Freedom

During these unprecedented times, what does freedom mean to each of us individually and collectively? It’s a question worth contemplating this week as we celebrate July 4^th in ways that will be different from prior year celebrations.

I started thinking about this blog over a month ago. In that time, so much has changed. This may be a good time to reflect on recent events and freedom.

COVID-19. Starting in March 2020 and into early May, much of the country was confined because of the virus.  Businesses closed. Stay at home and wear masks in public orders were issued. Some of these directives were met with verbal protests about restrictions of freedom and civil rights. 

One letter I read proclaimed that freedom is freedom no matter what we are facing and criticized the directives to wear masks declaring that somehow her freedom was being withdrawn.  Her letter was more a rant than a compelling, persuasive argument. Did the writer consider that along with freedom comes responsibility? One person’s freedom ends when it impinges on another’s right. The commentator’s choice not to wear a mask encroaches on other people’s right to be safe from a public health risk—one like we’ve never seen before. 

Black Lives Matter. How silly all of this rhetoric about restrictions of freedom and civil rights over wearing masks sounded a few short weeks later when George Floyd was killed on May 25, and the country erupted in protest over systemic discrimination against African American citizens.  The protesters represented a wide diversity of American citizens: diversity in age, race, ethnicity, socio-economic status, occupation, and the list goes on.  

Juneteenth, celebrated on June 19, commemorates the proclamation on June 19, 1865, that slaves in Texas were free. President Lincoln had officially outlawed slavery in Texas and the other states in rebellion against the Union almost two and a half years earlier. A little-known holiday likely until this year, it enjoyed nation-wide attention and celebration. A quote in one article I read said that for African Americans, Juneteenth was their independence day—they weren’t free on July 4, 1776. Now there is a call to make Juneteenth a national holiday.

LGBTQ+. Five days before Juneteenth, on June 15, 2020, the Supreme Court handed down a decision in Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia, stating that: “An employer who fires an individual for being homosexual or transgender fires that person for traits or actions it would not have questioned in members of a different sex.” Employment discrimination against someone because of their sexual orientation or transgender status is a violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Law’s prohibition against discrimination because of sex.   

Will protests, demonstrations, national holidays, and Supreme Court decisions eliminate bias and discrimination?  No.  Have these events raised our collective awareness? I would like to think that we are finally realizing that the freedoms some of us enjoy are not, and have not been, equally enjoyed by all. This is a good week to reflect on that. Consider what you can do and what you will do.

Time to Listen...Now, More than Ever

To say we are in interesting times is probably the understatement of 2020. Most of us are confined to our homes and living with a great deal of uncertainty. As managers you have to find new ways to stay connected, ensure that your team is as productive and least stressed as humanly possible, all while handling your own anxieties. We’re grateful for the technology we have that allows us to see each other and hear each other’s voices.

I wish I had magic answers for you. I don’t, but what I do know that in your role as a manager, this is the time when you

• must be as empathetic as you’ve ever been in your life; 
• need to listen to your employees as closely as you can;
• have to be a clued-in leader as we wrote about last week.

The key to doing this is paying attention to your listening skills. When I talk about listening, I’m talking about doing more than just hearing the words they’re saying. You must be listening to and understanding what they’re not saying and closely watching body language. For example, when you’re on Zoom or another video platform, if you ask an employee how he is and he says, “I’m fine”, are you seeing downcast eyes? Do the words she’s saying fit the frown on her face?

Listening is hard work, even in the best of times—and we’re certainly not in the best of times right now. Listening takes concentration. Listening is NOT waiting until the other person is finished speaking so you can talk. Listening requires focus.

One way to ensure that you are hearing what your employee is saying is to paraphrase what you heard. This allows you and the employee to clear up any miscommunication before it becomes a problem. It’s easy to do. Say, “What I just heard you say is…” and repeat what you heard. To do this successfully, you have to listen carefully, which is half the battle.

During this time of uncertainty, careful listening will make managing your remote staff a bit easier. And, becoming a better listener will make you a better manager when the world returns to whatever the new normal becomes. Also, being a good listener will help you be a better friend, husband, wife, partner, son, daughter…in other words, a better person.

You may have some down time right now, so consider picking up a copy of our book, The Manager’s Answer Book. Check out the information on page 126 on improving your listening skills.

Clued-In Leaders

Doug Claffey wrote an article that appeared in The Albuquerque Journal on May 11, 2020 about the importance of strong communication during a crisis. He is the Founder of Energage, an organization that specializes in employee engagement and workplace improvement research.

He used a term in the article that caught my attention: Clued-In Leaders. Clued-in leadership is about upward feedback and employees feeling heard. It caught my attention because a related article that same day about top workplaces in New Mexico contained a quote from an employee at the top-ranked company, T-Mobile, in the large workplace category.  The employee said, “There is something to be said about a company that always has your back and listens to feedback from the front line all the way to the top.”

Claffey went on to explain what happens when organizations struggle with clued-in leadership. “When employees believe senior leaders are out of the loop, it’s harder for them to connect with the organization. And when leaders really aren’t clued in to what’s happening, they’re missing valuable insight from those closest to the customer: their employees.” He offered three ideas for keeping the lines of communication open:

• Communicating through the hierarchy. Ask employees to talk to their managers, and managers to talk to their managers, and finally talk to the senior leadership. This sounds like an open-door policy, but to be effective, it has to practiced, not simply something you put in an employee handbook. 

• Conducting town-hall or all-hands meetings. Whether in-person meetings (which will likely be on hold for a while) or virtual meetings, they are an effective way to communicate key messages and give your employees a voice. I once worked at a company that met with representatives of each department before all-hands meetings to gain insights into what was on employees minds so their concerns could be addressed at the larger meeting.

• Asking your employees for feedback. Claffey suggested pulse surveys as an efficient way to give your employees a voice, capture real-time data and deliver it to the leadership team quickly and directly. Of course if you do conduct any employee survey, you’ve got to commit to act on it and provide feedback to the employees about the survey’s results. Otherwise it becomes a paperwork exercise and can erode trust.

Leader’s communication skills are critical to the success of any organization, but more so during this time of crisis. Workplaces have been disrupted because of COVID-19 as more employees are working from home and dependent on technology—as are other family members. Communication is key during these times. Even if employees are beginning to return to the workplace, communication continues to be important. It’s better for managers to over-communicate with everyone on the team than to under-communicate.

Building Resilience

Life happens. Even in non-pandemic times, we face difficulties, and change of any kind can throw even the most adaptable of us. But this is different. Added to our usual life events, the changes required by the global pandemic have added a WOW factor that has shaken us all. I'm not sure about you, but I've discovered I need to be a bit more resilient.

The American Psychological Association defines resilience as "the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, tragedy, or significant sources of stress." Easier said than done, right? Here are some easy things we all can do:

• Have a strong support network of positive people who you can turn to for help -- even if it's just to listen to you on a Zoom call.

• Set life goals, then reward yourself when you reach them. Personal goal achievement builds self-confidence, which in turn builds resilience.

• Take care of yourself. When we're feeling stressed, many of us don't eat right or exercise. Do your best to keep your body strong, and don't overlook your mental health. Consider meditation, yoga, mindfulness, or prayer to keep centered.

• Do something for someone else. Not only will you be helping someone in need, you should get satisfaction from the experience, which will boost your overall well-being. 

• Look for ways to inject humor into your routine. Laughing is so good for us. It enhances oxygen intake, stimulating your heart, lungs and muscles, increases endorphins, cools down your stress response, and aids muscle relaxation. So remind yourself that enjoying a good chuckle can brighten your mood and help you deal with your challenges just a little better.

• Keep things in perspective and focus on the future as much as you can. Remember times when you faced a difficult situation and came through it.

First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, who faced a lot of adversity and exhibited tremendous resiliency, said, "You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, I lived through this horror, I can take the next thing that comes along."

And so can you.

What Do Top Workplaces Look Like?

Best workplace contests and surveys extend beyond Great Place to Work’s “World’s Best Workplaces.” Local surveys of workplaces likely take place in cities and states around the country, and New Mexico is no exception. The Albuquerque Journal partners with Energage of Philadelphia, PA to conduct an annual survey of top workplaces in the state. This year’s survey, which closed just before the first case of COVID-19 was reported in New Mexico, offers a unique insight from employee’s perspective. What makes an organization stand out in the eyes of its employees? No surprise to our readers – it’s being appreciated, challenged, coached, and invested in by their employer. These are qualities in an organization’s culture that management has to build authentically and deliberately. They are qualities that differentiate an organization. 

Doug Claffey, Founder of Energage, reported in a May 11, 2020 article in the Albuquerque Journal that “Energage has surveyed more than 20 million employees across 60,000 organizations over the past 14 years. We’ve learned that one of the things that matters most to employees — what truly motivates them — is feeling appreciated.” In the New Mexico survey, appreciation ranked only second to confidence in the direction that the organization was headed. 

Don’t be surprised to learn that appreciation far outranks pay, especially if you’re a manager. Claffey said pay is low on the list – and this has been trending for years. He suggests showing appreciation in the same way we do – offering a simple Thank You. “The simplest and sometimes the most effective form of appreciation is giving positive feedback or praise. “Thank you for your effort” or “You’re doing a really good job” goes a long way, whether delivered in person, electronically, or in a handwritten note.” As we say in The Manager’s Answer Book on page 91, a simple thank you may be all the recognition your employees need, and it’s cost effective as well.

There’s another point that Claffey makes that echoes our advice. “Managers are most familiar with their employees’ roles. Employees like to know their manager understands and values their contributions.” In The Manager’s Answer Book we talk about the importance of motivating employees. On page 89, we say, “Today’s workforce needs to know their work matters, so spend time with each staffer to educate them on the value their work brings to the organization.”

Recruitment and retention have important issues in organizations, and they are going to continue to be important. Employees and applicants will continue to look at the organization’s values and whether or not it demonstrates open-mindedness and innovation, their own ability to do meaningful work and make a contribution, and their own ability to develop and grow. Being a top workplace is more than how you rank in a survey. It’s how your organization’s culture and its climate impact your employees and your broader community.