When work perks go remote: How we support employees in a virtual environment
A shortened version of this story was originally published on Built In NYC and is republished with permission and edited.
Beyond just the logistical hurdle of transitioning to remote work during the COVID-19 pandemic, our PeopleOps team wanted to address an even more pressing and evolving challenge: maintaining employee wellness.
Employee needs can differ greatly, and as work-from-home (WFH) life continues, those needs can change. The uncertainty of the times can lead to stress, burnout and a lack of engagement and productivity. Parents have to adjust to new school schedules and childcare responsibilities.
At Pager we feel a continuous responsibility to protect the mental health of our employees and support them in impactful, tangible ways. Approaching support strategies by listening to team members and being responsive to feedback helped us adapt to a changing remote world with updated resources and perks that were practical for work and life in a virtual setting. It also gave us a new opportunity: to take a closer look at how our perks differed for typically remote employees versus those in the office, and find ways to make resources more accessible for all, regardless of location.
Pager Office Manager Ryon Burrell shared insights on the variety of ways Pager has responded to the transition to remote work and the COVID-19 pandemic.
How did Pager adapt its perks to suit a remote work environment?
Ryon Burrell: Since our transition to remote work life, we’ve tried to both maintain our existing traditions and find new ways to help our team members connect with each other. Our usual all-hands meetings, game nights, movie and book clubs are now alternating weekly virtual meetings. We also introduced a weekly breakfast club and lunch table, which encourage team members to catch up and make new friends. In lieu of our biannual engineering on-sites, we created a number of virtual events that still allow our entire team time to enjoy each other’s company, solve problems and have fun together during the work day.
Since Pager had a number of remote employees prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, we’ve been able to take a look at how well our perks and resources were suited to employees who have always worked remotely. By adding some of these virtual perks, employees who are permanently remote have had better ways to connect with the larger team and take advantage of our resources.
“All of our new perks and benefits are shaped by the team members that will use them.”
How do you support employee mental health?
Our PeopleOps team hosts three weekly “Headspace Huddles” that offer time during the work day for self-reflection, meditation and breathing room. We also instituted Pager Days, which are an extra day each month that team members have off work to spend how they choose.
We continually work to understand how current events and social pressures affect our team members. We hosted workshops on wellness and diversity, inclusion and equity alongside our virtual field day events. We’re also building out new employee resource groups (ERGs) for our team in addition to our existing ones; we have a PLUS group for LGBTQIA+ team members to discuss current events, queer media and participate in events, and Wakanda for Black employees to share mental health resources and celebrate Black excellence.
How has Pager leveraged technology to support these new perks?
We’ve learned to use some of our existing tools differently. One of the new clubs that’s started at Pager is our Movie Club. Originally, we were using a Google Chrome extension called Netflix Party. We all voted on movies that were only on Netflix, and we had a couple of nights where we thought something was on Netflix and it wasn’t. Then, there was an “Aha” moment where someone said, “can’t we just use Zoom and share the screen?” and that really expanded our options. Using Zoom in a different way than I originally thought was helpful because we could just share the screen and there weren’t lag issues like we had seen before.
We used to have in-person game nights, so that was something we also had to turn remote. We have a group of people at Pager who are big fans of Settlers of Catan. A few of us found Settlers of Catan online, so we played that together. I built out a games document that has a few different ways we can play together, including Code Names and Jackbox Games. We’ve been open to finding new programs or sites that allow us to play different games together virtually.
How has employee feedback influenced these perks?
The easiest way to ensure that employee needs are met is by talking to them and making sure their voices are heard. We often use pulse surveys on certain subjects to get a sense of how our team feels and what their needs are. We created a culture committee with representatives from every department to ensure that our culture is built in an inclusive way by the whole team. Now, all of our new perks and benefits are shaped by the team members that will use them.
One way we’ve responded to employee feedback is by instituting new time off policies in response to employees feeling burnt out. To help minimize the burnout that team members were beginning to express, we instituted Pager Days, which are an extra day each month off across the company. Additionally, we updated birthday recognition perks to include a day off of your choosing during your birthday week.
How do you see these remote perks shaping work life in a post-COVID-19 world?
One thing we’ll continue to be mindful of is how to keep perks equal and inclusive for all employees, remote or in-person. For our book club, we’ve always had a Zoom component where people can join the conversation remotely. But now, we’re thinking about fun ways we can make sure we can include people in different types of events. When I think about how we’ve been able to do game nights virtually, I think it’s important to keep the inclusivity once we return to the office. So whether we make sure there’s both a virtual and in-person interaction component to game night so people in the office can play with the people remotely, or if it’s a different approach, it’s allowing us to think more creatively about how we can be even more inclusive.
For example, as of January 2021, we will be launching remote health insurance reimbursement, so our employees working outside of the United States can be reimbursed by Pager for costs associated with health insurance premiums every month. We hope this effort enables our employees who work remotely full time to better access support for their health and wellness.
Another thing the remote setting has brought, through our book club, is a little bit more structure to these events. We’ve always had a discussion and planned talking points, but in remote life, it’s not as easy to just sit around and gab. So we have to think about making sure that we’re creating structure for these sessions. It’s about sitting down to plan the talking points, the questions to ask, and how to keep the conversation flowing. I had to be more intentional about all of that – and that’s something we want to continue doing. So regardless of what book we’re reading, we want to make sure there’s a purpose to the discussion and that everyone is able to communicate, take space, and share their thoughts. I think that’s something we’ve learned from working in a remote setting.
A condensed version of this interview was originally published by Built In NYC on September 11, 2020 here.