Today’s corporate landscape has adapted to a number of changes that have completely transformed the way we work. One of the bases for these changes was the COVID-19 pandemic, which led many businesses – be it a large corporation or a small-scale business – to move to the hybrid or remote work model. Given that, businesses now have an excellent opportunity to find innovative ways to improve employee collaboration, regardless of what workplace setting the employees are working from.
Collaboration in the workplace can increase productivity, boost team satisfaction, and spur innovation. It enhances teamwork to the next level and allows team members to share their ideas, skills, and talent that can aid in the growth of not just the business but the employees themselves as well.
Nowadays, teams collaborate and work together to deliver high-quality projects. They communicate and work across departments to bring the best people together. Besides that, most teams these days are distributed and are working on different work models like remotely or in-house. While these changes enable businesses to hire the best talent, regardless of the physical location, time zone, or cost, the one thing that can become a problem is team collaboration.
In this article, we have mentioned a few tips and tricks that can help businesses develop a collaborative workplace. Read on to find out what they are.
Promote Collaboration as a Business Value
This may seem a little obvious, but it is important that your team members know that collaboration is vital for your business. Employees have different values when it comes to working in a competitive work setting, and while some may endorse team collaboration, some employees are driven by individual prowess and competition and would prefer working alone. Therefore, businesses need to take the time to establish how important team collaboration is and devise a plan that will help the team members get there.
Build a Supportive Team
For employees to work collaboratively, it is important that they feel safe and in the know of things. They need a supportive and encouraging environment to share their ideas and collaborate on tasks and projects.
The managers and team leads should support and appreciate everyone on the team. They should also not forget that it requires time and effort to create a supportive and trustable workplace.
Building a supportive work environment will help employees garner a better and more elaborate understanding of each other’s strengths and weaknesses. It will help them understand how they can work with each other leveraging those strengths.
Implement a Team Collaboration Tool
While emails and business messengers are a good way to communicate with employees within an organization, it can get a little tedious when you have multiple projects on your plate with different teams working on them.
As per a survey, up to 65% of the employees say most of their time is spent dealing with emails, when they could be doing something more productive. And up to 30% of workers who aren’t using project management tools would like to use one.
Do your research about the different pros and cons of multiple collaboration tools and then choose the right tool for your business. Make sure you give your employees the training needed to run these tools effectively and have a reliable internet connection in place as most of these tools are online. If in any given case you don’t have access to such a connection, subscribe to HughesNet Business for a reliable internet service for your business.
Encourage Employees to Communicate Openly
Only when team members feel like they can bring their real selves to work, real collaboration will take place. Every employee within the organization should be encouraged to communicate, innovate, and participate. Instead of reigning in their feelings and holding back, they should be encouraged to be themselves and bring all their ideas forward.
Wrapping Up
Workplace collaboration can impact the team and organization in a positive manner if done right. It can increase innovation, nurture healthy relationships, increase employee satisfaction, optimize workflows, and increase the overall efficiency of the workplace.
Implement some of the above-mentioned strategies and invest in the right tools to improve employee collaboration within your business.
