6 Team Strategies for Returning to Your New Office

Is your team starting to talk about returning to an office this year?

For many of our members, their work styles and offices have changed. Here are a few trends we’re seeing in Metro Detroit to support new forms of hybrid and remote work in your Detroit office space.

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Social Distancing is here to stay. There’s no need to return to crowded office spaces again. Plan for a nice spaced out design for your team. At Bamboo, many teams are planning to take up more space or rotate in so there’s less people in one room at any time. We’ve also social distance designed both of our co-working space locations, to help welcome people safely back to their office. 

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Hotelling is in.  Larger teams are now “hotelling” in. This means they let their team members book a desk inside their private team office. Instead of going to an office daily, they’ll rotate in on different days and bring a laptop. Monitors can be set up to make it comfortable. Consider adding branded items to help create a fun and welcoming team space to return to. Hotelling in for 1-2 days a week allows for team members to have a balance to their schedule and enjoy the perks of a new change in scenery.

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Adding your own zoom rooms is an option, too. While some of our teams are spreading out their floor plans, they are also adding on smaller zoom rooms to have private spaces for taking more calls. These “zoom rooms” help to create more space for taking calls but be nearby a larger team space. In our Detroit and Royal Oak co-working spaces there are  many places to take calls, but adding private branded options can support a nice team experience too. 

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Turn your office into a collaboration room. Many remote teams miss in person collaboration and in person team building. Some teams are now turning a larger office into a “collaboration room” to meet this need. This is a place setup for your own team offsites, allowing you to meet to innovate, whiteboard, brainstorm, and plan together.  TV’s and whiteboards can be added to the team collaboration room to make it easy to connect to other remote team members too. You also get the perks of the rest of the co-working space, kitchen, common areas, and amenities included.

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Add new design features for sound absorption. Many of our members still expect phone calls to be a part of their days. Some teams are adding in sound materials that can help make calls more comfortable inside theri private office. Affordable options like rugs, corkboard, and sound absorbing foam in areas will help to absorb sound. Some teams are having fun adding shower curtains and other design features to show off in person zoom backgrounds in their office.  

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Co-working passes are a great way to test the water. For those who aren’t ready to start returning to an office just yet, you can test a day out of your home office by getting a day or week coworking pass.  A co-working pass at any Bamboo location is available Mondays-Fridays 9am-5pm. This allows full use of common areas, social distanced co-working, kitchen, fast wi-fi, complimentary coffee and cold brew, and other community perks. This is a great way to test out returning to an office.

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Come join us for a day in Royal Oak or Downtown Detroit. You can contact us here to schedule a tour or visit in Royal Oak and here to tour Detroit. 

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We look forward to a year ahead of safely returning to connecting in person again. Our team is available for a complimentary call to discuss ways to support your strategy for returning to an office to work.