new anymore, and the things that make it most challenging for employees to work from home aren’t changing. Children return home from school (when they don’t have unpredictable closures due to COVID) and play in the same room the parents are working in from home. And if you happen not to have kids at home with you, then your roommates are probably around much more than they used to be, as they, too, work from home now. Home is not what it used to be.
Coming from an HR background, I’ve seen it all — the nitty-gritty of what makes teams and individuals both fail and thrive. The latter is always the end goal. The landscape for how this is done in the workplace has wholly shifted due to COVID. Companies’ methods for doing so need to pivot as well. Remote is here to stay at some capacity — now it’s evident, and we have to ramp up the way we address building the vibe and culture pronto.
As an entrepreneur, the idea of changing it up excites me, especially if it’s a guaranteed value add. As a serial investor, I like to think about employee wellness as an investment in and of itself — because that’s precisely what is.
A company expecting to thrive economically while its workforce suffers is paradoxical at best, draconian at worst. So, what are businesses doing to accommodate and thus retain their workforce? The moment for empathetic “I get you, and I see you” comradeship has passed. Now it’s time for action and concrete solutions.
Zoom happy hour once a week or a goody bag sent to the employee’s home once a quarter is not enough. An employee’s time is of extreme value and thus needs to be handled wisely. A company should be aiming to be the sage of its employees’ wellness because happier employees are higher performers. Again, think about the return on investment here. Implement new steps to ensure they feel valued and seen. Here’s a crazy thought — ask them what they need to make working in this type of chaos manageable.
Companies need to be creative and inventive to increase empathy and comradeship in the (virtual) workplace, without people having physical access to each other. The solutions should be organically applied to the established working hours, with the occasional after-hours option — not a must.
A feasible solution is a technology that gives employees the feeling of connectedness, which then filters into an increased connection to their job and the company itself.
What worked in the physical world is not directly transferable to the virtual one.
Ultimately, the add-on to the current way of doing things needs to consist of multiple factors: the tech needs to provide entertaining, dynamic ways for employees to interact when everyone is present, or alternatively, to participate at their convenience asynchronously. It needs to offer the option for folks to break out and interact independently from the larger group, and it needs to provide options other than Zoom happy hours as a way for employees to enjoy their time together casually. It’s not just about the space but rather the activity and the content offered.
What do you think? I would love to hear your take with this short survey.
