WFH... trying to make it work...

The leadership challenge during lockdown...  

This week marks the twelfth in which my team have been permanently working from home to help keep ourselves and others safe.  A fortnight ago, Mental Health Awareness Week brought the pressures of making this work sharply into focus.  We put steps in place early on in an attempt to support our team as much as possible. Three months later I wanted to reflect a bit on what is working and what isn't - including things I personally find, frankly, really difficult!

Our team is based all around the country but primarily in Edinburgh and London. Some of us are used to working from home, but even for those of us seasoned by the home office setup, this is still quite a different situation.  We’ve moved from ‘working from home’ to ‘being at home, during a pandemic, trying to work’. For many of us this can also mean supporting significant others who have lost their jobs, are struggling with self-employment, or have been furloughed.  It also means the joy of discovering that you are not very good at explaining what a synonym is but that doesn't matter because you get to see your kids every day!

So what is working?  Well, we’ve been fortunate enough to have been moving towards a virtual office model on Microsoft Teams prior to the lockdown, which has now come into full effect. We supported individual team members in setting up suitable home working environments - even choosing to invest in some screens and decent IT equipment for individuals who needed it.  Our weekly meetings that used to happen in person, now happen entirely online and, dare I say it, may have even become more streamlined due to a heightened awareness of everyone’s time.  

Our work day has changed with an 8:00am start and a ‘no meetings after 6:00pm’ rule. From 11:30am to 1:30pm there is a mandatory break for the team to get some exercise, spend time with family, or otherwise get a break away from work, to help stop the line between home and office becoming too blurred. 

After a week or so of the ‘new normal’ we realised that people missed the corridor and coffee machine chats where folk typically pick up that "Wassup" thing and support each other.  So we started buddy groups. Everyone in the team was allocated into groups of seven or so to get together on Teams and ‘shoot the breeze’ and check in with one another. Some groups have quizzes, some have games. Some groups are doing virtual tours on Google Maps of where they grew up. We’ve also been taking part in ‘mystery coffees’ to learn and share new things with our international colleagues, and attending the odd ‘virtual fika’.  It keeps people talking and reminding each other that we’re all in the same boat and it provides a safe forum to talk openly about how bloody hard this all is!  There is also an open door policy for anyone who needs to discuss concerns around CV19, personal circumstances and response to government announcements. 

And we keep talking.  Every week the leadership team meet to discuss what is working and not working... logistics... mood... individual challenges... you name it, we chat about it. 

But in the grand scheme of things, these are small efforts. Are they working? That’s something not easily quantified.  Some days I think yes, some days no.  Balancing the needs of individuals to socialise and build strong relationships is critical, especially as we are doubling our team over 12 months. It’s a real challenge.

What are we finding hard?  We miss the human contact!  You cannot replace that buzz you get from working, in person, with people you like and getting the spark.  It isn't the same online.  We have offices for a reason - they are collaboration spaces.  They are environments to bring people together and help unite them to a common purpose.  I still need to be convinced that this can be done entirely virtually.

At a practical level we also find it hard to work through challenges online - collaboration tools are great but the old white-board and a room with take away is not replaced well by little boxes on a screen and me holding up a piece of paper with scribbles on it, "Look, it is a Venn...!".  Roll eyes.  One celebrated (and not to be named) member of the management team had his own pack of markers and a board rubber he carried around, so much value did he get from working through things with people in this way.  We are setting up lots of our operational processes this year (year three!) and it is a challenge made harder by remoteness - one of our colleagues from the Netherlands joined us in February on an 18 month secondment to help set things up and expecting a year in the UK.  Instead he has worked from his house 100 miles south of Amsterdam and 800 miles from the team he has joined.

I have personally had some challenges also.  Anyone who has worked with me longer than an hour will know that I am not a 'write it down' kind of leader.  I am most effective working with the people in the team and my personality and energy are a big part of what makes me successful.  These strengths are partially blunted on video conference though... and (dread) I have to be more organised... more prepared... and I have to write things in documents and send them.  It sounds comic here, but there is nothing like a crisis to highlight those leadership development challenges you were brushing in to future development plans!

But crucially, and with the recent focus on Mental Health, it is important to also not hide that the mental toll can be seen across the group, including from me - tempers fray, some people get quieter, some don't behave the way they used to... all tell-tale signs that things are not quite right.  And they are all harder things to spot when you are remote from each other.

Patience to explain things 'again' over the virtual link that were not clearly understood the first time... is slipping.  Yes some meetings are more efficient.... but we seem to have more meetings - because we need to connect more to 'reconfirm' things all the time.  And in the middle of this are people going through tough times personally - and trying to show mental fortitude and resiliance and grit and all those things you read about in self-help books and want to have but sometimes just don't.

How do we keep learning and responding the needs of the team?  In spite of the challenge of CV19 we are continuing to grow and thrive. The new hires we’ve taken on in the last three months (yes we are still hiring) are starting their jobs in a completely virtual environment, including induction process, meeting new team mates and getting to work.  We have been at home for so long some people have been interviewed virtually, and started work virtually.  All report that "It isn't totally rubbish".  We seem to be learning.  And improving.

Practically I think we need to keep reviewing HOW we work - including purpose, freqency and effectiveness of meetings and pre-reads and agendas and all the stuff that we all know make for more productive businesses.  This is something we will keep discussing every week and trying to improve.  Including me... writing more things down.

And finally... we got our team together last week to reflect on Mental Health Awareness week and the discussion came back to the recent social media discussion about Being Kind.  Sounds simple.  But in the pressure cooker of kids not learning their quadratic equations, the internet connection dropping in and out, the supermarket not having food deliveries for a fortnight, the project deadline still being Friday, and your team-mate biting your head off for something inconsquential... it can get lost.  We still have a business to run.  And we still need to make sure we deliver for our customers.   I sometimes feel out of my depth in dealing with the challenges faced in these difficult times but I also believe if things are hard it is good to keep simple principles in mind... as you can remember them when the going gets tough. 

So I think we need to keep reminding each other that it is important to stop, breathe and just be kind. 

I am interested to hear what everyone else is doing to manage your teams and businesses through this time...  all suggestions welcomed.  We don't have it solved here but we do love being part of the conversation and learning from others.

Thank you for reading.

#covid19 

#workingfromhome 

#mentalhealthawareness

#WFH 

#VattenfallHeatUK