How to Engage Hybrid Workforce Members

HomeBusinessHow to Engage Hybrid Workforce Members

The last few years have taught business owners and employees alike that not all work needs to be completed on-site. Plenty of tasks are suitable for at-home work. Still, despite this shift online, staff members are also aware of the drawbacks of an entirely remote workforce.

Team-building activities can feel awkward and stifled, and hands-on work with groups is virtually impossible. Further, employees can feel isolated and lonely. As a result, many companies have chosen a hybrid model, allowing employees to work from home a couple or a few days a week. Due to this shift, owners and managers need to find ways to keep their hybrid employees engaged.

Offer Virtual Professional Development Opportunities and Meetings

Some businesses allow employees to work from home but require those same workers to travel to the office whenever there’s a professional development session or a meeting. Learning how to engage hybrid workforce members involves flexibility. In some situations, hybrid meetings can work. However, at a large company, having half of the staff in-person and half online can be distracting. A better solution is to consider professional development opportunities and meetings that are exclusive to virtual spaces. Another possibility is to designate one day a week as a required in-person day. Then, meetings can always be scheduled on that day.

Plan Casual Meeting Opportunities

If employees were on-site, they would likely meet to talk on their breaks or wave hello to other team members on their way out to grab a coffee. Virtual employees often need to establish these social bonds too. Not all online meetings have to be formal.

Team leaders might set up team-building activities, such as virtual trivia, for staff members to create bonds and collaborate. Another option is for managers to have open office hours. The managers can establish an online meeting room for a set hour each week, and employees are free to drop in with questions or chat about any issues they are experiencing.

Establish Regular Schedules

Camaraderie in a work environment is essential. Colleagues talk through ideas for new projects, struggles with sales, and challenging situations with clients together. When employees are not consistently seeing the same individuals on the job, however, the development of these relationships can be suffocated.

A way to combat this issue is to create a schedule that allows employees to work at home on the same days each week. The exact way to plan the schedule depends on the work environment and the hands-on labor involved. One idea is to have a few cohorts of employees. Each cohort will be required to come to the office the same two or three days per week.

Set Work Hours

Flexibility comes with both benefits and drawbacks. Employees can feel empowered when they have the ability to work at a time that suits them; however, sending emails in the middle of the night and completing projects before dawn can hinder the company’s operations. These actions also make it difficult for employees to interact with on-site team members.

Setting specific work hours is a way to keep hybrid employees engaged on their virtual days. Managers can let employees know that specific projects need to be completed by a set time. The company can also use a timekeeping system that allows staff members to log in and out at designated times.

Consider Timezone Differences

In many cases, hybrid employees live in the timezone where the job is located. However, some employees do not. If workers have to come into the office only once a month or less, they may live elsewhere. Managers should be aware of these timezone differences when planning required meetings and training sessions. While asking the entire staff to accommodate one employee who lives in a distant timezone is unreasonable, starting the meeting a little later in the morning so that hybrid employees can attend is a practical solution.

Check In

Virtual employees can feel as though they are disconnected from the rest of the business. While managers should not be sending constant emails throughout the day to see how these employees are doing, checking in once in a while reminds staff members that they are part of the team. Virtual employees might have questions that they feel hesitant about asking for fear of looking foolish. An email from a boss inviting questions can diminish these feelings of inadequacy and increase overall productivity.

Send Regular Updates

In addition to seeing how individual employees are doing, managers and bosses should also send regular updates about what’s happening at the job location. Without these updates, at-home employees can start to feel out of the loop and as though they aren’t as much a part of the team as they used to be. The frequency of those updates depends on the business and how regularly new information is available. One idea is for each manager to send out a newsletter to their team weekly or biweekly to keep everyone up to speed on what’s happening.

Ask for Feedback

For many companies, a hybrid model is still relatively new. There are going to be obstacles that arise and problematic situations in need of resolution. Managers should ask for employee feedback. This feedback could come in the form of an anonymous survey. Individual meetings can work, too, though employees may not be honest about any frustrations or concerns that they have with the new hybrid model. Taking a survey about issues doesn’t mean that the business owner has to resolve all of the complaints, but this strategy does assist in the revelation of the recurring problems.

The world of work is evolving rapidly, especially when it comes to hybrid employment models. Allowing employees to work from home has several benefits for the staff members and the business itself. However, this model can also come with issues, such as a lack of engagement for employees on days when they work from home. Managers can harness some strategies to make all employees realize they are essential parts of the team.

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