Think about the best team you’ve ever been part of. Chances are you still remember how it felt to work with those people, and you may still be in touch with many of them years later.
That feeling is precisely where great cultures start.
Dr Francis Collins led the US National Institute of Health for 12 years. He’s also a keen musician. During his time there, he played guitar in a band with fellow scientists. He also helped launch Sound Health, a partnership with the Kennedy Center that studies how music affects the brain.
In a 2021 interview looking back on his time as director, he described being on stage with his colleagues when a song really comes together. “A lot of internal dopamine gets delivered at that moment,” he said.
Dopamine is part of the brain’s reward system, and it makes us want to repeat an experience. When people feel it together, they start to link that good feeling with each other.
In our experience, it’s a powerful reminder that strong cultures start with strong bonds.
People who feel connected to each other trust faster, speak up sooner, and stay together longer. How many people do you know who say they’ve outgrown the job but they stay because they have “the most amazing colleagues”?
Many companies try to build these connections slowly, through projects, meetings, away-days and mission statements. In combination or alone, those elements can work, but they take time. Music speeds the process up.
We think this matters more than ever right now. Many teams are hybrid or remote, meaning some people have never met their colleagues in person. Others have joined after a restructure and are still finding their way. A shared music experience gives everyone a quick way to connect; it literally cuts through.
At SongDivision, we’ve seen this happen for over two decades. We’ve opened global sales summits with tongue-twisting raps and closed HR workshops with soulful ballads and company anthems written and composed by the groups themselves.
Employees enjoy the experience but, more importantly, they leave feeling closer to colleagues they’ve barely spoken to before. And the positive impact isn’t temporary. Clients often tell us that the feeling lasts long after the event, and the key messages stick. Which is exactly the point!
Music experiences alone won’t fix a broken company culture, but they can give people something incredibly valuable: a shared experience and a stronger sense of connection. And that’s a great place to start.
What the data shows
Researchers at Oxford University measured how connected choir members felt before and after 90 minutes of singing. They tested small choirs and one large choir of 232 people and found that feelings of inclusion and connection rose in bothgroups. The researchers also saw signs of a rise in endorphins, the brain’s natural feel-good chemicals.
Even more fascinating, the biggest jump in closeness came in the large choir, where many of the singers were strangers.
A question worth sitting with
When was the last time your team shared an experience outside of their day-to-day work that genuinely brought them closer together?
