Leading Remote Teams during the Corona Virus Times

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This podcast is about how to lead #remoteteams during these challenging times of #covid19 - It is not easy as teams are used to the Face to face interactions at the office where now they can feel alone and lonely
We will discuss what a leader should do and how they can show their #personalleadership skills in inspiring and motivating their teams at a distance 

Transcript

speaker 0:   0:00
Are you ready to let go of your fears and limiting beliefs, Ready to live in the moment, ready to live a positive life by creating new habits. You're in the right place. Join us every week at the reinvent yourself to greatness with Sahar Show to learn how to create the happy life you always wanted and deserved.  

speaker 0:   0:17
Hi guys this is Sahar Andrade I am a culture competence and a leadership consultant, and trainer. And today I thought about having a really quick video about leading remote workers specifically during the Corona virus that we're living right now. Most of us are used to live and to work in offices. Together, we are used to share space, and now we are have a full range of new challenges with us because we're working remotely and we are not with the people that we're used to work and put into actions that are they are daily together, are not the same. So I thought to do this video on how we can lead effectively when employees are our team members are actually working far away from their home specifically here, like us in California, when we are shelter in place for most everybody Hopefully, we're using mostly videoconferencing zoom at least this way we are face to face.  

speaker 0:   1:21
So, for the leaders that are leading remote teams right now, I would suggest that they double down on the great leadership skills. What does that mean? I'm gonna give you a few pointers that you can think about. The first thing to do is to establish clear goals and expectations from every single person:

speaker 0:   1:39
- What is it that you expect from them?  

speaker 0:   1:42
- And what are you leading to?  

speaker 0:   1:45
- Be the cool head and maintain transparency.  

speaker 0:   1:48
- Let them know, step by step, what is going on? Even if it's not always good news, just let them know Let them be field in the loop. Let them feel important. And if you don't know anything, if you are asked about something that you don't know, say I will find out. Don't volunteer information is that you don't actually know because if not, it will increase the anxiety. If you don't if you don't know anything, just say I would find out,  - Try to, have great meetings that are somehow a little bit of fun,  

speaker 0:   2:17
- A little bit of humor into it and, most importantly,  

speaker 0:   2:20
- Have very clear communication.  

speaker 0:   2:22
So what does that mean? First of all, try to  

speaker 0:   2:24
- Use basically the strength off every single person more than ever, Then then you used to do it, even at the office. Don't give someone a project where it's not really the talent or the scale.  

speaker 0:   2:37
- Make sure that everybody does something that they like because now more than ever, they need their morale high.  

speaker 0:   2:44
- They need to feel that they are important. They need to feel that they belong to a space they belong toe a team that is successful, so make sure to use everybody's talent and skills to the maximum,  

speaker 0:   2:55
- be the cheer leader as well.  

speaker 0:   2:57
I know change is never easy and we always said that when we get out of our comfort zone, we never feel comfortable specifically now that we are not only face with change, but we're also faced with a totally tune off different tone of music. So look at it. That's something like, Maybe this is the time. What I can learn something new where we can have our interactions in more than intimate way. Since we are here,  we can't touch each other. We cannot be in face of each other, but at least we can use video conferences and it can feel a little bit closer. There will be a lot of resistance in the beginning. Like we said, like, you know, change management 101 Whenever we are applying something new, they were always be resistance. So go into that as a leader, knowing what resistance you're gonna have, all you're gonna face and try to overcome it before it even starts. We have no idea how long this is gonna take, and we have no idea if it's gonna take 60 days, 90 days or 4  months. But what we know for sure is that at the end of it, there are things that are gonna change and we're not gonna be back to normal. So maybe people will get even more comfortable with dealing online. So maybe this is a way or for us or a time that we can actually learn how to work remotely. That will be to our advantage as a new skill that we add to our portfolio. And I know that there is a lot of pain and suffering, right now between people between both of us, many of us, including myself, we are suffering from cancellations, were suffering from businesses being shot. We are suffering from loss of income. You know, we are suffering from not only financially but sometimes emotionally as well. And I know that a lot of people are now faced with the idea or the responsibility of having little Children at the house, taken care of themselves, of the family, of their parents and of the kids all at the same time because there is not even day care right now. So they have to work in an environment where it's not even be very conducive to business that they have to take care of a lot more responsibility in the day.  

speaker 0:   5:03
And this is something that we have to put in our mind when we think about each other and about different teams.  

speaker 0:   5:09
So the first thing that you can do as a leader is to have, Like I said, very clear rules off engagement and I always Whenever I talk about leadership, I say the first thing to do in teams is to have proper and clear rules of engagement. Clear boundaries are the most important part that make a team succeed. Everyone should know what is expected from them as a team in general and as individuals or as a team member, clarify each each team role of them and how, most importantly, how they fit in the big picture specifically for millennials. It's very important for them to understand and to know where they fit in the big picture, that they have a voice in whatever is going on. They need to know they need to feel the connection. I mean, everybody else, not only a 1,000,000 years, we need to feel the connection. And we need to feel the impact that our work is having not only on the organization, but maybe on everybody else and maybe on the community, or maybe even on the universe.  

speaker 0:   6:09
Ask them about their availability and when they can work, because it's not a 24/ 7 and it's easy to get drafted in a way to think that you can work all day long because you don't have to go to office and you're not in the office like, for example, from 9 to 5 or from 10 to 7. So we have a tendency sometimes to work, watch burn out because we have an extra stress and anxiety that it's added on our plate right now. As the leader, concentrate on the results. Concentrate on the way to get there, give them a little bit off freedom. Do not micro manage the situation. Right now, we all need a little bit of leverage to do what we do best so we can get the results. Promote peer to peer accountability, and this way the responsibility, level and sense will get higher. And you can free yourself a little bit as a leader to overwatch everything else that can actually go to each other to share ideas or to share responsibilities, and they will hold each other accountable. And this is the highest level of  Accountability in teams in general have frequent meetings like at least like 10 minutes every day, and this way they can feel interpersonal connection. Have some sense off humor include some jokes. First of all, asked any every single person how they're doing, How is their family? What is it they need? Share stories, share pictures, share jokes, let everybody share what activities they're having with their families, tell them: So what are your plans for the weekend? Make the connection as human as you can, because we all need the connection. Right now, we are feeling disconnected because we are sheltered in place. You know, we can go only for emergencies. So now more than ever, we feel that we feel this connection. You know, I have been having, um, a lot of virtual coffees, a lot of virtual lunches. And some of my friends and myself are organizing having a glass of wine virtually  because we always as human beings, we need to feel that warmth.  

speaker 0:   8:21
We need to feel that we are together and as a team, more than ever, we need to feel that connection most of all, as a leader. Always ask your team members what can you do for them where they do they need help. And always remember, equity - equity here is not equality. Equity is basically that some off your team members will need on more resources than other people, depending on their own needs. At the end, you're can have great results and most importantly, as a leader, make sure to remember that we all have unconscious bias. So don't. Don't let it kick in automatically where you give the big projects or something that is back to people that you are used to or people that are somehow similar to you. And you do that unconsciously. Remember what every single person is doing. Remember who you have on the team and make sure to give them all responsibility where they all can shine so we can avoid unconscious bias in a way to remember that it's maybe to have like your organizational chart in front of you or the names of your team. And this way, consciously, you are thinking equally about every single person of the team, their projects, their skills and always in front of you understand that your people, more like everybody else are feeling pressure and are feeling anxiety. And I know that you are as a leader feeling the same way. But you are the leader. That's what is expected from you is to lead in the time of difficulty as you know, leaders are not only leaders in the easy a time, but also mostly they will prove their worth in the difficult time. So we need to lead remotely the same way that we need face to face. We all depend on our personal interactions. As I said, you are the leader. Everyone will look at you to increase their morale and elevate their mood. It will not be easy in the beginning. Like anything else in the beginning is never easy. But it will fall into place. It will become our new comfort zone. It will become our new normal, you know. So let's get together. Always. Please be remember that to be kind, you know, to help others to ask others because people might not ask you for help. So go and ask people if they need help and help people even when they cannot help you back. And I'm talking about this to all of us, remember we are are in this together united we stand. And if we don't do that, you know we are gonna take a lot longer to recover. At least now we can build the steps to our recovery and our healing by helping each other. This is what I wanted to tell you. I know that the Corona virus or covert 19 or whatever is really a difficult time for us. But we can make it a little bit easier by being there for each other. Check on the people that you love. Check on your neighbors. Check on your parents. You know what? We are believers. Schedule zoom video conversant with your families with your siblings. You know, with kids, you know, so we can see each other. Share jokes, and they're gonna share games instead of Yes, We're not gonna be able to do it face to face, but at least it will be a few inches from the from the screen. Do something better than anything else. And I and I know I wanted to share this because most of us are working remotely now. So maybe hopefully these few pointers that I shared with you will help you tell my next video. Expect me to do a couple of videos every week to try to offer as much as I can for you And if you want some tips and resource is on Corona virus, you can go to my website SaharConsulting.com/coronavirustips  If you have any questions. If you need any help, do not hesitate to PM me if you want to make it like one on one, or you can post it under this video, and I will be more than happy to answer all your questions. Bye for now. And please, please stay safe. I love you all. Thanks for listening To reinvent yourself to greatness with Sahar , tune in next week for even  more inspiration and tools to create the happy life you've always wanted to go to. Www.Reinventyourselftogreatness.com or send us an email at info@Reinventyourselftogreatness.com. See you next time