Just as we accelerated our technology to work virtually – we must also radically accelerate the style in which we lead.
The leadership game has changed:
We always agreed that Leaders who deeply care about their people and have the skills to develop, grow and empower them are more effective…. But now they’re essential.
The old compliance leadership ways simply don’t work virtually. In the modern world, if you want people that fly out of bed, loving what they do and wanting to make a real contribution, you need Leaders that know how to coach and connect on a deeply human level.
And with most of us now embracing hybrid working as the future, our ability to lead well whilst not always physically present has never been more important.
Over the last year I’ve been sharing 10 tips for virtual leadership with my clients to help them empower and engage their teams. So I thought might share a couple of the simple ones with you now.
No 1: Rhythms
The frequency and consistency of our connections with our people
Research is showing that for many companies, engagement actually went up at the start of the pandemic.
But has steadily fallen over the last six months, as leaders stopped checking in with their people as often.
So I have two questions for you:
1. Where are you now? Score yourself 1 to 10 for how rock solid and consistent your 1-2-1 and team meeting rhythms are.
2. What do you want? If your Rhythms were 9 out of 10 good what would you be doing differently?
For virtual leadership this is essential.
Having the discipline to lay down your rhythms in the calendar, and stick to them with consistency, not only drives performance and engagement… But tells people they matter.
No 2: Make it Human
Our ability to reach through the screen
Of course, creating connection virtually feels harder than in person – lots of stats on this but here is just one:
Internal Google research from right at the start of the pandemic showed that people are 40% less likely to take an action coming from a virtual interaction as opposed to an in-person interaction. Why? Because it is less human.
So what can we do about this when leading virtually?
The first thing is think about how we connect through the camera.
Are we making eye contact? Where do you make eye contact when online? …. think about it? Clue: it’s not the virtual faces of your colleagues 🙂
And are people able to see enough of you so they can read your body language – or are they just getting a disembodied head on a screen?
The second, is simply to ask how are you? I know this is obvious, but recent research showed only 10% of managers even do this, never mind do it well.
For some reason we are embarrassed to ask people about their emotions and have actual quality conversations about how we feel, but when we do we feel more connected, more cared for, and just a little lighter.
Virtual can be more human, we just need to learn, play and explore how to make it so.
