Remote work makes spontaneous convos, which once happened organically around the office, hard to come by. The Slack-based survey app, Kaapi, has a new Icebreakers feature that is trying to spark those previously natural engagements through random questions sent out to a team over Slack. The questions are designed for colleagues to discover shared interests and encourage engagement. Participants can hi-five someone, discover shared interests with colleagues, or just scroll through to better understand their co-workers.
The way it works is that Kaapi sends out conversation starters to your team each week. The answers are posted publicly, and everyone can engage. They have a library of 250+ Icebreaker check-ins but you can design your own as well. Kaapi also offers team pulse survey questions to solicit honest feedback from teams, understand their morale, and get feedback on team culture.
The product’s website lists 3 sample Icebreakers questions:
#1 – Which Avenger character are you?
Unless they were living under a rock last year, this is everyone’s favorite question. The best part is that this is a global icebreaker question that everyone in a remote team can participate in.
#2 – Tabs or spaces?
Oh, the eternal fight of tabs vs spaces in the tech world! Personally I am a tab person, and I think the spaces people are monsters. Bring it on! This question might not be very well suited to non-software engineering teams though.
#3 – What will you pack first when the zombies come?
Covid-19 lockdown bringing you down? Make elaborate plans on how to survive the end of the world. You will be surprised by what the team comes up with.
In addition to the Icebreakers feature, the Kaapi app can be personalized by team leaders to discover insights like team morale, leadership blind spots, and feelings about the larger mission and values of an organization. It encourages celebration of wins and gives the chance for leadership to understand who is and who is not in sync with organizational values.
With the philosophy that a happy team performs better together, this app tries to build that cultural bridge for remote teams through making feedback accessible and teams more connected.
Yasmin Diallo Turk is a long-time Austinite, non-profit professional in the field of sexual and domestic violence, and graduate of both Huston-Tillotson University and the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas. When not writing for AG she should be writing her dissertation but is probably just watching Netflix with her husband and 3 kids or running volunteer projects for HOPE for Senegal.
