How to Properly Engage Employees Working Remotely
From a leader standpoint, it may be difficult to properly engage employees while they are working remotely. However, it can be done and can be done efficiently. Find out here.
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Covid-19 caused a negative impact for individuals, families, and organizations worldwide. One of the problems Covid-19 caused for many organizations was that they had to completely change and shift their daily routine. Employees had to start working remotely. Working remotely has been controversial, some individuals enjoy working from the comfort of their home, which allows for a better work/life balance, and other individuals are motivated by waking up early and going into an office with other co-workers. With this said, working remotely can be challenging for anyone. It can create distractions and a loss of motivation when you are not seeing co-workers each day. Despite the concerns working remotely has already caused, many individuals still struggle with this remote working change due to the simple fact that change is hard.
From a leader standpoint, it may be difficult to properly engage employees while they are working remotely. However, it can be done and can be done efficiently. Start by motivating and engaging your employees while utilizing virtual meeting apps, such as Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, WebEx, or Zoom to host meetings with your employees daily to keep everyone aligned. Most organizations know how to use them at this point but learning and creating an environment where motivating and engaging becomes paramount and burn-out is limited.
One of the most effective ways a leader can engage their remote employees is simply asking for and listening to feedback from their employees. As mentioned, virtually working is not for everyone and a leader should stay connected with their employees and stay open minded to the ideas and feedback for improvements as many roles have now begun hybrid or fully remote. Each employee works and excels differently, learning about each employee and how best they work will make the team effective and effective.
Lastly, provide your employees with the tools needed to succeed. A successful leader of a virtual or hybrid team should also be doing research on what the best resources are while working remotely and provide tutorials and various solutions for the employees. Doing this will make your employees feel like they are cared about and understood, which as a result will increase their productivity and engagement at work.
Remote working is a modernistic trend in the working community, but it will only continue to evolve. Times have changed (and continue to change) and managers and leaders need to learn to adapt to these trends and changes. To learn more about how to properly engage and supervise your employees remotely, check out this free short course on Leading Remote Teams.
For free performance and engagement resources head over to our Resource Vault!
Building Successful Performance Environments Using the C.A.R.E. Model (Video)
Every organization and individual needs a foundation to enable both personal and organizational performance. A foundation which leads to building successful performance environments that enables individuals throughout an organization to perform their best, without unnecessary barriers.
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Every organization and individual needs a foundation to enable both personal and organizational performance. A foundation which leads to building successful performance environments that enables individuals throughout an organization to perform their best, without unnecessary barriers. C.A.R.E provides and ensures organizational clarity and alignment, while properly allocating the right resources in the right place at the right time. It then enables actions and behaviors to deliver, and more importantly, sustain top-tier performance while enhancing engagement and commitment. Watch this short video to learn more about the C.A.R.E model for building successful performance environments.
For free performance and engagement resources head over to our Resource Vault!
The Three I's of Performance: Measuring Continuous Performance
Understanding the benefits of continuous performance and how to implement it within an organization is utterly important, however an important aspect of the continuous performance trend we find always gets left out is how to actually measure the success after implementation. The managers and employees are following the plan, but how do we actually measure that individuals success?
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As we have mentioned, the traditional model of semiannual or annual performance reviews conducted by managers is outdated and ineffective but very few organizations have formally changed how they “manage” employee performance. Over time, the evolution to a more ongoing, continuous development process will happen, but for most organizations that type of organizational change can take years.
On Monday, we posted an article from Business.com that we felt had a good grip on how to implement a continuous performance environment within an organization. It boiled it down to five steps, plus a final sixth one about using technology to help the implementation. Here were the six steps:
Talk to managers to discover who is already conducting regular performance discussions.
Get buy-in from senior leadership.
Sell the benefits to your managers.
Provide the necessary training and guidance.
Continually communicate the changes that are about to take place.
Make use of continuous performance management software.
Understanding the benefits of continuous performance and how to implement it within an organization is obviously an important first step, however a critical aspect of the continuous performance trend we find always gets left out is how to actually measure the success after implementation. The managers and employees are following the plan, but how do we actually measure that individuals success?
It is done by measuring the Three I’s of Performance: Initiative, Influence, and Impact. Each area builds and emphasizes the other and all three are needed to truly succeed in a continuous performance environment.
Here is how they break out and what questions can be asked to measure the success.
Initiative: (noun) the power or opportunity to act or take charge before others do.
A primary driver for any performance success is consistently taking initiative. Is the individual:
Better clarifying roles and responsibilities?
Defining their goals and objectives?
Aligning their performance actions and activities?
Personally setting performance expectations with the leader or manager?
Scheduling 30-40 minute connections, on an every 4-6 week cadence to review and plan the performance results?
Influence: (noun) the capacity to have an effect on the character, development or behavior on someone or something.
It’s not just what you accomplish but how you go about getting results is equally important. Every interaction is an opportunity to either positively or negatively influence the outcome. How we act, and more importantly, how we react can define our impact and the effectiveness of that impact.
As part of continuous performance development consider if the individual is:
Developing greater situational awareness?
Is their attitude consistent and does it promote positive interactions?
Are their daily behaviors aligned with organizational and team values?
Do they create authentic connections, not just more communications?
Impact: (noun) the force of impression on one thing or another.
And finally, assessing and enhancing overall impact. In continuous performance development, understanding, measuring, and enhancing the daily impact and individual has is critical to ensuring sustained value being delivered to the team and organization. It is the initiative combined with the influence that will determine overall effectiveness and success.
Consider these focus areas that enhance overall impact:
Better self-awareness combined with better situational awareness.
Is the individual reflecting each day on their personal daily contribution?
How are their actions and results supporting the team?
How and where can they accelerate their own performance?
This 3 I performance framework can and will set a continuous performance environment apart. As you look to focus and account for performance actions, activities, and results, always remember to measure the initiative, influence, and impact of each individual.
For free performance and engagement resources head over to our Resource Vault!
Engaged Teams
A ‘network of engaged teams” performance model which promotes high employee engagement, strong, real-time communication, and rapid information flow is transforming organizations and providing for a very powerful organizational competitive advantage. These teams are purpose-focused, consistently exhibit the right team behaviors, are committed and supported at the very highest level of the organization.
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The age of the hierarchical organization is quickly coming to an end. Businesses are reinventing themselves to compete in this complex and unpredictable world of change and opportunity, and this change applies to any and all industries, both small and large organizations. Organizations are decentralizing decision making, moving toward product and customer-centric performance models, and forming an agile network of highly engaged teams that communicate and deliver results in powerful ways.
This “network of teams” performance model which promotes high employee engagement, strong, real-time communication, and rapid information flow is transforming organizations and providing for a very powerful organizational competitive advantage. These teams are purpose-focused, consistently exhibit the right team behaviors, are committed and supported at the very highest level of the organization.
Let’s focus on purpose first. The foundation for any engaged team is establishing a clear purpose that every team member is aligned to. Sounds easy, but it isn’t. Every team struggles with this, and often, most teams skip over this important step and go right to resources and activities.
This step is NOT just creating a purpose statement, this is a defining action in the formation of the team that provides:
An anchor point for the team.
The “what” for the team.
A definition of both success for the team and the desired impact of the team.
The answer to “why” this team and its work are important.
A team can have all the right behaviors with all team members committed and tremendous organizational support but without a clearly defined and aligned purpose, the team will have little to no direction and rarely achieve its full potential and desired outcomes.
Next up is behaviors. After clarifying the team purpose, we want to turn our attention to establishing the right team environment by identifying and exemplifying the right team behaviors.
The team can have a clear team purpose, each team member can be committed, and the team can have all the organizational support it can garner, but if the team doesn’t define and consistently show the behaviors that will enable success, as well as identify and acknowledge behaviors that, if shown, will derail the teams efforts, the team stands a chance of not reaching the its full potential and not delivering on its stated purpose and team charter.
A critical team best practice is in the initial phase of team formation: Openly brainstorming and documenting team behaviors that will enable success and those that could potential derail the team.
Once the enabling and dis-enabling lists are agreed upon by all team members, it is a team best practice to review the lists periodically at the start of team meetings just to reinforce how important the focus on exhibiting the right team behaviors are to achieving team success.
The results an engaged team delivers are important, but how those results are achieved along the way are equally as important. Don’t assume good team behavior, cultivate it!
This brings us to commitment. Plainly put, your team needs you! A team can define its purpose, exhibit all the right team behaviors and have complete organizational support, but if any one or more of the team members are not fully committed to contributing to the team’s efforts it is this lack of commitment that is a major contributing factor for teams not achieving team the goals and success they have defined.
In working with leaders and their teams over the last 10+ years we have found a number of key areas where individual and team commitment enables and accelerates team success.
Each team member must be committed to:
Consistently attending scheduled meetings and events.
Preparing for each team meeting.
Commit to and deliver on all agreed upon next step actions.
Providing thoughts and ideas and challenging the status quo.
Learning and developing both as an individual and as a team.
Encouraging peers and those in their sphere of influence to actively engage.
Coach and mentor other newly formed teams.
Staying committed to a team's success is difficult. Each year we work with dozens of teams from their initiation to completion and with each one of them team and individual commitment is tested in some way. Day to day functional job pressures and the pace of change in business adds pressure and challenges that commitment. But, stay the course and, if necessary, reach out to the team supervisor or sponsor to assist in prioritizing both the importance to the organization and the time commitment required of you and your team to deliver on your team purpose.
Stay committed, your team and organization need you.
And lastly, a successful team needs support. An engaged team’s level of success and the ultimate impact of that success is often determined by the level of organizational support it receives throughout the team engagement.
Does the overall organization embrace and enable employee performance and engagement by sponsoring and supporting individual and team training? Are senior organizational leaders actively participating by allocating time for these activities, and by showing interest in and implementing many of the various team and individual recommendations? Lastly, do our front-line leaders encourage greater engagement by inspiring and enabling people and teams, not directing or controlling their activities?
A team can have a clearly defined and communicated purpose, exhibit all the positive team behaviors during the teaming process and all members be completely committed, but if they do not have organizational support to listen and act then it marginalizes, if not destroys, all future team activities.
Our experience enabling employee performance and engagement points to a simple, but effective success model for team and individual engagement and success. Purpose, behavior, commitment and support.
For free performance and engagement resources head over to our Resource Vault!
OLE Performance
When we transform performance we are literally flipping the performance model for most organizations. We move away from top-down driven, compliance-oriented performance, to employee engaged performance, where the individuals are driving their own performance. This is done through what we call O-L-E Performance. Organization enabled, leader supported, and employee-led performance.
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Dramatic change is occurring in organizations across the globe. Business cycles and opportunities that used to last for months or years now change in weeks or even days. Expectations continually change and become more demanding. Organizations and employees have to respond quickly or find themselves in a struggle to compete and survive. In response to these dynamics, organizations now must transform their overall performance environment.
When we transform performance we are literally flipping the performance model for most organizations. We move away from top-down driven, compliance-oriented performance, to employee engaged performance, where the individuals are driving their own performance. This is done through what we call O-L-E Performance. Organization enabled, leader supported, and employee-led performance.
Organizations enable talent performance by connecting everyone to a clear organizational purpose supported by clear organizational values. They enable it by chartering and supporting employee-led teams that develop options and recommendations which then turn into actual results.
Leaders support talent performance by evolving from top-down planning, directing, controlling and managing people and processes, to inspiring, enabling, facilitating and developing employee performance, accountability and change. Leaders should create and support the environments for active employee engagement and cultivate a lead where you are performance environment, not attempt to manage their people and activities.
And finally, develop the environment where employees don’t just submit an annual survey and wait for something to happen. If you want sustained performance, engage them at the very start to turn feedback into change. Magic happens when organizations intentionally enable and support employee-led actions and activities.
OLE Performance is the key to shifting performance results from top-down driven to one that is enabled by the organization, leader supported, and owned and led by the employees. This performance transformation will lead to enhanced and sustained performance by the employees and the organization.
For free performance and engagement resources head over to our Resource Vault!
Performance Management vs. Continuous Performance
The unfortunate reality about performance management as it was designed 30 years ago; it doesn’t work today. Enhanced talent performance requires change, moving from traditional performance management to future focused performance enablement.
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For over 30 years the theory behind performance management was to provide a process of accountability and ownership to an individual’s performance development and success.
Annual and semi-annual performance discussions were added to provide accountability and performance rating systems were put in place as a way to document and often justify annual pay increases.
The unfortunate reality about performance management as it was designed 30 years ago; it doesn’t work today. Accountability and ownership is misplaced and falls on the leader and does little to develop and enhance an individuals performance because so much of the focus is on documenting and discussing past performance to justify future compensation.
In most performance management processes, leaders set the performance expectations, leaders schedule time for the performance reviews, leaders talk 80-90% of the time in the performance review discussion, and the final determination of performance success or failure resides with the leader in their assigning an end of year performance rating. Something is seriously wrong with this picture!
So rather than a process meant to enhance and development performance, it has evolved into a process that nearly everyone dislikes and organizations, year after year, tolerate it even with its inherent, "check the box" ineffectiveness. Performance management has become one of the most disengaging processes any organization conducts.
Enhanced talent performance requires change, moving from traditional performance management to future focused performance enablement. Shifting the accountability and ownership for performance from the leader to the employee, where it should reside, is key. Continuous performance development is highly effective at developing and sustaining talent performance, not at documenting and justifying compensation decisions.
However, performance management won’t evolve on its own. It requires an intentional effort to improve a very ineffective process. If performance management in your organization is not working we can show you a better way.
See the graphic below on how performance accountability and ownership shifts from the leader to the employee in a continuous performance model.