The Power of Music to Connect
Everyone is experimenting with new and fun ways to interact virtually these days and coming up with some really interesting ideas. During our 10-year stretch of working from home at scale, we’ve developed an expertise in remote engagement and tried all sorts of things ranging from the more commonplace virtual happy hour to unique activities only appropriate for our Bhive virtual office.
But until last week we never tried live music, and we’ve been missing a huge opportunity.
I had hosted a house concert* in February with a group called Ryanhood and the audience was moved by their inspiring, affirming, thoughtful music. We decided to hire them for a private livestream concert for Bhive + BroadPath employees and their families. Huge hit.
We started at 5 p.m. with small informal groups of 5-15 for people to share stories and favorite cocktails. At 5:30 everyone jumped into a HiveLife session together to watch the show. Many also posted pictures of themselves watching and of course posted lots of comments in the chat.
My personal favorites:
-
“Really appreciate this, it’s a great break from all the craziness in the world right now.”
-
“You guys are terrific! Great job. We are in tears over here.”
-
“Amazing!! Thank you so much for putting joy in my heart. I am loving the music!”
In the coming months we’ll be wrapping these events into a comprehensive offering called HiveLife, along with other workshops and classes like stress management, nutrition, and even pet grooming. The vision is to create a purpose-built engagement and enrichment platform for remote employees. We’ll also be developing new features within our Bhive platform to enable event hosting and take community-building to the next level.
For those interested in learning more you can watch clips from the event below. We also have 1-2 more slots available in our HiveLife beta program for any organizations that are interested in taking remote to the next level. Feel free to reach out to me or anyone else on the team with any questions.
*House concerts are a simple yet effective way for emerging artists to supplement their income with small, intimate performances at a host’s home. You basically invite 50-100 of your friends and family to your house for an evening potluck and performance, then shamelessly twist their arms to place a $20 donation each into a jar, which the band then takes 100% of. The COVID variant is to do this same thing, but virtually.
