Can Technology Replace the Coffee Talk? How to Create Psychological Safety in Virtual Teams

Most of us have experienced the ups and downs of working from home at one point or another over the past six months. One major downside certainly is the loss of social bonds with our co-workers, which is especially detrimental to teamwork (1). Through informal conversations over a coffee or after meetings, we would usually learn about our team members’ work and private lives. When working virtually, even if you are lucky enough to see your team during video calls, there is often no time to talk about anything else than the task at hand. 

This is a widespread phenomenon in virtual teams. Not knowing what our colleagues are working on, however, can result in missed opportunities to help each other or to show our appreciation. Besides the fact that this can make us feel quite isolated, studies have shown that it can also hinder our productivity as a team (2).

A few years ago, Google conducted a study among its most successful (physical) teams and found that one key ingredient was “psychological safety” (3). Psychological safety describes a team atmosphere, in which members feel safe to ask questions or raise issues without fear of being punished or embarrassed, and in which they feel valued by their team (4). Several studies have shown that psychological safety can improve team performance, communication, and team learning behaviours (2). My study aimed to understand how this feeling of psychological safety can be created in virtual teams.

So, what did I do?

I studied what made people feel psychologically safe by interviewing 16 virtual team members and leaders. All of them had worked in virtual teams before the pandemic already. Participants came from various industries, teams and organisations. In the following, I will explain my key findings, each accompanied by practical recommendations that are designed to benefit you and your virtual team.

What were my key findings?

The study showed that two basic human needs are underlying the creation of psychological safety in virtual teams: the need for a shared identity and for shared context.

A team with a shared identity fulfills individuals’ needs to belong to a group and, in this case, to identify as a member of their virtual team. A team creates a shared identity by uncovering personal similarities or making shared experiences (5). A virtual team-building event, for instance, could be one way to help members identify as part of a team. 

In a team with a shared context, members have access to the same information and a shared understanding of tools, work processes, and work cultures. A shared context is created by being attentive to differences in work practices and working towards making processes and tools more compatible across sites (1). Openly sharing one’s availability and usual working hours, for instance, could be one way to virtually create a shared context.

My analysis of the interviews further resulted in three concrete enablers of psychological safety in virtual teams. All of them either foster a shared identity or shared context, too. The three enablers as well as my practical recommendations are presented in detail below.

Accepting virtual team challenges

Virtual teamwork comes with its own unique challenges. On top of the obvious ones, such as time zone differences and lack of face-to-face interaction, I identified two key barriers to building psychological safety:

1. Many day-to-day tasks take extra time and effort in virtual teams. Asking someone for help, getting to know each other, or even just arranging a meeting can feel more straining when working virtually.
2. Often, team members have frequent one-on-one interactions with one or two colleagues that they bonded with quickly. They start forming “cliques” and do not talk as much with the remaining members of the team. Those excluded from these "cliques" can often feel quite isolated and may find it harder to speak up.  

What is meant by accepting these challenges is not surrendering to their inevitability, but rather acknowledging them and then adopting a willingness to actively address them. This way their impact the team's performance can be minimised. As acceptance is a skill, it can be learned and practised.

How to: Try to write down the most prominent issues in your virtual team. See whether you can get to the root cause of why these feel challenging to you. The goal is to acknowledge and mentally rephrase your thoughts and feelings about these challenges so they motivate you to address the issues.

Building a relationship with everyone on the team

To build the basis for a shared sense of identity, team members must get to know each other as human beings and thus build relationships with all of their team colleagues.

1. Demonstrate genuine interest. Demonstrating genuine interest is all about creating opportunities to speak with your colleagues individually and then asking them relevant questions that show you care about them as human beings.

How to: Why not invite colleagues to a virtual lunch break or coffee chat to see how they are doing or where they might need help. An informal meeting setup can help us forget about the task at hand for a second and focus on the other person instead.

2. Share your personal and work backgrounds with each other. Try to learn more about each other. Your goal as a team should be to understand each other better.

How to: Information you could exchange includes where you live and with whom, what hobbies or interests you have outside of work, what areas you have worked in before, or what your strengths and weaknesses are.

3. Make new experiences together. You should try to understand how your colleagues like to behave. Team-building activities are an excellent way to do this in an informal setting.

How to: Although it would be best to meet face-to-face, there are virtual team-building alternatives, too. Some ideas include virtual escape rooms, virtual reality minigolf, or virtual pub quizzes.

Explicitly discussing ways of working

Finally, virtual teams need to create a shared context by discussing how they will want to work together and communicate with each other. Many things that go without saying in a physical setting, need to be brought up explicitly in a virtual setting.

1. Discuss what your team’s “code of conduct” will be. Finally, teams should explicitly set expectations and boundaries for how they want to work together. Being transparent about these from the beginning can help prevent frustration and conflict down the line.

How to: Some topics to explicitly discuss and agree on include, for instance, expectations on when to be available, when not to send emails anymore, or whether to send a short message before calling somebody.

2. Discuss what technology to use and how. As the majority of communication in virtual teams occurs via technology, there should be a consensus on when to use which tool. Emails, for instance, do not allow for immediate feedback and thus a video call may be a better tool to use when raising urgent issues. 

How to: Why not suggest a (virtual) technology training session to your team? The most proficient person could simply provide an overview of all functions, as well as the pros and cons, of all communication tools that are used within the team.

3. Discuss what team goals and everyone's responsibilities are. Everyone should understand what the team is working towards and what they each contribute to achieving that goal. An excellent way to ensure ownership and understanding is when members can articulate their responsibilities in their own words.

How to: Try holding a meeting with the sole purpose of discussing team goals and everyone's responsibilities. Have everyone repeat for themselves what they are responsible for on top of their formally assigned role. It might be a good idea to document these responsibilities in writing, too.

The main takeaway from this study is that virtual teamwork can be learned. As virtual teams are unlikely to disappear anytime soon, this is really good news. If it does not work out straight away, please, remember how many physical teams you have likely been part of before teamwork felt natural to you. If you can convince your virtual team to implement these tips, it will likely become a safer space to raise issues and to ask each other for help which, in turn, boosts team performance. I would thus encourage you not only to implement the abovementioned tips but to discuss them with your team as well.

If you would like to receive a copy of my full study, please contact me via Linkedin. Many thanks to everyone who participated in this study, your contribution has been invaluable.

References:

(1) Hinds, P. J., & Mortensen, M. (2005). Understanding Conflict in Geographically Distributed Teams: The Moderating Effects of Shared Identity, Shared Context, and Spontaneous Communication. Organization Science, 16(3), 290–307.

(2) Newman, A., Donohue, R., & Eva, N. (2017). Psychological safety: A systematic review of the literature. Human Resource Management Review, 27(3), 521–535. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.01.001

(3) Rozovsky, J. (2015, November 17). The Five Keys to a Successful Google Team. re:Work. Retrieved from: https://rework.withgoogle.com/

(4) Edmondson, A. (1999). Psychological safety and learning behavior in work teams. Administrative Science Quarterly, 44(2), 350–383. https://doi.org/10.2307/2666999

(5) Tajfel, H. (Ed.) (1978). Differentiation between social groups: Studies in the social psychology of intergroup relations. London, UK. Academic Press.