4 Easy Ways to Build Team Rapport *Gen Z Edition*

By Brittany Lieu, Marketing Consultant at Heinz Marketing

Virtual team bonding doesn’t have to be an event or even a social hour. 

All you may need is 5 minutes at the start of weekly team calls to dissolve the digital distance between your remote workstations. 

For those of us who continue to work from home, we may continue to struggle to replicate otherwise “organic” encounters in the office to build rapport with our co-workers. Whether it be facilitated group activities on Zoom calls or chatting on watercooler Slack channels, our efforts to get to know one another require a level of intentionality. However, that doesn’t mean it has to be elaborate.  

Here are 5 quick ways to build rapport on your next team call that go beyond discussing the weather or your weekend.

Make Your Daily Ritual A Shared One

Play a round of Wordle, a daily word game hosted by New York Times. As 2022’s online version of a typical newspaper crossword, this similar mind puzzle is an easy way to kick off your meeting with some fun collaboration and excitement. Share your screen, pick a word to start as your first guess and allow your team chime in with different word guesses to solve the game. With a maximum of 6 guesses per game, this can be a quick activity with the help of everyone.

Play Quiz Games or Take a Personality Test 

Are you smarter than your co-workers? How much obscure knowledge does your team really know? Start off your next call with some competition using Buzzfeed quiz party. Unlike a normal Buzzfeed quiz, the trivia party version allows your team members to take the same quiz at the same time. Once your team finishes taking the short quiz, see how you rank against each other and discuss weird or oddly difficult questions. 

Share Hot Takes and Hypotheticals

What if…”You have inherited a large sum of money from an eccentric uncle with the stipulation that you must open a restaurant with a menu that focuses on one specific kind of food. What is your restaurant name?” Get to know who your co-workers are with fun hypothetical questions. Roundtable your different responses to “what if” situations and get a chance to explain your answers or question others’. Here is a list of thought-provoking scenarios to use.

Swap Recommendations

What do you love so much you’d leave a great customer review for? Swap recommendations for great TV shows, movies, restaurants, travel destinations, etc. Learn your team’s interests, find common ground and even get new ideas for things you’d like to check out next.

Get to Know One Another!

Rapport can be the foundation of trust and genuine sense of physiological safety that is crucial in a high performing team. Be more intentional about how you foster camaraderie in the smallest ways and change how your team bonds and collaborates.