What is the hallmark of an exceptional team?
Creating effective remote working teams is not child’s play. Creating a high-performance team is the goal for a manager as the entire enterprise’s success is dependent on this single factor.
While many aspects can be listed here, without a doubt, efficient and free-flowing communication is the key to create an efficient team culture during work from home (WFH). After all, employee productivity has been reported to reduce by almost 21% due to feelings of isolation.
So, to unlock the true potential of your existing team members and make the new team members feel welcome, you must plan for an ice breaker session. No, we are not talking about those ‘run of the mill stupid’ games in which no one is really interested!
We will discuss the latest and most interesting way to conduct the ice breaker session, a fun, and jovial question and answer session. It has been found that virtual teams can easily surpass in-person teams if adequate investments are made in support, communication, and online team-building activities.
Planning an icebreaker session
Now that you have rolled up your sleeves and are comfy in your pyjamas (let’s be honest, this is the WFH uniform), it is time to start planning an interactive ice-breaker session. Let’s decide on the desired outcome from this entire activity.
As per a recent report from Google, trust holds the key to the success of a remote working team. So, your approach to the ice breaker session should be to create mutual trust between the team members.
Now, what type of questions should you ask? Serious, fun, or something entirely random? Well, your questions should have a defined structure so that whether you are trying to welcome a new teammate or looking to improve the communication between existing members, all your goals can be fulfilled.
Last but not the least, when should you conduct this session? This is entirely your prerogative, but we would suggest conducting these sessions on Monday mornings, for it will give all the team members something to look forward to post-weekend.
Ice Breaker Questions to understand different personalities
Every team will have individuals with distinct personalities. So, you must include some questions that will help all team members get an insight into each other’s personalities. It will serve well in fostering mutual trust and co-operation amongst your teammates. But make sure to make the questions as fun and interesting as possible to pique curiosity amongst others.
- So, how does it feel working from your bed in your pyjamas, without having a bath!
- Are you enjoying working from home, or are you looking forward to being back in the office?
- What is one change that you want to see at work?
- Work from a beachside resort or a hill station resort? What would be your choice?
- Are you a breakfast person or a lunch person? What is your favorite WFH comfort food?
- One movie character that you want to emulate in real life and why?
- Would you prefer to become CEO for a day or receive a bonus?
- Washing the dishes or cleaning the house, the worst part about WFH?
- Your best childhood memory that you want to relive now.
- List one bad and one good thing about WFH.
- What is the most amusing thing you miss about the office?
- What is your motivation behind working even when other family members are asleep around you?
- Would you rather have the entire house to yourself or use noise-canceling headphones for better concentration during WFH?
- Which of your skills do you feel are being under utilized at work?
- What can the management do to help improve your productivity?
- What would you be in a parallel universe?
- Are you a tea person or a coffee person?
Ice Breaker questions to gauge thinking prowess
Now that you have initiated the conversation between the team members, it is time to gauge their thinking prowess to determine their responsibilities optimally during WFH. You can ask some questions about fictional situations to understand their responsibilities and get insight into their thought process.
- How would you spend your money if you won the lottery?
- What would you do if you were invisible for 24 hours?
- Which superhero would you want to be? Which superpower you believe is something you desire.
- What do you prefer? Lumpsum investment or a Systematic Investment Plan (SIP)?
- If you’d to evacuate your house and could only grab three things, what would they be?
- If you could teleport to any place in the world, where would you want to be?
- If you are stuck on an island, which five things would you want with yourself?
- Would you rather have a lot of acquaintances or just a few close friends?
- A childhood friend or a close relative, who would you trust with your money?
- Would you prefer to talk like Batman or Ironman for the rest of your life?
- Would you want to have unlimited free airfare or an unlimited supply of food?
- Would you rather prefer orbiting around the moon or the earth if given a chance?
- Would you prefer to start early or finish late at work?
- Would you prefer to always be slightly late or always be an hour early?
- Would you open an orphanage or an animal shelter if given a chance?
- Would you prefer to always be slightly late or always be an hour early?
- If you could change anything about the way you were raised, what would it be?
Protip
Try HuddleUp social connect features on Slack to spark lively ice breaker conversations with the team and have non-work related banter to combat zoom fatigue.
Ice Breaker Questions to encourage free communication
Now that you have understood your team members’ personalities and thinking prowess, it is time to have a look at questions that would encourage free-flowing communication at work. After all, mutual trust and open communication hold the key to success for the organization.
- Where do you see yourself ten years down the line?
- If you could trust one teammate with your life, then who would it be?
- What is the best way to let your teammate know about what he/she is doing wrong?
- Private conversation or open confrontation, your preferred approach?
- What is the best way to convey to someone about being laid off from work?
- Coffee machine conversation or water cooler conversation, what do you prefer?
- What is something you have always wanted to do but have not done yet at work?
- Can you give me a tour of your office space?
- How can the company make your WFH experience better?
- After the pandemic is over, would you prefer to come to the office or WFH?
- What is your morning routine like when working from home?
- What do you like to do after finishing work early?
- Do you have any pets as your WFH colleagues?
- If you could learn a new skill at work, what would it be?
- Do you want the management to offer learning opportunities at work or offer a higher payout instead?
- One grievance that you feel is shared by all the team members.
- If you could eliminate one thing from your daily routine, what would it be and why?
These questions are just to give you an idea about planning and executing a productive ice breaker session. You can always take inputs from other colleagues about this session and get even better results. So, do not delay it any further; get started on the new ice breaker session right away.