In the Covid pandemic, working remotely has become a challenge that many people experienced. In the remote team, members face the challenge of dealing with a lack of everyday face-to-face communication. They miss out on the informal daily interactions that co-located teams take for granted. It’s hard to stay connected and build trust with each other. The situation can get even worse with a multicultural team. Cultural differences, time zones, and language barriers made it even more challenging to stay on the same page and work efficiently. And for new employees, there is one more tough task: build a network from scratch.
In this project, I collected more than ten remote intercultural stories through secondary research, interviews, observation, and co-design workshop. Based on the research, I grab a pain point in a remote multicultural team: the informal social space disappearing in the online work environment. It is hard for the newcomer to build a stable network with other online teammates. Hence I designed a virtual community with open resources to engage people deeply in interacting with each other in a virtual leisure space.
