“Teams are relying on us to lead with empathy, compassion, and care.”
Part of a series of posts written by the Directors’ Network, supported by One Team Gov and the National Leadership Centre
We’re writing this blog post to continue our series. One Team Gov are supporting the growth of a community of Directors committed to collective leadership, co-creation and building cultures that support collaboration.
Leading public services has always been tough — we have to tackle complex societal issues which no single organisation can face alone. This is especially true at the moment, and Directors are at the forefront of this, wrestling with the systemic and interrelated nature of many issues.
We had our twelfth breakfast call in early October, where we responded to the questions:
How can we lead people through the extended period of working at home?
How do we facilitate career paths outside of London?
Below is a summary of our discussions.
How can we lead people through the extended period of working at home?
The quality of a team’s interactions and team connectedness matter more than ever during this pandemic. COVID-19 has either brought teams closer or drove them increasingly apart.
Our conversation centred on wellbeing and the primacy of connectedness. We are no longer within arm’s reach of one another, but dispersed across villages, towns, and cities.
We worry about the future of the teams we lead — and about how to reach those that are silent right now. There is a feeling that leaders are taking their eye off the ball when it comes to checking on wellbeing within their teams as the pandemic has elongated. But we have a responsibility to lead inclusively, and lead all of the time. That includes exploring how people are feeling, fostering human connections, and deepening relationships in a world of virtual work that has almost completely abolished informal interactions.
We explored how colleagues in other organisations are experiencing leading from home during the shift toward virtual work. As leaders we need to create new rituals and practices, to build in time to connect, share our vulnerabilities, and prioritise our own wellbeing. We must put in the work —and that effort must begin with us as leaders. Teams are relying on us to lead with empathy, compassion, and care.
How do we facilitate career paths outside of London?
When will we see COVID-19 as a driver of a deeper cultural transformation?
Covid-19 upended office work as we all knew it. There’s a big opportunity for shared campuses and place based teams, for there to be a path of collaboration and cooperation from local to national. However, we must learn from what went before — what we had, what worked, what didn’t work — otherwise we will go round and round in circles.
Perhaps the secret to new home working lies asking what the ‘offices’ of the future will look like. For some of us, this change will be huge; however, the questions we ask today will define the future(s) we create tomorrow. Some of the most questions we asked ourselves were:
- What do people need? Have we asked them?
- How do we support them?
- How do we refocus on what is important to them?
We can come together to shift from rigid workplaces to a range of different work styles based on what people need. They can be places for us to collaborate, innovate, learn, and share. We can try something new and different. We can connect with communities. This cultural change comes from us — things change when we do. Change is hard; but, we sometimes make it harder than it needs to be.
This year has broken down some of the myths we held, for example, that you need to be located in the office to be productive. You can make a good contribution when you have the tools at your disposal. We can enable people to seamlessly transition between organisations — with the technology and tools to do it — like never before. However, we’re coming at this from an era of presenteeism and cultural bias. We’re coming from a time where you needed to be in London to pursue a career and still be office based to do it. The cultural change comes from the top — it starts with us.
How we grow people is important. To attract leaders out of London, visibility of career pathways are critical. People must be able to see a leadership career pathway in a location or region, not for just a single department or organisation. A lack of senior people affects the way others feel about their prospects in a region. We have a responsibility to break the myth of ‘things that can’t be done outside London’. So, how do we get to a tipping point for variety, type of roles, and job numbers in the regions?
The hybrid workplace is here. Will we embrace it?
Reflection
There is power in communities in uncertain times. Our community has become a safe holding space for delving into inquiry, to ask ourselves what it means to lead in the context of government in the 21st century. We are imaging new ideas, possibilities, and values in a public sector built on old hierarchies, processes, and rules.
The Directors’ Network breakfast calls are bi-weekly on Thursdays from 8.30–9.30am. If you are a director and would like to join the network, e-mail: csdirectors@cabinetoffice.gov.uk.
We look forward to seeing you there!
