8 Post Covid19 Surf Tips for Business Leaders & HR Professionals

I’m sure we are all crossing everything – fingers, toes, and whatever else might work – but it actually feels as if the worst is almost over. This horrible pandemic, for all of its craziness and unpredictability, is about to take us back to shore. While normalcy as we once knew it may never return, the fact is that the worst part of this crisis appears to be almost behind us, leaving business leaders and HR professionals scrambling to figure out what comes next and what work is going to feel like going forward.

It’s a bit like surfing if you ask me. You have ‘the back’, the area past the breaking waves where the surfers line up.?This is where you will surf from once you learn how to successfully navigate the shorey with a sweet duck dive. It’s where surfers hang out, figuring out their next move. It’s also where you learn to slow down before you can speed up and ride.

COVID-19 has forced all of us to slow down, reflect and rethink. It has forever impacted how we work and how we see work fitting into the rest of our lives. Along the way, there will be a great number of challenges to cope with. I don’t want you to be caught inside again. The inside zone is also known as the white zone or crash zone if you are a surfie and it’s not somewhere you want to be.

I have 8 ‘post’ COVID-19 ‘surf tips’ for business leaders & HR professionals so you can handle any future surf condition including choppy waters and even blowouts.

Tip #1?Be a trustworthy leader – always surf with a mate

Resilient organisations — the ones that remain successful post-pandemic — have?high-trust leaders

Trustworthy leaders have been needed to weather the challenges of the pandemic, and they will be the lifeblood of an organisation’s success in the post epidemic business world. I never surf alone – I always surf with a mate, especially in a big swell…

When employees trust leaders, they feel valued, engaged, productive and willing to put their best foot forward. But when there are dishonest and disingenuous leaders in an organisation, the result is disengaged employees, high turnover rates and low productivity. Untrustworthy leaders erode employees’ perceptions of fairness.

Tip #2?Manage your people with clear expectations – don’t snake

Remote working and in-person working both have their benefits, but they can only be realised when an organisation has a clearly defined structure in place.

You can of course evolve as you go, but you must have consistent expectations for remote workers and in-office workers so that everyone feels psychologically safe — and feels that fairness exists in the workplace. ??I recommend an After-Action (‘post’ pandemic) review. It’s a structured approach for reflecting on what happened after something monumental takes place.

This experience [COVID-19] has been intense. Figure out where you are as an organisation right now. What were some pandemic-related accomplishments and where did you miss the mark? It’s a great way for organisations to learn from past successes and failures.

After-Action Reviews require facilitative leadership. It’s about saying my job as a leader is not to make all the decisions but to create the conditions in which you can make a contribution to the decisions and create the conditions where we can share in the responsibility of its success.??

Bad surfers snake; they are ruthless, cold and without care for others.

Tip #3?Provide employee?support – look out for each other

In our ‘always-on culture, burnout is nothing new. Burnout did not just happen during COVID-19, but during the pandemic rates of burnout and emotional exhaustion among workers skyrocketed, with people leaving their jobs in droves to counteract the effects of increased pressure to always be available. Just Google “The Great Resignation”,?

If you want to manage this issue proactively, your business and your HR managers will need to focus on building a culture of safety.

Here are some elements of a psychologically safe workplace:

·???????Boundaries are encouraged?– employers encourage time off from work and don’t expect employees to be available around the clock.

·???????Connected leaders?– relationship building is prioritised, and leaders are willing to have genuine discussions with employees.

·???????Supportive resources?– resources and benefits are available to support employee physical, mental and emotional well-being.

·???????Inclusive space?– people feel comfortable being themselves and sharing thoughts and opinions with peers and managers without fear of retribution.

Tip #4?Don’t fall back into old ways – when in doubt, stay out

Surfing is a very challenging and unpredictable sport.?Your environment is constantly changing,?and you can be exposed to situations that are out of your control.

As people come back into the workplace, it may be tempting to try and put the events of the last two years behind you and try to rekindle the culture and atmosphere our offices enjoyed pre-pandemic.

But the fact is that in the course of the pandemic, people have changed.

All of us had a lot of time to reflect on our lives, our wants, needs and expectations. ?People now see the workplace and their work lives in a different way.

There simply is no putting this genie back in the bottle. Trying to return to the days of old will have serious consequences for organisations as a large percentage of employees have indicated they will look for new work should employers try to make them spend 40 hours per week in the office again. So before heading out for your next surf, ask yourself, “will I be able to swim to shore comfortably if my leg rope snaps?”

Tip #5?Stay flexible – get surf fit

Get surf fit - not just fit, but?surf fit. Being able to bench press obscene amounts or run a marathon at a world record pace will be of limited?use in the surf.?Your paddling muscles are by far your most important ones; the faster and further you can paddle, the further you’ll be from danger.

Companies will have to remain flexible and be willing to engage employees around issues of workplace policies and culture to ensure they remain appealing. Flexibility is no longer some fancy soft benefit employers can use to lure millennial workers under the guise of work-life balance.?It’s a need and an expectation for workers of all ages and backgrounds. Keep your leadership and HR dudettes & dudes surf fit.

Tip #6?Embrace the evolution of skills – turn kooks & grommets into pros

The pandemic has shifted the way many companies undertake their business and at the same time put a lot of people out of work. Furthermore, many employees do not wish to go back and many businesses now require people with different skills than they did just a couple of years ago. This evolution of desired skills means company leaders and HR professionals now have to support the development of the workforce. Internally, their L&D programs will have to drive the development of new skills and identify people for emerging roles and leadership opportunities. There are tonnes of cool tools, apps and learning platforms for any budget out there.

Tip #7?Speed up your recruitment processes – jack up your game

Whether it’s the unbinding of work to a geographic location or changing the way we interview, vet and screen people, companies are having to rethink the recruitment process for a couple of reasons.

First is the adaptation to the era of?remote work, allowing candidates to interview virtually in a process that is smooth and transparent, as a signal of company culture and values.

Second is a greater push for diversity. Reliance on traditional and slow methods of recruiting, screening and vetting tools such as the standard resume is going to have to change if companies are going to create a workforce that reflects our society more accurately. Now is the time to invest in a thruster and get rid of your longboards.

Tip #8?Remain focused on wellness – learn to recognise rips and currents

Wellness, and in particular?mental health, has become a key priority for employers in the last couple of years. As we slowly shift into a post-pandemic world, it will be important to keep a close eye on wellness as employees deal with yet more change. There continues to be a great deal of uncertainty for many employees when it comes to the health of loved ones in a world living with the virus, their job security for the future and high levels of general anxiety surrounding world events.

Ensure your HR team knows how to help the business leaders to create a culture with a passion for people, not just results.

Surfing is heaps of fun and once you know how to go over the falls, duck dive and get barrelled, you’ll be stoked that all is good again!

So grommies, now that you have these 8 ‘post’-COVID-19 tips, go rip it up and stay safe out in the water. (and thanks for indulging my humour)

Uli?