Workplace Culture: Developing a Productive Company Culture in a Remote Environment

Originally published in 2022 for SSON/WorkX

In the wake of the pandemic, remote work proved productive and profitable, forcing companies across the globe to contemplate how, when and if it is even necessary for their knowledge workers to resume regular in-office hours. Today, employees' priorities have shifted from wanting better pay, benefits, and employee contracts to well-being, flexibility, and work-life balance.

As we ride the storm of The Great Resignation and enter a new era of Quiet Quitting, Microsoft declared that 55% of employees state that their work environment plays a significant role in their decision to either switch jobs or return to the office. One thing is sure, though: the consensus to resist a return to life before the pandemic is non-negotiable.

Although the concerns of employees today appear to be a new phenomenon, research shows that employee wellness, flexibility, and balance have long been desired. Before the pandemic, only the most forward-thinking companies embraced what the pandemic forced all companies to consider; today, leaders are crystalizing a latent desire for working freedom while leveraging business success.

According to a survey by Owl Labs, remote workers are more productive due to the removal of the commute, in-office small talk, and distractions. They also harbour a better quality of life by allowing more time for family, friends, and physical activity. Surveyed to be 22% happier than on-site workers and staying in their jobs longer, remote workers report having less stress, more focus, and clock in 43% more working hours per week.

Pros and cons

Remote work does not come without its challenges. The traditional office and the work-from-home landscape have virtues and failings that fall outside the realm of hitting targets and completing deadlines. "Work is more than getting tasks done," says Brian J. Esposito, CEO & Founder of Esposito Intellectual Enterprises. "It's about employees feeling good about what they do, valued in the workplace, and participating to keep the company and project moving in a positive, growth motion."

• The virtues of a traditional office

Going ‘to the office’ provides a working day structure, routine and social interaction. For some, the office is the only opportunity to socialize with others (particularly with adults if they have children) and allows staff to identify, bond with, and trust their employer. Such feelings develop between employees from face-to-face interactions, observing how their colleagues work and interact with each other, and via informal, often creative, peer-to-peer learning.

• The failings of a traditional office

Pre-2020, offices were compact, noisy, and occasionally riddled with office politics, which led to unproductive atmospheres where output quality and quantity were compromised - both individually and collectively. In addition, the small space proximity bred seasonal coughs, colds, and cases of flu resulting in absences and poor morale. Commuting bled into time spent working and increased anxiety which also cut into time that would otherwise be spent fulfilling other passions and hobbies. The lack of privacy also made more introverted employees uncomfortable, increasing their stress and feelings of pressure.

• The virtues of a remote work

A dedicated, well-equipped workspace can provide a productive space without interruptions, promotes flexibility, better time management, and tardiness, reduces absenteeism, decreases turnover, promotes cost savings, and contributes to a better work-life balance.

• The failings of remote work

Remote working requires trust, good processes, excellent management, and discipline. Without structure and routine, many workers soon find themselves overworked, stressed, and unable to “switch off” from work. Depending on the employee's home life, they may experience more distractions from children and childcare issues, to housework and partners.

Facing reality: the challenges of working from home

Many companies are overly focused on technology and not enough on the process. Unfortunately, this writes a recipe for disaster and is akin to a sports team buying better equipment to improve their performance. Such adjustments may result in minor improvements, but real change requires a return to fundamentals; communication, coordination, and culture.

Finding and forging aligned cultures in an entirely remote office

Pre-pandemic, Andrew Zuckerman, VP at Rentable, explained that the company began as a start-up with 30 employees working from one office. Post-pandemic, the company has grown to 110 people working across 31 states and has no plans to return to the office and instead continue forward entirely remotely.

“Working remotely has enabled staff to explore other things that are important to them,” says Zuckerman. Because of this opportunity, many employees moved to different states as traditional geographic constraints became obsolete. With no intention to return to the office, Rentable shifted priority to caring less about when the work gets done to how the work gets done. Instead of measuring how long their staff sat at their desks, they now focus KPIs on ensuring employees hit their deadlines and work is of high quality.

Andrew explained that his biggest challenge is finding a process where ‘Old Blood’ employees, who previously worked and connected face-to-face in the office, can relate to and connect with ‘New Blood’ colleagues they have never met. Legacy employees who previously worked in-office have direct, in-person connections to leadership and are already ingrained within the company and aligned with its values before switching to remote operations. Recreating those fair and equitable experiences to new employees is almost impossible when done remotely.

To mimic in-office relationships and enhance remote culture engagement, Rentable has prioritized resource management to support company-wide in-person events, which include annual off-sites, team-building activities, and quarterly team meetings. On a micro level, they have invested in technology tools, such as Breakout rooms to quiz each other and Donut, a slack integration tool that randomly connects three people throughout the company. The video call occurs every Thursday at 11 a.m., and employees are encouraged to talk anything non-work related. The half-hour call encourages employees to get to know their teammates more personally, enhances communication and collaboration, and recreates those in-office moments of passing someone in the hallway or at the coffee machine.

Finding and forging aligned cultures in an hybrid environment

Razia Ferdousi-Meyer, Head of Workplace and Employee Experience at Thirty Madison, says that since 2021, employees have become increasingly comfortable working flexibly. The challenge, however, lies in connecting employees and maintaining great employee experiences within a dispersed workforce. Many employees are located across the country with clusters in warehouses, others in remote centers, many working from home, and more in the New York headquarters. However, the key to maintaining employee satisfaction is simple, says Meyer: it’s all about giving employees the power of choice.

Meyer believes that when you afford people the choice, they will take pride in their decision and work positively and proactively to prove they made the right call. However, maintaining cohesiveness and connection between a scattered workforce is challenging. In response, Thirty Madison takes pride in hosting events to bring staff together simultaneously physically and virtually.

From seasonal parties and contests, such as the upcoming Halloween costume competitions, to summertime picnics, in-person and remote staff are encouraged to participate in whatever capacity they can by turning up physically for a few hours or logging on to the Zoom call displayed on a big screen. Such events help to develop and maintain a united company culture, strong team morale, and a sense of community among the workforce.

More than only celebrating good times, Meyer explained that staff take pride in fulfilling purposeful community service - “and not only during Christmas.” She explains that remote workers are in prime positions across the country to work together with their employer and become cultural ambassadors of causes that are important to them. The company takes great pleasure in supporting their employees in purposeful endeavors that matter to their staff.

Data makes the world go round

Data has empowered companies to understand their staff better and find ways to get the best out of them. Razia Ferdousi-Meyer, uses data to inform processes and ensure that the right people are fulfilling the right roles. Brian Esposito, Founder of Esposito Intellectual Enterprises, LLC (EIE), uses data to determine employee rewards and ensure his staff feel valued, and Megan Bickle, Global Head of Culture, Employee Engagement and Employee Listening at Western Digital, says that employee listening is a cornerstone of their people strategy and utilizing data helps to understand their employees' experiences at a more granular level.

However, collecting the data is only the first part. Finding valuable insights drives change and improvement. Through qualitative data collection and quarterly surveys, Zuckerman identified optimized working hours by finding downtimes where staff were struggling to find motivation and times they were peaking. From the data, Zuckerman concluded that Monday mornings and Friday afternoons were most difficult for employees to feel engaged. In contrast, employees stated that Tuesday mornings typically proved most energizing. Before the data collection, team meetings occurred on Mondays and Fridays during dips in productivity. In response, they chose to capture peak energy moments and rescheduled calls to double down on that engagement and productivity.

Esposito explained that people need to be happy, valued and rewarded to perform - but that can only happen by “properly collecting real, genuine, non-bias data from the ground up." He continues, "leadership cannot assume that happiness derives from salary or compensation. There are many factors that determine job satisfaction." Utilizing data, Esposito says, is crucial to ensure that the right people and skill sets are in the right roles within the company or project. "Someone can not feel their best if they are applying their very valuable time to a job, project, or task that is not attached to their skillset, heart, or passion.”

Onboarding and engaging remote workers

The data has revealed that remote onboarding is unable to replicate in-person induction. Over the last two years, remote employee networks have shrunk significantly, and the learning curve has extended when compared to their onsite associates. The opportunity for remote employees to connect with anyone outside of their immediate team is sacrificed and, as a consequence, lack a deeper understanding of the work and company.

While remote onboarding gives employees the rulebook of standard operating procedures, it lacks the nuanced know-how traditionally absorbed from colleagues and co-workers. Without traditional in-office initiation rituals that naturally ingrain company culture, from team lunches to the ability to watch others around the office and make friends through happenstance, companies must now establish new processes to engage remote employees virtually.

Meyer says that Thirty Madison’s onboarding team “is doing a fantastic job” through collecting trial and error data. In accordance with the feedback, the department decided to reduce onboarding days from five days to one and now require all new employees to fulfill their first day remotely. During this time, employees learn about the company, the locations, benefits and culture - a stark contrast to pre-pandemic in-office onboarding.

However, Esposito expressed the difficulty team leaders have in motivating and remaining accountable when onboarding new staff, “getting employees to understand, connect with, and contribute to the company and its culture is almost impossible,” he says. “Staff need to be in it to experience everything, and interact with fellow teammates, management, and clients. Without that, we can’t reach their full potential.” In response, EIE anticipates the implementation of the metaverse and other virtual reality experiences to help bridge the gap and inspire the remote worker. “It’s not simply about getting the task done and hitting expectations.”

Zuckerman explained that at Rentable, teaching people about the business and its culture during onboarding is more important than worrying about getting staff set up with their computer or making sales. Aiming to recreate in-office moments without forcing staff to be sat on a Zoom call day, Rentable introduced a program called ‘the first 30 days of onboarding.’ Here, each new employee is assigned a buddy who acts as their confidant, guide, and mentor and provides a soundboard to question company norms without pressure. “We want our employees to walk away from their first day, week, and month thinking they made the right choice by joining Rentable and confident in the company. We take pride in our welcome meetings and explaining what it’s like to work at Rentable, because connecting people to the business is important to us.”

While there is currently no one-size-fits-all approach, Bickle believes there is ample opportunity within HR teams to redesign nearly every element of the employee experience amid the evolution of remote and hybrid work. “The biggest challenge with onboarding remote employees is striking the right balance between the operational aspects of starting a new job and welcoming employees into our culture. While the HR function supports the official new employee orientation, there is a lack of consistency for the employee experience after they depart the workshop to when their manager welcomes them,” she explains. Whichever direction companies choose to take their onboarding processes will be a matter of trial and error until they’ve found what works best for them. The reality is that remote working is here to stay - so companies will fail if they bury their heads in the sand and presume they can continue as they once did in a pre-pandemic world.

The secret ingredient

In reality, we transformed into an entirely new way of working overnight. Sadly, the pace at which we converted to remote work left us bereft of solid foundational principles, practices, and expectations. Navigating the rough seas of change has led to each company interpreting its own standards and therefore relying heavily on exceptional management to encourage, supervise and maintain staff motivation. While many have rung the alarm bells on remote work and subsequently rushed workers back to the office in hopes of side-stepping the root cause of the problem, they find themselves trapped in a middle-ground and failing to get the best of either world.

Not constrained by geographical barriers, remote-only businesses have access to the best talent from anywhere around the world. When managed well, they have motivated, driven employers who take pride in their work and exercise a balanced work-life. They look forward to productive team meetings, exciting off-site events and forge friendships with people they would previously have never met. However, this euphoric picture can only be painted with well-formulated processes, excellent management, and innovative tools.

Conclusion

Flexibility, freedom and balance are the new hallmarks of work life. Signaling the beginning of a new era, remote work presents enormous benefits for companies and employees financially, emotionally, and with increased productivity. Businesses operating with pre-pandemic expectations are no longer welcome, and the new generation of workers will cease to accept stringent cultures that fail to put their wellness first. Today, employers have an opportunity and obligation to adhere to new demands - but it’s not a simple translation from in-person to virtual. New processes, innovation, technology and mindset shifts are needed today - but this can only be achieved through great management who consistently create a dynamic, enjoyable, purposeful culture from the very top of the hierarchy all the way down to internships. So we ask our readers: where will you take your company next, and who and what tools will you invest in to keep up with and excel during revolutionary times?

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