It’s all happening

Heart And Hustle
Jul 20, 2017 · 4 min read

I sat at my desk wondering what I was going to do with all this drive to connect employees. Sure, I have tons of ideas but that doesn’t matter unless I take action. I got up and decided I was going to gather the first group of employees and push through my own anxiety about the possible negative consequences. Maybe it would be a disaster, but maybe… just maybe it would be a success.

With the employees staring at me in fear of the unknown, I began to speak. We would be starting something new as a means of connecting employees in a human to human way as a measure of getting to know each other. I would ask them two questions each and everyone was encouraged to respond to what was shared. I went first to provide a template for the process and build rapport.

Each person discussed something they were currently interested in and an aspect of themselves they felt was quirky. It was awkward but they were starting to get the hang of it. As we went around the room, people chimed in with questions and comments after someone shared. Having been extremely structurally strategic in my choice of individuals for this group, I realized that the nervous laughter was turning into something more substantial. The people that I have known pieces of were opening up to a group and finding acceptance.

I left the first group feeling unsure of a multitude of things but at least I had started. There was more to do though to get this experiment up and running. I Slacked the employee that I had the least experience with and was not personally part of their hiring process. I requested that we get together to talk for a few minutes. I got an affirmative response but the follow-through did not occur. That evening, I sent an email nudging again.

Then Monday, the employee came to my office and we talked. This one on one is different than my normal check-ins as it is lead by the employee. Check-ins are where I hear from the employees all their thoughts and feelings about their work, co-workers, management, and how the company can support them. It has been effective. As relaxed as I try to make them, it is still me guiding the discussion. My decision to do one on ones comes from wanting to pro-actively encourage each individual employee to share in the way that they want. They can talk about work, personal things, shoot the shit, ask questions, or anything else that comes to mind. It is about me focusing my full attention on who they are as person and connecting without the constraints of it being business focused.

At the end, I started my inception question. Who would you most like to get to know personally or professionally in the company right now? I got an enthusiastic answer and with that, I had activated my plan. Now what? I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with this employee to employee piece but I figured I had gotten this far… why not do more?

I reasoned that I would share this information with whomever the employee had mentioned they wanted to get to know. This could work in my favor or not. Some people feel special when they are singled out and others feel pressured. I would need to tread lightly and shift my approach for each person based on what I already know about their personality. I directly went to the other employee and in private explained the process. At this point, I hadn’t figured out if I was going to tell each person who picked them first or ask them to tell me first who they wanted to get to know. Pulling out all my knowledge from behavioral game theory, I charged ahead.

Instantly, I was scanning the employee for unconscious and conscious cues as to their reaction. In this instance, I decided to share from the get-go who had picked them. The employee was delighted and discussed how happy they were with all these new changes occurring. Externally, I kept the conversation going. Inside, my mind was racing. I just picked up data that this employee had gotten word about what I had started the week previously with other employees. Fueled by this, I started a chain reaction going to one employee after another throughout the day with information in hand about who wanted to get to know them more. I managed to navigate correctly through five employees that day with a range of approaches to connect them with one another.

It had only been two days in total that I had started to move forward with this idea in my head of scaling connection within the company. I had some data points that appeared to be positive in nature. However, it wasn’t till Tuesday that I felt it was all happening!

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Heart And Hustle

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