The watchword is clear: stay at home. Nurseries, schools, colleges, high schools, universities are closed, but also restaurants, bars and all shops which are not basic necessities. And it is very important to respect these measures, because even if you are young and in good health, or if you have no symptoms, you can still transmit it to someone, who could be fragile and potentially die.
In short, employees are demanded to do home office whenever it’s possible for an indefinite period. But enterprises have to see it positively! It’s time to take the opportunity to do lots of activities differently, and you can also improve your teamwork skills this time.
1- Keep learning
Improving your professional profile means going further than just achieving basic goals. You can perfectionate your knowledge by keep learning, and this is a great time for spending time at home doing it.
Yes! You can improve your skills while being at home. Why not start learning the basis of Spanish to add a valuable asset to your CV? You can even start to plan a trip to learn Spanish Argentina once the quarantine is over.
2- Develop respect and trust
How to develop team spirit? How to work well in a team? Finally, the answer is quite simple: everyone must show confidence and respect for others. There are of course the basic rules of good manners and politeness.
Tasks should be distributed fairly and everyone should respect the work of others. You also need to be able to handle your mistakes and problems in general. Any problem must be discussed openly so that it can be resolved as a group. Whether it is a problem of people, work, quality, the whole team must be aware so that they can discuss the best solution. Every idea is welcomed. It is only with transparent communication that trust can be established.
Finally, everyone must want to set an example both in terms of behavior and work. This encourages others to do the same and creates an environment that makes everyone enjoy teamwork. Everyone will be pulled up and the team will be more efficient.
3- Work on motivation
On the other hand, to further improve everyone’s motivation, it may be interesting to also set individual objectives (which naturally go in the direction of the common objective), such as improving a skill, its productivity, or again taking responsibility.
The scope of intervention and the room for maneuver of the team must also be known to all. You must be able to situate the importance of the team’s work within the company, the schedule to be followed and the expectations of other teams. Mastering the scope of intervention, the ability to make decisions and initiatives also helps determine how to work as a team effectively.
Home office can be quite challenging. Society is living a stressful situation and enterprises are under pressure. Work hard from home can prove to your boss that you can self manage your task and support the goals even from distance.
4- Work hard on communication
Transparent communication is a rule of operation for a team. It is also a pledge of confidence. As soon as information arrives at one of the group members, it must be communicated to everyone. Everyone is then able to provide their interpretation, thus allowing for a decision that is thought out and adapted to the situation. Imagine that the customer gives you negative feedback regarding a technology that you wanted to implement. You can keep the information to yourself and make the decision alone to maintain or change the technology choice. But you have no guarantee that it is the right decision other than your own judgment. By communicating customer feedback transparently, you will be able to get feedback from each member of the team and explore a much wider range of possibilities.
If internal communication is essential, communication with other project teams or your company is just as important. Your team does not work alone in their own corner, but is part of a whole, with other teams, departments and customers. Knowing what other people are working on, with which customers, what technologies, makes it possible to know where to go in case of need to obtain information, where functional or technical experts can be found… This can only improve the effectiveness of teamwork and beyond that of the company.
This is a special moment for the world. It is important to keep focus on a better future and to get the best of every team member to keep the enterprise going.