An amazing coaching session this week

I wanted to share an amazing coaching session I had yesterday with one of my members. This is particularly pertinent to the current challenges the world is facing with the corona virus.

Like many of my members, the thought of having a coaching session to discuss their own personal development journey seems to be somewhat superficial and this was apparent when I met with this member. We talked about safety and how each of us was coping and the conversation developed onto her consideration for her team.

Like many organisations this week, they had imposed a work from home policy and my member had gone further by suggesting many of her team might consider travelling back to their families. To put some context around this, her workforce is mostly made up from people in their early to mid-twenties, work in central London, live on their own or with friends rather than direct family and, as my member described, may begin to feel vulnerable. This I felt showed care and empathy for her team. Each one managed to make their arrangements as early as last weekend to prepare for an extended period of remote working which began this week.

My member described the things she had implemented to try and keep the remote working as near to possible as normal. The team share an early morning meeting and come together at the end of the day. This is to maintain connection. They also used WhatsApp to provide some social interaction which tries to replicate the lighter and more social dialogue that would exist in the office. What I found really interesting and what I wanted to share with you all is that they have also introduced “virtual lunch time”. This is a set time where they go in a group call and share lunch, each sitting at home but with an option to come together as if they were eating their lunch in the office canteen.

What my member has done is create not just a digital working environment but has considered too the social element that is all too often forgotten about with remote working.

What also impressed me was the next idea. Once a week the team normally get together and have Pizza’s in the office, I think Friday. My member has made sure this ritual continues and has planned to have a virtual lunch this week and has arranged for each of her team to have a Pizza delivered to their door at the agreed time of their online meeting. This is no mean feat as some of her team have gone home to their parents and they reside across the UK and Western Europe. She has arranged for Pizza delivery for example in Belgium and France (lock down permitting).

We further discussed the importance of this social interaction and she shared with me how she has also arranged for another group to meet online these are other parents from her children’s school. They are to have a 9:00 pm wine chat.

This shows great leadership ability and is something I certainly felt inspired by, so much so that I wanted to share this example with you all.

I think as leaders and as influencers we could be sharing examples such as these to help support our communities and our members through difficult times. This seems so much more powerful as support than the general information share which I know is well meant but is generally quite negative.

Best wishes to you all and stay safe and positive.

Tim Anderson