January was the fourth month in our “Season of Connectedness” on the Showing Up newsletter. During the season, we’ve explored the power mindsets of a strong remote and hybrid team — Belonging, Meaning, Faith, Clarity and to come in February, my favorite, JOY!
In writing Your Resource Is Human: How empathetic leadership can help remote teams rise above, I developed these mindset leadership behaviors as antidotes to some of the common pitfalls of remote work: feelings of loneliness, boredom and even paranoia about being out of sight and out of mind.
Remote and hybrid work imparts huge flexibility advantages but we have to know how to keep our wellbeing in check, too.
Clarity tip #1: Get good at asynchronous work
According to remote.com, the definition of asynchronous work is the practice of working on a team that does not require all its members to be online simultaneously. It requires sophisticated tools and a culture that enables and champions it, and its prominent reliance of documentation helps give minute-to-minute clarity on what work is in progress.
This file sharing and documentation technology is more than convenient and practical — it reinforces belonging and gives clarity to workflows but also to an individual’s standing in the group.
Clarity Tip #2: Break the “yes” addiction
Saying “no” when you work physically away from your team takes a huge level of clarity in your own mind: self-awareness, confidence, and of course support from your leaders. But it’s key to protecting yourself from burnout, and you need to learn to trust that saying “no” won’t damage your reputation as much as you think.
Clarity Tip #3: Hold people accountable
When teams work less often in office settings, visible accountability (i.e.: you literally see someone working on something) doesn’t happen as often, or at all. So you need to be more explicit about milestones and decide what accountability looks like at each stage. Is it a section of analysis? Readout from customer interviews? Determine the tangible output that goes along with accountability and when it should be delivered. Make sure this is a central part of your documentation process, especially if you do more asynchronous work.
So how are we feeling about the “Clarity” of our remote and hybrid work? Here are a few questions to take a pulse on your mindset right now. Be honest, and once you reply you’ll see the other responses:
[The poll will be live permanently from the date of this post.]
If we’re feeling good about our sense of clarity about the work we do and our ability to manage boundaries and not feel at risk of being forgotten… then our answers would all be choice #3. If you aren’t there yet, click back through January’s posts for some tips on Clarity.
I can’t wait to share “Joy” with you in February. It’s what work should be for all of us, but that feeling of delight and happiness of doing work is sometimes very hard to find and hold onto when we work in physical separation from our colleagues. And it matters so much! I promise it’s there for the taking… we’ll go after it next month.
Wishing you Belonging, Meaning, Faith, and Clarity until then!