How we connect our remote team to drive change at a global scale

While the office versus remote culture war rages on in headlines and LinkedIn posts, we continue to let our employees make their own choice as a remote company with the option for coworking as employees see fit.

But, with our rapidly-growing team of almost 60 employees spread across Europe, North America and even the Caribbean, it’s important to bring everyone together to connect, first and foremost at a human level, but also to reflect and plan ahead for our business.

And that’s why we have ev.energy Team Week - a quarterly event where we bring the whole team to one location to celebrate our successes, map out the next phase of the journey and get energised about what the future holds.  

This April we gathered in sunny Southampton, UK, for our first in-person team week since last autumn due to COVID-19. Since then, the team has almost doubled, new teams have been formed and we also gave our Team Week format a revamp. Here’s how we did it.

Kicking things off right

We kicked off with a warm welcome from our co-founders, Nick and Chris, who set out our priorities for the Team Week, our intentions for the next business quarter and the bigger mission that we’re supporting - to connect everyone to greener, cheaper and simpler charging.

This team week, we had a particular focus on creating warm, productive and remote-ready relationships, and inspired, motivated and energized team members that are aligned with a solid set of goals.

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Creating space for reflection

Following the all-hands kickoff, author Brita Fernandez Schmidt joined us for a session on protecting our personal energy with an innovative approach to mindfulness, allowing the team to unlock our best potential.

It’s probably no surprise that things move quickly at the crossroads of energy and transport, so this session ensured that everyone is taking time out for reflection and equipped us with practical tips for collaborative work in our mostly remote-based environments.

Retros, power hours and training

Following this, the team embarked on a range of powerful conversations, goal-setting meetings and training sessions. There were also open discussions at our Data Club and Content Café, with refreshing perspectives from members who may not usually join these sessions.

The relaxed, in-person setting allowed everyone to reflect on all aspects of work, set out a plan for improvement and ultimately fuel our cheaper, simpler, greener EV charging mission for the months and years to come.

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Creating meaningful connections

In the evenings, we parked the business objectives and took time to connect at a personal level.

On the first night, our Head of Growth, Kathleen, led a (carbon-free) fireside chat with co-founders Nick and Chris, allowing us to learn more about how they met, their lives outside of the workplace and what puts the fire in their bellies.

Following that, we learned more about members across the team with speedy Pecha Kucha style presentations.

Supporting change with GiveOut

Towards the end of the week, we brought everyone together for a talk from GiveOut, a charity supporting LGBTQI communities around the world. We’re proud to sponsor GiveOut’s Climate Fund, which focuses particularly on LGBTQI communities impacted by climate change.

Lee Dibben joined us over Zoom to inform our team about their great work with communities who do not have access to the required support in the wake of natural disasters brought on by the climate crisis.

Moving forward together

Finally, before heading off to Fully Charged Live UK for the weekend, we brought everyone back together for a wrap-up session to set out the newly agreed goals for the months ahead.

While a week of conversations can be fairly tiring, the week was full of remarkable conversations and, being a remote company, we're all feeling incredibly motivated for the months and years to come after living outside the screen for the week. Here’s to the next 3 months and beyond!

A special thanks to all of the people internally and externally who helped us to deliver an exceptional Team Week, as well as our guest speakers Brita and Lee, Ollie Whittingham and the Neostage team for help with the AV set-up, and our photographer Dave Bird.

Finally, a special shoutout to Robert, our Financial Director, for the lowest carbon journey - a 191-mile cycle ride between his home, Southampton, Fully Charged Live in Farnborough and back again. Way to go!

We’re hiring. Check out the latest opportunities via the ev.energy careers page.

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