As organizations increasingly employ remote workers, successful managers must adjust work processes, both large and small, to ensure that remote employees feel connected. Even a staple such as the staff meeting should be revisited so team members who aren’t sitting around the same table still have the opportunity to build relationships with their leaders and their peers.
Whether attendees join virtual staff meetings by phone, Web cam, Web service, or some combination, the nature of the interaction is inherently different from face-to-face. We all have experienced the less personal nature of communication during virtual meetings. Without the benefit of nonverbal signals, attendees may talk over each other or not participate at all to avoid interrupting.
Taking into consideration this often-stilted interaction, how can leaders encourage team members to engage during virtual staff meetings? Typically, the common denominator is that everyone has an audio connection. A savvy leader can capitalize on that by incorporating activities that rely on auditory instruction. Such activities easily allow virtual team members to share experiences that will contribute to a stronger sense of team.
Below, I describe three types of audio-based activities, along with examples, resources, and potential pitfalls. Each activity should take about 10 to 15 minutes, depending on the number of attendees. Select the games based on your audience. Start with the simple ones, such as Ask a Question, and then determine if you should move on to the more involved categories.
In addition to the activities described here, you can lead purely audio activities such as “Name That Tune,” where the leader plays pre-selected clips of songs and asks attendees to identify them. The same can be done with movie clips, where attendees guess the movie or the actor who is speaking.
TYPES OF ACTIVITIES
1. Ask a Question: Each attendee answers an intriguing question the leader has sent out in advance. (Having the question in advance allows attendees to prepare a level of information they are comfortable sharing.) At the start of the meeting, after the leader identifies everyone on the call, each attendee says hello and then answers the question. The leader can go first or last; going first allows the leader to provide a gauge for attendees’ responses.
Examples:
- Complete this sentence: “If I ruled the world, I would __.”
- What is the temperature where you are today (or in your hometown)?
- If you could live in any historical building for a year, which one would it be?
- If you could host a TV show, what kind of show would you have?
Resources:
- Table Topics conversation-starting cards
- Chat Pack box of cards from The Question Guys
- Children’s quiz card games
Potential pitfalls:
- Stay away from questions involving money, such as “If you had a million dollars, what would you do?” You are probably not aware of employees’ financial situations.
- Avoid questions that could go in a serious or negative direction, such as, “If you could have dinner with anyone living or dead…”
2. Construct Something: Lead attendees in creating a simple object, requiring actions from a few folds to cutting and gluing. Distribute needed materials in one of two ways:
- E-mail a PDF to attendees if the activity requires a printout.
- If the activity requires other materials, mail the ones you easily can, then give remote team members a heads up that they will need to provide supplies such as scissors or glue.
Examples:
- Paper Pizza—Cut a triangle from a brown paper bag to represent the puzzle slice. Then, from magazine photos, cut out and glue on the shapes of pizza toppings: bits of white for onions, green for green peppers, yellow for cheese strands, black for olives.
- Paper Fortune Teller—Also known by its grade-school name of “cootie catcher,” modify an online template to include categories and answers relevant to attendees.
- A visual puzzle features two racehorses and two jockeys. To solve it, you have to fold the paper so the jockey appears to be riding on the horse; you cannot cut it.
- Cut a 4” x 6” magazine photo into four diagonal strips. Glue half of the strips onto white paper, separating them about an inch apart. With colored pens or markers, draw in the missing parts of the photo.
Resources:
- Search the Internet for terms in the examples above, as well as “paper-based games,” “folded puzzles,” “games using newspapers” or magazines.
- Go to http://www.enchantedlearning.com.
- Look online for posts by educators for high school students.
Potential pitfalls:
- Keep supplies simple, using items most people would have around the house. Some may not have a craft paintbrush. Most will have a newspaper, magazine, or junk mail containing text or photos.
Celebrate!
Team members can take photos of their completed projects and immediately share them electronically with attendees.
3. Solve a Text- or Picture-Based Worksheet: Give directions to attendees to independently complete a word, number, or picture-based activity. Select content based on your attendees’ interests. As in Construct Something, e-mail the worksheet as a PDF, with instructions not to look at it before the meeting.
Examples:
- Generic vocabulary quiz or one you create using terms from your industry or profession
- A color illustration containing hidden objects
- Find the two identical images of the six illustrations provided.
- Read a short whodunit.
- In advance, write a Mad Lib framework about a work place scenario; during the meeting, ask attendees to call out responses; then read it aloud.
Resources:
- Search the Internet for “word search,” “word games,” “trivia quiz,” “grammar quiz,” “numbers quiz,” “visual puzzle,” “numbers puzzle,” “hidden objects in pictures,” “find differences in photos,” and “logic puzzles.”
Potential pitfalls:
- Review the solutions in advance. Make sure you can explain it to someone who can only hear you on the phone but can’t see what you’re doing.
- Have an answer key! I once gave the wrong answer to a mystery whodunit word puzzle. One of my very astute team members pointed it out privately afterward.
SELECTING THE GAMES
- Use games relating to words or numbers, depending on the team. A group of front-line managers might enjoy a written scenario in which they have to use problem-solving skills. A group of finance employees might enjoy deciphering a coded message.
- Avoid activities specific to holidays. With all of the experiences employees have had or may have, avoid activities related to holidays such as Mother’s Day or religious observations. That way you won’t unintentionally bring up sensitive situations or possibly overlook one that an employee may feel is important.
- Despite best-laid plans, things still can go wrong. At one meeting, I asked attendees to tell a brief, interesting story about an experience in a previous job. One attendee had been a journalist and proceeded to tell us about an accident involving animals in a great amount of graphic detail.
TIMING
To determine how long an independent activity should be, ask remote employees to tell you when they’re done. If you haven’t heard from everyone and it’s time to move on, announce that if they are not done, they can set it aside and finish it later. Or designate one remote employee to text or e-mail you when he or she is finished.
Amy S. Drew is a corporate communications specialist residing in Orlando, FL. She has worked in learning and development for a worldwide leader in the hospitality industry and in publishing. She can be reached at http://www.linkedin.com/in/amysdrew/.
