Supporting Teams During Periods of Significant Change

All names, company references, role titles, specific locations, project details, and other identifying information have been obscured to protect anonymity and privacy in this narrative account.

In my early career as an engineering manager, I found myself needing to step in when a technically capable team started struggling significantly during a period of major change. The specific challenge wasn't from inadequate skills or capability. They were solid engineers, but rather, adapting to entirely new working conditions suddenly imposed by the onset of a global event, COVID-19.

Everyone experienced a sudden shift from collaborative, in-office work with proper facilities to makeshift setups at home. I worked in a big city, so think small apartments without dedicated desks, monitors shipped days/weeks later, and trying to maintain focus through video calls all day instead of meeting colleagues face-to-face. This physical discomfort, combined with the isolation, really started impacting their productivity and team morale.

My primary goal was clear. I needed to support them in navigating this difficult transition, help restore effective collaboration, and rebuild that sense of engagement and shared purpose they'd previously had. Since it wasn't just technical output declining, but also communication flow and spirit, a purely data-driven approach felt incomplete, though data was important.

I decided to tackle the immediate logistical issues head-on first. I made sure everyone understood resources were available to help make their home setup as effective as possible, pointing them towards an internal process for requesting essential equipment like monitors or better keyboards, often provided at no cost. For those struggling with the lack of a proper workspace, I encouraged exploring options like quiet cafes, which were still open, if that felt more sustainable than working from bed, which some people were.

Beyond logistics, collaboration was broken. The team missed the organic interactions they had in an open floor plan office before COVID. So, we implemented some lighter, more flexible communication practices. We opened a general video chat channel where people could drop in anytime for spontaneous questions. Zoom became our go-to for quick daily check-ins without scheduling formal meetings all day long. And I emphasized turning cameras on during key one-on-one and team calls to help recreate that feeling of presence.

We also intentionally tried to rebuild the human connection with virtual team-building activities. We started by creating a rotating our Sprint Owner. Each sprint, the Sprint Owner would get to pick a theme for our Zoom backgrounds. It would be things like your favorite food, best vacation, family photo, etc. The idea was that each team member would have a unique background and would talk at the start of the sprint about their background. When all together during the sprint, we were bonded by the sprint theme. And when solo, it made for an interesting conversation with other coworkers. We labeled our sprints A-Z. Each sprint, the Sprint Owner would pick a Pokémon name for the sprint. It was something silly and small, but it helped and added up.

We also did things like gaming hours or happy hours. Everything was aimed at strengthening those bonds outside of just task-oriented communication. Throughout this process, I tracked key performance indicators relevant to team health and effectiveness. Because the team was the same people well before COVID and as during, I could use previous metrics to compare to the current ones to find if we were improving. Specifically, I was looking at sprint velocity (how much they accomplished) and pull request open times (how quickly ideas were discussed and changes landed), and the average length a ticket was open for (encourages smaller tickets and gives a good sense of the entire Software Development Lifecycle for a team). These metrics helped show if the team building activities were having a positive impact.

The results started showing within a couple of sprints. Those core metrics shot back up and returned to where they were before everything changed. More importantly, I saw a real shift in morale. The team was more engaged during meetings, took ownership of initiatives, and the overall communication improved significantly. The team became more self-directed and tightly bonded.

This experience crystallized for me that high-performing teams aren't just about technical skill. They need psychological safety to navigate uncertainty together and clear but flexible communication norms suited to their environment. It showed the power of combining empathetic understanding with data points like velocity. And crucially, involving the team the entire time was key to finding solutions and building lasting engagement.