Deepening Workplace Community: Building on the Foundations

Dec 18, 20244 min read

In a previous post, Workplace Community and Wellbeing: Fostering a Healthy and Productive Environment, we explored the vital connection between workplace community and employee wellbeing. We discussed how fostering a sense of belonging, trust, and shared purpose can lead to increased productivity, improved employee retention, and enhanced overall organisational health.

Office workers engaged in informal conversations

Today we dive a little deeper. Building a strong workplace community is an ongoing practice, not a one-time event. Deepening workplace community requires consistent effort to build on the foundations with intentional strategies, and a genuine commitment from leadership. Here are some key areas to focus on:

1. Cultivating Psychological Safety

Open Communication Channels: Encourage open and honest dialogue. Create safe spaces for employees to share their thoughts, concerns, and ideas without fear of judgment or reprisal.
Active Listening & Empathy: Leaders must actively listen to their employees, demonstrate empathy, and validate their experiences.
Embrace Mistakes as Learning Opportunities: Create a culture where mistakes are seen as opportunities for growth and improvement, rather than grounds for punishment.

Cultivating a truly safe space for employees is both simpler than it may sound, while at the same time being more comprehensive than it initially sounds. Employees need the space to fail if organisations are to be innovative. The risk appetite of the organisation needs to be clear, guardrails put in place, and taking risks needs to be encouraged. The ability for leaders to cultivate truly listening to employees will underwrite the success of an organisation's attempt to cultivate psychological safety.

2. Fostering Inclusion & Diversity

Unconscious Bias Training: Educate employees on unconscious biases and their impact on workplace dynamics.
Celebrate Differences: Recognise and celebrate the unique contributions of each individual, regardless of their background, ethnicity, gender, or any other diversity factor.
Create Inclusive Policies & Practices: Ensure that all policies and practices are inclusive and equitable for all employees.

Creating integration in the workplace is an essential art. Social change often operates as a pendulum, swinging between corrections, over-corrections and equilibrium states. In order to create a cohesive, balanced, harmonious, productive and focussed environment, get diversity and inclusion right in your workplace. This will help reduce resistance to change and enable constructive discourse on the issues.

3. Prioritising Work-Life Balance

Flexible Work Arrangements: Offer flexible work options such as remote work, flexible hours, and compressed workweeks to accommodate diverse employee needs.
Encourage Disconnection: Promote healthy boundaries between work and personal life. Encourage employees to take breaks, use their vacation time, and disconnect from work outside of regular hours.
Support Employee Wellbeing Initiatives: Provide resources and support for employee wellbeing initiatives such as on-site fitness classes, mindfulness programs, and access to mental health resources.

Workplaces need to be strategic about the options and services they offer their employees. Wellbeing intranet sites with generalised, outdated content are not a great way to show the priority you're placing on employees. When a workplace introduces wellbeing support, it needs to be maintained and sustainable. Therefore it's essential to monitor the uptake of wellbeing services and initiatives to ensure they're hitting the mark. Otherwise, de-clutter and stop wasting precious time and budget on wellbeing initiatives that are not of value - try something else instead.

4. Recognising and Rewarding Contributions

Regular Employee Recognition: Implement regular programs to recognise and reward employee contributions, both individual and team-based.
Employee of the Month/Quarter Programs: Celebrate employee achievements and milestones.
Public Acknowledgement: Publicly acknowledge and appreciate employee contributions during team meetings and company-wide events.

It seems fundamental; but workplaces that fail to express gratitude to their teams and employees are missing a significant point. The organisational culture is grown from small rituals. Acknowledging people for their efforts makes them feel visible. Naming people out loud tells them they belong in this workplace, and they are an integral part of it. This enables a deeper sense of ownership, allowing organisations to truly engage their workforce in their vision and mission.

5. Building Meaningful Connections

Team-Building Activities: Organise regular team-building activities that encourage social interaction and collaboration.
Social Events: Host social events outside of work to foster informal connections and build stronger relationships among colleagues.
Mentorship Programs: Implement mentorship programs to connect employees with experienced colleagues for guidance and support.

The tensions of the workplace can suddenly seem less dramatic over an informal chat. When employees socialise together, they start to see each other as fellow humans rather than boss and employee or service provider and internal customer. This can reduce rivalries, encourage greater understanding and a desire to maintain harmony, cooperation and cohesion when working together next.

6. Measuring and Evaluating Impact

Employee Surveys: Regularly conduct employee surveys to gather feedback on workplace culture, employee satisfaction, and overall wellbeing.
Track Key Metrics: Track key metrics such as employee turnover, absenteeism, and productivity to measure the impact of community-building initiatives.
Continuously Improve: Use data and feedback to continuously improve and refine workplace community initiatives.

The numerous benefits of building workplace community are not available to organisations on a set-and-forget basis. It takes genuine commitment from workplaces to find the right strategies for their employee base, ensure the programs are sustainable and to offer true psychological safety at work. Measuring and evaluating the impact of initiatives is key to maintaining relevance and currency.