Hybrid working. What leaders need to think about

A one off reflections and top tips for leaders considering hybrid working and how to do it successfully. 

Episode Transcript

Unknown (00:03):
Hey there, it's Lucy Barkas back for another
leader x podcast. Now, I wantedto talk a little bit about
hybrid working. And it's a topicthat seems to be coming up again
and again at the moment becausepeople are really struggling to
figure out how we're going toget people back to work. And
what's it going to look like?

(00:24):
When do we do it? How will wemaintain the social distancing?
What are we going to do? Aboutour lease? Do we sell our
properties? So many questionsthat are going around? And so
yeah, that's what today is allabout. Now, I remember when lean
was the buzzword, then it wentto agile and Scrum and flexible

(00:46):
benefits. Now, all of thoseterms are completely relevant
even today. But yeah, they'renot the passwords anymore. Now
2020 was the the yearwhen remote working
and fellow our rates and zoomfatigue came into our common
language. And the 2021, I thinkhybrid working is going to be

(01:07):
the word on everyone's lips andoccupying everyone's minds. Now,
hybrid isn't just being seen asthe Saviour of the 21st century
workplace. It's actuallychanging the way that people
think about what they do, andwhat actually makes them happy.
And these are really some quitedeep questions, not just

(01:27):
bleeders, but for everybody.
They're having those thoughts,those conversations with their
friends, with their partners,with their parents, with their
colleagues. And now already,recruiters are finding it really
hard to place talent in rolesthat are either 100%, remote, or
100%. On site. You know, we'veall done both, and neither is
the perfect solution foreveryone. So is hybrid really

(01:49):
the answer? Well, it could be.
But it's actually not thatsimple, either. Now, hybrid is
that mix of working fromanywhere and from the office to
it feels like freedom, it feelslike empowerment, it feels like
choice. But some people justdon't want to be away from the

(02:11):
office and their colleagues. Andsome people don't want to be in
or do that daily commute or bestuck somewhere for eight hours
a day under some kind ofcontract. Some people don't want
to have a choice. You know, theydon't even have a choice. Their
work can't be done from thelocal coffee shop or their
garden or a co working space.
Let's face it, choice isactually really, really tough. I

(02:34):
mean, look how many options youhave on your TV right now? Is it
Netflix? Is it sky?
Is itamazon prime, and then you look
at how many playlists you've goton Spotify or iTunes, I mean,
it's overwhelming. It's too muchchoice almost makes the decision
even harder and can kind of leadto more stress. So how do you

(02:56):
got to policy freedom andbecause you know, if hybrid
working is going to be the thingthat you do in your
organisation, you're gonna needa policy around it, you're gonna
need some kind of rules and someboundaries. And how do you as a
leader, get everyone in on thesame day? When you've given
people freedom to choose wherethey work? Can you mandate it?

(03:18):
Can you force people in oncertain days and, and for how
long they've got to be there,which desks they're going to
use? So the decision about whocan work remotely and what
proportion of their time it'sgot to have some structure
around it, it's got to have somekind of rules, but not so
stagnant and structured. Andthat people feel that loss of

(03:40):
that sense of empowerment andthat freedom. You've also got to
remember, it's, you know, is itfair and consistent. You know,
if you've given people choice,is it going to cause some
resentment if some people arenever in and others running
until three days a week? Whatabout if one manager wants
everybody in all the timeanother manager is really

(04:01):
laissez faire about it? So howdo you make sure that the
culture the policy, that the wayin which you work is fair and
consistent is not going to causepolitics grudges, gossip, and
basically toxicity? Well, theanswer is you need to engage
others in the conversation. Youneed to find out how they want
to work, what suits them what'sgoing on in their personal

(04:21):
lives, and what are their fearsand their worries, and then
together co create an approachthat feels fair for all. It
might differ workplace toworkplace industries, industry
leader to leader, you know thatno one company is the same. And
that's why we don't want to giveyou a list of things that you
must do. We mustn't do. All Iwill say is that you have to

(04:45):
listen to what your people won'tlisten to what talent wants, you
know, is your geographicallocation, a limiting factor?
And, you know, is parking reallyrubbish or is it busy? He
motorways do, you want to beable to hire people in different
time zones, different locations,all of these are going to be
informing the way in which youdo remote flexible on site

(05:08):
working. So get clear on whatyou want, as a leader, and as an
individual, the kind of workthat you actually do the culture
that you want to do that work inand find a way to make it work.
And you've got to make sure thatall of your managers are on
board, they understand what'sright for your organisation. And

(05:31):
so they don't just do thingsbased on their own personal
preferences. Ad know that you'renot going to get it right
straightaway, you may need totrial it, you may need to just
try it with your team start offwith and but you're going to
need to adapt and change. That'sjust the world that we work in.
And you know, the world of workwill always change. So you need

(05:52):
to be agile, is that word again?
Told you it was still about.
But what it lookslike in reality is really
tricky. I mean, you might havethree days in the office two
days out, and you might have allof a certainty in on a set day.
Or you might just leave thedecision making to the

(06:13):
individual. So they just pickand choose when they're in. And
you might need to createflexible spaces, so redesign the
office. And those desks mightneed to be come. More working
hubs, more collaborative spaces,I think, you know, it could be
really, really powerful inknocking down all those
departmental silos, you know,one day you could be working

(06:36):
with God for marketing. And nextday, you're sat next to max from
finance. And you know, so it's areally great way to work
collaboratively. And I've donethat in the past. And it was
really lovely. And you know, younever know who you're going to
be bumping into that day, whenyou decide to work from the
office, and you know, use theircoffee, use their printers, all
that kind of stuff. But yeah,those informal formal networks,

(06:58):
it just helps you find outwhat's going on what's going on,
and other people's functions anddepartments, and just get a
different perspective. So Ithink it's really lovely. You
might decide that one day permonth, everyone in your team
comes together for a team day,it might be a meeting or just
either an idea creation session,just social time where you all

(07:21):
go for lunch together or go fora walk together, you might do an
evening. And you might form coworking spaces in key locations.
So get rid of your main hub andjust set them up all around the
country. So people can just youknow, use their credit to go and
book a desk where they knowtheir colleagues might be for
that that day or for a morning.

(07:44):
What is more likely is that youwill have some people online,
some people in the room. Andhonestly facilitating those kind
of meetings where you've gotsome people in the room with you
some not, it's a skill thatyou're going to have to learn it
is difficult, it is challenging.
So really, there's no way to doa hybrid, I'd love to be able to
say this is how to do a hybrid,but the reality is, is you're

(08:06):
going to have to figure it outfor yourself. Every company,
every culture, all the work thatyou do is different. And it's
going to cause you to rethinkhow jobs are actually done and
how work is structured, how tolead those projects, even though
more matrix teams, how do youget the day to day routine jobs

(08:26):
done. You might even find sometasks become redundant in the
new world replaced by AI, or nowthat people work remotely. And
they just don't need to do that,that function anymore. I have to
adapt this way with my own team.
We all work remotely. And wewill be meeting face to face. We

(08:48):
live in the same city, which isamazing. But we've chosen to
work remotely predominantly. NowFridays are the only days in our
diary where we have ourschedules clear and our first to
have a weekly meeting. You know,and I asked them when is your
best day. And we all looktogether and like okay, Fridays,
that's the day. And so theyknow, we all know what we need

(09:08):
to do when we come to thatmeeting, how we need to show up,
get prepared with the questions.
And so it's really efficient.
You know, but some of the teammembers that they're really busy
in the mornings and others, theyare busy doing stuff in the
afternoon. So none of us areworking on projects all at the
same time. But over a week. Soour time is looked at in week

(09:30):
slots. And so on that Friday, wesay right, what are we going to
achieve next week? Who is doingwhat? And what do you need from
me? Okay, and then we get backtogether on the Friday and we
look at our successes andplanning ahead for the following
week. But we have collaborationstools we discussed how are we
going to keep in contact. Sowe've got a SharePoint, we've

(09:51):
got a whatsapp group. We've gotzoom calls where we jump on and
just have conversations. So it'sreally anytime, anyplace
anywhere kind of work. King. Andthis is what leader x does
really, really well, becausethey value autonomy, and
relationships and the experienceof work and trying to make it
fun and meaningful. So theybuild their organisations around

(10:13):
those values, and they hirebased on those qualities, their
organisations play withdifferent scenarios and find the
best way to move forward, youmight need to craft roles and
responsibilities to best meetthe needs of the customer,
yourself and your people, butnothing is static, the job
descriptions might get a littlebit fuzzy, but they focus on

(10:33):
outcomes now, and values andbehaviours rather than these are
the 10 things that you must doin your job. And then even the
tasks and outputs might becomemore hybrid, you know, for some
parts of the job, they might bedone at home, some you might be
able to let them be in the park,others you might need to be in a
workshop or on a production linephysically in the place.

(10:54):
Sometimes you might needprivacy. Sometimes there may be
GDPR issues or you know, it's asensitive conversation. So
looking at all of the differentactivities and tasks and finding
the right location for them iscritical.
So plan all those activities. Sothey allow for the flow, they
allow for everybody to show upand be at their best. So online

(11:16):
planning tools, collaborationtools, like Trello, or Slack,
Google Docs, Mondays, all ofthose things need to go in your,
I guess your tech stack and yourcommunication stack. And one of
the biggest things in the newworld is going to be how you
then manage performance. So youneed to move away from this
presenteeism and micromanagementmindset. So just because you can

(11:39):
see that they're locked down orthat they're physically sat in
front of you doesn't actuallymean to say that they're doing
any work. So your shift needs tobe more around daily or that
weekly performanceconversations, focus on outputs.
I mean, that's all you reallyneed to be clear about in your
delegation, isn't it? Who isdoing what by when, and what

(12:00):
does good look like. And ifyou're not being clear about
those, then don't be surprisedif people are doing different
tasks, or it doesn't look whatlike what you imagined it to be.
You need to monitor the outputs,the behaviours, you need to be
able to keep a record and, andjust be able to assess
performance, because that's whatyou're enrolled to do to deliver

(12:22):
performance. You need to dealwith the issues in real time,
not until you Next, see themback in the office, you need to
just pick up the phone, sendthem a message, say, look, I
need to chat with you aboutthis, something's going wrong,
or I'm not feeling it. And it'sa lot more informal in that
sense. And then when praises dogive it but it's got to be
meaningful, it's got to havecontext, it's got to be timely.

(12:45):
It's got to be sincere. Soremote working, and hybrid
working will really shift thefocus away from where work is
done and towards what work isbeing done. So your performance
management becomes more aboutcoaching and mentoring and
supporting colleagues and peersto deliver. And then there's

(13:08):
well being it's got to be a bigfocus in your your mindset. I
mean, how do you know howsomebody is really doing when
you don't see them every day?
Let's face it, many managersdidn't even know that their
employees were doing well or notwell, even if they were sat in
front of them anyway. But hybridworking means that you need to
be really aware of how yourpeople are doing both mentally,

(13:29):
physically and emotionally. Arethey happy? Are they fulfilled?
Are they engaged? Do they wakeup motivated to achieve their
goals? Or are they completelybacking the team's mission? Are
they aligned? Or are theystressed, anxious, disengaged in
chaos? Are they not deliveringthe work? Are they not

(13:49):
responding to your emails? arethey missing deadlines? These
are all really good indicatorsthat you really need to focus
on. So you need to build somekind of welfare calls into your
work. And yeah, the more likeinformal check ins, and it's not
just about the work, it's aboutthe person, how are they doing?
what's on their mind? What dothey need from you? How can you

(14:10):
support them more, you know,really just, you know, focus on
the outputs in terms of what'sbeing done at one meeting, and
then focus on the human in theother. Now, leading others in
this way means that you need tocreate a culture where people
feel safe, they need to feelsecure, they need to feel
aligned. But you know, you, youas a leader really need to grow

(14:31):
your emotional intelligencemuscles to notice what's being
said and not being said, to beable to have those coaching
style conversations. You need tobe able to lead effectively in
this hybrid model. Now, one ofthe areas that I really
struggled with, is onboardingnew staff, training existing
ones, in new ways of working anddeveloping talent. Now,

(14:53):
honestly, if you're excelling inthese in the old world, then hi
Bread is not really a challengefor you. You just need to
rethink how it was delivered. Ihad to record myself doing all
of my key tasks on zoom, whichmeant me narrating over the top
of the slides or whatever I wasdoing. And I had to really think

(15:14):
about why am I doing this stepwhat comes next. And then store
the more centrally on a drive.
So my new team members could goto the portal whenever they were
working. And get these how tos.
I set up the Shared Documents,Whatsapp groups, and so they
could ask me any questions whenthey were struggling. And if I
could, I could just jump on acall and, and help them out. So

(15:34):
they just don't feel alone likethey're struggling. Now, back in
the day, I'd probably sat withthem at their desks. And I'm
going through the tasks withthem really just explaining and
asking questions, check backunderstanding. Now I give them
the training and then virtuallysit with them when they need me.
So it's not on my schedule thatthey're doing it on their

(15:55):
schedule. So training sessionsare being
done online. My workshops are ablend of the online portal, so
they can do the modules whenthey need to do them face to
face phone, zoom WhatsApp, soall of the training is hybrid.
And the question I keep askingthem is, what else do you need?
How am I doing? How can I serveyou more, you know,

(16:18):
cuz I want to make sure thatthey've got the right tools for
the job. And they feel that theycan approach me anytime. The
result is that we formed areally fluid and trusting
relationship.
We have the structure, but we'realso flexible. We are learning
how to be together and learningas we go through. And when
things aren't working, we nameit, we co create a solution

(16:39):
together. They are involved asmuch as I'm involved. So when
you think about training ononboarding or performance
management or reevaluating whatwork is done, and where it's
done, what policies you need to,to create, just remember that
hybrid is an evolution andrevolution. It's here, it's now

(17:00):
but how it works will needcontinual improvement and
tweaking. You need to adapt as aleader and you need to help
others adapt and develop in thisnew way of working. So just
remember, it's an evolution anda revolution. So get in touch
let me know your thoughts.
Follow the hashtag leader x. Andif you do want help with this

(17:21):
because it's big stuff, it's abig change. Get in touch by
heading to the website, www dotthree w h.uk.com. That's the
number three and the letters Wand H. I hope you found this
useful and take care everyoneand look after your own
wellbeing.