3 steps every manager should take right now to help employees feel less lonely and isolated when working from home
- As companies turn to remote work amid the novel coronavirus pandemic, some workers are struggling with loneliness and isolation.
- Lynda Gratton, an executive education faculty director at the London Business School, said creating a culture of collaboration can remedy this issue.
- Gratton suggests scheduling casual social breaks that allow employees to destress and build relationships with each other.
- Join Business Insider on Thursday at 12 p.m. ET for our digital live event "Leading From Home," where we'll be talking with WorkBoard founder Deidre Paknad and Chatbooks founder Nate Quigley about how to lead remote teams amid the coronavirus crisis.
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I find it hard to adjust to working from home.
While the virtual messaging platform, Slack, has been useful in connecting with my colleagues, I still miss our in-person conversations.
We joke, we meet up for coffee, and hashed out headlines at nearby coffee shops. These were brief moments where my coworkers and I had a break from our daily grind. I find myself missing these interactions.
This is a new reality for thousands of workers across the globe, thanks to the novel coronavirus pandemic.
Research shows feeling secluded or lonely when working from home isn't all that uncommon. A survey of more than 2,000 employees from HR advisory firm Future Workplace and employee engagement tech company Virgin Pulse, found 40% of teams are craving deeper relationships with their colleagues.
Lynda Gratton, an executive faculty director at the London Business School and coauthor of the book "The 100-Year Life," said in a recent webinar about virtual work, that isolation is the new reality for many remote workers because of the novel coronavirus pandemic.
"What earlier pioneers found is that although working from home had a lot of advantages, the disadvantage was that they were lonely [and] isolated," Gratton said. "Also companies fretted that they weren't as innovative as they might have been because they weren't collaborating."
But this doesn't have to be the case. Gratton suggested managers use these three strategies to help workers feel more connected to one another even when they aren't in the office.
Invest in relationship building
One of the best ways to combat loneliness at work is to use video chat for meetings so employees can see one another, Gratton said.
"Use video as much as you can," Gratton said. "Humans really like face-to-face communication."
You can also schedule virtual meetups. Gratton advises managers schedule "water cooler" conversations or casual social breaks for their employees. For example, in the afternoon, Gratton takes a virtual coffee break with her staff. At the end of the week, she schedules a virtual cocktail hour.
According to the management consulting firm Overland Resource Group (ORG), water cooler conversations are essential to temporarily destress and build workplace relationships. Building connection can also make workers more productive. A study by the researchers at MIT found employees who felt a sense of connection to their coworkers were 10% more productive at work than employees who did not socialize.
"Humans are very social animals," Gratton said. "When we are put in our home like this that is going to have an effect on our relationships with ourselves in terms of our mental health, but also our relationships with others."
Have conversations about shared values
Now is a good time to bring employees together to have a conversation about values. According to Gratton, this can easily be done through conference sites like Zoom, where hundreds of people can connect at once.
"Have conversations about values and how you're feeling," she said.
To combat feelings of isolation, managers can suggest employees discuss shared values over virtual meetings platforms, she said. Not only does this challenge employees to come up with new ideas, but it can strengthen company culture.
Foster work-life balance
Make sure workers are separating their work and home life. Gratton said it's useful for managers to set up boundaries for remote workers. According to the team productivity blog and podcast, "Collaboration Superpowers," this includes laying out specific expectations for remote workers or asking IT to supply devices, like laptops (instead of using a personal computer), to help separate employee's work and home lives.
"You really need to separate out the things you do at work and the things you do for pleasure," said Lisette Sutherland, host of the Collaboration Superpowers podcast in an episode on "How to Set Boundaries When Working From Home." Sutherland added, "You would read your emails on one particular device and look at Reddit on a different device."
Without intentional social breaks and time for connection, employees could burnout. Gratton said fostering work-life balance is more important than ever since today's workforce is likely going to be remote for a while.
"This isn't just a blimp. This will fundamentally change the way that we work," she said.
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