Working Remote Without Feeling Remote
This past year of working from home has forced a lot of us to face what it is like to be a part of the distributed workforce. However, it has been different from the previous versions of working remotely, because all of us were in the same situation. Now that we have proved that an office is optional, we also need to ask ourselves how we feel about being distributed workers. I know that before being forced to work from home, I was very vocal about not liking to work from home. I felt too isolated. I wanted to be a part of the hallway conversations and I craved social interaction with my colleagues. However, this past year has given me a lot of practice on how to be social from a distance. Just like many of you, I have adapted to what we now call the “new normal” and now I don’t find myself wanting to go into the office now that I have the choice to.
So what changed? I learned that I can have meaningful social interaction with my teammates without sitting next to each other. We are still the same people and we still care for each other as colleagues and we created a new set of ways to stay connected to show that we are there to support each other. Being able to work without feeling remote is important to be able to carve your path because it is through the support of your colleagues and teammates that you are able to continue your journey when things get tough like having to work from home for over a year because of COVID. I adapted more easily due to the fact that I still was able to connect with my teammates.
Having a team messaging tool like Slack has been a key factor in begin able to have casual conversations with the team and have a little fun with using reactions and sharing Giphys just to be a little silly. What I learned is that I missed the casual conversations and humor, so I adapted by shifting my expectations and using tools like Slack to compensate for what I felt I was missing.
Before we were forced to work from home, my team used to gather in the morning and have our first cup of coffee while talking about anything but work. It was a routine that was a part of bond as a team. After going remote, we compensated for this routine as well by having morning coffee time a few times a week via Zoom. This gave me the socializing I was looking for and it also taught me that seeing someone’s face via Zoom is in many ways more powerful, because of the direct focus on each other’s faces.
We have proven that working remotely doesn’t mean we have to feel isolated. There are ways to interact that will makes us still feel engaged and compensate for the fear of missing out as we continue to carve our paths.
