Four Tips to Navigate Working from Home

I talk for a living, whether it’s through keynotes, employee trainings, executive coaching, human capital consulting, writing articles or just a chat with a client. I’m lucky enough to have clients from a variety of industries and sectors, giving me a wide view of how organizations are handling similar situations. This week alone I had the honor to chat with people from large consulting firms, start-ups, Federal government, tech firms, mid-size companies, biopharma organizations, large school systems, manufacturing firms, real estate industry leaders, and HR professionals. I learned a lot of best practices for navigating the Covid-19 work from home (WFH) situation and I’d like to share those with you here.

Schedule daily white space

Someone said to me, “It’s just telework. It’s not a big deal.” Wrong. It’s not just telework and it is a big deal. Why? Because the old paradigm of telework was that you worked from home 1-2 days/week, usually while others in your home were at work and/or school. Now everyone is working and learning under one roof, which adds complexity to the situation. I have it fairly easy; our high school daughter can self-manage her day. However, I have one client who has 3 children under the age of 5 at home while both he and his wife are trying to work. Ouch! That’s a tough situation!

So what are organizations doing to manage this? One best practice is to create intentional white space and schedule set times for team calls. One firm only holds calls from 8:30am-noon and then 2-5pm, local time. This allows people to have a midday break to attend to their own personal needs or the needs of those who live with them.

Learn together

It’s easy to disengage on employee development right now. I’ve heard “Training and development is a non-essential, so we’re cutting the live employee training we had planned”. I get it; financial stability and cash flow is vital right now. However, don’t forget about your teams who want to feel a sense of normalcy. So instead of offering a live employee development training, conduct a 60-minute virtual ‘lunch and learn’ on living through change or a 45-minute webinar about stress management instead. It’s easy to do and shows the teams that you are still there for them.

Lempathy

It’s easy to lose focus when WFH, so set clear focus on short term goals and how the goals align with the organizational mission. Create a 2-minute podcast or video to remind your team what you’re working on and use shared docs to create accountability.

It’s also easy to tilt toward excessive empathy, such as “It’s OK that Biva didn’t achieve his tasks today. He has 4 kids at home.” Giving a pass every once in awhile shows flexibility; excessive empathy breeds missed deadlines. Souse ‘both/and’ instead; in other words, try “Wow! Having four kids at home while working is hard. How can you achieve the biggest deadline today and have the kids home? What’s the first step? Second step?” Bottom line: show you care AND that goals still need to be completed. One of my coaching clients calls this “lempathy”: leading with empathy. It works for him; see if it works for you.

Focus on self-care

Stress manifests in different ways, for different reasons. In general, there are three pillars of health: physical, mental and emotional. Take a self-assessment and ask yourself how you’re doing on:

Physical: Maintaining the nutrition, sleep and exercise that your body needs

Mental: Focusing on the task at hand

Emotional: Self-regulating your emotions appropriately with those around you

Whatever you do to manage your WFH situation, remember to keep it fun! People want to feel connected; they are looking for the water cooler experience, where they can just have a fun chat for a few minutes with each other. So set this up with virtual coffee chats, happy hours, walks, exercise classes and even hobby times (knitting anyone?). One company in Boston creates daily entertainment videos for the employee’s children to watch while the parent is working. Another organization spreads smiles via Skype. What will work for you?

Let’s share experiences. Leave a comment below, send me an email, or find me on Twitter.

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Five Tools to Successfully Work from Home

Coronavirus is causing organizations to shift toward telework. Though telework is not new, employees now are working remotely more often, which changes team dynamics. There are tools available that can help organizations streamline remote employee management, enhance professional skills and collaborate successfully.

Some of the most popular tools for remote teams are:

1. Project management: Asana
2. Video conferencing: Skype and Zoom
3. Team communication: Slack
4. Cloud storage and file sharing: Dropbox

Let’s learn more about each tool, to help you better identify the best one for your team.

Project Management: Asana

Skype is a popular voice communication service. People can share instant messages, hold video calls and share screens, as well as call Skype numbers and landline/mobile numbers.

Asana’s key features include project management, task management and file sharing. Asana has numerous features to manage complex projects, so build in time to master the learning curve and eventually manage projects more efficiently.

Want to learn about similar tools?  Check out Trello, Proofhub, ProjectManager.com and Workzone.

Video Conferencing: Skype

Asana is an online management tool that helps teams stay focused on daily tasks, goals and projects. It’s known for its simple functionality, clean design and elegant usability.

This tool offers cross-platform support and is an excellent instant messaging tool, which is important for document collaboration.

Some of the alternatives for Skype include WhatsApp, Telegram and Viber.

Video Conferencing: Zoom

Zoom is a video communication tool. Widely used for virtual meetings, webinars and virtual conferences, it’s a great way of connecting via video when team members and clients are unable to meet in person.

The tool’s key features include video meetings, voice calls, hosted webinars, messaging and file sharing. Some users have had issues with unpredictable video quality so check your bandwidth before you begin working.

Some excellent alternates to Zoom include GoToMeeting, Webex and Adobe Connect.

Team Communication: Slack

Slack is a popular communication tool that brings remote teams together by having all communication in one place. It can also be used for instant messaging and collaboration.

The key features include instant messaging, file sharing, voice and video calls, as well as screen sharing. Some people find Slack hard to search so check it out for yourself.

A few of the alternatives for Slack include Microsoft Teams, Rocket Chat and Flock.

Cloud Storage and File Sharing: Dropbox

Dropbox, popularly known for online file sharing and storage, helps teams working remotely and saves time tracking down files. It is a modern workspace where all files can be stored together in one place and remote workers can easily sync and share documents.

In general, Dropbox is better for casual files; you may not want to store sensitive files here. Some of the alternatives for Dropbox include Google Drive, OneDrive and Box.com.

Technology helps us keep up with the changing times, where telecommuting and remote work is more of a need and requirement. These collaboration tools make it easier to achieve business goals by providing platforms to work more efficiently, regardless of where the employees are located. Once you pick your tool, you may want some tips on how to best present yourself on video. Check out this blog, from our speaker coach, Jezra Kaye.

Want to develop your remote-based employees, but don’t know how? We can help! We’ve designed and delivered interactive webinars for over a decade on a range of management and leadership topics.

I’d love to hear from you. How are you coping in these stressful times? What tools are you working with and what has been your experience?

Let’s share experiences. Leave a comment below, send me an email, or find me on Twitter.

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Tips to Adapt to the Multi-Generational Workforce

The workforce is more diverse than ever with different generations working side by side. Each generation is distinctly different from the other, which can be an organizational challenge. However, it is also an opportunity to leverage generational strengths for improved organizational performance.

Want a quick summary on this topic? Watch our short webinar synopsis before reading on.

According to Statista, Baby Boomers (born 1946-1964) are 22.6% of the US population, Generation X (born 1965-1980) are 20.2% of the US population, Millennials (born 1981-1996) are 22.1% of the US population and Generation Z (born 1997 and later) are 26.5% of the US population.

What does this mean for your workforce?

Baby Boomers: The Aging Workforce

By 2029 20% of the total U.S population will be over the age of 65. In addition, the Baby Boomers will soon retire. As Baby Boomers leave the workplace, it’s important to capture their knowledge so that the transition can take place for future generations.

How do you do this? Have the younger generations use technology to conduct experience interviews with Baby Boomers; this allows each generation to learn more about the other. It also gives the organization videos or podcasts of these interviews which can be archived to preserve institutional knowledge or help with onboarding.

Gen X: The Next Leaders

The Millennial crazed media has totally forgotten who our next leaders truly are. Gen Xers founded Google, Twitter and Amazon.  They have the capacity to bridge the generational gap between Baby Boomers and Millennials. Almost two-thirds of Xers (62%) say they “want to be mentors”, and 40% see themselves as teachers. That’s more than any other generation.

So how can you help your Gen X leaders? Provide formal emotional intelligence and communication classes. In addition, ensure they understand the organizational vision and purpose.

Millennials: The New Majority

Millennials are the majority of the US workforce. As per Dr. Mary Donohue’s research, strong Millennial relationships in the workplace can decrease employee turnover by 50% and increase productivity by 11%. Yet 58% of Millennials expect to leave their jobs in three years or less; 52% think that corporate norms are totally outdated, and professionals are successful if they carve their own path.

The Millennials believe that ideas matter more than experience, and work output is valued more than the time put in. Coaching in the workplace is an important aspect for them so ensure that your managers provide coaching, along with frequent feedback for better employee engagement. To increase creativity and productivity, offer opportunities to work remotely.

Generation Z: The Most Diverse

Generation Z is the most diverse generation; according to Frank N. Magid’s estimates, Gen Z is 55% Caucasian, 24% Hispanic, 14% African American, 4% Asian and 4% mixed race or other.

The majority of Gen Z resides in underdeveloped or developing countries. Relatively low in mature European markets, Generation Z is largest in India, China and Nigeria.

Gen Z considers honesty as the most important leadership quality. They are less influenced by money and more motivated by opportunities for advancement. They have the capability to handle multiple plans and projects. To fully leverage this generation’s strengths for organizational effectiveness, a strong company culture is required.

Want to learn more? Watch our short webinar synopsis.

Managers, we want to hear from you! Tell us about your experience with managing Baby Boomers vs. Millennials. What has worked and not worked for you in managing a diverse workforce?

Let’s share experiences. Leave a comment below, send me an email, or find me on Twitter.

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What The Heck Is Executive Coaching

“What the heck is executive coaching?” I get asked that question many times a day.

I admit that coaching is a nebulous term. When I say that I’m a certified coach, people ask if I coach sports teams. When I say that I actually coach work teams, people look surprised. ‘Why would a work team need coaching?’ they ask. Because work teams are just like sports teams:

• They are made up of different people who try to reach a team goal together.
• Each person on the team has two types of goals in mind: individual goals and team goals.
• Every team member has his/her own communication style, which may or may not work well with the others on the team.
• Although there is one official leader (the coach or captain), there are usually other team members who carry as much weight, if not more weight, than the official leader.

Similar to a sports team, thriving work teams need an ‘outsider’ to coach them to success, whether the whole team or just some of the team leaders. That’s what CHCI does. We coach teams and leaders to get from Point A to Point B, in the most effective way possible.

During the years, many people have asked for a practical book on coaching, so they can bring coaching skills to their own teams. That’s how Anne Loehr’s book, “A Manager’s Guide to Coaching” was created. Here is an excellent write up about one of the book topics: How to create effective coaching questions. Enjoy!

Let’s share experiences. Leave a comment below, send me an email, or find me on Twitter.

How to Train Your Staff With A Decreasing Budget

In our last blog, How to Use the 70/20/10 Model to Develop Careers, we discussed the “what”, “when” and “how” of using the 70/20/10 Adult Learning Model for employee development. Now let’s discuss the “why”.

Managers face daily decisions to ensure their team gets what’s needed for success. But with budgets getting smaller, it’s hard to stretch resources. After reading this blog, you will learn several tips on how to stretch your training budget, spend wisely, plan strategically and still meet your employee development goals.

The “Why” to Employee Development

What is the return on investment (ROI) for a manager who wants to allocate time and financial resources for her employees? Simply put: a better prepared employee is a more productive employee. According to the Association of Talent Development (ATD), companies that invest in training employees see a 218% higher income per employee than companies that don’t. The 70/20/10 model for employee development is one effective tool to leverage the current talents of your staff and build stronger teams, which increases the organizational bottom line.

We know that the manager cannot motivate an employee to improve; that has come from within the employee. However, managers can create a learning environment for them to grow. How? The first step is to take an inventory of the current staff, using a consistent assessment tool such as a 360-degree assessment, with an objective lens to collect skills data. This full assessment will provide two sets of data in one assessment: strengths and areas to grow. By selecting the right 360 tool, you can complete two tasks at once for the same price, creating cost savings for your budget. This 360 view lets managers begin to leverage the strengths in their staff that can be shared with other employees; it also shows the delta between the strengths and weaknesses, so you can create the best strategy to decrease the weaknesses of the entire team.

How to Break the Glass Ceiling

Panelists at the IREM Global Summit share best practices for mitigating bias and advancing diversity.

Cultivating talent is the industry-wide mission for the property management profession and all of the commercial real estate. At the Institute of Real Estate Management’s Global Summit last week in San Francisco, an international panel of rising leaders shared best practices and strategies for advancing that goal through diversity.

Signs of progress for women in real estate stand side by side with persistent contradictions. Women entrepreneurs enjoy a rising profile; nearly one-third of all privately held firms are owned by women. On the educational front, women bring more to the table; they hold more undergraduate degrees than men and earn 50 percent more graduate degrees than their male counterparts. Women’s workplace priorities are led by flexibility and quality of life, according to national studies; compensation ranks third.

The speakers also recounted the qualities that women in business tend to bring to the table. “The more diversity, the better your product is going to be, the better your bottom line is going to be,” noted Anne Loehr, executive vice president at the Center for Human Capital Innovation and the panel’s moderator.

Eight Ways to Improve People Processes in Your Organization

People are a critical part of every organization’s balance sheet. Investments related to acquiring, retaining, developing, and inspiring employees are critical to your organization’s success, requiring a thoughtful strategy to build and maintain a productive workforce.

CHCI’s talent life cycle, called PRIDALRM, refers to the interrelated strategies that support the most important assets of an organization – the people. Most of the activities that occur within an organization’s human resources, human capital, and talent management divisions can be distilled to one of the eight components highlighted in the PRIDALRM image. 

CHCI uses PRIDALRM to diagnose problem areas and develop targeted remediation efforts. This systematic approach to organizational performance encourages the interconnection among elements and alignment to outcomes. Let’s review the eight components.

Starting with the “north star” of the talent life cycle, the workforce PLAN sets up a framework that allows organizations to address current needs and identify future opportunities and threats. It helps answer the following questions:

• Does the organization’s workforce have the right capabilities today?
• What resources will the organization need to be successful in five years?
• How can our human capital approach give us a competitive advantage in our industry?

The next component, RECRUIT, is about talent acquisition. Talent acquisition is the organizational process which fills current and future positions and manages the transition of new employees to becoming fully productive. According to research commissioned by Glassdoor, 95% of companies admit to hiring the wrong people every year.  In fact, Society for Human Resources Management (SHRM) identified that the cost of a bad hire could be up to five times the amount of a bad hire’s annual salary; so hiring the wrong person is a costly mistake. Here are three categories of questions to ask candidates at the initial hiring process to help determine if candidates are a good fit in your organization: