Creating Belonging at Work
A practical guide to help you build a team where people feel safe to speak up, supported when they struggle, and energized to do their best workâwithout burning yourself out trying to hold it all together.
- Understand what belonging actually looks and feels like on your team, beyond claiming it as a value on a poster.
- Spot the everyday structures and habits that quietly build or block trust and inclusion.
- Follow a simple roadmap to start shifting your team culture with small, doable changes.
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A focused, 20-page guide with reflection prompts and ready-to-use conversation tools.
Turn âwe care about belongingâ into concrete practice.
Creating Belonging at Work is a focused guide to help you see your team culture more clearly and start shifting it with intention. Instead of vague values, youâll get language, questions, and structures you can actually work with.
- A grounded definition of belongingâwhat it looks and feels like in everyday interactions, not just in value statements.
- A breakdown of the forces that build or block belonging across five areas of team life: communication, decision-making, workload, recognition, and repair.
- Reflection prompts to help you map how power, identity, and role shape your teamâs experience of âwho gets to belong here.â
- A simple cycle you can reuse anytime you want to examine a structure on your team and redesign it with more care and equity.
- Scripts and question sets for 1:1 and team conversations, so youâre not staring at a blank page when itâs time to talk about culture.
A clearer picture of what belonging looks like on your team todayâand a realistic starting point for one meaningful change you can make in the next month.
For leaders who want both care and clarity.
This guide is for you if youâre responsible for peopleâeven informallyâand youâre ready to move beyond good intentions into everyday practices that actually shift how your team feels at work.
Youâre supporting a team through change, stress, or growth and want a simple way to name whatâs happening, rebuild trust, and make your decisions feel more transparent and fair.
Youâre taking on more responsibility and want to be intentional about the kind of culture you help createâ even if you donât control every policy or structure yet.
Youâre the person people come to when something doesnât feel right. This guide gives you language, questions, and a framework to advocate for change in a grounded, actionable way.
A simple 5-step path to begin shifting your team culture.
You can read the guide in one sitting, but itâs designed to support you over time. Use it to focus on one structure at a timeâlike workload, meetings, or communicationâand invite your team into the process with you.
Start with something that shapes everyoneâs dayâlike how requests come in, how decisions are made, or how workload is distributedâand use the prompts to map whatâs really happening now.
Use the 1:1 and team questions to hear how different people experience that structureâwhat feels supportive, what feels heavy, and where belonging is strong or fragile.
Work through the equity prompts to notice who is most impacted, whose needs are centered, and where patterns tied to identity, role, or power might be showing up.
Choose one shift you can realistically make in the next month, like clarifying expectations, adjusting a process, or adding a new touchpoint, and name how youâll test it.
Come back to your team to see whatâs shifted, what still feels off, and what you might evolve next. Then reuse the same cycle with another structure when youâre ready.
Belonging is not created through aspirationâitâs created through practice. When leaders bring clarity, care, and intention into the everyday structures of work, people feel seen, supported, and able to contribute in meaningful ways.
Founder & Principal Consultant, Relational Notions LLC
Elsa Casanova (they/them) is a facilitator, strategist, and founder of Relational Notions LLCâa culture strategy and equity practice dedicated to helping teams work in more human, intentional ways.
Elsa partners with leaders across companies, public agencies, nonprofits, and community organizations to redesign the everyday structures of work: how decisions are made, how people are supported, how communication flows, and how power is shared, so belonging isnât accidental, but deliberately cultivated.
This guide reflects years of helping teams build clarity, trust, and shared responsibility inside real constraints. Itâs built for leaders who care deeply and want tools that meet them where they are without having to invest in solutions that won't create a tangible shift in their team's culture.
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âCreating Belonging at Workâ
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Frequently asked questions
A few things leaders often ask before they start working with this guide. If youâre wondering about something else, youâre always welcome to reach out.
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Is this guide only for people managers?+Not necessarily. While many examples speak to supervisors and team leads, the frameworks and questions can support anyone who is trying to influence team culture. This includes project leads, equity committees, HR partners, or informal culture-keepers on a team.
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How much time will this actually take me?+You can read the guide in under an hour. To really use it, many leaders set aside 30â60 minutes a week over a few weeks to reflect, talk with their team, and experiment with one small change. Itâs meant to be doable alongside a full workload.
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Does this replace DEI or HR work in my organization?+No. This guide doesnât replace organization-wide equity or HR efforts. Instead, it helps you focus on the part of the system you directly shape: the everyday experience of your team. It gives you language and tools to bring your teamâs practices closer to the values your organization cares about.
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Can I use this with my whole team?+Yes. You can adapt the reflection questions for team meetings, use the prompts in 1:1s, or turn the exercises into a short series of conversations. The goal is not to have a perfect session, but to open up more honest, grounded dialogue about how you work together.
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What if my team is already overwhelmed or burnt out?+The guide is designed with limited capacity in mind. Youâre invited to focus on one structure thatâs creating the most friction right now and take one meaningful step, rather than trying to fix everything at once. Even small shifts in clarity, voice, or support can make a real difference in how people feel.
