Socialising is important. It's how we build trust – and therefore how we build strong teams. And as humans, we're inherently social creatures. In an office, we tend to get our social fix through quick ad-hoc conversations. In a remote environment this doesn't happen, so we need to intentionally engineer opportunities to socialize.
Social calls give us an opportunity to build connections outside of the people we normally work with, and are a chance to learn about each other and explore other cultures and places.
It’s possible to build social relationships asynchronously via tools like Slack and Loom, but it can only go so far: it's almost impossible to develop a genuine social bond with someone via text messages alone. So we need to take the time to socialize synchronously with our colleagues.
Because this kind of socializing happens naturally in offices, it can feel weird booking meetings with the specific goal of socializing. Remember that in remote teams, this is perfectly normal. Not every video call needs to be about work.
Booking a Social Call
- Don't feel weird about reaching out to someone random on Slack and asking "can we hop on a 30-minute social call to say hello?" This is perfectly normal.
- Booking a call with someone you never met with a social agenda is considered to appropriate, so don't be afraid to do it! 👍
- Try to book social calls at a time where the participants are likely to feel social. (If I have an hour's gap between two super important work meetings I might not want to spend it on a social call.)
- When you join a new company or team, try speak socially to as many people as you can in the first few weeks - it's the fastest way to build relationships.
- If someone reaches out to you, make time for them.
What if it feels weird?
If it feels awkward, smile and say so. In all likelihood the other person is feeling the same as you. Maybe have a chat about how awkward social calls can sometimes seem? Remember - it will get less weird the more you do these calls. 😉
- Can you show me round your house/home office?
- What does your day normally look like?
- Got any pets? Can I meet them?
- What's your city/neighbourhood like? Can we have a look on Street View together?
- What are you finding tough at the moment?
- How was your weekend?
Donut 🍩
Donut is a slackbot that helps arrange social calls between random people. It can be configured to organise one-to-one or group sessions. It’s definitely worth checking out…
Donut | Slack Integration for Team Building & Engagement
Donut helps connect teams serendipitously on Slack for virtual coffee, peer learning, DEI discussions, and more.
www.donut.com
Group Social Calls
A lot of distributed companies will organize group social events – either asynchronously or synchronously. These can often feel awkward if you're new to remote working (especially if you're an introvert).
Try your hardest to engage with these activities, and remember that in remote teams socializing is part of work.
It can be super fun to snap a screenshot during a group social call and share it in slack with a short update on any funny/interesting stuff you talked about.