10 online collaboration activities for remote teams
Discover simple but effective online collaboration activities and exercises that can help your remote workforce improve performance and team spirit.
Jess DeVore
Published:
September 6, 2023
Last updated:
October 8, 2024
What we'll cover
Study after study has shown the importance of collaboration at work. Companies that get collaboration right are more likely to beat competitors and have a highly motivated, engaged workforce.
But fostering collaboration can be a challenge when most of your employees don’t work from the office. If your employees work on the front lines or from their homes, they won’t have the same bonding opportunities as desk-based workers.
What can you do about this? Invest in creative ways to build effective virtual collaboration into your culture and promote teamwork.
One such way is to conduct online collaboration activities. These exercises provide remote employees the chance to socialize with peers whom they rarely get to meet in person.
So in this post, we’ll walk you through some of the best online collaboration activities we have hosted or seen working recently. But before we get to that, let’s see why virtual collaboration is so important.
Why is online collaboration important?
2500% more companies globally are investing in remote collaboration initiatives in response to Covid-19.
The media has bombarded us for years with stories of isolated, self-made geniuses. But whether you’re an individual or a business, you need to work with other people and teams successfully to get positive results.
You and your workers need opportunities to develop rapport, understand each other’s abilities, and communicate effectively as needed.
It’s teamwork that lets employees put out a collective effort and get things done — things that cannot be carried out alone.
But as we said before, remote work deprives people of the chance to interact with their coworkers beyond the scope of work. If you’re part of a dispersed team, there’s little chance that you’ll ever bump into another colleague near the water cooler, or talk about a hobby.
Because of this, virtual teams often lack the human connection that is critical to job satisfaction and employee retention. And without emotional bonds, team members are less likely to be engaged at work.
That’s where online collaboration activities fill the gap. You can use them to enhance relations between employees and boost motivation. The remote collaboration exercises below will help your workers feel closer than ever, improving their overall well-being and happiness.
Online collaboration activities for remote teams
When picking the following online collaboration activities, we have ensured they are easy to implement and effective. And that they can be adapted to remote work environments using any well-known video conferencing tools.
Plus, if an activity requires a whiteboard, you can share your screen and use any online whiteboard or note-sharing software for each person to see a live, editable page. Let’s begin.
What’s on your bucket list?
Sharing our dreams with another person is a great bonding experience. In this online collaboration example, you’ll give each employee a few minutes to think and make a list of their goals.
Specifically, these would be the things they want to do in the next 12 months, or at least once in their lifetime.
Then, every worker will share the list they created in a video conference. If some employees have the same things on their lists, they can continue the conversation offline to discuss and plan together.
Online coffee meeting
Call for a short, stand-up meeting at the start of the day. Each team member finds a coffee shop nearby, or brews a fresh cup on their own if they are home.
During the meeting, they can talk about the work they have planned for the day while enjoying their morning coffee. If mornings are not possible, you can apply the same concept to evening coffee breaks.
Be careful with this activity though. It’s very easy for it to become a strictly formal, work-related conversation. Make sure to keep the chatter light and fun.
Wall of fame
This online collaboration exercise helps employees facilitate clear communication and recognize each others’ strengths.
Divide workers into teams of two. Now ask each employee to take two minutes and share a work-related accomplishment they have had recently. You can set a particular time frame, such as last year, quarter, or week.
These could include successes such as handling a client, reducing the time it takes for a task, or gaining new insights.
After a worker is done speaking, the other person on their team will summarize to make sure they have understood the value of this achievement. Then repeat the same process for everyone in the meeting.
Photo of your life
Ask your distributed employees to take or share a snap of something meaningful from their personal life.
For example, it can be:
A family portrait
A picture from their recent vacation
A shot from their daily routine
Something they recently purchased
Whatever it is, it should shine some light on their personality and interests. Then schedule a video meeting where workers can show and talk about their pictures. They can say why they chose the image and what it means to them.
Memory board
The memory board is an amazing way to bond over past events, and it helps immensely with virtual team building.
Create a list of some work-related subjects and post them as notes on a whiteboard. For example:
My favorite team member
First day at work
Client presentation
You can then have each worker pick a topic and share a memory related to it.
Two truths and a lie
This is a great collaboration example for newly formed remote teams. Typical introductions based on “say something about yourself” can feel awkward, boring, and uncomfortable.
But with this remote team-building activity, you can give workers a fun, alternative way to introduce themselves and improve future communication.
Before calling an introduction meeting, ask employees to prepare three statements — two truths and one lie — about themselves. The lie should be conveyed as realistically as possible. It shouldn’t be easy to spot.
Each worker will then disclose their three statements in the meeting when delivering their introduction. And other team members will guess what’s the lie and what the truths are. Once they are done, the worker will tell the team members if they were right or wrong.
You can also make it more fun by awarding points to people who hid the lie successfully or who guessed it correctly.
Guess the phrase
This team-building activity has gained so much momentum over the years that companies like Hasbro have turned it into an electronic game.
Create a list of words or phrases. These could include celebrities, expressions, objects in the office, or movie names.
Then assign one to each employee. No one should know the word apart from the worker whom it’s assigned to.
Next, ask each employee to describe the word given to them without actually mentioning the word. And other team members will guess what the word is.
Online lunch and learn
Breaking bread together is an obvious connector. And lunch and learns have been one of the classic online training activities to promote collaboration in physical workplaces. So there’s no reason they can’t be adapted to the virtual world.
Get your team members on a video call and invite a subject matter expert to teach something that everyone can use. The topics may include productivity, problem-solving, and of course, working remotely.
You can schedule the event during lunchtime, allowing workers to enjoy their meals while absorbing new knowledge. If budget is not an issue, you can also offer to pay for the food.
Survival on an island
In this virtual team-building activity, give your team a hard situation. For example, let’s say they were going somewhere in a plane and it crashed on a deserted island, or a zombie apocalypse has made its way into their region.
Then share with them a list of objects that might help with their survival and eventual rescue. Next, ask them to rank each item based on its importance, first individually and then as a whole group.
It’s a great way for everyone to reflect and compare their personal decisions with collective choices. And it may give them new perspectives on collaboration.
Online recipe showcase
It’s not just eating. Cooking too can lead to an effective online collaboration exercise. With the popularity of remote work, more and more people are cooking at home.
You can start an online event where workers share their culinary favorites or experiments with food. And you can also run a challenge where employees will try each others’ recipes and take pictures of what they made.
Over to you: 10 online collaboration activities
Online team building doesn’t have to be difficult. It can be just as fun for workers to get to know each other virtually as physically.
As you can see, there are many online collaboration activities that are quick and easy to arrange. And they are essential to creating a digital employee experience fueled by teamwork and positive working relationships.
Not just that.
Online team-building exercises help you leverage the unique strengths and perspectives of each and every employee, resulting in a better output at work. So incorporate them regularly in the virtual workplace, and the harmony you’ll create is bound to help your business excel. Consider it one of the best practices for employee engagement you need to follow.
Plus, having the right technology, like one of the best employee engagement tools or an all-in-one team collaboration platform can foster collaboration to an even greater level. Request a free Blink demo today.
Study after study has shown the importance of collaboration at work. Companies that get collaboration right are more likely to beat competitors and have a highly motivated, engaged workforce.
But fostering collaboration can be a challenge when most of your employees don’t work from the office. If your employees work on the front lines or from their homes, they won’t have the same bonding opportunities as desk-based workers.
What can you do about this? Invest in creative ways to build effective virtual collaboration into your culture and promote teamwork.
One such way is to conduct online collaboration activities. These exercises provide remote employees the chance to socialize with peers whom they rarely get to meet in person.
So in this post, we’ll walk you through some of the best online collaboration activities we have hosted or seen working recently. But before we get to that, let’s see why virtual collaboration is so important.
Why is online collaboration important?
2500% more companies globally are investing in remote collaboration initiatives in response to Covid-19.
The media has bombarded us for years with stories of isolated, self-made geniuses. But whether you’re an individual or a business, you need to work with other people and teams successfully to get positive results.
You and your workers need opportunities to develop rapport, understand each other’s abilities, and communicate effectively as needed.
It’s teamwork that lets employees put out a collective effort and get things done — things that cannot be carried out alone.
But as we said before, remote work deprives people of the chance to interact with their coworkers beyond the scope of work. If you’re part of a dispersed team, there’s little chance that you’ll ever bump into another colleague near the water cooler, or talk about a hobby.
Because of this, virtual teams often lack the human connection that is critical to job satisfaction and employee retention. And without emotional bonds, team members are less likely to be engaged at work.
That’s where online collaboration activities fill the gap. You can use them to enhance relations between employees and boost motivation. The remote collaboration exercises below will help your workers feel closer than ever, improving their overall well-being and happiness.
Online collaboration activities for remote teams
When picking the following online collaboration activities, we have ensured they are easy to implement and effective. And that they can be adapted to remote work environments using any well-known video conferencing tools.
Plus, if an activity requires a whiteboard, you can share your screen and use any online whiteboard or note-sharing software for each person to see a live, editable page. Let’s begin.
What’s on your bucket list?
Sharing our dreams with another person is a great bonding experience. In this online collaboration example, you’ll give each employee a few minutes to think and make a list of their goals.
Specifically, these would be the things they want to do in the next 12 months, or at least once in their lifetime.
Then, every worker will share the list they created in a video conference. If some employees have the same things on their lists, they can continue the conversation offline to discuss and plan together.
Online coffee meeting
Call for a short, stand-up meeting at the start of the day. Each team member finds a coffee shop nearby, or brews a fresh cup on their own if they are home.
During the meeting, they can talk about the work they have planned for the day while enjoying their morning coffee. If mornings are not possible, you can apply the same concept to evening coffee breaks.
Be careful with this activity though. It’s very easy for it to become a strictly formal, work-related conversation. Make sure to keep the chatter light and fun.
Wall of fame
This online collaboration exercise helps employees facilitate clear communication and recognize each others’ strengths.
Divide workers into teams of two. Now ask each employee to take two minutes and share a work-related accomplishment they have had recently. You can set a particular time frame, such as last year, quarter, or week.
These could include successes such as handling a client, reducing the time it takes for a task, or gaining new insights.
After a worker is done speaking, the other person on their team will summarize to make sure they have understood the value of this achievement. Then repeat the same process for everyone in the meeting.
Photo of your life
Ask your distributed employees to take or share a snap of something meaningful from their personal life.
For example, it can be:
A family portrait
A picture from their recent vacation
A shot from their daily routine
Something they recently purchased
Whatever it is, it should shine some light on their personality and interests. Then schedule a video meeting where workers can show and talk about their pictures. They can say why they chose the image and what it means to them.
Memory board
The memory board is an amazing way to bond over past events, and it helps immensely with virtual team building.
Create a list of some work-related subjects and post them as notes on a whiteboard. For example:
My favorite team member
First day at work
Client presentation
You can then have each worker pick a topic and share a memory related to it.
Two truths and a lie
This is a great collaboration example for newly formed remote teams. Typical introductions based on “say something about yourself” can feel awkward, boring, and uncomfortable.
But with this remote team-building activity, you can give workers a fun, alternative way to introduce themselves and improve future communication.
Before calling an introduction meeting, ask employees to prepare three statements — two truths and one lie — about themselves. The lie should be conveyed as realistically as possible. It shouldn’t be easy to spot.
Each worker will then disclose their three statements in the meeting when delivering their introduction. And other team members will guess what’s the lie and what the truths are. Once they are done, the worker will tell the team members if they were right or wrong.
You can also make it more fun by awarding points to people who hid the lie successfully or who guessed it correctly.
Guess the phrase
This team-building activity has gained so much momentum over the years that companies like Hasbro have turned it into an electronic game.
Create a list of words or phrases. These could include celebrities, expressions, objects in the office, or movie names.
Then assign one to each employee. No one should know the word apart from the worker whom it’s assigned to.
Next, ask each employee to describe the word given to them without actually mentioning the word. And other team members will guess what the word is.
Online lunch and learn
Breaking bread together is an obvious connector. And lunch and learns have been one of the classic online training activities to promote collaboration in physical workplaces. So there’s no reason they can’t be adapted to the virtual world.
Get your team members on a video call and invite a subject matter expert to teach something that everyone can use. The topics may include productivity, problem-solving, and of course, working remotely.
You can schedule the event during lunchtime, allowing workers to enjoy their meals while absorbing new knowledge. If budget is not an issue, you can also offer to pay for the food.
Survival on an island
In this virtual team-building activity, give your team a hard situation. For example, let’s say they were going somewhere in a plane and it crashed on a deserted island, or a zombie apocalypse has made its way into their region.
Then share with them a list of objects that might help with their survival and eventual rescue. Next, ask them to rank each item based on its importance, first individually and then as a whole group.
It’s a great way for everyone to reflect and compare their personal decisions with collective choices. And it may give them new perspectives on collaboration.
Online recipe showcase
It’s not just eating. Cooking too can lead to an effective online collaboration exercise. With the popularity of remote work, more and more people are cooking at home.
You can start an online event where workers share their culinary favorites or experiments with food. And you can also run a challenge where employees will try each others’ recipes and take pictures of what they made.
Over to you: 10 online collaboration activities
Online team building doesn’t have to be difficult. It can be just as fun for workers to get to know each other virtually as physically.
As you can see, there are many online collaboration activities that are quick and easy to arrange. And they are essential to creating a digital employee experience fueled by teamwork and positive working relationships.
Not just that.
Online team-building exercises help you leverage the unique strengths and perspectives of each and every employee, resulting in a better output at work. So incorporate them regularly in the virtual workplace, and the harmony you’ll create is bound to help your business excel. Consider it one of the best practices for employee engagement you need to follow.
Plus, having the right technology, like one of the best employee engagement tools or an all-in-one team collaboration platform can foster collaboration to an even greater level. Request a free Blink demo today.
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See how Blink helps frontline teams stay connected, informed, and engaged.
Today’s employees routinely use digital tools to manage their personal lives — for banking, shopping, fitness, and even dating — and now expect a similar level of convenience and connectivity in their professional environments.
Forward-thinking organizations are meeting these expectations through employee experience software platforms that transform how teams communicate and engage. Solutions such as Blink’s employee experience platform enable staff to feel more connected, motivated, and loyal to their company by simplifying communication and recognition.
Frontline teams, in particular, benefit from a unified employee experience solution. The “frontline connection gap” often leaves these employees isolated from leadership and peers, reducing both satisfaction and retention.
A mobile-first employee experience platform, such as Blink, bridges that gap by bringing everyone together wherever they work. It gives each employee a stronger sense of belonging, supports regular recognition, and creates continuous communication that makes work more fulfilling.
This guide from Blink outlines some of the best employee experience software platforms available today — helping you identify the right solution to connect your workforce and elevate engagement across your organization.
Whether your organization has frontline, desk-based, or hybrid teams, an employee experience software platform like Blink’s employee experience platform helps you meet and exceed modern employee expectations and deliver measurable improvements across engagement, operations, and culture. Here’s what effective employee experience software can help you achieve:
Enhanced employee engagement
Low employee engagement costs the global economy $8.8 trillion, according to Gallup. Employee experience platforms like Blink enable two-way communication, recognition, and collaboration that increase loyalty, satisfaction, and productivity.
Streamlined HR processes
The best platforms automate repetitive and time-consuming HR tasks such as time tracking, performance appraisals, and routine communication. By handling these automatically, HR teams free up time for human-touch, value-add work that improves the overall employee experience.
Improved talent management
Around 65% of frontline employees are unsure how to progress in their careers. Employee experience software provides continuous feedback, coaching, and development tools that help managers identify high-potential talent and guide employees toward advancement.
Data-driven insights
Comprehensive reporting and analytics capabilities enable organizations to measure engagement, sentiment, and performance. Blink’s platform, for example, supplies real-time insights that support better decisions, highlight trends, and surface issues early.
Employee recognition and empowerment
Employee appreciation and self-service tools make staff feel valued and informed. Access to essential information anytime, anywhere fosters a sense of support and connection across the organization.
A positive company culture
Transparent communication and meaningful connection — both core features of leading platforms like Blink — build positive company culture. When employees feel proud of where they work, satisfaction rises, churn decreases, and employer branding strengthens.
Key things to look for when choosing an employee experience software platform
Now that the benefits of an employee experience software platform are clear, it’s important to identify the key capabilities that define an effective solution. When choosing your platform, consider these essential features — many of which are core to Blink’s employee experience platform:
User-friendly interface
The best employee experience platforms minimize the learning curve. They should feel intuitive and familiar from day one, encouraging quick adoption across all teams.
Personalization and customization
Every organization is different. Choose a platform that lets you tailor tools and workflows to your company’s structure and employee needs.
Employee self-service
When employees can access the information and tools they need independently, HR teams spend less time handling routine requests and more time on strategic, people-focused initiatives.
Integration capabilities
For a seamless employee experience, ensure your platform integrates smoothly with existing business systems — from scheduling and payroll to communication tools. Blink, for example, integrates across multiple systems to provide a unified digital workplace.
Mobile accessibility
Frontline workers and remote employees often lack equal access to company tools. A mobile-first platform like Blink enables engagement and communication anywhere — whether on the shop floor, in the field, or during a commute.
Analytics and reporting
Select software that delivers robust analytics on engagement, satisfaction, and retention. Data-driven insight helps HR teams make informed decisions and address trends early.
Comprehensive feature set
To reduce the need for multiple apps, look for a platform that combines employee engagement, feedback, rewards, performance management, and learning and development. Blink’s platform consolidates these into one accessible hub, simplifying management and improving the overall employee experience.
15 best employee experience software platforms
1. Blink
Blink is a leading employee experience app and communication platform purpose-built for frontline teams. As a mobile-first solution, Blink unifies dispersed workers and connects them with leadership through an intuitive, easy-to-use interface.
Users can quickly launch pre-loaded or custom employee surveys, add mandatory reads to a shared company news feed, recognize colleagues for outstanding work, and access real-time insights on engagement, satisfaction, and retention.
Built around frontline accessibility, Blink’s Hub centralizes essential information, including pay stubs, schedules, and key documents. Its interface encourages high adoption and consistent daily use — ensuring every employee stays informed, valued, and connected.
Even after identifying the right employee experience management software, securing senior leadership buy-in remains essential. Before presenting your case, gather evidence and insights in the following key areas — all central to the successful implementation of a platform like Blink.
Developed by the team at Blink, the platform brings together communication, engagement, and HR functionality in one secure space. It’s designed to strengthen connections and alignment across all levels of an organization while reducing the administrative burden on HR teams.The essential guide to executive buy-in for frontline employee experience
Scalability: Evaluate how your chosen platform will adapt to your company’s future needs, including long-term growth and an expanding workforce. Blink’s platform is designed to scale seamlessly as organizations expand, supporting larger teams without adding administrative complexity.
Implementation: Assess how straightforward it is to deploy your software and integrate it with existing systems. A solution such as Blink simplifies this step with pre-built integrations and guided onboarding.
User adoption: An employee experience platform only delivers value when employees actively use it. Confirm that your software has a proven record of adoption. For example, 97% of employees at Care Synergy now use the Blink app, demonstrating how intuitive design drives engagement.
Vendor reputation and support: Review customer testimonials and case studies to verify a provider’s reliability and service quality. Blink’s long-term partnerships and customer success programs help ensure ongoing performance and satisfaction across industries.
Case study: Elara Caring
Elara Caring employs more than 32,000 caregivers who provide in-home and hospice support to patients across the United States. The organization faced a significant communication and coordination challenge:
Without company-issued phone numbers or email addresses, caregivers felt disconnected from both colleagues and headquarters.
An outdated manual scheduling process left hundreds of shifts unfilled each week.
The existing HR platform failed to meet employees' operational and engagement needs.
To close these gaps, Elara Caring implemented Blink’s employee experience platform, developed by joinblink.com. The mobile-first platform unified essential communication, scheduling, and feedback tools into a single, secure, accessible application. Managers and caregivers could now share updates through a company news feed, manage shifts in real time, and recognize great work — all from their smartphones.
The impact was immediate. Workforce efficiency improved, communication bottlenecks were eliminated, and employees felt more connected to both their teams and leadership. Ninety-five percent of employees now report stronger connections to Elara, and 96% would recommend Blink’s platform to others in their field.
Culture Amp is an excellent choice if you want to improve your performance tracking process. You can set and track employee targets, create personalized L&D plans, and access historical conversation and 1:1 data so managers can provide actionable feedback.
This employee experience management software also gives you access to a ton of data. This provides a great basis for analysis and insight. And the platform even does some of the hard work for you too, using employee engagement stats to predict staff turnover.
Key features
Reporting and analytics
Turnover prediction tool
Performance reviews
Goal tracking
Pricing
Contact sales team for prices
3. Bonusly
Bonusly is a great option for employee recognition. Employees meet personalized targets and build up points, which they can then use to claim a selection of rewards, all via the platform.
Whether you want your team to go above and beyond for customers, meet their sales quota, or simply engage with a request for employee feedback, Bonusly helps you to promote and recognize the employee behavior you most want to see.
Key features
Peer-to-peer recognition
Employee rewards
Goal setting
Reporting and analytics
Pricing
Core: $3 per user/month
Pro: $5 per user/month
Contact sales team for custom plans
4. Lattice
With Lattice, you’ll find it easy to launch employee surveys, celebrate employee wins, and get real-time experience data with the help of the platform’s Pulse feature and sentiment analysis. Lattice also supports employee development opportunities. It connects individual work to business outcomes so employees can view their progress easily.
Key features
Reporting and analytics
Employee surveys
Employee recognition
Goal management
Pricing
Performance Management + OKRs and Goals: $11 per user/month
Engagement: +$4 per user/month
Grow: +$4 per user/month
Compensation: $+6 per user/month
5. Qualtrics XM
Qualtrics XM offers several products, one of which they’ve designed specifically for people teams. The employee experience platform uses AI and automation, so you can continually gather and assess employee feedback and get to know employee views at every point in the employee life cycle.
Data analytics tools help you to connect employee feedback to customer experience and business outcomes – so you can target employee experience improvements where they stand to make the most difference.
Workhuman is built around social recognition. Team-based social feeds support peer-to-peer appreciation. Employees gain recognition points, which they can exchange for personalized and locally sourced rewards. And an AI-powered Inclusion Advisor gives real-time feedback on recognition posts to prevent unconscious bias and promote a culture of belonging.
Key features
Employee recognition
Performance management
Translation into 34+ languages
Community building
Pricing
Contact sales team for prices
7. Mo
Mo is one of the best employee experience software platforms for team communication and appreciation. It allows you to share successes, recognize results, and reward good work.
Standout features include the Mo assistant, which helps people managers to remember work anniversaries and prompts them to appreciate employees who haven’t had a pat on the back in a while, and the social feed, where you can start conversations, prompt employees to start conversations, and ask for employee feedback.
Key features
Team appreciation
Social feed
Employee feedback
Insights
Pricing
Starter: $3 per user/month
Level Up: $5 per user/month
Contact sales team for custom plans
8. Motivosity
Motivosity provides tools for every stage of the employee journey. From recruitment to onboarding to development to career progression and even an employee’s company exit experience. The basic plan gives you access to a company social feed, great for important announcements and getting to know co-workers. Add-ons include Recognition and Rewards, Manager Development, and Employee Insights.
Key features
Social feed
Employee recognition
Manager training
Surveys and insights
Pricing
Motivosity: $2 per user/month
Recognition and Rewards: +$2 per user/month
Manager Development: +$2 per user/month
Employee Insights: +$2 per user/month
9. WorkTango
WorkTango (formerly Kazoo) allows you to highlight the strengths and skills of peers and employees, while a points and rewards system incentivizes key behaviors. It’s one of the best employee engagement platforms for teams who want to make recognition an integral part of their company culture.
Key features
Employee recognition
Goal setting and feedback
Surveys
Analytics and reporting
Pricing
Contact sales team for prices
10. 15Five
15Five is one of the best employee experience software options if you’re looking to connect employee work with business objectives. Managers and employees can create career paths that motivate performance. Employees can identify their strengths and how these align with their goals.
Key features
Goal setting tools
Feedback
Employee recognition
Manager coaching
Pricing
All of the following prices are billed annually:
Engage: $4 per user/month
Perform: $8 per user/month
Focus: $8 per user/month
Total Platform: $14 per user/month
11. Leapsome
Leapsome is a solid employee engagement software, particularly if you’re looking for a solution that can scale with your company. You can select the modules you need, adapting the software to the size and budget of your organization. With Leapsome, you can run meaningful, well-structured meetings. You can also congratulate co-workers publicly and share private feedback too.
Key features
Employee feedback
Learning and development
Goal setting
Employee competency framework
Pricing
Pricing starts at $8 per user/month with the option to add on the extra features you need
12. BambooHR
BambooHR provides a huge range of HR tools. Teams can use it to track payroll, hours worked, and paid time off. The platform offers recruitment and L&D tracking tools.
As well as making life easier for HR teams, BambooHR has a couple of features designed to improve the employee experience. Wellbeing and eNPS surveys help teams to understand the employee perspective, while performance tracking tools support employee progression.
Key features
Performance reviews
Time tracking
Payroll management
Applicant tracking system (ATS)
Pricing
Contact sales team for prices
13. Officevibe
If you’re looking for an easy and effective employee survey tool, Officevibe is an excellent choice. Officevibe is just one of the HR products available under the Workleap umbrella and this offering is laser-focused on employee experience.
The platform gives managers tools to become better leaders and build happier teams. Pulse and customized surveys, peer-to-peer recognition, and 1-1 meeting tools that guide meaningful and productive conversations are all at a manager’s disposal.
Key features
Surveys
Employee feedback
Employee recognition
Performance tracking
Pricing
Free: $0 per user/month
Essential: $5 per user/month
Pro: $8 per user/month
14. Workvivo
Another good employee experience management software, Workvivo helps organizations streamline their communications and showcase their company culture, even when teams work remotely. When posting on the social feed, employees can link their posts to company values and goals. And with the Badge Feature, managers can recognize employee achievements publicly.
An intuitive platform with a quick and easy setup process, Jostle is another popular employee engagement platform. It works to connect everyone within an organization, providing a social feed and a space for shared documents.
Managers can set tasks and then use built-in chat functions to track progress. They can also separate the social feed by location or team, ensuring that the right information reaches the right people.
Key features
Social feed
Surveys
Peer-to-peer recognition
Document and policy sharing
Pricing
Prices depend upon the number of employees you have. For an organization with 15-50 employees, prices are as follows:
Bronze: $5 per user/month
Silver: $9 per user/month
Gold: $12 per user/month
Smaller organizations can expect to pay more per user. Larger organizations can expect to pay less. Prices for the Platinum plan are available from the sales team.
Additional considerations for HR teams
You may already be sold on a particular employee experience management software, but getting senior leadership buy-in is a vital next step. Before entering conversations about the type of tool you’d like to implement, be sure to gather information on all of the following:
Scalability – Find out if and how your chosen platform will respond to your company’s future needs, considering long-term company growth and an increase in the number of employees.
Implementation – Determine how easy it is to implement your chosen software and whether it integrates with your other existing systems.
User adoption – An employee experience platform provides very little value if employees don’t use it. Check whether your chosen platform has a user-friendly interface and a history of high adoption rates. We’re proud that 97% of employees at Care Synergy are now using the Blink app. Find out more by watching our on-demand webinar.
Vendor reputation and support– Take a look at customer reviews, testimonials, and case studies to find out whether your software provider has a good track record in terms of product quality and client care.
Case Study: Elara Caring
Elara’s 32,000 carers spend their workdays caring for patients in their homes or in hospice settings. The company faced a million-dollar communication problem:
Without company phone numbers or email addresses, carers felt disconnected from their co-workers and head office
Carers wanted shift opportunities but an inefficient manual system meant hundreds of shifts went unfilled each week
The company’s existing HR platform was failing to meet the needs of employees and the wider organization
Elara saw a solution in Blink. Our platform gathered all the information and tools that employees needed in one easy-to-use platform that everyone could access from their smartphones. Employees and managers had access to a social feed, shift scheduling, employee feedback and employee recognition tools.
The result? Improved workforce efficiency and streamlined communications. Thanks to Blink, Elara has transformed the employee experience. 95% of employees now feel more connected to Elara and 96% would recommend the platform.
Looking for a Jostle alternative that fits your internal communication or employee experience goals better? Whether you're aiming for a more modern UX, greater mobile accessibility, or better analytics, you've come to the right place. In this guide, we explore the top 10 alternatives to Jostle — with detailed comparisons on features, pricing, reviews, and suitability — so you can make the best choice for your organization.
What to look for in a Jostle alternative
Before choosing your next platform, it’s essential to understand what separates the best Jostle alternatives from the rest. Whether you're upgrading your employee intranet, switching to a more intuitive internal communication platform, or adopting employee experience software with better analytics and mobile access — here are the key features to prioritize:
#1. Mobile-first design
Look for platforms that prioritize mobile accessibility, especially if you have frontline, hybrid, or distributed teams. A Jostle replacement should offer native mobile apps with offline support, push notifications, and responsive design.
#2. Two-way communication
Modern comms tools should enableemployee feedback, not just top-down broadcasting. Tools with surveys, comments, polls, and chat improve engagement and support a transparent workplace culture.
#3. Targeted messaging & personalization
The best Jostle competitors let you segment your workforce and personalize updates by location, department, or role — ensuring that the right message reaches the right employee at the right time.
#4. User-friendly interface
A clean, intuitive UI helps boost platform adoption. Look for solutions that are easy to use for both end users and admins, with minimal training required.
#5. Integrated ecosystem
Ensure the tool integrates with your existing systems — such as Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, HRIS, payroll, or shift scheduling tools — to centralize information and streamline workflows.
#6. Real-time analytics
Powerful communication analytics help you measure reach, engagement, and campaign effectiveness. This is a crucial upgrade over Jostle’s limited insight capabilities.
#7. Frontline communication tools
If you serve deskless workers, you’ll want features like QR code logins, broadcast alerts, digital forms, and mobile-first feeds. These features make platforms like Blink a better choice for engaging non-desk teams.
#8. Scalability and customization
As your company grows, your intranet should grow with you. Choose a platform that supports multilingual content, governance, and custom branding as your workforce evolves.
By keeping these capabilities in mind, you'll be better equipped to evaluate not just an intranet replacement — but a platform that powers the entire employee communication lifecycle.
G2 Rating: 4.7/5 Gartner Peer Insights: 4.8/5 Pricing: Free trial available — Start your free trial
Overview: Blink is an employee experience platform that goes beyond traditional intranets by combining communication, engagement, and productivity tools in a single mobile-first interface. It enables two-way communication, real-time targeting, and frontline accessibility that Jostle lacks.
Pros:
Mobile-first experience designed for frontline, hybrid, and HQ teams
Smart content targeting and audience segmentation
Real-time analytics and engagement insights
Integrates with Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, HRIS, and payroll systems
Fast deployment with a free trial available
Cons:
Does not offer a desktop-only intranet for organizations without mobile needs
Overview: Simpplr is a modern intranet platform with AI-powered personalization, search, and structured content experiences. It's designed to support internal comms and knowledge sharing, primarily for desk-based knowledge workers.
Pros:
Sleek user interface and strong personalization features
Native integrations with Salesforce and Microsoft 365
Good support for structured org-wide communications
Cons:
Setup and onboarding can be complex
Lacks flexibility for frontline or mobile-first teams
Overview: Staffbase is a communications-first platform with mobile and desktop experiences. It offers a branded app, newsletter tools, and internal comms analytics — with a strong focus on top-down messaging.
Pros:
Branded employee app for mobile communications
Easy publishing tools and editorial workflows
Excellent for large, distributed enterprises
Cons:
Limited peer-to-peer or two-way communication features
Advanced features may require paid add-ons or integrations
Overview: Workvivo is a social intranet that combines engagement tools like shoutouts, polls, and live streams with content distribution. It’s geared toward companies looking to foster culture and community.
Pros:
Social-first design boosts engagement
Easy to use with intuitive content tools
Supports recognition, wellness, and culture initiatives
Cons:
Not ideal for task-oriented communications or operational updates
Can become cluttered in large orgs without moderation
Overview: Unily is an enterprise-grade digital workplace platform with a highly customizable intranet, multilingual support, and robust governance capabilities.
Overview: MangoApps offers a modular intranet and collaboration platform where organizations can pick and choose features like messaging, wikis, task tracking, and HR portals.
Pros:
Flexible modular pricing
Supports multiple use cases beyond communication
Simple UI with broad capabilities
Cons:
Interface can feel outdated compared to newer tools
Requires configuration and training for full potential
Overview: Happeo is a social intranet tailored for Google Workspace users. It offers channel-based communication and integration with Google tools like Drive and Calendar.
Pros:
Deep Google Workspace integration
Quick deployment and low learning curve
Clean, social-style UI
Cons:
Limited integration support beyond Google ecosystem
Less customizable than enterprise-grade tools
#10. Noodle
G2 Rating: 4.1/5 Gartner Peer Insights: Not listed Pricing: Starts at $6/user/month
Overview: Noodle is a no-frills intranet platform geared toward small businesses. It offers employee directories, file sharing, and discussion forums.
Pros:
Affordable and simple to use
Good for small, budget-conscious teams
On-premise or cloud deployment options
Cons:
Dated UI and limited engagement tools
Lacks mobile-first design and integrations
Final thoughts
Jostle has served many organizations well, but its limitations around scalability, two-way engagement, and analytics have prompted many teams to look elsewhere. Platforms like Blink offer a more modern, mobile-first experience — giving you the power to connect, engage, and support every employee, no matter where or how they work.
Growth is exciting — until your communication stack starts showing cracks.
What worked when you had 500 employees rarely survives the jump to 2,000. Messages get missed. Tools and communication channels multiply. Frontline teams fall out of the loop. Managers spend more time clarifying updates than leading their teams. Collaboration suffers.
And the cost adds up fast.
Internal communication isn’t just about “sending messages.” It’s the connective tissue that keeps people aligned, productive, and confident through change — especially during rapid growth, acquisitions, and reorganization.
In 2026, the best internal communication platforms are mobile-first, integrated, and built to scale. They bring updates, messaging, recognition, feedback, and knowledge into one clear place — reducing noise while increasing clarity.
But choosing the right platform is where many growing organizations stumble.
In this guide, we break down exactly how to compare internal communication tools for growth — so you can avoid tool sprawl, protect employee trust, and scale communication without slowing your business down.
Let’s get into it.
How to choose and compare internal communication tools for growth
Step #1: Audit your current communication tools and challenges
Start by mapping your current comms tech stack. List every communication tool your company uses — email, intranet, chat apps, recognition tools, employee apps — everything.
Categorize these tools by function and adoption level. Then, identify pain points. Are employees frustrated by fragmented communication? Duplicate workflows? Low engagement? Or maybe frontline teams can’t access key updates at all?
Creating a simple audit table with key criteria can make this research easier to digest:
Tool
Purpose
Coverage
Integration status
Mobile experience
Overall user experience
Analytics
Adoption rate
Unique features
Problems we have with this tool
This gives you a baseline. So you can see what’s working and what’s holding you back.
Step #2: Define business outcomes and KPIs
The best employee communication tools don’t just support better comms. They support your overarching business goals and KPIs.
So, when comparing internal communication tools for business growth, start by asking: What do we want to achieve?
Example goals include:
Increase productivity by ensuring employees have the information the need, when they need it
Improve retention by fostering engagement and a sense of belonging
Boost customer satisfaction through better-informed frontline teams
Strengthen collaboration across departments, locations, and roles with joined-up comms software
Next, define KPIs that make these outcomes measurable. For example, missed deadline rates, employee satisfaction scores, time-to-information, and cross-functional interaction rates.
During M&A or large-scale change, communication KPIs matter even more. Leaders should track not just engagement, but clarity — for example, repeat questions in manager channels, policy page revisit rates, or sentiment dips following major announcements. These indicators reveal where uncertainty is slowing integration and decision-making.
Step #3: Prioritize essential features for growth and engagement
In 2026, mobile-first communication solutions are essential. If your tool isn’t designed to work seamlessly on a smartphone, you exclude frontline workers and make life harder than it needs to be for everyone else.
When you compare internal communication tools for growth, look for platforms that deliver an exceptional mobile experience and the following functionality to drive adoption, impact, and scalability:
Step #4: Test integrations and compatibility with your ecosystem
Your internal communication platform can’t live in isolation. Integration matters. It eliminates workflow fiction, maximizes comms ROI, and supports seamless adoption of your tech tools.
Start by auditing your software ecosystem: HRIS, CRM, payroll, identity providers, operational tools. Then, look for internal communication platforms that offer strong integrations with your current tech stack.
Things to look for?:
Single sign-on. So employees can access all workplace software via one unified dashboard and a single set of login details.
HRIS sync. From benefits to policy docs to schedules to payroll, you make life easy for employees and your HR team when internal comms and HR systems talk to each other.
Calendar/file system connectivity. To create a joined-up system, the same calendar and files should be accessible across all workplace software.
Security compliance. Easy access is important. But you need to balance this with security and privacy standards. Look for platforms that balance usability with data protection.
You may like to run sample integration tests, documenting any issues or workarounds needed, to find the best match.
Use case: Supporting internal communications during M&A and organizational change
Business growth doesn’t always follow a straight line. For many organizations, growth comes through mergers and acquisitions (M&A) or major restructuring — moments when communication becomes both more critical and more fragile.
While legal close and system access often run smoothly, the employee experience that follows is far messier. What we consistently see during M&A-driven growth includes:
Conflicting messages across teams
Duplicated tools and knowledge bases
Managers fielding questions they don’t yet have answers to
Employees unsure where to go for “what’s actually changed”
This is where internal communication platforms are truly tested.
Communication at scale — without losing local context
Successful M&A communication balances two competing needs:
A shared narrative from the parent organization
Local relevance for acquired teams
The best internal communication tools support this by clearly separating global updates from location-, role-, or entity-specific information — so employees understand what applies to everyone and what applies to them.
Systems change needs a human layer
During M&A, system consolidation is inevitable. What shouldn’t be inevitable is confusion.
Employees don’t want another announcement about a new platform. They want:
One clear place to start their day
Simple guidance on what changed (and what didn’t)
Confidence they’re using the right tools
Mobile-first platforms that unify communication, knowledge, and workflows help organizations turn change management from a one-time event into a guided experience.
Modern intranets under pressure
Legacy intranets often collapse under M&A strain:
Duplicate pages and policies
No clear ownership
Inconsistent branding and structure
Modern internal communication platforms act as flexible, living knowledge hubs — supporting shared content while allowing phased integration and local nuance.
Supporting managers is risk mitigation
Managers become the front line of communication during M&A — often before decisions are fully finalized.
Platforms that provide:
Manager-ready messaging
Clear distinction between what’s decided and what’s evolving
A single source of truth managers can point teams to
…reduce mixed signals, rumor cycles, and burnout. Supporting managers isn’t just enablement — it’s how organizations protect trust during change.
Why measurement matters more during M&A
The most successful M&A integrations share one thing: visibility.
Strong internal communication tools allow leaders to see:
Who’s engaging with updates
Where confusion persists
Which teams need additional support
Without this data, organizations guess. And during M&A, guessing is expensive.
Bottom line:
If an internal communication platform can support employees through M&A — preserving clarity, confidence, and culture — it’s built to support business growth at any scale.
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Execution mistakes to avoid after choosing an internal communication tool for business growth
Choosing the right internal communication platform is a big milestone. But growth-ready comms don’t come from software alone — they come from how well the platform is implemented, adopted, and embedded into daily work.
Here are the most common execution mistakes growing organizations make and how to avoid them.
Mistake #1: Rolling out to everyone at once
A full-scale rollout might feel efficient, but it often hides problems until they’re expensive to fix.
Different groups experience communication very differently — especially during growth or post-acquisition integration. Frontline teams, managers, and HQ staff don’t have the same needs, habits, or access.
What to do instead:
Run targeted pilots with representative user groups. Track adoption, ease of use, and qualitative feedback. Use what you learn to refine onboarding, governance, notifications, and content formats before scaling.
A phased rollout surfaces friction early — when it’s still easy to fix.
Mistake #2: Measuring usage, but not impact
Login rates alone don’t tell you whether communication is working. High activity can still mask confusion, misalignment, or low trust.
What to do instead:
Measure adoption and engagement alongside business outcomes. Segment data by role, location, and department to identify where communication is supporting productivity — and where it’s falling short.
Look for correlations between communication patterns and KPIs like retention, customer sentiment, safety incidents, or time-to-information. That’s where ROI becomes visible.
Mistake #3: Letting tool sprawl creep back in
One of the fastest ways to undermine a new platform is by continuing to introduce side tools “just in case.”
This recreates the very fragmentation the platform was meant to fix.
What to do instead:
Commit to consolidation. Use your internal communication platform as the default starting point for updates, resources, and workflows — and only introduce additional tools when there’s a clear, documented gap.
Clear ownership and governance keep the platform focused, trusted, and scalable.
Mistake #4: Treating communication as a broadcast channel
Posting more messages doesn’t automatically improve alignment — especially during periods of change.
When everything looks urgent, employees stop paying attention.
What to do instead:
Design intentional communication flows. Use push notifications sparingly for critical updates. Reserve feeds for cultural and organizational alignment. Enable group or team channels for local coordination.
Structure reduces noise — and increases trust.
Mistake #5: Leaving managers unsupported
During growth or M&A, managers become the de facto interpreters of change — often before decisions are fully finalized.
Without support, this leads to mixed messages, burnout, and rumor cycles.
What to do instead:
Equip managers with clear, shareable messaging and a single source of truth they can confidently point teams to. Be explicit about what’s confirmed, what’s evolving, and where employees should go with questions.
Supporting managers isn’t just enablement — it’s risk management.
Mistake #6: Treating implementation as “done”
Employee expectations, business priorities, and communication needs don’t stand still — especially in growing organizations.
What to do instead:
Regularly audit performance using analytics and feedback. Adapt content, workflows, and governance as teams and structures evolve. Continuous improvement turns your communication platform into a long-term growth asset — not a one-time rollout.
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Bottom line
The right internal communication tool creates the foundation for growth. But disciplined execution is what protects clarity, trust, and momentum as your organization scales.
Avoid these common mistakes, and your platform won’t just support growth — it will actively enable it.
Frontline employee engagement is no easy task. Your frontline employees work varying shift patterns and spend limited time at head office. They don’t tend to get much downtime during their working hours. And they aren’t always kept in the loop when it comes to company comms.
These obstacles get in the way when you’re trying to connect frontline workers to company culture — and each other. And it’s why standard team-building activities usually fall short.
To make a success of your employee engagement strategy, you have to tailor activities to your deskless workforce. Otherwise, you risk disengagement, plus the productivity and retention issues that go with it.
That’s why we’ve created this list of 18 employee engagement activities. These ideas are suited to busy frontline workers and their schedules. They’re designed to boost engagement and offer meaningful benefits to your employees.
This can lead to lower levels of productivity. It can also cause increased staff turnover rates, which already tend to be pretty high in frontline organizations.
Employee engagement activities, like the ones we’ve included below, help frontline employees feel more connected to their company, role, and co-workers.
And, according to Gallup, improving your employee engagement rates can lead to a range of business benefits. Besides increased productivity and employee retention, these benefits include:
A reduction in safety incidents
A decrease in absenteeism
An increase in customer loyalty
An increase in profitability
Employee engagement is good for employees — and it’s good for business. So let’s take a look at the activities that will help make it happen.
18 employee engagement activities (that work for a frontline workforce)
To engage your frontline workforce, you can incorporate any of the following employee engagement activities into your work days:
1. Engage with employees from day one
2. Celebrate employee milestones and contributions
3. Incentivize goals
4. Create a mentorship program
5. Offer perks that boost employee wellbeing
6. Give regular feedback
7. Encourage group chat
8. Provide shift swap tools
9. Plan a money management month
10. Launch a poll
11. Create online communities
12. Offer professional development opportunities
13. Launch a competition
14. Use video tools
15. Organize a volunteering day
16. Hand the mic to your leaders
17. Run Lunch and Learn sessions
18. Measure employee engagement
Team engagement ideas for frontline workers are different than for other workers. With their variable schedules, you can’t arrange lunch dates or after-work get-togethers.
Here are a few employee engagement initiatives your frontline workers can benefit from.
You can start with employee engagement activities like:
Introducing new co-workers (digitally if it’s not possible to introduce everyone in person)
Supporting new hires to login and familiarize themselves with your engagement tech tools
Sharing a library of online resources that explain the company, their role, and company culture
Assigning them a buddy or mentor
New hires need regular guidance, especially from managers. So don’t assume your workers are done onboarding after a few days or weeks. Instead, design a process that lasts for at least 90 days.
2. Celebrate employee milestones and contributions
Employee recognition improves engagement. Everyone likes to feel appreciated and valued by their employer.
So make recognition a regular feature on your company intranet or newsletter. Celebrate birthdays, volunteer work, and project milestones. Recognize the hard work and successes of employees.
You can also encourage peer-to-peer recognition. 75% of employees say that giving recognition makes them want to stay at their current organization longer.
Get co-workers to nominate each other for awards, then hold an award ceremony. Or simply get them to appreciate each other by sending a message on the company news feed.
3. Incentivize goals
Gamify the work environment by offering rewards in return for meeting goals. When employees perform well and meet targets, give them a gift you know they’ll like. Company rewards can include gift cards, discounts, cash prizes, an extra day of paid vacation, or the option to give a charitable donation.
But don’t dive right in. Before you announce your reward program, it’s a good idea to survey employees. Ask them which rewards they’d prefer so you can be sure that workers will be motivated by the prizes on offer.
4. Create a mentorship program
Do you want your employees to engage with each other, learn valuable skills, and help each other at the same time? Try rolling out a mentorship program.
Assign frontline workers a mentor within your organization. You can pair people from different departments and different levels of the company.
Then, set a regular schedule of mentor meet-ups. Mentors and mentees might like to conduct meetings online to better suit their work schedules.
Also, offer guidance on how constructive meetings should be run. The aim is for mentees to set workplace goals and come up with a plan for achieving them.
5. Offer perks that boost employee wellbeing
A healthy worker is a productive worker. So encourage fun runs, offer free healthy snacks, and provide discount gym memberships.
Also, try to provide flexible scheduling when possible to give employees a better work-life balance. You’ll reduce employee stress and their risk of burnout.
To ensure frontline employees can access wellbeing activities, you can use a wellbeing app. Via this type of tool, you can provide employee engagement activities. Things like mindfulness and meditation sessions, nutrition planning, and health tracking, all via an employee’s mobile device.
6. Give regular feedback
Gallup research shows that 80% of employees who say they’ve received meaningful feedback in the past week are fully engaged in their work.
So schedule activities where employees receive regular feedback from managers. Make it constructive and useful for employees, so it’s not an appointment they dread.
Also, take a few hours each week to run an online open-door session. This is a time when employees can meet with managers digitally to ask questions and express any concerns.
7. Use the company news feed
A user-friendly employee app with a company news feed acts as a virtual water cooler. It’s a place where frontline workers, who may spend little time with co-workers, get to build stronger workplace relationships.
The comms team can support engagement by using the news feed to share a mix of essential and informal posts. They can announce news, celebrate birthdays, and share tips — encouraging workers to comment, like, and post.
Also, consider these engagement-boosting ideas:
A weekly challenge — a photo contest, a trivia quiz, or a step-count competition
Employee spotlight — highlight a different employee each week, describing their achievements, personal stories, and contributions
A survey — whether the topic is something fun or something more serious, surveys are a great way to engage your workforce
Health and wellness tips — share tips and articles related to physical and mental health, all suited to the demands of frontline roles
8. Provide shift swap tools
Frontline employees want greater levels of flexibility. It’s not always easy for frontline organizations to provide this when there are fixed shifts to fill.
But with shift swap tools, you make it easy for workers to achieve a little more work-life balance. They can swap shifts with co-workers without HR or managers having to get involved.
You can provide other self-serve tools, too. For example, via the Blink interface, employees can access their pay stubs, request time off, and view their shift schedules.
Automating HR tasks like this gives more control to your frontline workers and lightens the load for your HR team.
9. Plan a money management month
Money worries can affect an employee’s wellbeing and their engagement with work. And employee engagement activities are most effective when they provide real value for your workers.
So plan a money management month to help employees make informed financial decisions. Use quizzes and polls to engage employees in the conversation. Challenge employees to a low or no spend day. Provide money advice over 1:1 chats or via your company resource center.
This is exactly what they’ve done at supermarket chain, Tesco, where they recognized the strain that the cost of living crisis has put on employees. In response, they introduced a range of new initiatives:
Skills training activities so employees develop store-wide skills and can pick up extra shifts
A Pay Advance scheme that allows workers to access earned pay ahead of payday
Personalized videos explaining to every worker how much their pension will be worth
10. Launch a poll
Polls give employees a chance to share their ideas and opinions. It’s a way to make their voices heard.
You can launch polls online, with the help of a tool like Blink Surveys. This allows you to quickly and easily find out what frontline employees are thinking about your chosen topic.
You might like to ask questions related to internal communications, company change, employee engagement, or simply the layout of the break room. Using this insight, you can make changes that make a real difference to your employees.
Just be sure to keep them updated with poll findings and your plan of action so they know that you’re really listening to what they have to say.
11. Create online communities
It’s easier to build connections with co-workers when you have something in common with one another. Online communities — based around shared interests — make it easy for frontline workers to find like-minded work friends.
So create space on your intranet for these types of communities. Perhaps you have a group that loves to run in their spare time. A gaggle of gamers. Or a bunch of bookworms. An online community helps bring these co-workers together.
12. Offer professional development opportunities
Training is a great way to improve workplace engagement. 71% of frontline workers have a strong desire for more learning opportunities at work. But a third of workers say that employers don’t invest enough in their growth.
Try to make training more accessible to your frontline workforce. Remember that it doesn’t have to take place in a classroom. You can put training resources into the palm of frontline workers’ hands with the help of the right technology.
You can offer micro-learning modules that workers can complete on mobile devices during a break. And provide fun online courses, with competitive and gamified features.
Also, remember that a lot of worker engagement can be tracked back to your managers. So ensure that managers get the employee engagement training they need, too.
13. Launch a competition
Pit teams of employees against each other with a fun company-wide competition. For an engagement boost, link your competition to company goals and values.
For example, if you’re championing employee wellbeing, set workers a steps or fitness challenge.
If you’re focused on employee development, encourage workers to complete training modules by setting them a training challenge.
To highlight your commitment to a chosen charity, set a fundraising contest.
Alternatively, improve engagement on the company app with a quick photo caption competition.
Pick challenges that can be completed remotely, without teams having to meet up in person. Also, plan rewards for the winners and give regular updates via your comms channels to keep competitors engaged.
14. Use video tools
When you can’t meet face to face, video is the next best thing. You can film leadership updates, company events, and new product demos to give employees more insight into the organization and their roles.
Videos are a great option for town hall meetings. Post the video on your employee news feed and employees who can’t attend in person can watch the video back later.
Similarly, get new hires to film a video to introduce themselves and post it to the news feed. Their co-workers can comment on the post to say hello and help their new co-worker feel more at home.
15. Organize a volunteering day
Offering employees opportunities to volunteer is good for their wellbeing and engagement levels. You can make this activity more appealing to frontline workers by giving them paid time off to volunteer and by giving them flexibility over the days they choose.
Salesforce leads the way on this. They give employees seven business days every year to volunteer for one of the non-profit organizations that Salesforce formally supports — or one of their own choosing.
Jamie Olsen, senior director of Citizen Philanthropy at Salesforce says:
“These are the types of programs that people want and that are attracting them to companies right now. They better the community. They improve people’s happiness.”
You can ensure everyone is on the same page by conducting a virtual Q&A session with one of your leadership team.
This type of event gives employees direct access to leadership. It bridges the gap between the frontline and head office. It also helps employees make their voices heard, which makes them feel valued and motivated.
The prospect of a Q&A can be a little daunting for leaders. But remember, a moderator can facilitate the session, reading out pre-submitted questions and managing live questions.
Also bear in mind that there are huge benefits to be gained. These include frontline insights, improved communication, and a stronger workplace culture.
17. Run lunch and learn sessions
When employees have all the information they need to do their jobs well, they feel more engaged. So give employees access to an online library of resources, transferring any old paper documents to a digital format.
With this library, you can then run virtual Lunch and Learn sessions. This is where a group of employees watches or reads a selected resource. Afterwards, they discuss their reflections either over video call or via group messaging.
18. Measure employee engagement
The last on our list of employee engagement activities is one for your people team, not your frontline employees. And it’s a really important part of any employee engagement strategy.
Find out how you’re doing by tracking employee engagement KPIs. Track your employee net promoter score (eNPS), engagement with your intranet platform, or employee survey results.
You can then set goals and — by drilling down into the data provided by your platform analytics — find actionable areas for improvement.
Final thoughts: employee engagement activities and ideas
To make a success of frontline employee engagement, you need to:
Provide employee engagement activities that offer real benefits for frontline employees
Make these activities accessible to the frontline with the help of flexible, digital solutions
You then create a culture that employees can play an active part in, no matter their schedule or location. You also motivate frontline workers to engage with company culture out of choice, making time for it in their busy days.
Incorporating the activities above into your frontline workplace is much easier when you have the right technology. And an employee engagement app comes in very useful. It’s a way to put all content and communication into the palm of every employee.
By creating online spaces where employees can gather, chat, share knowledge, and connect with company culture, you extend employee engagement to your hardest-to-reach employees — those on the frontline.
According to data, there’s a good chance that one of them will quit this year.
In 2021, 25% of employees quit their jobs.
Think about it: you track customer happiness to avoid churn. So, if you want to hang on to your workforce, you need cold, hard data.
That's where employee satisfaction metrics come in. By keeping an eye on these, you can spot a small problem before it becomes a big one.
And best of all, there isn't a sea of data points to muddle over. Here are the only 4 employee satisfaction metrics you need to know.
What is an employee satisfaction score?
It’s hard to quantify sentiments — but that doesn’t mean you can’t do it.
You can take a combination of data points related to your employee’s satisfaction and get a clear picture of how happy your workers are.
With an employee satisfaction score, organizations can make adjustments to ensure their workers are engaged, and therefore 17% more productive than their peers.
Happy employees stay longer and are more likely to recommend their job to their friends.
How to measure employee satisfaction
You can measure sentiment by finding out the following employee satisfaction metrics.
1. Employee net promoter score
Find your employee net promoter score (eNPS) by asking a simple question from your employees:
On a scale of 1-10, how likely are you to recommend working at this organization to others?
This metric gives you a clear picture of how your employees feel.
To turn the results into actionable insights, divide your respondents into three categories:
Promoters: Answered nine or ten.
Passives: Answered seven or eight.
Detractors: Answered six or below.
Gather insights about what you’re doing well from your promoters and what you could improve on from your detractors.
Learn more about your passives to understand how to convert them to promoters.
2. Absenteeism rate
The absenteeism rate measures how often employees don’t come to work due to unexpected sickness or other causes.
Divide the number of absent days from the total number of working days in a given period — excluding holidays, vacations, and weekends.
The average absence rate in the U.S. in 2020 was 3%. Use this number to get a benchmark for your organization.
A high absenteeism rate across your organization could be a sign that your employees are feeling burnout. They may be overworked and stressed, making them more likely to get sick — or simply call in for a personal day.
Try to optimize your employees’ workloads, improve your work culture, or provide tools to make their jobs easier.
3. Employee satisfaction index
Sometimes the best way to understand how satisfied your employees are is to ask them. That’s what the questions in an employee satisfaction index aim to do.
There is no mandatory set of questions, but the most common questions include:
How satisfied are you with your current organization?
How well does your current workplace meet your expectations?
How closely does your current role match your ideal job?
Answers should be given on a numerical scale. ‘
You can make questions more specific to get a sense of your workers’ satisfaction with various aspects of their jobs — salary, coworkers, and duties.
Consider adding your satisfaction questions to a larger survey.
4. Turnover
Turnover is a measure of how many employees leave your company in a given period. It is a strong tell for how satisfied your employees are since happier employees are more likely to stay at an organization.
Calculate turnover by taking the total number of separations in a given period and dividing it by the average positions. Then multiply the result by 100 to find a percentage.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average turnover in 2020 was 57.3%. This includes both voluntary and involuntary turnover.
Guru breaks down the average turnover by industry.
If your turnover is higher than your industry average, it’s likely your employees are unsatisfied.
Final thoughts: the 4 employee satisfaction metrics you need to know
To keep your employees engaged, happy, and productive, it’s important to actively track their overall satisfaction in their roles.
You can do this by surveying your employees and gathering their feedback. With the data guiding your way, it’s easier to zero in on what you can do to improve your organization.
While the Great Resignation seems to have subsided, talent retention is still a pressing issue — and it can make all the difference to your business. Holding onto your best people, with all their skills and knowledge, means better productivity, customer service, and profitability.
In this quick guide, we explain what talent retention is and why it’s important. We also share what you can do to inspire employee loyalty in 2025 — from a connected workplace culture to the perks that matter most.
Ready to turn retention into a competitive advantage? Let’s get started.
What is talent retention and why is it so important?
Talent retention is your ability to hold onto your employees once you’ve hired them.
If you have an effective talent retention plan, employees stick around for long, stable, and productive careers within your organization.
So why does talent retention matter?
Talent retention is important because replacing employees is expensive. Gallup estimates that replacing a frontline employee costs 40% of their salary. This rises to 80% for employees in technical roles and 200% for leaders and managers.
By improving staff loyalty, you reduce costs associated with recruitment and onboarding. But there are other benefits of employee retention to bear in mind:
Improved productivity. Your organization is more productive because a high proportion of employees are fully trained and know how to do their jobs.
An expert workforce. You retain knowledge and skills within the business, which means you achieve your goals faster.
A positive company culture. Because workers are able to build strong and lasting relationships with co-workers, you raise satisfaction and loyalty.
One final benefit of staff retention is a better customer experience. And that deserves a section all of its own...
The link between employee retention and customer experience
“The customer's perceptions and related feelings caused by the one-off and cumulative effect of interactions with a supplier's employees, systems, channels or products.”
The snappier version? It’s the degree to which interactions with your brand spark joy in customers.
It’s easy to delight customers when employees are informed, happy, and engaged. And it’s very easy to do the opposite if staff are new to the job — or looking for a role elsewhere.
According to PwC research, 46% of customers will abandon a brand if employees aren’t knowledgeable and don’t know how to meet their needs.
Employee retention, employee experience, and customer experience are closely linked. Do right by your employees and they’re more likely to stay working for your company.
They continue to build their knowledge and skills, which means they’re more likely to provide an industry-leading experience for your customers.
Talent retention: why now?
52% of employees say they’re watching for or actively seeking a new job. And turnover rates for frontline industries remain high: 73.8% in hospitality, 56.7% in transportation, and 21.9% in professional and business services.
There’s another, stealthier problem at play too. Glassdoor has revealed that nearly 2 in 3 employees feel stuck in their roles. And Gallup says that we’ve moved beyond the Great Resignation into the Great Detachment, where employees are staying in roles they have little interest in.
In 2025, some employees are quitting. Others are sticking around for lack of a better option. In either case, the business suffers. But a focus on talent retention can help to combat both of these issues.
Talent retention strategies revolve around improving the employee experience. You make your workplace a better, more fulfilling, and more inspiring place to be. So both employee engagement and retention improve.
The first hurdle: identifying talent retention issues
How is your company doing in terms of talent retention?
To truly understand your performance, you need to know — and keep track of — your employee retention rate. You can use this number to set a baseline and establish targets. But while this figure tells you how many employees are leaving your organization, it doesn’t tell you why.
For that, you need to dig deeper. Exit surveys and interviews can reveal trends and problems with the employee experience. They can help you understand why employees are choosing to leave. Some of the most common culprits in 2025 include:
Work-life balance: a lack of flexibility in the workplace is leading staff — including frontline employees — to look for jobs elsewhere.
Career progression: lack of career or professional development opportunities is one of the most cited reasons for leaving a job.
Recognition: when you don’t show regular and authentic appreciation for employee efforts, they become demotivated and more likely to jump ship.
Workplace culture: a sense of connection and belonging have a big impact on employee satisfaction, so issues with managers and co-workers, or feelings of loneliness can raise employee turnover.
Salary and benefits: sometimes, it’s simply about the money — it’s difficult to keep employees if competitors are offering better rates of pay.
Convince employees to stay with these 6 talent retention strategies
Staff retention rates not where you’d like them to be? Reduce employee turnover with the help of these practical strategies.
Keep your finger on the pulse
Exit interviews are a useful talent retention tool. But wouldn’t it be better if you could prevent employees from handing in their notice in the first place? To do this, you need to understand the state of employee morale and engagement in your organization at any given moment.
There are some signs a manager may be able to spot. Drop-offs in productivity, refusal to commit to long-term projects, and a lack of enthusiasm are all signs that an employee sees their future elsewhere.
But you can go beyond manager observations to take the pulse of your entire organization. Use employee surveys to gauge sentiment on a range of retention-related topics. For example, job satisfaction, internal communications, benefits packages, and recognition.
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You can then act on any major bugbears to prevent employee experience issues from translating into higher employee turnover.
This feedback process has another talent retention benefit. When you show employees that their input is prompting real change in the workplace they feel heard and valued — and become more invested in your organization.
Help them achieve their goals
According to recent Randstad research, 31% of employees have quit a job because of a lack of career progression opportunities. Employees want to feel that they’re making progress toward their learning and career goals.
Investing time and money in professional development sends a strong signal that you’re supporting your employees over the long term. Build in career development plans, coaching, and one-on-one time as soon as a new member of staff joins your workforce — and sustain these initiatives throughout the entire employee journey.
Emphasizing that you see this as a long-term partnership rather than a transactional exchange of services (“you work, we pay”) lays the foundations for future success.
Offer regular recognition
Retaining employees is easier when they feel valued and appreciated. Workers are five times more likely to stay with your organization for two years or more when there’s a comprehensive recognition program in place.
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All employees — whether they work in the office, at home, or on the frontlines of your organization — should receive regular appreciation for the work they do.
For teams working in the same location, informal recognition is relatively easy. For disparate teams and frontline employees, you have to be more intentional. The right internal communication tools can help.
You can use an employee app or intranet to highlight the hard work and achievements of your employees — and encourage peer-to-peer recognition across digital communication channels, too.
Create a positive workplace culture
Having a work bestie is more important than you might think. Employees who feel a sense of belonging are more likely to stay working for your organization.
As well as helping employees to build connections with co-workers, support them to understand and take part in company culture. Make company values and purpose part of your every day.
Managers also have a big role to play. 70% of the variance in team engagement comes down to the manager. So give your leaders the training they need to boost employee engagement and create a culture employees enjoy being part of.
Offer flexibility where possible
Flexibility and work-life balance are a top priority for employees. In fact, it’s the second most important factor for frontline employees when choosing a job.
Flexible working looks different in different organizations. Some employees get to work remotely, work compressed hours, or choose start and finish times.
For frontline employees, this isn’t so easy. But you can support work-life balance for this segment of your workforce by offering expanded paid time off (PTO) policies, a choice of schedules, and easy-access shift swap tools.
Revamp your salary and benefits package
When was the last time you looked at the salary and benefits package you offer? Pay is another big factor in employees deciding to look for another job.
So compare your offering to that of your competitors and consider improving your package if you find you’re falling behind the pack.
But remember that pay isn’t everything. It will take more than a small pay increase to tempt engaged employees to jump ship. According to SHRM, employees may be willing to trade pay for improved work-life balance, flexibility, and workplace culture.
Make life easier for your HR team with talent retention software
An effective talent retention strategy gives you an edge over your competitors. When you build and maintain a skilled and engaged workforce, your business performs better.
To achieve high levels of retention, you need to offer training and development, honor work-life balance, and provide regular recognition. You should also strive to create a company culture based on purpose, connection, and community.
The best software is available on desktop and as a mobile-first employee app, so you can tackle talent retention issues across your entire workforce. These solutions provide employees with easy, digital access to:
Training and career development tools
Company news, community, and co-worker chat
Recognition and rewards
Health and wellbeing resources
They also give HR teams access to tools like employee surveys and analytics. So you get greater insight into the state of employee engagement and talent retention within your business.
You can spot engagement and retention issues before they harm company culture and lead more workers to jump ship — and you can uncover what employees want from your organization.
With this information, you can make meaningful improvements to the employee experience, keeping staff turnover rates low and engagement high.
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