Squads assemble! keeping engagement high when teams go remote...
summary
Bloom and Wild moves a 50‑person engineering org split into six squads to a quarterly face‑to‑face ritual called Squads Assemble that targets team building, planning and cross‑team workshops; the claim is that concentrated in‑person divergent work (useful for ideation) plus convergent prep for video meetings raises engagement. Tools used include Liberating Structures, lean coffee, Miro and standard video tools (Zoom/Meet). About 30% fully remote engineers travel in, attendance often hits ~90%, feedback shows improved connection but with measurable travel cost and recovery time; it largely works.
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chapters (22)
- 0:00Remote team engagement intro
- 1:50Hybrid and remote work styles
- 3:36In-office to remote shift
- 5:47Novelty and remote fatigue
- 8:37Why engagement drops remote
- 10:42Bloom & Wild growth remote
- 12:06Mostly remote team structure
- 14:52Remote pros and cons
- 16:59Flexibility versus office link
- 19:04Tools vs social connection
- 20:29Meeting frameworks compared
- 24:01Squads Assemble concept
- 27:11Squads Assemble activities
- 28:55Squads Assemble costs
- 31:03Tips for team assemblies
- 33:55Key takeaways and future
- 34:36Q&A: Cross-company events
- 36:24Q&A: Hybrid attendance
- 39:15Q&A: Fully remote sessions
- 41:06Q&A: Measuring assembly benefits
- 42:29Q&A: Remote dissatisfaction
- 44:39Closing remarks
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