Rituals and Ceremonies
When building a remote team, connecting is key. At both Introhive and Field Effect, I implemented a set of intentional rituals and ceremonies for the team to enable collaboration, keep the team members informed, foster connection, and allow for moments to bond outside of the day-to-day.
Each of these rituals or ceremonies is documented, has a purpose, includes rules of engagement, and an owner to ensure it has staying power. Rituals and ceremonies are serious business. If a team member wants to add one, they must pitch the idea to the team before we add it to the calendar. These rituals must benefit the team in at least one of a few ways:
Bonds us
Informs us
Educates us
Each quarter we do retros to ensure each ritual is still adding value. These are some of the intentional connection points I’ve used.
Coffee Talk
Cadence: Weekly | Duration: 30 minutes
A weekly meeting for the team to talk about anything but work. If you talk about work, you have to leave the session and face the constant stream of “shame” gif’s in Slack. So far, we have not had anyone break the rules :)
This has been one of the best ways to bond and connect as humans. If I could only attend one meeting a week, it would be this one.
Crit
Cadence: Weekly | Duration: 60 minutes
Share early, share often. This is what I teach young designers and push regularly. I prefer designers are doing this independently but we set up a weekly session where any design team member (researchers, writers designers, managers, etc…) can share. It’s a safe space to share what they are working on, along with the needed background so the team can provide thoughtful and useful feedback. We also do this to help designers learn to present work.
“Wear your best Canadian plaid call was hilarious and a fashion disaster”
- Team member on a theme call
Annual In-Person Design Jam
Cadence: Annual | Duration: 2-3 days
An annual 2-3 day event where we come together as a design team to celebrate our wins, reflect on what we need to improve, connect as humans and plan what we want to accomplish in the next 12 months.
At the core of this event, it’s about bonding and connecting as humans, in real life.
Highlight Reels
Cadence: Annually | Duration: N/A
At our Annual In-Person Design Jam, I like to build highlight reels that communicate and look back at what we accomplish in the 12 months prior.
I’ll send you my documentation, one second.”
- Product designers when being asked about a project
Team Retro
Cadence: Quarterly | Duration: 90 minutes
A quarterly session where we, as a design org, virtually gather to work through what’s propelling us forward, what’s holding us back, and what are our goals for the next quarter.
The objective is to ensure there is a platform to communicate openly about our progress as a team.
Document It or It didn’t happen
Cadence: Daily | Duration: N/A
Operating as a remote team, I wanted to ensure we centralized decisions, plans, and notes.
Every team member is tasked with ensuring they are documenting as much as possible in our centralized tool (Confluence at Introhive, Teams at Field Effect). In an effort to standardize, we have been working on building common templates.