It’s no secret that at Neo, our team and company culture is important to us. We know the term “company culture” can be bandied around as a soundbite, but for us it has always been part of how we operate.
Below is a short video snippet from General Manager Scott Wilson, discussing the impacts on company culture during the pandemic. He explains how, as a company, it was one of our “biggest wins” during the ups and downs of the last two years to retain the company culture and communication with the team, despite the disadvantages of lockdowns and working from home.
The pandemic has obviously thrown a curve ball when it comes to team workshops and face-to-face events we usually hold in the office, however we’ve recently been able to start holding these again for the Neo team to implement.
A team retrospective workshop was held in August 2021, and a follow up one in March 2022. These workshops are an interactive event for our team members to have their say on how to continually optimise their experience within the company. No management is present during these workshops to encourage openness and communication, which is something we strive to foster at Neo within our team and with our clients.
From these workshops, there were some great ideas that came up which we are looking into;
- – Modifications to the lunchroom to add soundproofing – providing less distractions for those working while others are preparing or eating.
- – The 9 day fortnight – a concept that the team have been brainstorming to present back for consideration.
- – Change seating in the office (which is open-plan) – to mix it up a bit, keeping it accessible for everyone.
- – Do more BBQ’s for lunch – company lunches are a great time to catch up with one another outside of our work tasks.
– Get a Pinball or arcade machine in the lunchroom – a great screen-free option for relaxing / spending time with one another during lunch breaks.- – More company culture events – our culture club has been reformed and is now back organising things.
We are also proud to have a mentoring programme where every Neo engineer is partnered up with someone from the management team. This promotes openness and allows for direct chain of communication with management. Our buddy system also ensures that each of our graduate team members is partnered with a senior team member to work alongside.
Retaining a company culture during the COVID pandemic has had its challenges. Juggling a workload remotely, being required to individually deliver work while also leading from the front can at times be an overwhelming task to get right. Through our values with inclusive leadership and the team workshops we regularly run, we are continuously looking for ways to optimise our company culture to ensure it benefits our team directly.
