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!
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!
Team Performance: Form, Perform, Reform
If you want better employee engagement, what a better way than to engage your employees. And with the future of performance being a network of engagement and performance teams that form, perform and reform as needed to deliver results, it is key to have a model that provides a framework for team success from inception to disbanding.
Subscribe to the Lead Where You Are Podcast on all your favorite streaming outlets! Simply click one of the buttons below.
If you want better employee engagement, what a better way than to engage your employees. And with the future of performance being a network of engagement and performance teams that form, perform and reform as needed to deliver results, it is key to have a model that provides a framework for team success from inception to disbanding. The video below highlights the Engagement Team Life Cycle. It is a predicable team cycle that once understood can be accelerated and leveraged to provide focus and deliver next level team success.
For free performance and engagement resources head over to our Resource Vault!
Destination: Success | A Man on the Moon
An engaged team put a man on the moon!
There is a predictable model for team success leading to amazing results. Let's explore the formula for success one team used to literally put a man on the moon.
When President John F. Kennedy first announced that America was going to send a man to the moon, most thought that it was impossible and insane and predictably asked, "Why?". But alas, we know (or most of us know) that he did it!
The formula for success President Kennedy used?
Purpose + Behavior + Commitment + Support = Amazing Things
First have a purpose. It must be compelling, relevant, and go beyond just performing or completing a task. The purpose established by JFK – “Put a man on the moon and return safely by the end of the decade”. Now that was a clear and compelling purpose.
The second element of the formula for team success – behavior. To enable success, a team must identify and consistently display enabling team behaviors. For the Apollo team, they didn’t focus on obstacles, they focused on opportunity. It was about the mission and not personal gain. They worked as one to achieve the purpose and never lost sight of what was truly important. That team had the right behaviors.
The mission required the third element of the success formula; commitment. Not just commitment from the three astronauts who risked their lives, and as a result, became national hero’s either. No, it was the thousands of NASA employees dedicating their lives to the purpose. Even when tragedy struck the program in 1967 and three astronauts lost their lives on the launch pad, commitment to the purpose never wavered. In fact, that incident rallied NASA to ensure that the sacrifice of human lives would not be in vain. It takes real commitment to ensure team success.
And finally, it takes support to succeed. President Kennedy made an appeal to both Congress and the American people on May 25, 1961. “I believe this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal before this decade is out; of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to Earth”. The men and women of NASA had the support of the President and now an entire nation.
Because the team had a compelling purpose, showed the right behaviors, were committed to success, and had the support it needed, on July 20, 1969 at 10:56 PM Astronaut Neil Armstrong stepped off the lunar module ladder and planted his foot on the powdery surface. Then on July 24, 1969 the space capsule safely splashed down, completing Apollo 11’s mission and realizing the dreams of a nation.
For more information on how to more actively engage in your organization join our DESTINATION: SUCCESS page, or contact us!
Cornerstone Learning is a performance and leadership consulting organization that has worked with clients all over the world. Our focus is working with individuals and organizations to create performance solutions that deliver top-tier results by inspiring, enabling, and developing employee-led, leader supported, and organization enabled performance. We are able to successfully deliver this through multiple products and services such as employee surveys, online training, performance assessments, and performance coaching. The goal at Cornerstone Learning is to assist our clients in enabling success by developing a dynamic and customized pathway to deliver role model organizational and personal performance.
Destination: Success | The Future of Performance is all about Teams
Performance is evolving from top down, command and control directives to engaged teams that are supported and enabled by leadership and the organization.
The future of organizational performance – A significant portion of work will be conducted by a network of employee engagement teams. These teams provide incredible decision making/problem solving agility and performance. Teams form as needed and disband once success is achieved. Individuals will potentially contribute to a number of teams over the course of any given year.
As this team performance evolves, titles and organization hierarchy become less important. Success is achieved through the teams’ collective knowledge, insight, and experience all guided by a shared vision to achieve a defined purpose. Organization support and formal leadership roles shift from top down decision making and management to enabling performance success by breaking down any barriers that might exist.
The end result of this evolution?
These engagement teams, with the right training, support, and reinforcement, produce amazing results while enhancing productivity, increasing the speed of change, breaking down silos, and engaging every employee in the organization.
Want better employee engagement? The future of performance is all about the team!
For more information on how to develop a fluid, high performance network of teams in your organization join our DESTINATION: SUCCESS page, or contact us!
Cornerstone Learning is a performance and leadership consulting organization that has worked with clients all over the world. Our focus is working with individuals and organizations to create performance solutions that deliver top-tier results by inspiring, enabling, and developing employee-led, leader supported, and organization enabled performance. We are able to successfully deliver this through multiple products and services such as employee surveys, online training, performance assessments, and performance coaching. The goal at Cornerstone Learning is to assist our clients in enabling success by developing a dynamic and customized pathway to deliver role model organizational and personal performance.
Old Versus New - Which model are you?
The management model that has existed and thrived since the industrial age is rapidly evolving and shifting. In an era that lacked meaningful technology and real time information, managers had to plan, direct, control, and manage both people and processes to get work accomplished. Telling people what to do and how to do it was required and accepted for decades. Generations of leaders were trained and molded using this management model.
Fast forward to today and how work is organized and results are accomplished. No one wants or needs to be managed and the process of planning from the past takes too long and often the resulting plan is obsolete before it is even finalized. And very few, if any, people today want their time and efforts controlled and directed by someone else.
So have you and your organization made the shift from the old, ineffective management model to the new leadership model of inspiring, energizing, facilitating, and developing? In fact, rather than extensive time and efforts expended on management planning, do you inspire a purpose that leads to results through others? Think about it, Martin Luther King didn’t have a “I Have a Plan” speech, he delivered a “I Have a Dream” speech. In the future, it is not about having a detailed plan, it is all about having and connecting others to a purpose. Inspire results with a purpose.
Do you and other formal leaders create individual and team energy instead of assigning directive tasks? Have you developed a “lead where you are” culture where employee-led initiatives tackle the toughest issues and create the greatest opportunities? Don’t direct people, create energy by empowering, guiding, and recognizing?
People and their work product are not assets to be controlled as in the past. The successful leaders of the future facilitate and cultivate trusted, authentic relationships where active listening takes place versus orders given. Where change is not managed or controlled but environments and competencies are developed to proactively lead change and positive disruption is encouraged. Where creativity and innovation is more valued than management reports.
And finally, since no one wants to be managed, the critical leader shift from managing people to developing, coaching, and mentoring the leader in everyone is the foundation for success. People need clarity, alignment, and a clear sense of ownership leading to enhanced accountability. Stop managing people and make the shift to developing people.
The old versus new model, where are you?
Cornerstone Learning is a performance and leadership consulting organization that has worked with clients all over the world. Our focus is working with individuals and organizations to create performance solutions that deliver top-tier results by inspiring, enabling, and developing employee-led, leader supported, and organization enabled performance. We are able to successfully deliver this through multiple products and services such as employee surveys, online training, performance assessments, and performance coaching. The goal at Cornerstone Learning is to assist our clients in developing a dynamic and customized blue print to deliver role model organizational and personal performance.