In March and April of 2020, very early in the pandemic, I had the opportunity to coach several dozen leaders from a large company in the aerospace industry. Most of them were in the first week of figuring out how to completely change the way they’d worked. Many of them had teams that were used to working together in an office. Some of them also had team members who did shift work on assembly lines or who were in sales. Of course, the sales people were used to flying all over the world visiting their clients in person. This was obviously not happening!
Leading in a Hybrid World
Now that your team has finally adjusted to working from home, you face the transition back to the office. But not completely. Your company has decided to permanently implement a hybrid workplace. Folks will be expected to go into the office 2 days a week and work from home 3 days a week. No one will have their own office. People will sign up for a cubicle and show up with their laptop, ready to get to work.
You’re excited about this change but apprehensive about how your team is going to react. Shutting down wasn’t easy but a hybrid environment could be even more confusing. You want to do your best to create positive and productive working conditions.
Want some ideas to consider how you might lead effectively in a hybrid environment?
The "Big Three Questions"
Quick question: When you were a young leader, what three questions would you have liked to ask someone with more experience?
I was prompted to think about this while listening to a podcast episode by Dave Stachowiak on The Ways to Pay it Forward. He and his guest Glenn Parker shared some great stories of how they’d been mentored early in their careers.
Read on for my “Big Three Questions.”
An Invitation to Explore Systems Thinking
Do you sometimes find yourself “stuck in a rut,” solving persistent problems that crop up again and again no matter what solutions you try?
Would you like to:
Better understand the underlying causes of complex problems?
Improve teamwork and reduce conflict?
Find lasting solutions to difficult problems?
If so, consider this an invitation to explore the world of systems thinking!
Embracing Conflict as a Constructive Force
What’s your mindset about conflict? Do you view it as something to avoid at all costs? Or as an obstacle to accomplishing your “real” work? That’s not surprising. As social animals we want to get along and cooperate. We tend to see conflict as something scary and dangerous, where there will be winners and losers and nobody goes away as friends.
What if you could view conflict as a constructive force?
Remote Leadership Presence: Dos & Don'ts
Having trouble keeping people engaged and focused during endless video meetings? If so, you’re in good company. That often comes up in coaching sessions these days.
Read on for some “dos” and “don’ts” of remote leadership presence that I’ve gathered during the last year. Chances are, there’s at least one thing you can start doing and one thing you can stop doing. I’ve certainly learned a lot about the subject.
"Life as Coach": How to Grow as a Leader with 3 Simple Practices
I am all for investing in in-depth leadership development. This is one of my main passions in life. In fact, I’d almost rather take a course that helps me grow as a leader than take a vacation.
But there are times when formal leadership development might not be a top priority.
That doesn't mean you have to give up developing. Using a "life as coach" approach, you can still grow by using your day to day experiences as a springboard. Sound intriguing? Read more for simple practices to keep growing even in the most challenging times.
How to Reduce Resistance to Change
Every day, it seems like the taken-for-granted foundations of our lives are crumbling. Sometimes, it’s a sad loss and other times it’s an opportunity for a fresh start. But the initial reaction to this persistent uncertainty—threat, fear, resistance—is pretty much a given.
The human brain strives to maximize certainty and predictability as a central driver of behavior. In the presence of ambiguity, people fill in knowledge gaps with fear. Even the smallest change can be experienced as a threat and activate the flight or flight response.
Partnering for Productivity and Positivity
How connected do you feel to other members of your team these days? If your team is working remotely, connected only by Slack and Zoom, it might be hard to sustain a sense of teamwork. Research shows that workers who have a sense of teamwork are more productive and have greater job satisfaction. But virtual Happy Hours and other "team building" efforts only go so far.
As a leader, how can you reinforce the benefits of working well together?
Book Review: Preparing Yourself for Life's Challenges
Toughness Training for Life
by James E. Loehr, The Penguin Group, 1993
I first read this book in 1993. I found it to be a useful application of methods used to train professional athletes for the rest of us. The book proposed that instead of focusing on stress reduction--which in today's world is pretty impossible--we need to focus on toughening up in order to handle more stress and be "healthier, happier, and more productive."
How to Sustain Physical, Mental and Emotional Toughness
Most of us know the importance of recovery in the physical realm. We exercise our muscles, then allow a period of recovery in order to maximize the strength gains. We expend significant energy over the course of a day and then recover by eating and sleeping. We work hard during the week and recover on the weekend by relaxing and having fun. Even if we don't always follow these principles, we know they contribute to our physical well-being.
2 Indispensable Tools for Leading in Permanent White Water
Our world has long been characterized by overstimulation, unmanageable amounts of input and demands for faster and faster action. Many of us have been chronically overwhelmed and have struggled just to keep up.
The confluence of challenges in 2020 have magnified the impact of these conditions, adding a layer of uncertainty and anxiety that can be crippling.
“Really?” you think, “What are you telling me that I don’t already know?”
How to Overpower Procrastination with Purpose
Does this sound like something you can relate to? You’ve got a project you really need to be working on. Maybe it’s filing six months of paperwork. Or learning how to use that new software you downloaded. It’s necessary but boring. Not surprisingly, you manage to find other things to occupy your time.
This next situation is even trickier. The project is important but you’ve got feelings about it. And not happy feelings.
The One Thing Nobody Seems to Be Talking About
Everyone seems to be talking about leadership these days. Given that our country is strikingly divided on what constitutes “good” leadership, it’s time to start talking about what we actually mean. How can we evaluate the quality of the leadership unless there’s a shared understanding of what leadership actually is?
How to Plan for an Uncertain Future
I have a confession to make. Last week, I lost patience with the stream of well-meaning and useful advice that appears digitally every single day. I was discouraged and dispirited. I really had no energy for another how-to.
The next day, feeling somewhat more grounded, I recognized the source of my discouragement: There’s no end in sight. Nothing to look forward to. It feels like we can’t influence or control anything. There’s an ongoing sense of uncertainty and a feeling of helplessness about how to influence our futures.
Leadership Potential: Do You Know It When You See It?
As a leader, you only have so much time to spend mentoring others. But it can be difficult to figure out who to invest in.
Wouldn’t it be great to have a reliable way to identify someone with leadership potential? Someone you can invest your time and expertise in with the confidence that he or she will thrive?
Well, obviously there are no guarantees. People’s lives have a way of playing out in their own way. But there are some ways to increase the odds of making a good investment.
4 Potent Strategies to Boost Teamwork
One of my clients said recently, “When I got promoted, I had no idea how much of my time would involve dealing with people. I just wanted to do the work!”
Does that sound familiar? If so, you’re not alone. Almost every leader I’ve worked with has had a similar revelation. In fact, another client had a great way of stating this: “I need to go from ‘I get it’ to ‘I get people’.”
Having the awareness is great but it doesn’t automatically translate into action. But I have good news. I’m about to share several of the most potent strategies I know to boost teamwork.
One Good Connection a Day
In this time of social distancing it’s not unusual to feel isolated and overcrowded at the same time. You might be working from home along with your partner and children, camped out in the bedroom, on a staircase landing, or in a closet. Your days are filled with back to back Zoom meetings, and your team abandoned the Zoom happy hours after the first two months because you’re desperate for some non-screen time.
But you still yearn for that sense of true connection.
This was the challenge faced by Jenna, one of my coaching clients. “I like my work and I’ve adjusting to working from home but there’s something missing,” she said. “My days are busier than ever before but I’d love to have more meaningful conversations with my co-workers.”
Can you relate to Jenna’s dilemma?
How to Have an Accountability Conversation Without Pain
This is Part Two of a piece on accountability conversations. If you haven’t read the original piece, you can find it here. You can also find a free PDF worksheet, 5 Reasons to Tackle That Conversation You’ve Been Avoiding here.
Quick recap: Many of us find oodles of ways to avoid having conversations focused on holding someone else accountable. And yet, there are so many situations that could use such a conversation:
Your co-worker always shows up eight minutes late for your weekly team calls. Meanwhile, the rest of you spend that time making idle chitchat.
Your neighbor’s dog barks all night long. Every night.
Your daughter leaves dishes in the sink, right after you’ve finshed the dishes.
Your direct report is a lovely person who just happens to have a chronic backlog of overdue assignments.