When and where to work as a team
What work is best done while our teams are in the same place at the same time? The answer that keeps coming up in the teams I'm working with is connection. Photo by Jud Mackrill on Unsplash
For most knowledge workers (people who we might have previously referred to as "office workers"), the way that work has been getting done in the past 20 months was a radical departure from how it had been done before that. The changes brought about by the pandemic have changed both where and when work gets done.
As this PWC report from earlier this year found, hybrid is going to be the new normal. It's an opportunity that the best teams will seize.
A simple conversation to have in your team is to explore and experiment with how you work together. This is particularly timely if you are considering what a return to the office might look like and useful for every team to regularly consider.
It starts with considering two simple factors about the best way to get work done. There are two factors to consider are:
Where - either remote or co-located.
When - do we need to do this at the same time (synchronous) or can we do this at different times (asynchronous)?
That lets us ask a simple question of four different ways of working. The simple question is...what is the best way for us to work together?
Here are the four ways:
Remote and asynchronous
The work that is best done this way might be what Cal Newport calls "Deep Work". Where the opportunity for uninterrupted focused time allows for extended periods of concentration on a cognitively demanding task.
Examples that could fit in here are report writing, analysing complex financial figures or research. Most teams have tasks that fit into this category and benefit from their members being able to do high quality work on their own terms. As one of the teams I work with discussed, "sometimes the best gift we can give each other is some space".Remote and synchronous
The work that is best done this way identifies the need for real-time collaboration, but not necessarily connection. The pandemic has accelerated remote work and collaboration tools. It's possible that many online tools like MURAL (my preferred platform), Miro and others allow more ideas to be shared, more quickly and more democratically (less likely to be dominated by the loudest or most senior person in the room) than traditional in-person methods. It's also much easier to capture, process and access the outputs than collecting or photographing a ton of post-it notes!
This is particularly useful for short, sharp sessions.Co-located and asynchronous
In my mind, this is what we could call "Shallow Work". Work that all of us have that could benefit from the presence of others without their input. It's the office equivalent of being at the gym. You are there, working on your own stuff, but the fact that others are around makes it more likely that you will stay on task rather than get distracted. Being physically co-located can help to create the conditions to support that work. Social facilitation (the opposite of social loafing) is an observed phenomenon – in the right conditions, individuals increase their effort and performance with the presence of others.
As opposed to deep work, this work isn't cognitively demanding. Routine administrative tasks that make up a part of all of our jobs can fit here - like reconciling payments or filling in your timesheets.Co-located and synchronous
What work is best done while our teams are in the same place at the same time? It's probably less than most of us think. The answer that keeps coming up in the teams I'm working with is connection. It's also the thing that people say that they are craving. Not collaboration, not getting tasks done, but connection. Real human connection.
This connection work relies on us seeing our colleagues as humans, not resources. Having lunch, sharing a drink or going for walk together. It may be the crucial conversations where sending an reading body language is central to demonstrating the value of the relationship that can get lost over Zoom.
My hope is that our experiences over the last couple of years help us to treat the opportunity to treat the times when we are in the same place at the same time with the reverence it has always deserved.
The examples that I have provided are exactly that, examples. They may or may not be relevant for your team at this time. What is relevant and useful is asking the question and working together by design and not default. The best teams will continue to ask those questions, as well as demonstrate the behavioural flexibility to include multiple modes in the same day.
Here are some questions for you to reflect on this week:
Where and when is the best way for us to work together?
Does your team intentionally consider these factors or fall into default patterns?
Are you flexible enough to adjust your ways of working in response to the needs of the team?