For years, we've been sold a story: culture happens in the office. Those water cooler moments, coffee runs, random corridor chats. That's where teams bond, right?

Wrong.

I spoke to Avani Prabhakar, Atlassian's Global Chief People Officer, on How I Work this week. And she has the data (from 13,000 employees) to prove it.

Connection isn't accidental. It's intentional.

Here's what Atlassian discovered: sporadic office attendance doesn't build connection. You know what does? Bringing people together with purpose.

They call it "Intentional Togetherness" (ITG for short). Once a quarter, teams gather - not for performance reviews or status updates, but to solve strategic problems together. An ideation sprint. A brainstorm. A gnarly challenge that needs collective brainpower.

The result? Real connection. The kind where people say, "Remember when we worked on that shitty project together?" And that bond lasts for months.

Try this: Instead of mandating three days in the office, organise one purposeful quarterly gathering where your team tackles something meaty together. Then let them work wherever they want the rest of the time.

Your workday is broken (here's the fix).

If your day is back-to-back meetings, you're not working - work is happening to you.

Atlassian's research found the optimal structure splits your day into three blocks:

• 20-30% for critical meetings (the truly necessary ones)
• 30-40% for deep work (just you, no interruptions, actually thinking and creating)
• 30% for collaboration windows (connecting with colleagues across time zones)

That's it. No magical productivity hack. Just intentional design.

Try this: Block out tomorrow morning for two hours of deep work. No meetings. No Teams. No email. Just you and the work that actually matters.

Default to async.

Here's a crazy stat: video messaging tools like Loom helped Atlassian eliminate nearly half a million hours of meetings.

Half. A. Million. Hours.

How? They've built an asynchronous culture. Instead of scheduling a meeting to make a decision, Avani's team records a Loom, drops it in Slack, and within 24 hours, everyone's weighed in (across US, Europe, Asia, and Australia).

The benefit isn't just time saved. It's better conversations. No posturing. No reading the room. No loud voices dominating. Just thoughtful, articulate input from everyone - especially people who'd never speak up in a live meeting.

Try this: Next time you're about to schedule a meeting, ask yourself: could this be a Loom instead? Record your thinking, share it asynchronously, gather input, then meet only if you truly need to.

The PowerPoint problem.

Atlassian ditched PowerPoint entirely. No presentations allowed.

Instead, they write. Before meetings, someone shares a Confluence page. Everyone goes off camera for 5-10 minutes to read and comment. Then the actual meeting is spent having real conversations, not watching someone click through slides.

Essentially, it's a shift from style to substance. You're not presenting yourself. Rather, you're thinking together.

Try this: For your next meeting, write a one-pager first. Share it beforehand (or read it together at the start). Use the meeting time for discussion, not presentation.

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The future of work isn't about where we work. It's about how we work.

And the organisations that figure this out? They won't just survive the distributed work era - they'll thrive in it.

Listen to my full chat with Avani here for more tips and tricks on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

Cheers

Amantha

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P.S. I've been experimenting with video content on Instagram. Lots of different work and life hacks to check out, if you are looking for an excuse to scroll...follow me.

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