How to drive employee engagement in a hybrid working environment

After what can only be described as a difficult 2 years, we now live (for the most part) in a hybrid working environment. However, this distance from a central working environment can make it hard to keep your employees engaged unless approached strategically.

A Catalyst study found that well-supported remote work can lead to less burnout, more innovation and greater commitment alongside making your team feel valued and supported. So how do you make sure your team is supported?

Often, small things like saying thank you and giving praise when earned can be powerful drivers of employee engagement. Showing that you value your people and want to help them to achieve their professional and personal goals is key to keeping motivation high within the organisation.

Making your team feel valued and supported can be challenging though in a more dynamic work environment when you are managing both at-home workers and in-office workers. Utilising technology can be a great enabler of positive work culture. Used wisely, it can do 3 core things…

1. Bring teams closer together with technology
2. Enable access to mentors, information, and learning
3. Highlight your team’s wants and needs

Bring teams closer together with technology

Utilising collaboration tools to bring your team together is vital when working hybrid. The likes of video conferencing platforms were the saviour of most businesses in the early pandemic, and there are now even more collaboration tools that can be used by your team to bring them together. Here are just a few of our favourites:

• Microsoft Office 365 (including Teams) – Collaboration and Productivity
• Asana – Task Collaboration and Project Management
• OneDrive – Storing and sharing files
• People Insight – Employee Experience Platform
• Salesforce – CRM System

Enable access to mentors, information, and learning

Professional development should always be central to your employee experience. Investing in your employees so that they are well equipped to do their jobs to meet your customers’ needs can only benefit you and your team.

Ensuring that your remote workers have the same access to development opportunities as their in-office colleagues can help them to help you. Allow them to progress their careers, skills and experience no matter where they are based – instead of becoming the forgotten remote workers.

When you have adopted a hybrid working environment it’s easy to miss out on regular 1-2-1 catch-ups with your staff members, and it’s harder to keep track of their daily efforts and training and development within their role. Ensuring your home workers have access to virtual and in-person training, and apps allow your team to connect with senior colleagues at any time for help!

Here are some helpful apps for mentoring, information and learning:

• Microsoft Teams – Online video chat, messaging and calls.
• Microsoft Office – Collaboration Tools
• Zoom – Video platform
• Outlook – Email provider
• HubSpot – Free learning courses
• Future Learn – Paid and free courses

Highlight your team’s wants and needs

The happier your employees are, the happier your customers become. According to Slack, 29% of UK workers are planning a career change in 2022.

It’s hard when working in a hybrid working environment to stay on top of your team’s wants and needs. We can all agree that when working in an office it’s easier to have regular contact and wants and needs are voiced regularly and quickly. When working from home, it’s harder to stay in touch with your whole team and their needs often become forgotten about or don’t get voiced. Perhaps some staff feel that they struggle to voice their problems or opinions whilst at home and at times they can maybe come across in the wrong way over email.

It’s important that managers know where their team is excelling and where individuals or whole teams need help to be at their best. Tools like People Insight and Qualtrics, provide great insights into staff workloads and skills gaps, as well as overall team dynamics and areas of friction or inefficiency. Having this data allows you and your senior team to take action to balance workloads, find training for individual members or improve their processes.

Want to improve your customer experience by optimising your employee experience? Contact Challenger today!