Hybrid Hangover: Why Your Team Isn’t Clicking – And How to Fix It

These aim to capture the frustration while providing a promise of solutions.

Have you ever spent an hour trying to schedule a meeting only to have one of the seven people on the Zoom say “turns out, I can’t make it.”?

Have you ever gotten on a Zoom call only to realize that the meeting is actually on Microsoft Teams and you’re going to be late because you do not have the most updated version of Teams on your computer?

Have you ever felt like your team isn’t connecting like it should on a big project, and if you could just meet in one room, you might be able to hash it out, but budgets and schedules prevent that from being a possibility?

Do you email, text, use a Slack Channel, shared drives, Zoom, Google Meet, a CRM and still wonder why you and your team aren’t connecting on the vision of the project?

Do you have to balance the needs of your family and the needs of your job multiple times throughout the day?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, you may be suffering from Hybrid Hangover.

What is a Hybrid Hangover? You may not have heard the term, but if you’re still reading, I bet you’ve experienced the effects. Hybrid Hangover refers to the set of challenges and complications that businesses experience while transitioning to and trying to maintain a hybrid or remote work environment. 

As the Team Lead for the TrainYard Advisors fully remote team, as well as clients with hybrid and remote work models, I know that suffering from Hybrid Hangover is a real thing!

I also know that the benefits of remote and hybrid work can be truly transformative for an individual employee as well as the company itself. The reduction in turnover alone can be worth the experiment. 

If you have a disaster of a hybrid/remote situation or your employees are begging to work from home at least a couple days a week, you can do these things to help create a smoother transition:

1. Create a Pilot Project. If this hybrid/remote project work is new to your company, or even if you’ve been doing it for years, a pilot project will signal to the company that you are taking communication and coordination challenges seriously and are determined to test different methods to ensure success.
2. Create a Team Lead role. If a project calls for more than one employee, a Team Lead can help with the challenges of coordinating communication and deadlines. The Team Lead should have access to each team member’s availability for scheduling meetings. And communication always includes the Team Lead.
3. Determine Rules of Engagement for Communication. Decide ahead of time what communication methods will be used and at what intervals. For example, the Team Lead can set up a project Slack channel for quick communication, as well as set regular joint meeting times (via Zoom or in-person) to discuss progress. If a conversation is necessary between two people on the team, follow up with the Team Lead afterward to keep them in the loop.
4. Utilize a Project Management Platform. The Team Lead should coordinate all work of the project through a Project Management Platform. I personally like Zoho Project, but there are many to choose from. Test them out and see what works for your team. This allows clear communication about deadlines and deliverables, as well as an easy way to follow up if something has been missed.
5. Review and revamp. Discuss with each team member on the pilot project what worked well and what could have been different. Make adjustments as needed.
6. Launch. Once reviewing and revamping have been completed, officially launch the plan for hybrid/remote projects. Launch it with a company-wide meeting and a follow-up email that clearly explains the Team Lead role, rules of engagement for communication, and the use of the Project Management Platform.
7. Review and revamp. Set an intentional quarterly conversation with Team Leads to determine if anything should be adjusted. Team Leads should prepare for the quarterly meeting by getting feedback from the teams they lead.

This is a lot, and it is also necessary to ensure that hybrid/remote teams can have a healthy culture in which to accomplish their best work for your company. 

If you are struggling with implementation or things continue to go awry, the experts at TrainYard Advisors are positioned to help.