One Month In: Reflections on Leading From Home
During the second week of March, the management team of The Argonauts took the decision to make attendance at the office voluntary. Guidelines for remote working were implemented and we ran an intense two-day exercise for our Berlin staff. They readily jumped in and quickly got a feel for this new way of working. By Friday the 13th the gravity of the current crisis was really making itself known and so we decided to move the entire operation online.
Now everyone was safe, based at home and raring to go. Now — almost a month later — the challenges — which have been plentiful — have been taken on and solved with both tried-and-tested and unconventional solutions. It has been an incredibly steep learning curve for all of us, an experience that has seen — unsurprisingly — a lot of tears, but also — obviously — plenty of laughs and joy as we discovered who we are as a team. Everyone stood up to the plate and at least got a hit — if not a home run. Well done, team!
On that Friday, as the memes, news and videos about toilet paper, sanitizer and food panic-buying began taking over every media feed we realized that, if (when) a lockdown came, we had better be prepared. No “maybes” or “perhaps”, we had to be on our game. A dedicated team swung into action and arrived at a wholesale supermarket ASAP. There they loaded shopping carts with — and here was a rule we absolutely stuck by — reasonable amounts of noodles, rice and, yes , toilet paper.
Some was to be distributed amongst us for personal use at home, while the rest was allocated to the office in preparation for a possible, if not The, Zombie Apocalypse. We prepared for a worst-case scenario because we wanted the team to be able to come together if needed at our office and to be able to haul in sleeping bags and get on with life, living on pasta, muesli, coffee — for a few weeks, if need be. Dividing up the grocery bags, we asked ourselves, “How did we do?” One month in, we can say: Mission accomplished.
Personal Challenges and Solutions for Managing Remote Teams
Without question the COVID-19 crisis is presenting every company with challenges. How to protect the health and safety of employees? How to keep the business going? How and what and when to communicate with customers? And of course, how to manage, and lead, a team from a distance, day after day after day. Days have turned into weeks and it looks like they will turn into months.
During the third week of March and already working from home a survey of The Argonauts’ members found that 54% of managers were implementing some form of teleworking in response to the crisis. For some companies, like our own, the sudden change was not too disruptive. Our work has always been mostly online and thus we are accustomed to working remotely; other companies were confronted with larger logistical and psychological hurdles.
Over the course of the past month — which now seems like forever — our team members have noted the core challenges of remote working that they faced, and share them with. I hope that you find them as useful as we did.
Challenge #1: Keep the Bandwidth
Set up and ready to go, it dawned on me a bit late that I was not the only one at home who needed the essentials of the modern office. My partner did too. Both of use constantly needing to take calls from around the globe (via video conferencing) had a huge impact on our bandwidth, especially when calls, conferences and meetings overlapped. Things were slowing down, being interrupted, and causing frustration.
Our Approach: We adjusted our positions in the home office, used wireless headsets, became aware of each other’s schedule and set calls accordingly. We often used our mobile phone hotspots — rather than the home WiFi. Social distancing is not just for physical health: you need to give your partner space, and your children, and you’ll see that they’ll gratefully reciprocate. Most of the time!
Challenge #2: Keep Focus
Being in a leadership role means that I am more or less constantly receiving calls. Each and every call is important, each person has an urgent question, and everyone needs input. So my day needs to be structured, yet flexible enough to be constantly open to adjustment. The usual planning tools — Asana, Slack, Gsuite and others — were not enough. I was overwhelmed by the sheer amount and intensity of the conversations that were streaming in, keeping me totally occupied from 7 am to midnight and beyond. I desperately needed a system.
My Approach: After 14 days of — to be frank — total craziness, experimenting with many methods and applications, I finally found one that works for me. You all know it: It’s called the Eisenhower Matrix. In addition to the all-digital-apps, I now jot stuff on post-its and arrange them within this matrix. It’s low tech, but it keeps me updated and on track throughout the entire day: I can now focus on my priorities. The craziness has gone, my calm has returned (mostly!) and everything is ticking along nicely.
Challenge #3: Keep Team Spirit
Even before the crisis threatened to kick our professional lives into chaos, our team always started each day with a huddle and signed off with a checkout. After the first week of working from home — doing huddles by video — we noticed that team spirit was higher on some days than on others. Some days it was really low. Those down days were clearly having an impact on the team’s health, emotions and performance. It needed addressing, but how were we going to keep our spirits up remotely?
Our Approach: During our daily huddles, we introduced icebreakers. Last week, each of us took turns humming a song while the others had to guess what song it was. Some people can definitely hum more accurately than others! Another day saw us telling each other what we plan to do when we retire. Simple, active, fun approaches like these create a great vibe and make the meetings energetic. Our video meetings during the day are not only about work: they’re social and fun. We work out together or have lunch via video. On Friday afternoon we end the work week by having a group drink — from home.
Challenge #4: Keep Moving
With increased work hours and no gym, the chance to workout became rare, and that had an immediate impact on my health and mental state. It really was telling how much I missed exercising as usual.
My Approach: I decided to go running very early each morning, even before my partner is awake. This gets my day, my body and mind, fired up. It gives me time to think and reflect on the coming day. I have become so attached to this routine, and find it so beneficial, that I plan to make it a habit — even after home isolation is lifted. It delivers exactly what I need: a great boost of “Get up and go!”
Challenge #5: Double down on Feedback and Pay Attention
Through digital communication — including over the phone — I increasingly found myself missing the cues of a person’s feelings and emotions. I wasn’t able to read their body language, especially the ever-important facial expressions that communicate so much in conversation. I began to make incorrect assumptions, which in turn led to misunderstandings. It was frustrating and stressful, as I pride myself on being a communicator.
My Approach: Absent all the cues and nuances of face-to-face interaction I realized that I now had to pay much more attention to the conversation, that I was going to have be — what I have termed a SAL, or Super Active Listener. I now constantly elicit feedback from the person I am talking to by expressing my own comments more transparently, for example, like this:
- I noticed (objectively)
- That made me feel (subjectively)
- And my wish is (a desired action)
Using direct and empathic expressions gets us all back on the same page. We see that it’s just a task to be addressed, an action item to be tackled. It’s never personal and should not be a source of emotional contention. We just have to work harder than ever to communicate and understand.
Even if COVID-19 has demanded adjustments in the way your company operates, don’t let it change your company’s culture. Focus on the benefits of remote working and share your best practices. Inject light moments, share company accomplishments, and daily embrace your team with positive energy. Look at the glass we’ve been served as being half-full, never half-empty. These experiences, made positive and constructive, will contribute to team coherence and improved work processes from this point onward.
So, even with all that is happening, the threats and challenges are ours to meet, solve and conquer. This is the silver lining amongst these dark clouds — at least, that is, until the Zombies arrive, or we run out of toilet paper.
Please let us know and share what you and your company are doing to make remote working work.
