Workplace collaboration is a combination of knowledge and skills of all employees to quickly and efficiently solve work tasks. Thus, all goals of the company’s work are achieved quickly. Consequently, positive results are achieved as quickly as possible.
What Is Effective Team Collaboration
Team collaboration is a way for people to come together in a productive way to work on a project or an individual task. It’s not just a rational distribution of the workload of each employee. Collaboration expands the opportunities for each person on the team, including through sharing experiences.
This method is effective both for company employees who work in the office and for remote teams. In the second case, collaboration skills will help all team members become fully engaged.
Also, team members can additionally learn from the achievements and mistakes of other employees. Such a learning method in the workplace can become part of the corporate values of this or that company.
3 Useful Skills for Productive Teamwork
Both remote and hybrid work in a co-working space will require effective collaboration skills from employees, those that help them maintain high levels of work productivity as well as team engagement.
Even if remote work leaves minimal opportunity for face-to-face contact, it’s possible to structure business communication so that employee productivity and motivation are not diminished.
Business Communication
Successful business communication skills are among the most important competencies in any field of work, and communication is a key prerequisite for a productive virtual team.
Unclear or untimely instructions and lack of feedback reduce team productivity during project work. Here’s a list of communication skills recommended to develop:
- Active listening;
- Empathy;
- Strict regulation;
- Obedience to rules.
The ability to be a friendly and attentive interlocutor is as important a skill for teamwork as professional knowledge and skills.
Choosing the Right Digital Tools
Another important skill for a virtual or mixed team leader is the ability to choose proper digital tools for different work tasks. Even when it comes to choosing video conferencing software, you don’t have to be limited to one-size-fits-all options like Zoom or Google Meet.
To choose a video conferencing platform with the right features for your team’s needs, you want to analyze each task. Based on that analysis, you will also be able to select appropriate apps and software solutions for your business, including:
- Messengers;
- File-sharing services;
- Screen-sharing software, etc.
In many cases, project management platforms are a good choice for managing a virtual team.
Getting Out of Your Comfort Zone
To be as productive as possible, it’s worth mastering one or more areas that are different from your main specialization. Working together with colleagues from other divisions of the company will provide the opportunity to acquire new knowledge and professional experience.
Even if you are an introvert, it’s advisable to get out of your comfort zone to gain important business communication skills. Moreover, joint projects and industry-specific conferences are a great way to get useful insights from working in different teams, as well as develop skills for “rigid” and “soft” cooperation.
Skills to look for in order to improve Collaboration In The Workplace
Choosing a Mentor
Another effective way to learn how to collaborate effectively in a team is through special mentoring programs. Working with a coach is a way to gain additional knowledge in areas where you have little to no experience.
Training as part of the corporate culture is an important part of the work process. Leadership development, team management, communication with customers, and cybersecurity training – this is a minimum list of additional skills that are needed for the successful performance of all team members.
If you have specific knowledge and experience, you can be a mentor to your colleagues. For this, find out if your company has a formal mentoring program. If not, the idea may be worth suggesting to company management, or you can train your colleagues unofficially.
Here are a few tips for successful mentoring:
- Develop a “rookie” mindset in which you are as open as possible to learning anything new, without fear of inevitable mistakes;
- Be non-judgmental about those you are mentoring. This will give you a fresh perspective and help you train people as effectively as possible;
- Motivate and inspire the people you teach. In addition to theory, you can give practical advice and motivate employees to look for new approaches to solving work problems.
Mentoring is a great opportunity for professional growth.
Team Building Skills
Various team training sessions and virtual games may seem like a waste of time, but they’re not – team-building activities are an effective method of teaching teamwork skills.
In essence, team building doesn’t need to be done in the office. It’s not about offline communication but about video conferencing platforms that make collaboration possible for virtual and mixed teams. This way, remote employees can participate in virtual team-building games, as well.
Conclusions
Team collaboration is all about sharing experiences, knowledge, and skills between employees. Without it, there can be no meaningful interaction between team members, which directly affects the level of productivity.
You can develop team collaboration not only in an office environment but also in a virtual or mixed team. In the second case, collaborative work among all employees is as necessary as possible. Without productive business communication, as well as full cooperation, the productivity of the entire team decreases significantly.
You will need to acquire certain skills for productive business communication and learn how to effectively use the right digital tools for video conferencing, file sharing, and other work tasks.
