COVID-19: A chance to build strong relationships with your employees and colleagues

“I have to be a mother, teach my children, and deliver in my job across time zones. I am stressed, we cannot go out, and it is difficult to activate the children from morning till evening. How should I prioritize?" That's how a call I got recently from someone in my team sounded.

COVID-19 has turned society upside down and pushed us into a new reality where there is no room for our usual daily routines. Many companies have sent employees home, and schools and institutions are closed.

That leaves a difficult parenting task and a major leadership challenge at a special time.

As part of the BCG leadership, my job is to lead teams that are spread across the globe and that I make a virtue of being close to and not just through video. Now I cannot leave the country and our offices are closed. However, that does not change the fact that I continue to have leadership responsibilities and teams waiting for my response.

However, I see this difficult time as an opportunity to show great leadership by setting the direction, show empathy and engaging and motivating employees by being open about one's own challenges during this special time.

One of our skilled employees recently told us that he has gained more respect for his managers over the past two weeks because he has seen and heard their children on video conferencing. "It makes a leader more human, and thus stronger," he said.

Here are a few ideas on how to manage your employees as best as possible while building trust and creating stronger teams that will also consist after COVID-19.

Rise to the occasion as leader - be open about the situation

In Denmark we have many families, where both the father and mother have a demanding career and who are dependent on educational and care institutions on daily basis. This also applies to our employees who work from home during this time.

As a leader, you must lead the way and create an environment where you can be open and honest about the situation and the challenges that all parents are facing right now. Use yourself as an example. Share your own challenges, it will make your employees open up about theirs. Before starting a formal meeting agenda, prioritize time to listen and understand the challenges of workload, parental responsibility and the lack of care opportunities. Take a round.

In this way, we discover as quickly as possible the "holes" to be covered in the short run, as well as who has the capacity to lift tasks from other people's plate.

I have created an overview of the most critical tasks for my teams and everyone knows what we need to deliver together. We have daily huddles to prioritize and solve problems together. Generally, presence is important during this time. We always have video meetings over phone meetings, so we see each other plus an increased frequency of 1:1 check-ins. It is important to maintain a close and open dialogue.

The need to adjust and match expectations happens every day. It is now that we have to train and exercise our ability to work agile and virtual.

Avoid that women are left alone with the burden

When a country shuts down and the government implements emergency legislation from one day to the next, we must act on the spot, but we must also ensure that it is not the women who end up having to catch all the balls.

In Denmark, we need more female leaders, but our progress in this area has historically been slow. This is due to, among other things, cultural norms, where women are often regarded as the primary caregiver, while men often feel a social strain in prioritizing work over the family

At a time when both children and parents are at home, we run the risk of women having the greatest burden. I can see what pressure many women currently are under, as they both have to lift the parenting task and deliver on the job.

As a leader, you should be supportive and treat mothers and fathers in your teams alike. We need a good distribution of roles between both genders during this crisis. We should all be aware of that. The alternative can have long-term consequences for gender balance both at home and in the workplace.

Provide inspiration for the parenting task and create a good framework for learning

Become personal as a leader and inspire solutions to not only work but also the home now parents now have to juggle childcare with homework during the daytime.

In my teams, for example, we have chat groups where we share a daily picture of our everyday life. It is a great way to stay in close contact while sharing experiences and learning from each other. For example, it may be that some parents have good experience utilizing the network in their child's class, where they alternate with other parents to provide homework help over video calling. Or ideas for schedules where parents take shifts to work and care for the children. It can also be to divide the home into different zones, e.g. play zone, homework zone, etc.

We also need to understand that parents with schoolchildren have been given an extra job as a private teacher. Many schools create e-learning portals and post tasks online. Encourage your staff to set aside time to understand the school's new learning solutions and to create a solid set-up for their children so that they can access the material easily.