Keeping company culture and productivity strong while remote working
April 16, 2020
The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has triggered a completely unprecedented way of working for many companies across the world – including eNett. With remote working the ‘new normal’ for most of us, it’s important to ensure employees feel empowered to keep operating at the same high level as before. This means they need the right tools on hand to remain productive, whilst maintaining a strong sense of company culture to keep morale and motivation boosted.
So, how can companies achieve this? Here are just a few things you could consider:
- Ensure productivity remains a priority – As always, our customers are our number one priority, and working from home hasn’t changed this. Our teams are hosting virtual stand-ups to help maintain everyone’s focus on the projects they’re working on and make sure all teams are co-ordinated. This activity is paying off for us. Throughout the prolonged period of remote working, we’re still upholding the same level of experience our customers are used to – such as producing new IT releases every fortnight. We’re working hard to ensure that no project is put on hold because we’re not physically in the office.
- Keep office traditions going – We’re keeping up with all our regular meetings and Town-Halls through various online channels. This includes frequent one-to-one catch ups with managers, coffee sessions with our leadership team and functional ‘work in progress’ meetings to make sure that we continue to deliver against projects, despite disruption to our usual business practices. Our CSR programme ‘Repay the eNett Way’ is also continuing apace, with the team becoming creative by moving various fundraising initiatives to an online format, such as bingo sessions and ‘Guess-who’ games, to keep raising funds for our next initiative. Employee engagement is integral to customer experience, so keeping our usual office activities going are a win for everyone.
- Take socials virtual – We want to make sure our hard work is complemented by our strong sense of teamwork and a great company culture. So, our employees are encouraged to continue with regular social events such as weekly trivia session and team drinks, now held via Zoom and Microsoft Teams. Additionally, we’ve started hosting online group fitness sessions and encouraging the team to keep in touch with each other as much as possible. Ultimately, if we’re feeling happy and supported in our work, this translates to higher productivity and a greater experience for our customers.
- Set yourself personal goals – It’s also important to put time aside for ourselves as individuals, whether that’s setting a personal goal or just making time for the things we enjoy. I’ve set myself a target of working-out twice a day and undertaking intermittent fasting to boost my health. Having something to work towards helps to break up the day. I’ve also seen people learning to play piano and a new language.
Whilst we are certainly living in uncertain times, it is possible to create a sense of normality for your teams. For me, this comes down to employee experience. Making sure our teams are set up with the right tools to communicate properly whilst having the structure and support they need to keep productivity high is crucial. It’s also important that they still enjoy their roles, which means making sure the lighter-hearted initiatives that help cement our company culture, remain.
Ultimately, if employees feel happy and supported, this underpins their ability to deliver to an amazing experience for our customers – even in the face of remote working.
This list isn’t by any measure expansive, but we hope it helps inspire your business. We wish you well from everyone at #teameNett
Anthony Hynes, MD and CEO, eNett International
ENDS
