Hey, it's Rachel Cook, your modern mentor. I'm the founder of Lead Above Noise, a firm

specializing in helping leaders and organizations crack their activation codes, finding the simple

tweaks to enhance both performance and employee engagement. One of the biggest challenges I'm seeing

these days, it's companies still trying to figure out how to navigate

this whole hybrid working thing. Most organizations, at least the ones in my orbit, are managing

hybrid workforces, and hybrid is probably here to stay. But so many are struggling with their

teams resenting the mandate to return to an office some

number of days a week. And leaders are asking me for help in how to manage this. My answer,

it's lay off the mandates as much as you can and just help your team find ways to make

their in-person time as productive, engaging, and just straight-up fun as possible.

Over the past few months, I've seen leaders test out so many strategies for dialing up the

goodness on their team's in-person days. And whether the focus is on driving connection,

productivity, continuous learning, innovation, recognition, There are so many fun ideas to choose from.

And today, I'd love to share just a handful of them with you. So next time you're planning a

commute by force or by choice, here are some things you might think about playing around with.

First, rock a desk swap. I don't know about you, but when I'm visiting a client, I can

generally bet I will find them sitting at the same desk in the same corner every time. And I get it.

We are creatures of habit. There's no shame. But these days, rather than hardwired phones and

dinosaur desktops, most of us are working on

light-as-air laptops and smartphones.

So try packing up your stuff and swapping desks with a colleague.

Give yourself a gift of having a different view, being near new colleagues, and maybe overhearing

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